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Old 24-Sep-2012, 1:30 AM   #1
sethpb
Junior Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2012
Posts: 3
Atlanta signal strength help

Yesterday I moved my Wingard 8200U from my attic to my roof in hopes of picking up more stations. While in the attic, it was pointed toward downtown Atlanta at about 122 degrees. On the master bedroom TV (upstairs, 3rd level and almost directly wired into the atenna), we picked up NBC, Fox (sometimes), PBS on a really clear day, ION, and qubo. CBS may as well not have come in the signal was so bad. We NEVER picked up ABC. I had a Wingard AP-8275 preamp hooked up on it. After moving it to the roof, we now get Fox, NBC, CBS (pretty weak signal at times so it comes and goes), 3 different GPG stations, qubo, Ion, Ion Life, PeachtreeTV (really spotty signal), and several others that we'll probably never watch. This is on our main TV on the main/middle level of the house (TV is a Samsung for what that's worth). I was really hoping that by moving it to the roof that we'd get all of the above listed channels PLUS finally get ABC. It does come in at times but the signal is so weak and at times doesn't come in at all. The rest of the stations typically seem to get around 30%-100% reception, most are around 50%-60% I believe. Before moving the antenna to the roof, we only received NBC on this TV. The master bedroom now doesn't get any channels.

The antenna is approx. 20' up on the roof of our back porch and pointed toward downtown Atlanta at about 120 degrees. This area of our roof is the easiest to access and is in safest location, in my opinion. There are higher areas but I refuse to go there because our roof is extremely steep and is almost 45' feet high in some spots. I tried using the Wingard amp but that seemed to make the signal worse so I removed it. The cable (RG6U coaxial) runs 50' from the antenna to a grounding block and then into the house (in the basement) where is it is connected to an RCA 4 way Amplifier/Splitter (http://www.buy.com/prod/rca-vh140x-1...204020398.html). Without this amp, I can definitely see a drop in signal strength in most of the above listed channels. In other words, it does seem to help some. Both TVs use a Zinwell ZAT-970A Converter. Back to the antenna, I have not grounded the mast or the coaxial yet. That's on my to-do list in the next couple of days. Thankfully the weather forecast looks clear in my area for the next week (now storms, phew!).

It really baffles me that we still don't get ABC. It is shown as being 25 miles away. Fox is 25 miles away too and that comes in fairly strong (50%+ signal strength at times). My main goal was to receive ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, the GPB stations, Qubo, and Ion. So we're really just missing ABC from that list. My guess is that ABC just has a weaker signal from the tower than others. I guess if I can't get ABC, is there a way that I can at least increase the signal strength on some of the stations and possibly get a few channels to show up in the master bedroom?

I'm a novice at all of this so it is highly possible that I'm doing something incorrectly. Can anyone help?

Here is my signal analysis: http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...2df98891f63c02

Thanks in advance!
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