wx radios issues

[Jonathan Whitehead]

I have an issue with my wx radio. Its just a simple generic Radioshack wx radio. I have it up halfway up the window on the ledge in my 2nd story apt.
My issue has to do with reception. Some days it gets great reception and other days I look up and see it has no reception. And there have been days where theres been active wx in area and ive had no reception.
And on those days where im not getting any reception, it wont matter where i move the radio in my room, i still get no reception.
Would really appreciate some help here.

 

[John Erwin]

Hi Chris!

Since you live in an urban area I should think there would be a wx station nearby, so I think we can rule out distance being a factor here.

If possible borrow another radio or scanner that can pick up the channel to rule out your radio being the problem. If another radio works better than you know you need a new receiver, no need to read further.

Still a problem? If so then the building itself might be the issue; a combination of building materials and position might be shielding/blocking the signal you're after. Fixing this might mean having to use a better antenna (if your radio has an external antenna jack) or moving your radio somewhere else. If at all possible see if you can get an antenna outside. Suitable antennas can be bought for wx use, but since this is only for receiving purposes you can put something together for cheap too; pretty well anything that could be used for 2m ham use or even FM radio use would also work for this. There are amplified options too but that might be cost prohibitive.

Hopefully this helps a bit!

 

[Gerard Jebaily]

Welcome to Norman. not only is there a wx bubble, but somewhat of an RF bubble. I lived in numerous spots in norman and had issues getting WX radio coverage to my wx radio. I eventually had to plug in an external antenna to get any reception.

 

[Chris Lott]

Here in Texas, we have some "dead spots" as well, but I rely heavily on my Icom 2200H ham radio, with weather alert. I can monitor any weather station, depending on what area I'm in, or I can put it on alert mode, that way if I'm monitoring a repeater, it will alert me for watches and warnings in that area. There's been days where repeaters were fuzzy, but the weather stations worked like a charm.

 

[Jerry Prsha]

I'm in Southwest St. louis County and I guess being at the edge of the Ozark Mountain Range, there's a lot of dead spots. I can barely pick up anything at my home but driving up the street, I start picking up the KDO-89 signal.

I guess we can add an amplifier to scanners as well but since this is a government sponsored warning system, shouldn't signal be stronger "out of the box?"