Posted by OhioGuy on September 5, 2009, 12:55 pm
I've been using a small, though well reviewed Radio Shack antenna. It was
a $30 upgrade from the $2 bow tie antenna we were using. The bow tie
antenna just wouldn't pull in Family Feud well enough, and my wife was
always complaining about how it pixellated during the show. The $30 upgrade
made the channels stronger, but we still only had about 11 of them.
A couple of days back, I remembered that I have a ~8 year old Winegard
9095 UHF only tv antenna in the attic. I got it down and just set it out on
our front porch. I was able to pull in 16 channels with that hooked up.
Then I decided to actually mount the antenna off the side of one of our
front porch pillars. The channels we got were stronger, but we didn't get
any additional ones.
Finally, I took a Channel Master amplifier out of a drawer, and hooked
that up to the coax cable before it went into the back of our TR-40 CRA
digital set top tuner. (made by Dish Network - it has a great channel guide)
Suddenly, we were getting 28 channels! One of them comes from Lima, Ohio -
70 miles away. It is as clear as a bell, with a signal strength of about
75.
The antenna is currently only about 9' off the ground. I'm getting 28
stations now, but the tuner keeps detecting more that are not quite strong
enough currently to get more than the channel guide and call letter info.
Our current setup has a roughly 12 db gain Winegard 9095 UHF antenna, plus
another 10db gain from the Channel Master amplifier. If I currently get 28
channels and detect another couple of dozen, I'm wondering if I might get 50
or more if I:
1) upgraded to a milti bowtie UHF antenna with average gain of 18db instead
of current 12.
2) changed to using an amplifier with 15db gain
3) put the antenna up on a 50 foot tower
4) either get a rotor, or mount two antennas pointing different directions
Would getting 50 channels be out of the question? If I can currently get
channels from Lima (70 miles away), with an antenna that is only 9 feet off
the ground, I'm thinking I should also be able to pull in the Columbus
market - about 55 miles to the east.
I haven't really experimented with this sort of thing in a long time, but
I do have fond memories of helping my Dad turn the rotor (him at the tv, and
me in the basement with a walkie-talkie, turning the rotor back and forth)
until we could get in far-flung channels. (fuzzy, but watchable - from far
off places like Indiana or Canada, sometimes) I'm glad I started messing
around with this, though. We've more than doubled our viewing choices
simply by using things I already had. I'm especially happy with the kids
programming, because now we get 3 different PBS stations, one of which
carries kids' shows on a sub-channel most of the time. My kids will love
having more choices.
So, anybody else out there experiment with trying to pull in "deep fringe"
channels? What is your setup, and how far away is the farthest channel you
get in well?
Posted by Rod Speed on September 5, 2009, 2:01 pm
OhioGuy wrote:
> I've been using a small, though well reviewed Radio Shack antenna. It was a
$30 upgrade from the $2 bow tie antenna
> we were using. The
> bow tie antenna just wouldn't pull in Family Feud well enough, and my
> wife was always complaining about how it pixellated during the show. The $30
upgrade made the channels stronger, but
> we still only had
> about 11 of them.
> A couple of days back, I remembered that I have a ~8 year old
> Winegard 9095 UHF only tv antenna in the attic. I got it down and
> just set it out on our front porch. I was able to pull in 16
> channels with that hooked up. Then I decided to actually mount the
> antenna off the side of one of our front porch pillars. The channels
> we got were stronger, but we didn't get any additional ones.
> Finally, I took a Channel Master amplifier out of a drawer, and
> hooked that up to the coax cable before it went into the back of our
> TR-40 CRA digital set top tuner. (made by Dish Network - it has a
> great channel guide) Suddenly, we were getting 28 channels! One of
> them comes from Lima, Ohio - 70 miles away. It is as clear as a
> bell, with a signal strength of about 75.
> The antenna is currently only about 9' off the ground. I'm getting
> 28 stations now, but the tuner keeps detecting more that are not
> quite strong enough currently to get more than the channel guide and
> call letter info.
> Our current setup has a roughly 12 db gain Winegard 9095 UHF
> antenna, plus another 10db gain from the Channel Master amplifier. If I
currently get 28 channels and detect another
> couple of dozen,
> I'm wondering if I might get 50 or more if I:
> 1) upgraded to a milti bowtie UHF antenna with average gain of 18db
> instead of current 12.
> 2) changed to using an amplifier with 15db gain
> 3) put the antenna up on a 50 foot tower
> 4) either get a rotor, or mount two antennas pointing different directions
> Would getting 50 channels be out of the question?
Impossible for us to say.
> If I can currently get channels from Lima (70 miles away), with an antenna
that is only 9 feet off the ground, I'm
> thinking I should also be able to pull in the Columbus market - about 55 miles
to the east.
May well be feasible, but you may need a separate antenna for
that, because the better antennas are directional and you dont
appear to have them all in the same direction from your place.
> I haven't really experimented with this sort of thing in a long
> time, but I do have fond memories of helping my Dad turn the rotor
> (him at the tv, and me in the basement with a walkie-talkie, turning the rotor
back and forth) until we could get in
> far-flung channels. (fuzzy, but watchable - from far off places like Indiana
or Canada, sometimes)
You wont get much of that with UHF.
