Reception help--Any hope?

[rustydj]

Hello,
Hoping for some advice. Recently the cable company (Charter) forced everyone on our system in the Upper Connecticut River Valley of northern NH and VT to get a cable box and changed to "Switched Digital Video" This made many of us very angry. In the days of analogue, we used to be able to receive CBS, ABC, NBC and PBS. Now, those channels are digital (CBS is ch 22; ABC is ch 13; NBC is ch 25--that comes in fairly strong--and ch 14; and PBS is very easy to get on ch 24, ch 18 and ch 48) I get a very snowy analog ABC station from a low power translator about 20 miles away (ch 29 and ch 38) I am most interested in pulling in the stations to the northwest at true 312 degrees... all of that cluster broadcast from the same mountain in northern VT (Mt Mansfield) With the exception of PBS stations and the two translators, all stations are 45 to 55 miles away.

There are two TV Fool reports here... The first from my front deck about 5 feet off the ground where I'm using a Super G 1483 to pick up channels 24 and 25 to the south. The further off the ground I raise the antenna, the lower the signal. A Winegard HD9032 also works well in that location.

The second TV Fool report is from my barn roof where old antennas were mounted in the days before cable. I haven't actually climbed up there to test yet. Any advice would be appreciated. The antennas I already own:
Winegard HD9032, Winegard HD 7697P, Super G 1483--rather flimsy; I couldn't picture mounting it on the roof!

http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...d243805b954d08

http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...d2431a939ca801

[timgr]

Not part of the industry... but maybe I can get you started.

If I had those antennas onhand now, I would first do some testing to see which channels I could pick up on which antennas. All three of your antennas appear to be UHF-only models... the Super-G is out of production, but appears to be a formidable antenna from the description here: http://forum.tvfool.com/showthread.php?t=13206 As a 16-bay bowtie it should be easier to handle than the very long Winegards.

The 7697P seems to be the least sensitive, so I would start with that.

You possibly have enough antennas that you can pick up all three directions using separate antennas (18,48 at ca 30, 24,25 at 220, 13,22 at 326). I'm thinking you may as well use all your antennas, and combine the signals either at an A/B switch or at separate tuners under the control of a HTPC. The HTPC can give you a live feed from any of the tuners, and act as a DVR server.

That leaves 13 WVNY to be picked up by a dedicated VHF antenna like the Antennacraft Y10713. Put the Y10713 on the same mast as one of the UHF antennas and mix that signal into its UHF downlead, either with a passive combiner or a mast-mounted preamp with separate UHF and VHF inputs.

Your recpetion environment is challenging, but you already have a lot of setups that you can test, since you own so many antennas.

On mounting the Super-G, I have not done it, but I would picture it on a tilt-up mast. Tilt the mast down, secure the antenna to the end of the mast, tilt up the mast and secure with the tripod struts or guy wires.

[rustydj]

Thanks for the quick reply. I have only the weekends to play around with antennas. I was hoping to use the Winegard 7697 as my channel 13 antenna as it is supposed to be a hi vhf as well as uhf antenna. Regarding the Super G 1483--I bought it new from Summit Source which is the sole distributor. It is very flimsy and came with very poor assembly instructions. Even moving the balun slightly can cause a drop (or gain) in signal strength of a couple db. If I put it on the roof and a bird landed on it or the wind, snow or ice threw it out of whack I wouldn't be able to tinker with it as I can if it's on my front deck. From the front deck to the northwest (the stations I most desire), there is 1) A tree, 2) the main road, 3) main power lines, phone and cable tv lines on utility poles.

I will check prices and perhaps order a Y10713. Should have mentioned I also have on hand the following pre-amps: two Winegard LNA200s, channel master titan 7777, and an RCA TVPRAMP1R with separate VHF/UHF inputs... also an old channel master distribution amp that I used to use for the cable tv signal since there are 7 tvs plus a cable modem in my house. The incoming cable tv signal was passively split 3 ways to the cable modem, the main tv and the da to distribute the cable signal to the other 6 televisions. I guess I fit the description of a tv fool!

Anyway, I'm on it this coming weekend! Thanks!
rusty

[rustydj]

Here is another tvfool report:
http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...d2430c32517807

This report is off the northeast corner of my property--4 feet off the ground! Must be groundwave, correct? Is it practical to mount antennas this close to the ground? If tvfool reports are reliable, this looks more promising for receiving the Burlington, VT stations to the Northwest (air channels 13, 14, 22) Now if I can get my neighbor to let me mount an antenna in the corner of her vegetable garden!