Dave,
i understand you point but i will push back a bit (as is my nature)
you correctly interpret my comment as humour but then you proceed to chastize me for my humour when the comment wasn't directed at you.
The tone of my posts was neither aggresive nor offensive. I appreciate the time people take to answer so I can be lazy and not have to invest as much of my time.
So again I thank Electron and groundurmast for their informative responses.
Your post however does not contribute to the discussion in any way so my question to you is, why bother?
As i mentioned earlier I have not been completely lazy and I have read posts here and in other forums trying to garner enough knowledge to ask semi-intelligent questions.
In my research I have seen the discussions on the cheap antennas (lava for example) and have appreciated the intelligent discourse on durabilty and performance advertising versus performance measurement.
In fact there are many quality manufacturers and I believe AntennaCraft is one of them. So I (lacking the experience with these different manufacturers) question why one over the other.
I rarely take "because I know better than you" as an acceptable explanation (this caused me some problems with authority growing up...but I digress...).
Here is a link to a post that I read comparing the performances of different winegard and antennacraft antennas
http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=139034
other factors include:
The winegard is less expensive
the winegard is more easily available in my area... actually the Antennacraft is damned near impossible to get locally or shipped at a decent price...
The channel master is also more easily available in my area....
So why one over the other?
Is it just based on going with what you know?
So in summary:
I am a sceptical, questioning individual with authority issues ( me and John mellancamp) whos is trying to be as politically correct as possible in an effort to pull the knowledge you guys have so I can make a semi-intelligent decision.
The basic question for me is whether there is any value in over sizing/over-complicating the configuration based on the potential results. In the signal analysis report the "other" channels reside in the backplane of a directional antenna. Ergo either I use a rotor to tune them in when/if wanted, as suggested by Electron, or I forget about them.
I suppose I could use a second antenna but then the complications are exacerbated as is the cost... considering the required gain to get them. It is unlikely that there is a omni-directional antenna that will achieve the required gain through 360 degrees....
A pet hypothesis (yes I am still typing believe it or not..) is to get the "BIG daddy" Antenna and point it at the remote stations with the expectations that the "fringe " elements will pick up the signals along the 140 degree position as the princiapal ones are fairly strong...
Again I suppose I am now challenging physics and the r-squared relation.
.... if you have actually read this far I thank you.