CM-7777 Using 12Vdc Power Supply

The Kitztech is a very good amp (I swear by them and own two!) but, as fred555 notes, it is not waterproof. You will need to put it in a waterproof enclosure.

- Trip
 
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Just an update:

This weekend installed the antennas, rotor, top-of-mast enclosure, SiliconDust and WiFi parabolic grid mounted and flying 2/3 of the way up at 45 feet. Waiting for one more auger type ground anchor to arrive on Wednesday to install the guy wires. I know that it should be able to extend up to the 65' point, but just don't want to risk it at this point with just 1600lbs base and the wall /eave mount. Spent much of Saturday installing a new worm drive winch. 10 cranks per inch, 120 cranks per foot, less that 5000 cranks to raise the top by 40'+..... going to rig an adapter for the drill to save my arms! :D

After several hours of testing, I decided to run the SiliconDust from the POE break-out and run the CM-7777 power from the power supply at the base via coax to the power insertion located in the top-of mast enclosure. Tried to run the antennas without the CM-7777, but not a single channel could be received. Some were borderline with channel data populating, but not enough to display programming.

Crazy results.... at 45 ft, not a single Sacramento station (35 miles away), but high Signal Quality on 42 channels from San Francisco, CA (135 miles) and 8 channels from Chico, CA (NW 40 miles). Seems that due to the terrain and lack of line of sight, the Sacramento stations may only come in on the ground effect. Love the project, but frustrating to have put over 4 days of hard labor and still be up in the air (LOL) on if we will be able to get the local Sacramento stations next weekend when the top finally gets lifted to 65'. Might end up with Two antennas at 65' and two and 12'.

Another issue: despite decent Signal Quality readings, most channels have a glitch in the audio and video every few seconds. Never experienced this glitching before when running the antennas at the 12' level. Just ordered a Kitztech and see if that helps.

Here are a few photos of the project so far:

Tower looks small on a 22' trailer. Laying forward on the tongue and off the rear
IMG_3631.JPG


Base with the original "Death Trap" winch before installing new worm drive winch
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Sitting at 30' / WiFi for Ubiquiti PTP fixed to the North for 60Meg link to office 1/2 mile distance
OnTower.JPG


The enclosure box (door removed) at the top of the tower. POE for HDHomeRun and CM-7777 power insertion
IMG_3687.JPG
 
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All prepped and ready to go up to 65-70' this weekend!

Hand swagged about 75 fittings so far for the guy wires. The isolators will be placed at top and bottom and are ready to hang with guys at approximately 40' and 60' level. The double isolators on each guy will allow them to be used for either ground radials, inverted V or linked for a long wire with tuner for amateur radio.
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Will set two 48" auger ground anchors tonight and bore a hole through the ridge beam to install 16" galvanized eye-bolt with 4x8x1/4" backing plate first thing tomorrow.

Sitting at 45' this week, had a few great early evening openings from Santa Barbara (approx. 380 miles distance). The antenna could be aimed anywhere from East to SSW and got the same SQ. Signal must have been dropping almost straight down a hole to my antenna!:)

No problems with the POE 12Vdc breakout for the HDHomeRun. Be pretty cool if SiliconDust could enable POE power natively on the HomeRun units! Maybe a switch to select plug or POE...

The Kitztech preamp arrived today and I hope to place that in-line before dark tonight to compare with the CM-7777. Hope that it removes the AV glitches that are happening on nearly every channel. Not sure what I will do if the Kitztech doesn't stop the glitches. The glitching is far too annoying to ever sit through a show.... :(

IMG_3709.JPG
 
Eight hours later.... No guys installed, but focused on the electronics and other antennas.

Swapped out to the Kitztech amp and don't receive any channels. Place the CM-7777 in-line and receiving 25+ channels (with AV glitches). Might have a bad Kitztech amp and will check with their support to troubleshoot. Frustrating....

On the HDRun meter, the highest signal strength with the Kitztech is 45% with no quality compared to 95% signal level and quality readings on locking MUXes with the CM-7777.

Added a 24" stand-off bracket at 65' with pulley and halyard. This way it will be easy to raise and lower only the inverted V for amateur radio. Added another 36" stand-off bracket at 45' for the Jetstream JTD2 discone antenna.

Peaked the Ubiquiti grid parabolic for solid 65-75meg throughput for the office connection. HD TS full bandwidth streaming from the C-band dish to my home PC. Loving parts of this project!!! Going to play with frequency hopping and priorities to see if I can squeeze out another 10-20meg throughput. :)
 
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It would have been an easy test on the ground, but things are much slower in the air.

The power inserter was defective. Swapped out the inserter and the Kitztech came to life. Wow! I am impressed! The Kitztech amp is bringing in so many more stations with much higher quality readings. The average SNR increased 10 - 15% and the AV glitching is gone!

No formal test yet, but in 15 minutes of scanning on two headings, logged 65 channels. Quite an improvement!

Count me in as a Kitztech fan!
 
Thanks Brian. I had already dug around and found it, don't know what I typed in that I couldn't find it on first search.
Yes, looks like the KT-200 is the way to go.
 
Wow I dont know if I would put the HDHomerun that far up in the air, and am concerned it may need air flow to keep it cool. I have two of those units die on me and that would be a pain to have to go up that high to fix it. I would put the pre amp up there but the HD homerun lower to the ground for easy access.
 
Been running a HDHomerun outside in a enclosure at the antenna for about three years. This has been the only way that I could receive any channels on the ground mounted antennas.

When running the HDHomerun in the house, only one channel would reliably lock. This was through approximately 75' of quad shield copper core RG6 with a single ground block inline. Signals are so near threshold that every little dB makes the difference between locking and nothing.
 
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