OTA with antenna possible?

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With the help of my father in law we got the antenna up. :) It's connected via 50' of coax to the diplexer for our DISH install into our living room (it looks like the installer did it this way for our living room only for some reason, and not the entire house). Once I actually mount the coax to the house I will most likely be able to shorten the coax by about 5 to 10 feet hopefully.

I get KLTV (ABC) at between 91 and 100% on the signal meter
KYTX (CBS) is at 66% which is amazing considering it is the farthest tower of the 4 and the one I was most concerned about.
KETK (NBC) is at 68%
The one that surprised me is KFXK (FOX). It didn't find the station. I have the antenna pointed at about 170 degrees as I wanted to try to get somewhat close to all 4 of the stations. I'm afraid if I move it to try to get closer in line with KFXK I'll lose KTYX. KTYX is for sure deep fringe as I've briefly lost the signal a few times this evening.

All in all I found 8 channels total with 3 of them being from KLTV.

I know you can't use a preamp with it diplexed with the DISH signal, but can I install some sort of amp once it's separated in the DISH triplexer near the receiver? I can't run a separate cable for the OTA.
 
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It's good to hear that you are getting some channels :cool: If you're worried about losing your prime spot just mark the pole with a pencil or marker so you know where to move it back to. I would at least try to see if you can lock the FOX channel in and then work from there. This is where a manual tuner box comes in handy so you can see the signal strength and how close you are to getting it.
 
Would a preamp or a signal booster take care of getting our FOX channel as well as boost the signal on CBS and NBC?
 
due to the distances you are trying to get I would say yeah a booster would help

preferably the 2 piece unit (pre-amp at the antenna and the booster part in the house)
 
Knowing what you said earlier about a pre-amp not working properly diplexed with a DISH signal, is there any other way to hook up a pre-amp that wouldn't require me to run a new cable which will be impossible?
 
I'm hoping when I go to actually mount the coax from the antenna to the diplexer this weekend I will be able to eliminate about 10-15ft worth of coax. How can I install a pre-amp with the diplexed line??
 
As long as the power injector has no switch, diplexor or splitter between it and the pre-amp you can use the pre-amp.

Of course if the diplexer is outside that could be a problem because the power injector is probably not waterproof.
 
Does DISH have a diplexer that allows power to pass on the antenna port?
 
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Saturday morning I was able to clean up the cable run from the antenna to the outside diplexer. I was able to shave off a good 13-14 feet of coax and this included making a drip loop and mounting that on the side of the house. The signal didn't improve any so a pre-amp is definitely required so that is the next step.

I did learn real quick that I should have made sure our receiver should have been turned off as when I was replacing the cable on the antenna side I could feel the voltage running through the diplexer. :) It was more of an annoyance than anything though.
 
I learned something about extra coax about 2 years ago.

My cable from the satellite ran from the back of the house to the east side, into the attic then back to the rear center of the house where my old 622 was located.

The signal was OK but I knew a shorter run would definitely get me a stronger signal, so I bored a hole through the brick and drywall and came right in near the living room TV.

My 25 ft if pre fab coax ended up about 10 ft too long anyway - the run is now about 15 ft instead of the previous 60, so I coiled the excess up behind the TV in the corner.

Well, to my chagrin, the signal actually was worse than before, so I started messing around with the cable and when I uncoiled the loop in the corner.

The signal jumped way up.

What I had inadvertently done with the coil of coax in the corner was create a choke coil that severly dampened the signal.

The moral is to use the correct length of coax and don't coil any up anywhere it may very well kill your signal strength.

A messt random snake of cable is better than a neat ciol in the corner.
 
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Thanks to how the DISH setup has to be with our OTA installation I was thinking of something this weekend: Since a preamp requires AC power to boost the signal, and since we have DISH with a diplexer to stack both tuners on one cable, would it be possible to use a flat coax cable (like what is used in apartment installs) to still be able to run the AC adapter inside our house? So it would look like this: pre-amp installed on the antenna mast. Cable runs to the preamp diplexer. Diplexer to the diplexer for our DISH install on one side, and diplexer to the flat cable which is ran into our house via a window and connected to the AC adapter. Would this work? I do have the option of running the AC adapter outside, but because our house we are renting is so old there are no outlets outside the only outlet I have is on the light fixture by our door. Running an AC adapter there would look quite funny.

I've been looking at the Antennacraft 10G212 as our antenna is an Antennacraft. Which is better: the Antennacraft 10G212 or the Channelmaster CM7777?
 
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I've been looking at the Antennacraft 10G212 as our antenna is an Antennacraft. Which is better: the Antennacraft 10G212 or the Channelmaster CM7777?
Click to expand...

Used channel master preamps for years but got the antennacraft 10g212 when everything started going digital.Use it with a 4bay uhf antenna and honestly it works great.It has more gain than the cm 7777 which in my case (deep fringe) certainly helped.
 
Is the piece that has the AC adapter on the Antennacraft preamp rated to be used outdoors?

I'm thinking of running the power cord wire under our window so that I can plug it in inside our house. The coax connectors I would mount right by the diplexer.
 
I do not recommend using a diplexer as they are very lossy. If needed use a flat cable to pass the cable under a window. You can use a flat cable between the pre-amp and power supply. The Pre-amp power supply should be installed inside and not outdoors.
A drip loop is fine, a coil of cable can be a problem.
I prefer the CM-7777, but have not tried the Antenna Craft amp.
 
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Diplexers are used all the time and have very low loss since the signal is seperated into frequency bands, almost the entire desired signal is directed properly.
 
Is the piece that has the AC adapter on the Antennacraft preamp rated to be used outdoors?
Click to expand...

No it's not,designed for indoor use only.That's not to say you couldn't rig something up to cover it though.As long as it stayed dry it should be fine.One of those old primestar plastic boxes would work.
 
Got my preamp installed (Antennacraft 10G212). This is odd though, I redid my antenna setup to bypass any DISH diplexers and switches. I have it running from my antenna to a grounding block, to a flat piece of coax running under my window to get inside the house. From there I have a cable running to the power supply for the preamp. Power supply to the OTA module on my 722k. The red LED is lit. I have now lost 15 points on my signal for my strongest station. Nothing else comes in. If I disconnect the preamp at the antenna and connect the coax straight, I go back to 100 on my strongest station and I pull in the other 3 sets of locals in the 65 range for CBS and FOX (didn't get that one before) and 75 for NBC.

I have messed with the gain and messed with the FM Trap button (what does In and Out mean on that button)? Sometimes the ABC station (my strongest) on the preamp where it was at 85, would occasionally drop completely and come back.

Do I have a faulty pre-amp?
 
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