Where can I get a rooftop TV antenna, installed, on a budget?

Why a roof-top antenna? Several good indoor antennas are made that should work in your situation.

On 08/08/2008 12:13 PM, snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com sent:

Hello Michael:

All DTV signals, come February 17, 2009, will still mostly originate almost 20 miles NNE of Huntington Park. "UCLANs" suggestion is a very good way of seeing if you could get acceptable reception now while you can still test various ideas.

If your GF aunt's home(s) have an attic, perhaps a very good VHF/UHF combination could be tried.

The antenna installers know the market, and that not much time is left, so the prices will be premium. So - maybe it's time the aunts gave some thought to cable or satellite TV.

The below URL is a very interesting site to explore:

Best wishes to you.

Several indoor antennas work significantly better that rabbit ears? I think not. If his rabbit ears won't work then a super duper amplified "As Seen on TV" antenna would be a waste of money.

The lowest cost outdoor rooftop antenna will greatly outperform the best indoor antenna.

The below are all cheap outside vhf/uhf/fm antennas. They get their gain by being directional. Compared to inside antennas they have height gain and a much less obstructed view of the desired signal. Hopefully the stations you are interested in are in the same direction so that a rotor would not be required.

Wineguard and Channelmaster are the two dominant players as far as TV antennas go.

Installation of such a small antenna should be a breeze. Just determine where you want to mount it. Among your choices of mounting hardware is a mast pipe( required) A small tripod, a side wall mount ect.

You also need transmission cable. The best choice would be a 300 ohm to 75 ohm outside transformer/balun mounted at the antenna so that you could run 75 ohm coax to the TV.

This antenna complete with universal mount and amplifier may be all you need if the broadcasters are close enough.

On 08/08/2008 12:13 PM, snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com sent:

Please try to tell us something about the aunt's home(s) location with regards to nearby outdoors obstacles. Are there nearby high trees, buildings or structures that will interfere with the signal path? Would a possible outdoor installation have a fairly clear path to the NNE?

Have you installed the DTV converter box? If so, what have the results been? How many feet of lead-in cable would be needed between the exterior antenna and the furthest DTV converter box? Putting a weakened high channel UHF station through 75 Ohm coaxial cable can lead to a disappointing result. However, I do it at home with a Radio Shack VU-190 XR, but I have a fairly short (40 feet) cable run to my home's VHF/UHF distribution amplifier.

Remember not to be influenced by anything describing an antenna that says it's been optimized for DTV or HDTV. R.F. is R.F., period.

What about installing an antenna in the attic? Reception might be slightly worse when it rains, but installation will be a heck of a lot simpler -- and safer.

--- The Lady from Philadelphia

It would help if you told us where Huntington Park is , what state, how far from the transmitters, etc.

Hello Bob:

Hunting Park is a community of Los Angles County. Huntington Park is approximately 19 to 20 miles SSW of most of the Los Angeles area's transmitter sites. I dug this out of the OP post. Santa Monica + the OP's IP gave it up. Plus, it doesn't hurt to live in California and have about half a dozen relatives near the OP.

Top of the day to you.

Before spending a lot of money, I suggest you google on "gray-hoverman". build it and try it in the attic. Hook it up with a balun and rg6 cable.

I've built one from scrap wood with heavy copper wire for the elements and aluminum foil for a reflector. I have it installed in an attic like position above a kitchen. I am receiving a channel 32 station 23 miles away with no problems.

hth,

kw

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I disagree, strongly. Read some opinions on AVS, or go to:

I've seen this antenna and the unamplified model in action, along with ordinary rabbit ears. It was no contest.

Dunno 'bout that. I've seen some pretty pathetic excuses for outdoor antennas, and some quite well performing indoor ones. For 20 miles and a digital signal, an indoor antenna and a converter with a decent front end should work fine. Besides, the OP didn't sound like he wanted to mess with masts, guy wires, etc.

On 08/08/2008 08:57 PM, Ken Wright sent:

Hello Ken:

I'm just wondering if, on those days when the roof is wet with rain or snow, if it might have been best to have used a good quality 300 Ohm twinlead from the "Gray-Hoverman", and then convert to 75 Ohm at the last possible moment?

Reason: Higher signal level, and probably better S/N ratio, delivered to the DTV converter or TV because the coaxial cable, even a very good quality RG-6, would exhibit so much signal loss at UHF frequencies versus a good 300 Ohm twinlead.

Granted, the twinlead would need to be carefully routed with the liberal use of standoffs and a reasonable amount of twists while avoiding metal and noise producing equipment and/or appliances.

With respect.

The first review goes like this...

