How do I improve reception

[DennisC]

I now have the recommended 2 antennas, preamp and 10' mast installed on top of our 2-story home at about 35' high. I do not have good reception of some of the closest stations from Louisville KY on all TV's (mainly my 50" Sony HD Digital LCD Projection TV (KDF-E50A10) in the living room).

Here is my original information:
http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...9e745f1f7ad2cb

I have the AntennaCraft U8000 pointed at 350 degrees on a magnetic compass.

I have the Wingard YA 1713 antenna pointed South toward the Louisville stations.

The Antenna Direct CPA-19 preamplifier is connected to both antennas.

Main problems:
No reception on main 50" living room TV of following stations:
3-1 WAVE NBC
3-2
3-3
30-1 WTIU PBS
30-2
30-3
30-4
32-1 WLKY CBS

I do get the following stations:
4-1 WTTY CW
4-2 WTTY THIS
11-1 WHAS ABC
11-2 WHAS WEATHER
11-3 WHAS WAZOO
21-1 WBNA ION
21-2 WBNA QUBO
21-3 WBNA LIGHT
21-4 WBNA RTV
32-1 WLKY CBS
32-2 WLKY
41-1 WDRB FOX
41-2 WDRB
42.1-WCLJ IND
42-2 WCLJ TCC
42-3 WCLJ JCTV
42-4 WCLJ ENLACE
42-5 WCLJ SOAC
58-1 WMYO MYN
58-1 WMYO
63-1 WIPX ION
63-2 WIPX QUBO
63-3 WIPX ION LIFE

I tried using a Zenith Digital Tuner (model DTT901) on the 50 TV but it did not help reception.

The same digital tuner on a small non-digital TV gets most all of the stations with little difficulty in the kitchen.

My motorhome setting beside my house with a crank up (older style) antenna gets most all of the Southern stations (Louisville) (it does not pick-up WHAS) very well and that antenna is only 15' in the air compared to 35' for the antenna on our home.?.

Any suggestions will be appreciated as we are at a loss at this point.

Thank you
Dennis

[MisterMe]

Two things:

1. The link to your TV Fool radar plot does not work.
2. The is absolutely positively nothing to be gained by listing the separate subchannels broadcast by each station.

[DennisC]

Sorry about the sub channel info - didn't know not to provide that.

I ran my antenna scan again and here is the current results

http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...60b5bb927d447a

Thank you for the assistance
Dennis

[MisterMe]

Are you trying to combine signals from the two antennas at the preamp?

[John Candle]

Thank you for listing the digital channels and sub channels , it tells me that you know enough to look them up , and thats more then many people can do , so I am impressed. A advantage of the U8000 is , the reflector bars can be turned from the horizontal position to the vertical position , this moves them out of the way so more signal can be received through/at the back side of the antenna. Read and understand about , REAL Digital Broadcast Tv Channels , Virtual Digital Broadcast Tv Channels , Analog Broadcast Tv Channels , http://forum.tvfool.com/showthread.php?t=695. WAVE VHF 3.1 NBC is really UHF 47.1 , WTIU UHF 30.1 PBS is really UHF 14.1 , WLKY UHF 32.1 CBS is really UHF 26.1. Here are some tv guides , http://www.zap2it.com , http://www.television.aol.com , http://www.tv.yahoo.com , http://www.tv.entertainment.excite.com. Most tv guides list the channels as virtual channels.

[John Candle]

Having a chain of splitters will reduce signal each time a split takes place. So that at the end of the last splitter there is not much signal left. The best way to do it is have one splitter , be it a 2 way , 3 way , 4 way , or 8 way , and the coaxes from the splitter outputs go out to the tv locations.

[John Candle]

And yes when using the UVSJ = UHF VHF separator joiner the output of the UVSJ is connected to the preamp.

[DennisC]

John C.

The U8000 is mounted at least 40" below the Wingard YA 1713 on a 10' mast using a (non-functional/no fire in fireplace) chimney mount and both connected to UVSJ which goes to CPA-19 mast mounted preamp. From preamp coax goes down 2-story exterior wall to ground block, then through house wall and across width of house inside of crawl space and out the opposite wall to a 3-way splitter (previously used by cable company to feed signal to TV's). I will check all of this but I am fairly sure there are no other splitters or coax splices to that point. Coax sealer was used on all connections. What I do not know is exactly how the coax in the house was run 15 years ago - this could be where the signal is loosing it's strength I would guess if there are additional splitters in the coax wiring of the house. It is not going to be easy to try to run new coax in the house but that might be what is required.

What if I purchase 100' of new coax and connect it to the ground block on side of house and run it through the front door of my home and directly to the back of the main living room TV, this would bypass all of the old coax run in the house. I would have a direct connection from antennas to the main TV to check for signal strength. If I get good reception with this temporary connection then I know that I must run new uncut/no-splitter coax inside of the house.

Thank you for the expert assistance - it is appreciated
Dennis

[rickcain]

You might just try recrimping all coax connections with higher quality compression fittings. Bypassing existing coax is a great solution especially if you suspect the old coax is rather dodgy or is the skinny RG-59 stuff. Coax is so inexpensive now its worth the small investment in money and time.

Put terminators on any wall plate jacks that aren't being used.

[DennisC]

John C.

I am not sure exactly which bars on the U8000 are the reflecting bars and how to bend them properly, can you give me a little more information so I am confident that I am bending the correct bars in the manner you are suggesting.

" the reflector bars can be turned from the horizontal position to the vertical position "

Thank you John
Dennis

[rickcain]

I wonder about that too. The U8000's two arrays are bolted to a frame, so the reflectors can't be retracted without bumping into the crossbars.

Makes me wonder if I put this thing together properly in the first place (grin). Now I'm second guessing myself.

[DennisC]

My U8000 came fully assembled so that saves me from wondering if I put it together properly. I just do not know which bars are the "reflecting" bars and in which manner and direction do I alter their shape and in what direction. I just downloaded a photo of the antenna assembled but I am not sure about what I am looking at.

Thanks
Dennis

[rickcain]

The reflectors are the horizontal tubular things behind the bowtie whiskers (the wires arranged in an X-pattern). Once they're in place they lock, but you can coax them back by pulling on the tabs.

Reflectors stop reflecting signal then they're vertical, so if you rotate them in theory they will allow the antenna to get signals equally from the front and the back, at the cost of some signal strength.

[DennisC]

Now I am really confused!

I just ran the temporary 50' RG6 Coax GE cable from the ground block on the exterior wall of my home directly to my livingroom 50" Sony TV and ALL I COULD GET WAS ONE STATION!?
The station was WHAS 11 TV.
I thought this would tell me if the coax in my home needed to be replaced or not.
Does anyone know why this happened.
Do I need the RG6 Quad Shielded coal to do this?

Help will be appreciated.

Dennis

[DennisC]

Could the fact that when I disconnected the coax from the grounding block I was also disconnecting the coax that carried the electric current back up to the pre amp --- so there would be no pre amp activity. Would this be enough to cause me to drop all but one TV station? Just trying to understand what happened.

Dennis

[GroundUrMast]

If you have a preamp on the mast with the antenna, removing power will turn the preamp into an attenuator of 30 dB or more. Only the strongest signals would get through, weak and possibly distorted.

[DennisC]

Thank you for the reply - it makes a little more since to me with that being the case.
I will have to find away to run the same test without cutting the current to the pre amp. That requires getting into the crawl space which is always fun.

Thank you
Dennis