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TV ANTENNA INSTALLING

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pinball View Drop Down
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    Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 12:47pm
Has anyone installed one of those Walmart's antennas. the 150 mile one with rotor, my dish network absolutely has gone bad from what it use to be and I am thinking of doing away with cable. my local channels are 40 miles away but was wondering if I would get any more. all comments welcome. thanks
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shameless dude View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote shameless dude Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 1:35pm
we went with them "as seen on TV" attennas, and now have about 20 more channels than we used to, and those antennas are hung inside the house. it's them little about 6x6 inch black flat plastic ones.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote DMiller Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 1:46pm
I keep considering that route, not sure will gain anything if the antenna does not function here.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote chaskaduo Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 2:21pm
Got a computer & wifi? Get a Roku. I bailed on Dish & Direct 5yrs ago. Antennas I can't say, lots of variables. That said I'm in a suburb, but pull 20-30 mile stations with a regular digital one.
 
1938 B, 79 Dynamark 11/36 6spd, 95 Weed-Eater 16hp, 2010 Bolens 14hp
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Hubert (Ga)engine7 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 3:57pm
Got one for the house at the farm, works okay, not great though. Some stations I can pick up great at times and at other times "no signal" seems to be not rhyme or reason as to whether or not it works. The antenna is directional and has a built in rotor but you need two people to adjust it - one to stand outside and monitor the direction it is pointing and another inside with the remote to turn the rotor. It does beat paying for Direct or Dish that I would hardly ever use.
Just an old country boy saved by the grace of God.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote CrestonM Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 4:09pm
We have rabbit ears on one of our TVs. Don't use it much except for when it's rainy and the DirecTV signal goes away. It works well for the local channels. 
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote steve(ill) Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 4:27pm
In general, antennas get up to 50 miles away.. See how many stations you have in the local city closer than that... and the "use WIFI" works good if you have high speed internet. We live 10 miles from small town and it has DSL internet over the phone line. Medium speed service.  You can watch YouTube videos on computer at somewhat broken speed.. Don't think watching a movie on the TV would be good.
 
We have a 60 miles BIG antenna ( 6-7 ft long) on the roof that gets 5-6 stations at the city 50 miles away.. We have the round DISHTV dish to get most channels... then DSL on local telephone line to get internet.


Edited by steve(ill) - 19 Feb 2019 at 8:03pm
Like them all, but love the "B"s.
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chaskaduo View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote chaskaduo Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 5:02pm
I have no problem at 6-7Mb on my 12Mb DSL and roku. My modem is 8-9 yrs old, my 4 yr computer is 4Gb w/win10.

Edited by chaskaduo - 19 Feb 2019 at 5:06pm
1938 B, 79 Dynamark 11/36 6spd, 95 Weed-Eater 16hp, 2010 Bolens 14hp
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Ken(MI) Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 5:36pm
I installed a winegard antenna at the farm on the roof of the pole barn, fixed with no rotor, and get over 30 good channels, before careful aiming it pulled a station in  Ft. Wayne Indiana, over 200 miles as a crow flies. I installed the same deal at my cottage, 6 miles away from the farm and can only receive about 8 stations. For my money though, I would give it a shot. There are many good sites on line with a ton of information about making it work.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote allischalmerguy Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 7:23pm
We have a roof antenna, all we have had for 15 years. Works great. We get
about 21 channels.
It is great being a disciple of Jesus! 1950 WD, 1957 D17...retired in Iowa,
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote DaveKamp Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 8:06pm
Most people who aren't 'radio guys' treat antennas as VooDoo magic. 

Most consumer antenna and related equipment manufacturers tout their products like they're VooDoo magic.  They rate it by 'miles'.  Totally inaccurate... but that's the figure they use, because that's something that an ordinary person might accept as a relative indicator of performance.

The concepts, by stark contrast, are VERY simple.

Imagine you're standing atop a really high roof, and you're looking for the lights of a really tall tower... and you can SEE them.

What's happening... is that your EYES are actually RADIO RECIEVERS... they are fantastic little receptors of electromagnetic radiation in the 430-770 TeraHertz range... that's 380 to 790 to 405 NANOmeters... that means they can recieve a fairly wide-banded range... The low frequency end starts at 740nM (405THz) (we call it "infrared", up to   380nm (790THz) (ultraviolet).  You see a red flashing light from the tower, you're seeing what we call a 'continuous wave' at 680 nanometers.  If it's a green light, you're seeing 530 or so.

Now... imagine if you will, that instead of looking with bare eyes, you use a telescope... a 4x telescope... that telescope doesn't 'amplify' the intensity of the source, but it takes a larger surface, and 'focuses' it on a smaller point, so that more of your visible surface is concentrated in the direction of that light.  Easier to see, right?

That's called GAIN...  you've DIRECTED the incoming light approching at a large surface to a smaller, such that it's intensity at the receptor (your eye) is much higher, thus, 'easier to see', right?

