Those cable clips (or ties if I am thinking of the same thing) are available for various cable thicknesses at Lowe's as well as Home Depot, and probably other hardware stores. The 1/4 inch size works well for RG6 cable. You'll still need to drill holes in the mortar, insert plastic/lead plugs and put a screw through the hole of the clip into the plug. They work great. I always use stainless steel screws to prevent rusting down the road.

Your vapour barrier is not air tight anyways so a hole through it won't make any difference. You need to seal the hole from the outside to prevent water and air infiltration. I've used grout (on a concrete foundation) and clear silicone sealant on the brick mortar, which works great. I like to use an electrical box to secure the cable with one of the clamps in the electrical box and provide the screw holes for the cover plate. I've always wanted to use the type of steel clamps that Bell uses on drywall rather than electrical boxes but have never found them in any hardware stores!

quickcurrent

WeeB , they look like this.
You simply put a screw through the hole into the brick or mortar and use it like a typical TyRap (cable tie).

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a321/wee-haggis/tyrap.jpg

As quickcurrent says,you can use SS screws and wall plugs or....you can use Tapcon screws which only require a pilot hole drilled then they screw right into the wall.
Whichever screw you use,be careful not to overtighten it or you'll squish the plastic tie and go right through it.

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a321/wee-haggis/tapcon.jpg

Sounds great. Do they make really small tapcon screws? I would rather use tapcons than having to put in an anchor at every hole. Unless of course the tapcons are very expensive.

Are those made by Thomas & Betts, weehaggis?

WeeB,

Just go to home depot and get a electrical PVC pipe (1") and some pvc clamps. Just run your coax into it. Also pick up the electrical box (same section) for your grounding block. The setup will look neat and tidy!

kooguy electrical PVC ducting is probably overkill for TV cable but will look nice so long as you don't use too much. If you saw my cables going into the house at different places, you probably wouldn't want to use duct piping because it would make them stand out more, lol.

For one or two runs of RG6 you should be able to manage with 1/2" duct pipe WeeB if you choose this route (less costly and less obtrusive). Don't forget to use PVC cement at the joints with PVC duct pipe and elbows (yikes I think those are large!) going into the wall.

I must have had fog on the brain yesterday, lol. I meant "conduit pipe" not "ducting pipe" in the previous post.

Quickcurrent,
Thanks for the clarification.... You got me there.

WeeB,
Planning is everything. Try your best to get best signal on antenna mount, short and straight cable run whenever possible. I try to have less nails or screws whenever possible and yet have a secure setup.

Stampeder.
No...they are made by a company called ITW Construction in Toronto.
They only come in two sizes 3/16" (using 5/32' drill bit) and 1/4" (using 3/16" drill bit).
They do of course come in various lengths and I think the shortest is 1-1/4".
I used the 1-1/4' x 1/4" Tapcons mounting my antenna and its really secure.

According to TVfool there is no way I will be able to pick up CBC-HD T.O. The only thing I can figure is that their database has info on lower not full power. It lists the power as almost -112dBm!! That is pretty low.

May hold off on this for a while

Steve

Several posts about tilting antennas have been moved to this thread covering the topic better:

Tilting Antenna for Better Reception? (http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=106196)

cheers

How far can the mast come out of the top tower piece?

My installer has about 2 feet of the mast protruding out of the tower, most of the mast is within the tower.

How far can the mast come out of the top tower piece?You will always need a good portion of the mast staying inside the tower, so I find that it depends on two things:

the tower top piece's design

with a rotor baseplate the upper collar sleeve bearing is designed to handle a pipe of about 5 to 10 feet
allows heavier antennas like VHF yagis
without a rotor baseplate (only a collar sleeve bearing) keep it below 5 feet and no big rig antennas

the material of the mast pipe

the extruded steel stuff is much lighter but not as strong resisting extreme windiness
galvanized EMT is much stronger as long as your tower and/or rotor is safe with the extra weight

So I am going to using a eave mount on my house. There will be 4 lag screws being screwed into the eave. Is there anything that I should be doing to water proof the mounting lag screws? I was thinking maybe coating the bolt heads with outdoor silicone after they are screwed in. I don't think I need to be too worried about water proofing since I am just screwing into an end stud instead of paneling on the roof. What do you guys think??

Weeb, all the info you need for waterproofing that mount is in this thread:

OTA Waterproofing, Sealants, Adhesives, Paint (http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=104181)

:)

I just bought a rotor, eave mount at S&R and the owner suggested using a
fence post as a mast. A lot of recommendations in here to use EMT conduit.

I assume both will rust where you need to cut it. Suggestions on rust paint
to keep the rust out? For attaching the ground wire, is there a special
clamp, or should I just drill a hole and attach with a metal screw?

Any other tips? Just waiting for the rain to let up ;)

Larry

Fence posts are essentially the same as EMT (galvanized steel) except that the walls are sometimes thinner. You could compare the thickness and weight of 10' lengths to see which of them will put less strain on the rotor and the tower's sleeve bearing collar. Fence top rail is maybe a better option than fence post, since it is much lighter and you can find it at Rona and Home Depot in 17ga thickness.

Cutting galvanized is tricky - if you're using an angle grinder just make sure you are upwind and wearing a particle mask with your eye protection because you do not want to inhale dust or particles. Using a sawzall or hack saw is okay but again stay upwind just for a bit of extra safety.

Galvanized steel needs a special etching primer before any paint is applied. Auto body supply shops have loads of it. If you don't use that you'll lose all the paint in no time.

I haven't checked this out, but I wonder if Rona or Home Depot would be willing to cut the product for you at the store?

Thanks for the warnings, Stampeder. I ended up buying the 1 1/4 EMT today. I will cut it with a hack saw, in my garage, out of the wind and will wear the proper gear.

Larry

I was on the roof today working on my main setup but the $10 RCA chimney kit from Addison packs 1.5" screws for 1.5" masts. (!!!) The screws end up being way too short, so I'll have to get supplies tomorrow to continue.

I also noticed some signal degradation in connectors I had installed before due to my poor installation. I use Gilbert UltraEase compressions connectors. Basically, I had left a gap (3 mm or more) between the coax dielectric and the connector base. This gap affected high frequency channels (WFFF mostly). So I've replaced the connectors so that the dielectric comes flush with the connector base and that solved the problem.

STL