Digital antenna

Anonymous-0 · Feb 16, 2009

Have anyone of you made your own antenna. I goggled that topic and came up with one. Just wondering if any of you all attempted to do just that. I have plenty of time on my hands and have made various items in the past and would like some plans on making an antenna.

ldj · Feb 16, 2009

It is my understanding there is no digital antenna. Your present antenna will receive the digital signal. You have to have a converter to change it to analog.

Anonymous-0 · Feb 16, 2009

I tried that and it did not work. We are about 60 miles from the station and need more reception. thank you for your response.

thurlow · Feb 16, 2009

Some good information at Antenna Web......about what kind of antenna and amp you need, based on your address.
antenna web

RockyMo · Feb 16, 2009

I finally got mine to work over the weekend. I had a large antenna and a signal booster, still got 0 reception with digital convertor. I finally found someone at Radio Shak that knew what he was doing. He sold me a two piece signal booster to replace my existing one. I now have 12 digital channels. The picture is perfect but the programming is not that great. Lots of weird pbs stuff etc.. Hopefully when they all go full power there will be more interesting content. Oh, by the way, I am in the middle of the woods at least 60 miles away from the transmitter.

Rocky in MO

Anonymous-0 · Feb 16, 2009

We are 70-80 miles from stations and the old antennae works well even though the stations are not up to full digital power yet. You may have to go to coax cable instead of twin lead, this made a huge difference for me, then I added a booster($60) and am able to receive some stations 100 miles away,but not consistantly.

Anonymous-0 · Feb 16, 2009

My understanding is that some stations are broadcasting in UHF now but when they switch to full power digital, they will be using VHS so an antenna that works now may not work when they switch.

Oldmax · Feb 16, 2009

The antenna yhat you have will get freq. are the same on lower chanels but the higher ones are the ones that are going to give trouble.

buickddeere · Feb 16, 2009

An amp placed just prior to the TV tuner is just a noise generator.
A true amp locates the amplifier at the antenna.The other part is located just prior to the TV tuner that plugs into 120V. Its a DC power supply and filter to supply the amp at the antenna.
If the coax used isn't RG-6 or RG-11 . It's ruining the signal and reception. By allowing unwanted noise to leak in and the desired signal to be absorbed.
Low loss coax speced to run from a Sat dish LNA to the converter box is good stuff to run from the antenna amp to the amp power supply.
The coax cable tv companies, home builders and what wal-mart sells is trouble.
Use silicon on the outside coax fittings to keep moisture out. Internally wet coax will absorb signal rather than transport signal.

Anonymous-0 · Feb 17, 2009

Digital signals use mostly the upper freq. received by the front of classic antennas. If your cobbling together one focus on that part. Seems all the elements on the front of mine are rivoted to the support and wouldn't do a darn thing. Looks impressive though.

RockyMo · Feb 17, 2009

Yes the so called noise maker is the type I had. The new one mounts one piece at the antenna and one piece inside. It sure made a difference. I suspect the coax is from wal-mart as it was installed about 15 years ago and that most likely was the only place in a town of less than 3k people open on a weekend when I would have been able to make it to the store. Now that I know I can receive a signal I will upgrade the coax. All in all the picture is very good with the digital but things have been a bit misleading from the government, ie. free convertor box coupon. The coupon is good for $40 but the box cost $60. another $72 for the amp and then what ever the coax costs. All in all still far less than $200 but not free to switch by any means, and this is with me installing the items. If I were elderly or physically impaired and had to pay some one the costs could really be large. Thanks for your advice.

Rocky in MO

Leroy · Feb 17, 2009

You just need a bigger antenna

buickanddeere · Feb 17, 2009

The quality of those converters vary and is the cause for much gripping about dtv.
Most of the people who can't get dtv but had 6-10 analog channels previous. They need to toss the $40.00 convertor. And get a converter with better sensitivity and selectivity specs plus the hdmi connection.

Joe(TX) · Feb 17, 2009

Channels 2-13 are VHF currently
Channels over 13 are UHF
Digital mostly affects the current VHF channels

tjdub · Feb 18, 2009

I think you're better off buying a manufactured one if you're just looking to save money. If you're doing it for the learning/fun there is a lot of information out there.

This one is pretty commonly copied:

http://www.hdtvprimer.com/ANTENNAS/cm4221.html

Digital antenna

Anonymous-0

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ldj

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