tenstu, what are your cable lengths from your 4228 and 4221 to your combiner? I have a 4221 here that I bought for that exact purpose, but got scared off when I heard of all the calculations to figure out for best reception.

Thanks

Tower - I am running the cables pre-combiner at 36 feet each. They are about 6 feet too long, but I am keeping the extra length in case I need it down the road for some reason.

The combiner is inside the basement now (it was on the roof in a watertight box) because with winter coming, I wanted it somewhere out of the elements and nearby in case something happened to it and it needed replacing.

I am not sure what the "calculations" are that people often use to scare people. I guess I have been VERY lucky. From the very first attempt at combining these, and with numerous changes in placement, cable legths and such, I have had zero issues. If your cable lengths are identical (or almost identical), if you have a good splitter/combiner, and if you can avoid multi-path, it really is not that big of a deal in my experience.

Stu

PS: I am not using any kind of pre-amp, which is extremely tricky when combining antennas.

Thanks Stu,

I think I'll wait. If CITY & Global increase their power in the near future, I don't think I'll have to worry about it.

On another note, I'm watching my old analogue right now, studying the picture. I'm seeing some ghosting from CTV. (pretty big separation between images too) Does Digital get rid of the ghosting?

Yes - digital solves ghosting completely. If you encounter a low signal using digital, you will see blockiness or lose the picture entirely.

I did not want the rotor because I am feeding 4 TV's and was afraid of 'arguments' about choosing the direction!

I watch this thread since us Etobians have some of the same issues as those of you in Peel and Halton with the angles between Toronto, Buffalo, and Hamilton.

I too resisted a rotor for almost 2 years for these very reasons but now that I have one, I've found my concerns unfounded. I find I use 3 directions:

a) just slightly South of the CN Tower - picks up all Toronto, Hamilton off the back, and most of Buffalo except MyTV and the religious channel out of Jamestown

b) about half way between the CN Tower and Buffalo - picks up all of Toronto and Buffalo, but lose CHCH (strangely CTS is ok).

c) directly at Buffalo - picks up all Buffalo and Hamilton, but lose Omni1, SunTV and the French channel

So as you see, in any orientation, I still get about 90% of the channels. Plus the rotor allows you to adjust for very bad atmospheric conditions (eg. when there's mist over Lake Ontario, I lose Buffalo unless I'm within a few degrees of pointing directly at Buffalo) and still get the signal.

Mind you, this is with a CM4221. The results may be different with another antenna.

El Gran Chico,

Sounds “darn good” for a CM 4221, 7778, 9521A very nice!

Much like you I have been lurking “Digital Home” and several other sites for few years now. I only started contributing to this forum earlier this year and thought I would share some of my past experiences, in hope it might help others as more people are starting to discover digital OTA reception.

Since I went HD three ago years, I originally installed CM 4228 and CM 9521A rotor and have had very good results with it. I was able to receive all the stations available at that time, to this date.

Here are some of the challenges I had to deal with my installation, our home was basically located in a hole. I would have to stand on my tipi-toes if I wanted to have a chance even to see the CN Tower, if you know what mean. When I look south and west all I could see were trees and that’s standing on the roof top of our two story house. Of course I had to deal with all the other good things like bad weather etc.

At end of last year I starting playing with combining antennas like many of you are doing or already have. If you look back at some of previous postings you might see how my setup has evolved overtime.

To-date my setup consists of 4228 + 4221 (mounted the 4221 within an inch of each other fortunately it did not have any real detrimental effects) and a rotor, three distribution amplifiers four dual splitters and two 4way splitters, attenuators etc. With this arrangement I was able to receive all twenty five digital plus the additional analog channels. Distributing a good signal to eight TV’s or more throughout the house, similar to “cable TV” connection. Of course it still suffers the typical signal dropouts, as result of poor weather conditions, fog etc. A couple months ago Channel 7.3 stopped broadcasting sports and I have notice they have now shut down the carrier as well so were down to 24 channels.

I have had a lot fun and gratification, putting this together. Experienced many interesting problems from, ( similar to what many of others have in the forum) signal overload on one channel on one TV, to distributing a right signal level to each individual tuner throughout the house. Unfortunately all the tuners don’t have the same characteristics, as it might make life a little easier. At one point earlier this year I had two rotors now that was great learning experience, it was very handy (especially in winter “no fun climbing two story house”). I even tried three antennas, but found that two were sufficient. I still use my rotor for (testing) fine tuning for bad atmospheric conditions. Some other members have posted, that they have found combining antennas quite simple that’s great, but this is just my experience. I know that what works for me, may not work for all, every installation has own unique problems.

When I look back I always have a fond memories, of just the “4228 and rotor” it was relatively simple setup and worked for a couple years for me. I am pretty sure in "general" it would work for many other Mississaugan’s and others in the GTA.

I am looking forward to the future hopefully the CTRC approves more stations. It would be nice if TVO goes digital, but for now I am just sitting back and enjoying!

Wasn’t the Beijing Summer Olympics fantastic? Next up the “Canadian Winter Olympics” GO CANADA GO :D

Biggy

BTW. I have really have appreciated reading all the posting on this forum, thanks to all.

I've been reading here for about a week now. I bought an HDTV with tuner last week at Tiger Direct with a SS clone. If I had known then what I know now, I wouldn't have gotten the SS clone.