"Design and construction is so flimsy the antenna was unable to support itself in an upright position without supplemental bracing. All our HD stations are on the same tower site so the distance to each is 20 miles (+/- one mile) and bearings are +/- 2 degrees. Using the autotune feature on the TV, this antenna was only able to capture 3 digital signals and unable to hold any of them long enough to permit viewing a program. A few of the analog stations were picked up, however, the picture quality was so bad the signals it did receive were useless. Got out my $10, 30-year old rabbit ears, pluggged into my high dollar TV and got 19 digital channels plus excellent performance on analog. Took the Terk back to Best Buy."

Terk makes junk. I had one of their amplified indoor FM antennas that actually gave worse audible performance than a piece of wire.

I don't doubt good twinlead would be best. But by mounting in an attic location you will probably need less than 50 feet of coax. My setup is truly horrible but still works. I have one uhf station off to the northeast at 44 degrees while all the rest range from 264 to 307 degrees. The 44 degree station is covered by an old commercial yagi with corner reflector and the rest of the uhf stations are covered by the Gray-Hoverman. I have the two conbined with a splitter in the 'attic' with a single rg6 coax feeding down to the tv room. A couple of the stations will revert to vhf frequencies after the Feb 09 switch so I have another splitter combining with the coax feed from two old vhf antennas which are pole mounted outside. I figure I'm losing about 9 decibels with the splitters and being located under a roof but it still works pretty good! Three of the uhf stations are usually in the green zone on the converter's meter. One uhf station is usually in the yellow but seems fine. I'm still waiting for one uhf station to come on the air, so I don't know about it yet.

kw

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How nice of you to quote back the worst review. How about all of the "5 Star" reviews, like:

"Before I bought this antenna, I was using a smaller HD antenna that was shady at besr. I bought the terk at best buy simply because it was open and they discounted it. I couldn't believe the difference. I scanned the available channels again, and discovered that I was now getting at least twice the number of channels that I was getting with my old HD antenna. I highly recommend the Terk HDTVa. It may be pricey but it's worth it."

or...

"I was really impressed with this antenna. My husband was fed up with the broken reception we were getting with the Phillips antenna. He was ready for Direct TV. I gave it a try anyways, I am sure glad I did. The picture is great on any channels from 2 to 68 and we are receiving more digital stations. No more broken images and digitization. Great product for the low price."

As I stated, I watched a test of both the amplified and unamplified versions of this antenna versus the TV's rabbit ear antenna. No contest. The rabbit ears just couldn't compare.

I'm not saying this is the *best* indoor TV antenna. My point was that the statement "If his rabbit ears won't work then a super duper amplified "As Seen on TV" antenna would be a waste of money" was not even in the ballpark.

As for me, I use a CM4228 mounted INSIDE in a north facing window, and have no problem pulling in digital signals from 100 miles away.

(+/-

the

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shady

The reason I quoted it was that (assuming it was an honest review, which it seemed to be) it pointed up the fact that amplified antennas don't always work very well.

It's also worth noting that the five-star review you quote was from someone who did not bother to comare the Terk's performance with a pair of rabbit ears -- which the first reviewer did.

What a terrific description! Of course by running RG6, you could tape it to water pipes and literally run it through mud puddles and snow without too much of a problem. Cool!

There's something odd here. All (and I do mean ALL) the HDTV sets I've seen do NOT include a 300 ohm twin lead connection which would be required to use a common wabbit ear antenna. Presumabley, he may have used a coax to twinlead balun adapter, but methinks he would have mentioned that.

I used that particular type of antenna as an example of lousy design. It's a log periodic antenna. With 7 short elements, it will have zero gain at any of the VHF channels, and perhaps 4dBi at best at the UHF channels. A 12dB RF amp working over the entire UHF band is going to have a marginal noise figure and is only good for compensating for the effects of coax loss. If the coax cable is quite short, as it appears to be in this case, the amp isn't going to improve sensitivity, especially if there's no signal to start with.

My guess(tm) is that the reviewer had to deal with some lower VHF channels, which his rabbit ears were able to pickup. 19 HDTV channels implies a metropolitan area, with strong signals. Methinks he did something wrong, such as a defective coax cable or not applying DC power to the amp.

Maybe. In a strong signal area, a piece of wire shoved into the F connector antenna jack will work. In a weak signal area, a much larger outside antenna, an amplifier to compensate for the coax losses, and possibly an antenna rotator are required.

Erecting an antenna:

Comparison of commercial antennas:

The higher, bigger and uglier the antenna, the better it works.

I know it well. My father's factory used to be nearby.

Most of the HDTV xmitters for the Smog Angeles area are on Mt Wilson.

If you can see Mt Wilson, you will get good reception. If you have a bunch of buildings in the way, you'll have problems. The exercise is to position the antenna so it points to Mt Wilson and does NOT have any obstructions. My guess(tm) is about 15 degrees from true north.