Signal strength and sensitivity is generally expressed in terms of GAIN... and the unit of measure is a 'ratio'.  We use the ratio unit 'DeciBels' to describe differences in signal strength.  A doubling of the signal strength is referred to as 3 DeciBels (db). Each time you double the signal strength at your eye, you're seeing a relative gain of 3db.  Doing basic math, that means your 4x telescope is exhibiting 12db of gain.

Simple enough so far?  Good, because you need to know what a Decibel IS.
Ten Amendments, Ten Commandments, and one Golden Rule solve most every problem. Citrus hand-cleaner with Pumice does the rest.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote DaveKamp Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 8:24pm
Now... Gain seems like it's good, right?  Yeah... crank it up to 10dB...  except... let's say you're lookin' thorugh that telescope, and the wind is blowing, and you got a 2yr old swingin' on your leg... you're tryin' to hold that telescope, and you can't see squat, because you can't stay ON TARGET.  that's what 'too much gain' looks like.  Zoom out... reduce the gain... get a better view of the sky, so you can keep that flashing light in your field of view.

Most people who fail radio exams... and most guys who put huge amplifers on CB radios, don't understand things like gain and loss... and can't measure Decibels.

An antenna needs to be tuned for a frequency 'center'.  Once tuned to the 'center', it needs to have it's total bandwidth (how far above and below 'center') it will still perform with any effective good. 

A DIRECTIONAL antenna also needs to have Front-To-Back Ratio (F/B ratio).  This is how to consider F/B ratio:

You're looking through your telescope, at the beacon on a tower.  Behind you is a guy with a massive carbon-arc spotlight, shining on your back, and on everything year you.  It's so bright, that the area around you is blinding you right through your eyelids.  There's so much glare, that you couldn't see anything through the telescope if you WANTED to.

To restore performance, you grab a welding blanket, and throw it over you, so that it's nice and dark everywhere but where that telescope peeks through.  You've increased front-to-back ratio by shielding yourself from what's behind.

A TV antenna MUST cover a wide range of frequencies: 
TV channels 2-6 appear between 54 and 88MHz.  That's higher than CB radio (27MHz), but lower than FM Broadcast (88-108).  {Remember- if you tune your FM stereo down to 88, you can actually HEAR the audio from TV Channel 6.}  An antenna for recieving those frequencies has to have a recieving element that's 4.3 FEET long.

TV channels 7-13 appear at 174 thorugh 216MHz.  That's 234/174= 1.3 FEET down to 234/216 1.08 feet.

TV channels 14 through 69 start at 470MHz, and go all the way up to 806MHz... that's from 5.97 INCHES, down to 3.48 INCHES.

Making an antenna to hit each one of these frequencies, in just ONE UNIT... is a real challenge.  Making one to exhibit GAIN over all those ranges, is really tough.
Ten Amendments, Ten Commandments, and one Golden Rule solve most every problem. Citrus hand-cleaner with Pumice does the rest.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote DaveKamp Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 8:38pm
Now... you're not gonna mount some big darned antenna in your livingroom... first of all, it's inside, it's too big to turn, it's lookin' at walls and draperies.  Instead, you mount it outside, and if you're smart, you mount it up as high as you can get it... look over the tops of trees and lower buildings.  By doing that, not only are you getting rid of stuff that'd block your view, it gets rid of surfaces that could be 'reflecting' noise from BEHIND you (f/b ratio, remember?).  Best of all, you're higher up off ground level, which means you can see further.  If you're standing at the Bonneville Salt Flats, and there's a flashlight on the ground, you'll loose sight of it before you make it to 3 miles distant.  You know that your line of sight of another PERSON maxes out around 12 miles or so... but get 50 feet in the air, and your line-of-sight goes to about 9 miles.

Imagine that flashlight is 750 feet off the ground, and your antenna is 50 feet off the ground... you can now get a reach of about 49 miles with a 'clear view'.
Ten Amendments, Ten Commandments, and one Golden Rule solve most every problem. Citrus hand-cleaner with Pumice does the rest.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote DaveKamp Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 8:47pm
Next... is LOSS.

the wiring going from your TV reciever up to that antenna... it carries radio frequency energy from the antenna to the TV's reciever, but it don't do it for FREE.  There's a certain amount of 'loss' that occurs in transport.  We call the transmission line for an antenna "Feedline".

Feedline is lossy... and some is more lossy than others, and loss gets dramatically  higher as the transmission FREQUENCY goes higher.  ANY given feedline will exhibit more loss at 880MHz, than it does at 400MHz, than it does at 170MHz, than it does at 54MHz.

Loss is identified in that fashionable ratio term "dB".  A feedline that loses HALF the signal strength, is causing a 3dB loss.

At 55MHz, a piece of typical RG-6 cable 100ft long, will exhibit 1.6db of loss.  that means It'll lose about a quarter of the signal... 
For 800MHz, that same piece exhibit about 6db (it will take away 3/4ths of the signal).

The higher you mount the antenna from your TV reciever, the longer your feedline will be... thus, the more loss.  You might put a 9dB gain antenna on the roof, and connect up so much feedline, that you lose 12dB, and your end result is LESS Signal.

...but you MAY STILL be ahead... because your antenna is well above the neighbor's trees, and your garage!