I did some experimenting with a coat hanger bow tie, then built a cheap wooden version of the SBGH with no screen or reflectors. I've got that hooked up to a cheap 10db pre amp from The Source and 50' of RG6 to the tv set. I'm getting 24 digital channels now. Everything is coming in perfectly, no glitches or anything. :D

Here's what I get, maybe someone could tell me if I'm still missing anything? I've looked over the map and I think this is the best I can get from here:

2-1
2-2
4-1
5-1
7-1
7-2
9-1
18-1
17-1
17-2
17-3
23-1
26-1
25-1
29-1
29-2
36-1
44-1
49-1
49-2
57-1
64-1
65-2
66-1


My next step is putting in in the attic and upping the amplifier to a CM7777 or 7778, just not sure yet which would work best with an SBGH? :confused:

Great site here, tons of very helpful information.

Great results, dialed_in! That's all I get under usual conditions.

I'm suprised that I'm getting it this well considering I'm pointing right over a hydro field. There is a string of hydro towers about 100 feet (or look like it) tall just a few hundred meters to the south of me that I have to point through. I figured they would be blocking everything.

This was a trial at seeing if I could get anything. First I got the SS clone, then built a bowtie, then another bowtie, had all three of them hooked up together on the roof at one point. What a mess that was. Now with this tested and I know I can get them all, I'll build a GH. I'll put it in the attic and start splitting it off to different rooms (3 hopefully)

So lots more reading for me in my near future.

So far it has cost me approx $120.

Fun! :)

Sounds like you are having a good time isn’t the world OTA interesting and once your final master piece is completed you won’t have to pay any cable or satellite fee’s. One problem you will run into if you install it in your attic is your reception will drop off. Hopefully you will be able overcome this with GH and preamp.

Looking Good :)

My plastic build of an SBGH is finally complete. It's close to the same as 300 ohm's pvc design, but a bit smaller. I made it smaller for a couple of reasons, it needs to fit into a small attic, and I don't need the large reflector screen on it. So it's about 30 1/2 inches tall and a bit narrower too.

It picked up all 24 channels as soon as I put it on the roof to test it. The wooden one wouldn't fit into the attic. The closest I could get to testing it in the attic was having half of it hang out of the attic into the closet. Ugh! It was still picking up about 16 channels there though after being split once and going down a 50 foot feed. Things should change for the better once this one goes in there. If not, I'll be trying for a roof mount.

I'll have a tuner card and an stb for testing this week, I'll post the results once I get everything set up and start playing.

This is where I'm at currently. I have a tv with built in tuner doing fantastic, and one stb doing poorly.

My set up is as follows. SBGH on the roof, 50' of coax coming down and into the house. The line is split there with an amp that has two 12db outputs. The first output is split again with a regular splitter to two 50' lengths. One to the tv, one to the stb. The other output from the amp will go to the top floor of the house. I've tried different splitters and amps, no splitters or amps, all with the same results. Right now I'm pointing more west than south, so I'm going to try turning it more towards the south and see what happens.

I'm still kind of amazed at the difference in the two tuners. I have a View Sonic tv here with a tuner and it easily gets all the channels with no pointing what so ever. Even with all the splitters out of the lines the samsung STB won't get a bunch of channels that the tv gets.

4-1
5-1
7-1
9-1
65-2

are all missing.

2-1
17-1,2,3
25-1
26-1
44-1
57-1
and some others all come in fine. It is having some trouble locking on to 66-1, so I think I'll use that as my guide when pointing. If I can get it to come in nice and clear, it may clean up a few other ones(I hope).

Receiver: Built into Viewsonic TV
Antenna: Channel Master 4228, just stuck up in attic, pointing generally South with about 100' of Coax in one piece to TV. Really haven't even tried to "tune" the antenna position at all.
Channels:
Digital...No Display for Signal Strength that I can find in the setup of TV
4-1
5-1
7-1, 7-2
9-1
17-1, 17-2, 17-3
18-1
23-1
25-1
29-1, 29-2
36-1
44-1
57-1
64-1
Analog, like anyone cares about these :)...
5 Fuzzy
7 Fuzzy
9 Less Fuzzy
11 Less Fuzzy
17 Good
19 Good
23 OK
25 OK
26 Fuzzy
29 Fuzzy
36 OK
41 Good
47 OK
49 Very Fuzzy
52 Fuzzy
57 Less Fuzzy
69 OK

Area: Near Corner of Bramalea and Williams Parkway

Yes I am in Brampton. I'm really tight on budget since I'm basically a college student and my parents arent likely gonna support spending 100 on a antenna. It'll be out from my own pocket.

So what do you think about this antenna? Someone is selling it but I dunno if its any good...I don't know how Im gonna install it outside,
since all Ive ever used is indoor antennas...

http://kijiji.ebayimg.com/i8/06/k/000/7d/15/6c44_20.JPG?set_id=1C4000

Deep Fringe VHF/UHF TV Antenna

* 108" Wide
* 183" Long
* Analog and Digital Channels 2 - 69

BTW2: Its funny I cant get Fox, but I can get the CW network rather nicely. I hear Fox is around the same location and power as the CW...

Its funny I cant get Fox, but I can get the CW network rather nicely. I hear Fox is around the same location and power as the CW...

The contours are different. WNLO is 1000kW bi-directional, while WUTV is 1000kW but the signal is directional to the southwest from Grand Island. This is why WNLO is easier in the north and west to get than WUTV.

Digiwave antenna posts have been moved to the thread for that brand:

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=41095

radeonboy, that combo antenna will receive almost everything you want on TV in Brampton, including FM HD Radio from Buffalo.

Stampeder, how much would you offer for that antenna? They are asking for $75 but its used. You think $50 is reasonable?

That antenna looks massive. I wonder what model and make it is.

Q, the model and manufacturer of the antenna is unknown, they said the sticker has fallen off and gone. How much do you think I should offer? :confused: