ChuckO
TVWBB 1-Star Olympian
You could be right, presently I’m aimed at 278 which is west, I’m thinking about aiming at the towers at 173 which is south
Indoor/Outdoor HDTV Antenna with Mast
- Thread starter ChuckO
- Start date
ChuckO
TVWBB 1-Star Olympian
I’m not overly thrilled with the chimney mount, I’m going to look into a different mountI used something similar for DTV (and later, Dish Network) and it worked well for me. Of course, the more you use it, the better you get at using it. What really made a difference for satellite antenna aiming for me was a lensatic compass like this:
View attachment 108147
There may be something better or more appropriate for your needs out there, but this is what I used for finding potential obstructions. I remember one time in particular at Patrick's Point I swear I was shooting over the tops of the trees but any little breeze would cause me to lose signal.
View attachment 108149
Also, you could buy an antenna tripod (mine is a Radio Shack but probably NLA) and a decent length of pipe from a fencing store and change your antenna location to try to find a better spot.
Wilmer Cogburn
TVWBB Super Fan
My iPhone compass app would go nuts when it was within 10-15' or so of the antenna and produce bogus results.
Ultimately I used it on the ground, aimed the iPhone, saw a target on the horizon, and aimed the antenna there by eye while on the roof.
Ultimately I used it on the ground, aimed the iPhone, saw a target on the horizon, and aimed the antenna there by eye while on the roof.
Brett-EDH
TVWBB Olympian
exactly. i aim when no antenna is nearby and then i tack down a blue masking tape strip in the direction i need to aim towards. then install the antenna and align it's face with the masking tape's direction. and then do any fine tuning while running live to the tv to confirm picture visual quality.
Keith Jenkins
TVWBB Fan
ChuckO, please forgive me for asking if you already have the amp bypassed, but since you don't have power to the amp, have you been connected through the amp, or is your antenna lead to your single test TV connected directly to the antenna? For locating signals without power to the amp, I would start with a lead directly between the antenna and a single TV, no splitters, no amps, etc. Once you can get power to the amp, you can try reception with the amp in-line, but no splitters until you know how much signal you're getting. The signal loss through an un-powered amp can be pretty high.
ChuckO
TVWBB 1-Star Olympian
I bypassed the amp entirely, the cable was straight from the antenna directly to the TV. I picked up the cables I needed, connected the amp to the antenna, connected the power module (the thing that looks like a splitter and has a low/high gain switch) I'm still aimed at 278 degrees (west) and I get nothing. Tried both high & low gain.....Nothing. There's two towers between 170 & 175, so I'll aim the antenna at 173 and see if I can get them. If not, my last resort is aiming at 214. If that doesn't work, I need to second guess my set up. Maybe if I go higher (add another 10' to the pole) try a different antenna location (not overly thrilled the the chimney strap set up) or.......Hopefully ya'll have some other suggestions.
Maybe a setup like this one about a mile from my house
Attachments
Keith Jenkins
TVWBB Fan
Chuck,
I looked at a few of those DTV reception mapping sites that i know take the surrounding terrain into account, and entered your location information.
The first one is the official FCC DTV reception maps site, which states:
"These predictions are based on a terrain-sensitive propagation model resembling but not identical to the propagation model used when calculating service and interference contours for licensed broadcast television stations. Actual signal strength may vary based on a variety of factors, including, but not limited to, building construction, neighboring buildings and trees, weather, and specific reception hardware. Your signal strength may be significantly lower in extremely hilly areas."
That site uses a default 30ft antenna mounting height, and came up with only three stations that are in possible reception range (KRCR, an ABC affiliate, KIXE, a PBS affiliate, and KNVN, an NBC affiliate):
The other site is TVFool.com, which while uses data that is somewhat stale, seemed to agree with the FCC site.
I was able to specify an antenna height on the TVFool site, so initially I tried what I thought would be a more realistic 10 ft height - you can see those results here: http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=29&q=id=b0fed827d332e0
With antennas, higher is very often better, so I tried some hypothetical what-if heights to see if I could get at least some of the stations to have a path of "line of sight" (LOS) rather than "single edge diffraction" (1Edge). At a 95 ft(!) antenna height, I was able to get the top three listed stations to be LOS. See those results here: http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=29&q=id=b0fe8e4cfaa7fc . Not sure you'd want to attempt to mount an antenna on a tower that high though.
I looked at a few of those DTV reception mapping sites that i know take the surrounding terrain into account, and entered your location information.
The first one is the official FCC DTV reception maps site, which states:
"These predictions are based on a terrain-sensitive propagation model resembling but not identical to the propagation model used when calculating service and interference contours for licensed broadcast television stations. Actual signal strength may vary based on a variety of factors, including, but not limited to, building construction, neighboring buildings and trees, weather, and specific reception hardware. Your signal strength may be significantly lower in extremely hilly areas."
That site uses a default 30ft antenna mounting height, and came up with only three stations that are in possible reception range (KRCR, an ABC affiliate, KIXE, a PBS affiliate, and KNVN, an NBC affiliate):
The other site is TVFool.com, which while uses data that is somewhat stale, seemed to agree with the FCC site.
I was able to specify an antenna height on the TVFool site, so initially I tried what I thought would be a more realistic 10 ft height - you can see those results here: http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=29&q=id=b0fed827d332e0
With antennas, higher is very often better, so I tried some hypothetical what-if heights to see if I could get at least some of the stations to have a path of "line of sight" (LOS) rather than "single edge diffraction" (1Edge). At a 95 ft(!) antenna height, I was able to get the top three listed stations to be LOS. See those results here: http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=29&q=id=b0fe8e4cfaa7fc . Not sure you'd want to attempt to mount an antenna on a tower that high though.