So the long and short of it is... what you see written on the boxes is basically irrelevant, unless you have the 'whole system' figured out FIRST.
Ten Amendments, Ten Commandments, and one Golden Rule solve most every problem. Citrus hand-cleaner with Pumice does the rest.
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DaveKamp View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote DaveKamp Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 8:50pm
BTW... my name is Dave, I'm a Ham Radio Operator, and it's not uncommon for me to be able to watch TV shows from Ann Arbor, Michigan from my home here in Iowa...
...and yes, it's using really special stuff, and just-the-right weather conditions.  There's days when my fancy stuff can't get good reception from stations 100 miles away, and even more that won't make it well at 25 miles away, but the cheezy little patch pointed south from my attic window will get me 34 local feeds from 7 broadcast locations...
Ten Amendments, Ten Commandments, and one Golden Rule solve most every problem. Citrus hand-cleaner with Pumice does the rest.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote HD6GTOM Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 9:56pm
I bought one and put it up without the rotor. We are at least 60 miles from the station antennas. It works well. I did put a booster of some sort on it for the new way they transmit TV shows. I get about 50 free channels and still can't find anything to watch.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Leesok Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2019 at 11:55pm
Have a radio shack 100 mile antenna on top of a 50' break over pole. Have a rotor, exterior booster.and indoor booster. Can pick up stations from Dallas to Wichita Ks to Fort Smith Ar. There are a lot more stations now than there was 20 years ago, but a lot of them will be airing the same thing. The only problem I have is, no matter which direction the antenna is pointed, I get at least a half dozen stations out of Mexico.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Clay Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 20 Feb 2019 at 3:13am
Wow Leesok.  Just where in Oklahoma do you live?
  I get a bunch of stations out of Wichita and Hutchinson.  Can't get PBS because they cut their output.
Before digital, it was not unusual to pick up Tulsa.  On rare occasion, I could pick up Joplin, Oklahoma City and others.
There is a link to find the location of the stations.  https://antennaweb.org/Address
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote john(MI) Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22 Feb 2019 at 12:08pm
I have installed a couple of the round plastic enclosure antennas from radio shack.  They do not require a rotor.  They also have an amplifier that you mount in the feed line at some point.  A friend of mine installed one in his attic.  All of them worked great.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Coke-in-MN Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22 Feb 2019 at 1:00pm
Have a TV that worked great - well I thought so - then seems started loseing stations depending on weather - have antenna out on a 20' pole and pointed at towers around 20 miles away . Tried booster and some other things . 
 Put a new TV in another room on same antenna lead - around 20 or so stations all clear and no problems .. Found the tuner in older TV was the problem on pulling in signals and then converting them to display - so replaced that TV also now and works great . 
 Do use Net Flex also and the DSL line at 20m works fine - in fact even before at 8m just took a little longer to start choice of movie . 
  
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote tractorboy Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22 Feb 2019 at 1:00pm
We use to get about 22 channels with 150 mi. ant. rotor, and booster, that was 20 yrs ago! our stations were 70, 110, & 100 miles away. You should get lots of channels at 40 miles. We moved to a creek bottom & now can't get anything but overpriced dish network!!!  Dave should be working for NASA.....  WOW!!
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote LouSWPA Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22 Feb 2019 at 2:56pm
the only thing Dave didn't cover is using an amplifier. it may help in some situations, but if one is used it should be placed as close to the antenna as possible.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote DaveKamp Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22 Feb 2019 at 7:16pm
Yes, Louis... that's absolutely, positively correct... when using an amplifier, it belongs AT , or as CLOSE TO the antenna FEEDPOINT as possible...

The amplifier doesn't magically 'suck' a signal out of the air... it merely takes what the antenna gathers, and gives it a boost.  This boost helps overcome feedline losses to your receiver(s).

A couple other things to know about amplifiers:

They're neither same, nor equal, and they're not magic.  as already noted above, broadchast television channels appear over a REALLY WIDE range of frequencies.  An amplifier that works well at 60MHz won't do the same at 100, or 350, or 700MHz.

The proper name for an amplifier that you mount near the antenna, is called a PREAMPLIFIER.  It's a wide-band, low noise gadget specifically tailored for driving a long feedline from your antenna feedpoint.

IF your house has several TVs and they're all tied into one distribution block, you'll need what's called a DISTRIBUTION AMPLIFIER.  it's not the same thing as a PREAMP... the DA's job is to take the antenna signal, and FOLLOW it with individual amplification to each TV set.  They're wide-banded also, but have totally different characteristics associated with keeping video quality when a signal's been split ten different ways.

NEVER use an amplifier on an non-directional antenna... you'll find that it does an excellent job amplifying all the stations you do NOT want.  You have a fairly strong signal coming in on one channel, your ability to recieve the station on the adjacent channel 60 miles away will get swamped because the amplifier will be blasting the stronger signal.  It's like trying to hear someone whisper to you when you're standing in the 12th row at a KISS concert.Wink
Ten Amendments, Ten Commandments, and one Golden Rule solve most every problem. Citrus hand-cleaner with Pumice does the rest.
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