> I'm glad I started messing around with this, though. We've more than doubled
our viewing choices simply by using
> things I already had. I'm especially happy with the kids programming, because
now we get 3 different PBS stations,
> one of which carries kids' shows on a sub-channel most of the time. My kids
will love having more choices.
And they'll be picking your nursing home.
> So, anybody else out there experiment with trying to pull in "deep fringe"
channels? What is your setup, and how far
> away is the farthest channel you get in well?
Quite a few of the locals have 50' towers that do fine for the
neighbouring town 100 miles away.
Posted by Gordon on September 6, 2009, 12:43 am
> I've been using a small, though well reviewed Radio Shack antenna.
> It was
> a $30 upgrade from the $2 bow tie antenna we were using.
Bowties and set top antennas are OK if the stations you are recieving
are not too far away and you have a good line of sight to the
towers.
>
> A couple of days back, I remembered that I have a ~8 year old
> Winegard
> 9095 UHF only tv antenna in the attic.
Yes, those Wingards are great antennas. And with DTV, you may
be able to get away with just a UHF antenna. Most of the stations
are now on UHF.
> Finally, I took a Channel Master amplifier out of a drawer, and
> hooked
> that up to the coax cable before it went into the back of our TR-40
> CRA digital set top tuner.
For best effect, the amplifyer should go as near the antenna as
possible. You can't compensate for coax loss after it has occoured.
I'm wondering if I
> might get 50 or more if I:
>
> 1) upgraded to a milti bowtie UHF antenna with average gain of 18db
> instead of current 12.
> 2) changed to using an amplifier with 15db gain
> 3) put the antenna up on a 50 foot tower
> 4) either get a rotor, or mount two antennas pointing different
> directions
Do some research, Go to www.antennaweb.org and put in your address.
You will get a list of all the stations in your surrounding area,
with distance and dirrection information. The list will be ordered
acording to how easy the stations will be to pick up. At the top
of the list will be the easiest.
>
> Would getting 50 channels be out of the question?
Antennaweb will tell you.
> So, anybody else out there experiment with trying to pull in "deep
> fringe"
> channels? What is your setup, and how far away is the farthest
> channel you get in well?
>
>
No, I live about 10 miles from the local transmitters. My setup
can be found on:
http://mysite.verizon.net/g_reeder/Content/DTV_antenna.html
I do get a channel 16 that is not listed on Antennaweb. It
is the one with the worst reception, and I have no idea of
it's physical location.
Posted by OhioGuy on September 8, 2009, 1:50 pm
Here's another website several people recommended to me:
http://www.tvfool.com/
It gives you a list of pretty much all the channels you might have a
chance of pulling in, with a good tower, great antenna, and an amplifier.
Now that I know there will be more and more digital channels on VHF, I may
have to look into getting another antenna with VHF reception.
>> I've been using a small, though well reviewed Radio Shack antenna.
>> It was
>> a $30 upgrade from the $2 bow tie antenna we were using.
> Bowties and set top antennas are OK if the stations you are recieving
> are not too far away and you have a good line of sight to the
> towers.
>>
>> A couple of days back, I remembered that I have a ~8 year old
>> Winegard
>> 9095 UHF only tv antenna in the attic.
> Yes, those Wingards are great antennas. And with DTV, you may
> be able to get away with just a UHF antenna. Most of the stations
> are now on UHF.
>> Finally, I took a Channel Master amplifier out of a drawer, and
>> hooked
>> that up to the coax cable before it went into the back of our TR-40
>> CRA digital set top tuner.
> For best effect, the amplifyer should go as near the antenna as
> possible. You can't compensate for coax loss after it has occoured.
> I'm wondering if I
>> might get 50 or more if I:
>>
>> 1) upgraded to a milti bowtie UHF antenna with average gain of 18db
>> instead of current 12.
>> 2) changed to using an amplifier with 15db gain
>> 3) put the antenna up on a 50 foot tower
>> 4) either get a rotor, or mount two antennas pointing different
>> directions
> Do some research, Go to www.antennaweb.org and put in your address.
> You will get a list of all the stations in your surrounding area,
> with distance and dirrection information. The list will be ordered
> acording to how easy the stations will be to pick up. At the top
> of the list will be the easiest.
>>
>> Would getting 50 channels be out of the question?
> Antennaweb will tell you.
>> So, anybody else out there experiment with trying to pull in "deep
>> fringe"
>> channels? What is your setup, and how far away is the farthest
>> channel you get in well?
>>
>>
> No, I live about 10 miles from the local transmitters. My setup
> can be found on:
> http://mysite.verizon.net/g_reeder/Content/DTV_antenna.html
> I do get a channel 16 that is not listed on Antennaweb. It
> is the one with the worst reception, and I have no idea of
> it's physical location.
Posted by Gordon on September 8, 2009, 6:54 pm
> Here's another website several people recommended to me:
>
> http://www.tvfool.com/
>
> It gives you a list of pretty much all the channels you might have a
> chance of pulling in, with a good tower, great antenna, and an amplifier.
>
Thanks! Bookmarked it. I knew there was another site out there
besides antennaweb.org.
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