TV AMP

[fairbankshockeypuck]

TV amp yes or no....I get great local reception with the outdoor TV antenna/Clearstream 4 max antenna/about 15 foot in the air..would I be able to pull in more distant stations with an outdoor amp at antenna...Maybe it's atmospheric, but I get more stations at night...but they diappear with no signal daytime...

West of Saginaw/South of Midland...Hemlock...lots of radio signals
I get 6.1 and 53.1 and 53.2 with two levels consistantly..
at night i got 47 out of Lansing///even touched 20 and 7 from Detroit ///it scanned channel 10 Lansing but couldnt get a signal.

Thanks for any info

[Ben Zonia]

Preamplifiers work best on fairly strong signals, because most of them add noise to weaker signals. It has to do with the noise figure of the preamplifier. If it's really low, but not overloaded with strong signals, it might work a little better on some marginal signals.

This antenna only specifies 2.5 dBi maximum on 7-13. That is only 2.5-2.15=0.35 maximum dBd (A tuned dipole is 0 dBd, and there is no such thing as an isotropic antenna, it's just a concept in Physics.) When they specify maximum gain this low, much of the range may be below 0 dBd.

https://store.antennasdirect.com/ClearS ... 7c0a1cb827

[HD74]

An amp may not help, and actually make things worse.
Close stations may overload the amp and receiver.
In your case, I would borrow an amp and try it.
You may see improvement, and may not.

[Marcus]

If possible additional antenna height will usually help the most.

[Ben Zonia]

The height factor is important. If possible, get the antenna up to 20 to 30 feet.

http://ham-radio.com/k6sti/height.htm

This link is based on 98 MHz, but other frequencies will show similar increases with height.

[k8jd]

I would try a bigger and higher antenna before investing in a preamp.
A preamp may be best for overcoming the losses of an extra long coax line from ant to TV. Like a circuitous routing for a Coax cable thru the house , before it gets to the TV receiver.
An other example, when I moved to the far suburbs I put up a good antenna and fed it with good quality coax cable, had 4:1 transformers on both ends. . I had fine VHF reception but the UHF signals had much snow and fading in and out. (PRE DTV)
SO I Changed to 300 Ohm twinlead and only had transformer on the TV end. That cleared up my UHF reception.
Matched Z twinlead has a lot less loss then Matched Z Coax at UHF freqs !

[Ben Zonia]

The Winegard 7694 or 7698 are the performance standards in most markets, but for Channels 2-6, you need the very large 8200. You really need a rotator to take full advantage with those, though an "Armstrong" rotator might suffice in some cases.

[Ben Zonia]

Winegard HD8200U Technical Data, Gain in dBd (add 2.15 to compare antennas shown in dBi) by channel, Patterns by channel.The performance of the HD7698 are similar to the 8200U on channels 7-69.

https://www.solidsignal.com/Manuals/HD8200U_Specs.pdf

https://www.solidsignal.com/Manuals/HD7698_Specs.pdf

[km1125]

The Winegard 7694 or 7698 are the performance standards in most markets, but for Channels 2-6, you need the very large 8200. You really need a rotator to take full advantage with those, though an "Armstrong" rotator might suffice in some cases.

But you really wouldn't need that unless you were trying to get WHNE, would you? Is there anybody else in the market in the low band?

[Ben Zonia]

The Winegard 7694 or 7698 are the performance standards in most markets, but for Channels 2-6, you need the very large 8200. You really need a rotator to take full advantage with those, though an "Armstrong" rotator might suffice in some cases.

But you really wouldn't need that unless you were trying to get WHNE, would you? Is there anybody else in the market in the low band?

z

Some people say it's also good on 88-92 MHz NCE-FM.