Unusual antenna problems please help

[wetzel402]

Hello everyone,

I have an rca ant751 installed in my attic with a 25' drop. When I attach my TV to the drop with an additional indoor 10' coax cable I get all the nearby channels and it works great.

Now the problem. When I relocate my TV to the living room and run my antenna signal through the coax in the walls I drop several channels and some of the ones I do get come in and out. If I connect my amplifier it seems to have no effect. Strangely, touching the amplifier (if installed) or the splitter (if no amp installed) seems to improve the signal at the TV.

Also at night walking around the house in certain areas seems to disrupt the signal.

Any help would be great.

Thanks!!!

[wetzel402]

http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...e07cb8fb886097

[Tower Guy]

Originally Posted by wetzel402

Strangely, touching the amplifier (if installed) or the splitter (if no amp installed) seems to improve the signal at the TV.

I see that as an indication that the coax itself is acting as the antenna. That would occur if there was a bad connection on the shield of the coax.

[wetzel402]

A new "F" connector would be a good idea then?

[John Candle]

Please post a tvfool radar report. . Bad coax cable in the wall , disconnected coax , cut coax , nail in the coax , defective splitter some where. A bad connector connection on the coax. Do you know how the home is wired with the coax , home run or loop?? Or combination of both home run and loop??

[wetzel402]

http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...e07c0bc66da20f

My problems may also have to do with some channels being so close (CBS,NBC,ABC) and others being so far away (CW,FOX).

[wetzel402]

Originally Posted by John Candle

Do you know how the home is wired with the coax , home run or loop?? Or combination of both home run and loop??

I am not sure what you mean by "home run or loop". Each jack has it's own run to a junction point in my basement. This is also where I ran my drop from my antenna. Currently I am trying to get antenna to just the living room. After I get a successful signal there I will consider further distribution of the signal to other rooms. Wishful thinking

[wetzel402]

Good evening everyone,

After work I moved the TV back to my drop point and connected it to my drop using the same 10' indoor coax cable. My wife watched TV all night without a single problem.

Just so everyone knows my drop is a 25' RG6 quad shield cable.

Hope this helps.

Thanks!

[John Candle]

Loop is , the coax starts at a place and goes to a outlet and from that outlet a coax goes to another outlet and from that outlet a coax goes to another outlet and so forth , looping from one to next , loop is not a good way to wire. . Home run is sometimes called star wiring , from one place a coax wire goes out to a outlet and from that same one place a coax wire goes out to outlet and from that same one place a coax wire goes out to a outlet and so forth , this the best way to do wiring. . Connect the antenna coax directly to the coax that goes to the living room , NO Splitter , now connect the tv in the living room , if you have bad reception then you know there is problem with the coax that goes to the living room , so you get thinking , what can be the problem , a bad connection , so you get to thinking , how can a connection be bad , and you get to thinking , if I look in the connector on the end of the coax and I see that the outer shielding and shield wires are pushed in toward the center conductor and might be touching the center conductor then that would 'short out the circuit' and reduce reception. And then you get to thinking I can push outer foil shielding and shield wires away from the center conductor. And then you get to thinking how can I find bad sections of coax and a idea pops into your head , I can use substitute coax to 'jump around' sections of coax that from the antenna coax connection to the final connection at the Tv and that way I prove that coax is bad or connectors bad or a splitter is bad , and then you get thinking , well maybe one of them other coaxes is bad that go from the splitter to a location in the house , so you disconnect all of them except the one that goes to living room as a way to figure out if the splitter is bad or not. . And you pop your suspenders and say I found the problem.

[wetzel402]

Hello again

I have an update.

I have now tried my TV in the guest bedroom of the house as well as the master bedroom. Both locations worked great. I then removed the wall plate from my living room to inspect the connectors. The wall plate appeared fine but to confirm I used it like a coupler with two coaxes in the master bedroom and everything worked great. I then checked the in wall coax. It had a crimp on end so I removed the old one and installed a new crimp just to be safe and still have the same problems. Does this mean the coax in the wall is bad? If it is ran "loop" style in my living room does the cable need to then make a complete loop (circuit) to function correctly? I am loosing several channels and having reception issues on others. It functioned great in both bedrooms.

