[mythtv-users] Attic antenna

[drew einhorn]

On Mon, Aug 31, 2009 at 8:55 AM, jason maxwell<decepticon at gmail.com> wrote:
> It looks like the OP got his questions answered, so rather than start
> another thread with the same title, I'll just hijack :)
> Right now I have a tinfoil and coat hanger quad bowtie antenna in the attic
> that works very well.  I'm ~35-45 miles from 2 major cities (DC/Baltimore).
>  Right now I'm grabbing all the DC stations with no problem.  If I turn the
> antenna, I can pick up some Bmore stations too.  I would like to make a
> second antenna so that they can be simultaneously pointed at each city.
>  Would this work if I just hooked both to a simple splitter, or do I need a
> fancy combiner of some sort?
> TIA.


If you point the antenna at DC can you see the Baltimore stations,
and vice versa?

A simple splitter/combiner will probably work for signals received
by only one antenna.  Signal to noise ratio will be a bit worse since
you are receiving noise from both antennas.

Things get more complex for signals received by both antennas,
it depends on the phase difference between the signals.
And there are impedance match issues.

Another coat hanger and tinfoil antenna and cheap splitter/combiner
won't cost much.  Try it, and let us know how it works.

Antennas are weird, unless they are precisely designed and manufactured,
results can be very counter intuitive.

-- 
Drew Einhorn