[John Candle]

Do the living room walls have a room on the other side that has coax to the room? You can use a two way splitter , one out put of the two way splitter will have a coax that goes through the wall into the living room. Or if the coax in the other room has nothing connected then connect a coax , poke a hole through in to the living room and put the coax through the hole in to the living room . . And no , a loop system does not go all the way back to starting point and connect up at the starting point. . You can also find a way to run a new coax to the living room. A new coax to the living room does not have to be the same route as the one that is in the wall and is bad. It's however you can get the coax from point A to point B.

[wetzel402]

Looks like I will have to figure something out to get a new coax to that point.

I appreciate the help!

I will update with a final result

[John Candle]

This is all real simple. You can do what is known as wrapping the house to get the cable from point A to point B , the coax goes around the out side of the house. . What you can do while you are making it harder then it really is , is connect a length of coax to the output on the splitter that the living room coax was connected to and run the coax under doors and across floors and into the living room and connect to the Tv.

[wetzel402]

Over the weekend I was prepared to run my new coax. I decided before hand that I wanted to mark all cables for location first. I moved my TV to each wall jack and would connect cables until I found the right one and label it. Interestingly enough I found that the one I thought was for my living room was not correct. I found it using the 9 volt battery and multi meter trick but obviously that did not work very well.....the cable may have been too long and had too much voltage drop.

Now that I have found the correct cables everything works great! I had to use my amplifier to keep some channels coming in clear but nonetheless works great!

Thanks so much for the help!

I also tried combining my cable internet signal and TV into one coax because I have a TV and modem in the same spot but this didn't work. Any products out there that can filter these frequencies or are both signals the same frequency?

[John Candle]

Well Ok , however for the 9 volt battery and the multimeter not to work the coax would have to be extremely long. There is no way that house wiring can be that long. I say that something is still wrong. A bad connection , a damaged coax cable. Like a kink in the coax , this happens when the coax is coiled in a loop and then the loop is pulled tight making a kink. . Or the coax has been pulled to the point the foil shied and shied wires were broken. . Or there is a non power passing splitter is connected , a non power passing splitter will not pass the 9 volts. . Read This---->The internet coax and the antenna coax can not be the same coax.<----Read This

[wetzel402]

My results were mixed with the 9 volt system. Some coax would read 8.75 volts while others would only show up as 1.xx volts or something low like that. It may have been my 9 volt rig itself that caused the low readings. I stripped a 6" piece of coax, wired my 9 volt battery to it, and then black tapped it. The connecting between the battery and the coax maybe was weak depending on position when attached at the wall.

I have had the antenna working with no issues what so ever for two and half days now so it seems unlikely now that the in wall coax is damaged. I just had the wrong cable all together and It must have been acting as it's own antenna for the stations that broadcast only a few miles away.

Your thoughts?

[John Candle]

Well Ok , if it's working , I am thinking some thing is still not right. But then I am not there.

[wetzel402]

It was very strange to say the least but now that I have a different coax identified as the living room and hooked up it works great.

Would you happen to know if I can run cable internet and OTA TV on the same coax John? We receive only cable internet, no TV signal. If it is possible how would I go about it?

Thanks!

[GroundUrMast]

Originally Posted by wetzel402

It was very strange to say the least but now that I have a different coax identified as the living room and hooked up it works great.

Would you happen to know if I can run cable internet and OTA TV on the same coax John? We receive only cable internet, no TV signal. If it is possible how would I go about it?

Thanks!

Cable TV is a closed system, meaning it must not radiate any signal into the air and it must not allow any over-the-air signals in. Aircraft navigation and communication signals will be interfered with if the 'closed' nature of the cable system is compromised. So, do not mix OTA distribution with any part of the cable TV network.

[John Candle]

DO NOT directly connect the Tv antenna system coax and cable TV internet system coax together in any way shape or forum. None , Zip , Zero , Zilch.