Telling it like it is. The goal here is to share with you the equipment needed to complete the antenna installation. Over 30 years and counting. Here's our rundown of mistakes to avoid when buying a TV antenna. Little a consumer can do except get educated and recognize scams when you see one. TV antenna range is the distance a TV antenna can receive a TV signal that is stable and reliable day in and day out.
Around the year when the U. The digital transition was completed in Another scam you should be aware of before installing a TV antenna.
Pay no attention to any reference claiming the antenna is designed for better 4k TV reception performance. Bottom line, there's no such thing as a 4k TV antenna. Any TV antenna that claims to perform better because it's a 4k TV antenna is a scam. The simple answer is yes it is. We've tested a lot of antennas and equipment.
For reliable TV reception nothing works better than the items on this page. Precisely tuned and test range certified antennas. TV signals are best receive by individually dedicated antenna elements cut to length to match the TV signal frequency in use. The more precisely tuned frequency dedicated elements a TV antenna has the better it will perform.
A few things to consider before making the attic install. How to determine your chances a TV antenna will work in the attic. Factors that affect attic TV reception.
How to select a TV antenna for your attic. Stack TV antennas together to improve performance. The proper order for Stacking and coupling TV antennas. How many channels will I receive with a TV antenna? Indoor vs. Should I try an Indoor Antenna? In nearly every situation; a well-designed outdoor TV antenna will outperform and provide better TV reception than a well-designed indoor antenna. Will a signal booster always improve TV reception?
Install the screws from the inside of the cap. The head of the screw will be close to the edge of the cap preventing the use of an unmodified washer. The prototype used no washers on the inside of the cap.
They are not necessary. Once the screws are installed, fit the loops ends of BOTH big loops over each of the feed point screws followed by a 10 stainless washer, a 8 stainless washer, and a stainless nut. The top loop is placed onto the screws first followed by the lower loop on the prototype. There is no washer between the large loop elements. The washer is placed onto the stud after both loops are in place.
Holding each of the loops in the proper orientation, tighten down progressively on each of the nuts. It is easy just to "eyeball it" or assembly could be done over a yard stick or ruler to verify they are up and down and centered.
NOTE: A little bit of rough sanding or scuffing on the small loop ends adds a little friction to keep the loops in place. Not too much. Just take the shine off. I tightened this whole assembly quite a bit. Not enough to break something - but enough that I could tighten and loosen the balun matching transformer attach nuts onto the same stud and be able to remove them without the whole thing coming loose. Just snug it up very good.
Once your Pennyloop Antenna is completed from the plans, a number of mounting options are available. You may choose to mount the antenna inside, or in an attic, or mount the antenna on an outside mast. Below you will find a how-to description to build the prototype Pennyloop mast mount. It is quite simple and an effective solution to mount your Pennyloop antenna. PVC works best for the construction of the mast mount because it is low cost, a good insulator, and is readily available.
The grey conduit is UV resistant to some degree, and would work just as well for the small mast and very low weight and wind load of the antenna. The Pennyloop itself weighs 5 oz! Cut one of the pieces to 12" and the other to 6". The lengths are not critical and could be changed to fit your location. Clean up and bevel the ends of the PVC tubes with a sanding block and sand paper. Slip the pieces into a 90 degree elbow fitting. Doing them one at a time, use a mallet and tap them into place for a tight fit.
No need for PVC cement. Set one end down on concrete and tap the other end with a rubber mallet Or piece of wood. I chose to do this because the PVC elbow has a slight inward angle to it.
It allows the plane of the antenna to be angled slightly upwards instead of downwards. A PVC cap is also used at the end of the shorter mast mount tube. This is used to keep the entire assembly "flush" with the mast. Otherwise, the elbow alone will not allow a flush mount without some sort of spacer, etc. After the mast mount is completed, simply slide the antenna onto the end of the PVC pipe. Again, no cement is used. This connection is only hand tight to allow removal, if necessary, to access the heads of the feed point screws for re-tightening or removal if necessary and it allows you to rotate the antenna, by hand, to align it vertically.
You may want to remove it later to experiment with different loop sizes and element diameters, etc. Install a good quality to 75 Ohm outdoor matching transformer and connect to your coax. Zip-tie your coax so that it has a drip loop, as seen in the photos, before making the coax to balun and balun to feed point connections. If not, damage to the lead ends of the matching transformer could result. Most matching transformers come with some type of weatherproofing boot to protect from the environment.
It is not shown in the above photos for clarity. The builder should make every effort to keep all connections out of the weather if possible. Indoor or attic mounting opens up the possibility for many more mounting options. For instance, wood has been used successfully as the center insulator when the antenna has been mounted in a dry location.
Others have mounted their antennas with lexan and thin plywood insulators to make a 'flush mount' to hide the antenna indoors on a book shelf or to simply hang the antenna on the wall behind the TV. This works really well with the optional direct coax feed described in the plans. It allows for a short length of coax and no worries to figure out how to mount a matching transformer. The lead ends of some matching transformers are not really designed to have the weight of the coax pulling on them without some type of support.
The Pennyloop antenna was designed to be a high performance, low cost antenna for indoor and outdoor use. It uses solid copper elements and stainless hardware for superior all weather performance. The design also offers a very wide beam width on each side broadside making it very easy to aim.
This wide beam width is very nice for locations that have multiple transmitting antennas. Here are a few photos during the building process. A round object that has a " diameter can be used as a form to shape very nice and smooth loops. It can also be noted in the above photos that when the PVC cap is used it results in the feed point screws being angled outward. I use a pair of lineman's pliers to bend the loop ends to the proper angle for attachment. It is easy to just approximate the angles needed and finish up the final bending and shaping once both big loops are attached to the center insulator.
One may choose to mount the twin loops to something other than a PVC cap and it would eliminate this step. Once both loops are fitted over the feed point screws install a 10 stainless flat washer, a 8 stainless flat washer and the nut.
The second nut seen in the photos is for the installation of the matching transformer. Dimensions and photos of the Optional Aluminum Reflector can be found on the following page in Step 2. The 10 and 8 washers are used with the conduit strap. The 10 followed by the 8 washer and then the nuts. Cut the pieces out on the lines that are marked. Note: The conduit clamp screws are degrees to the reflector screws.
In the above photo —only one of the two screws were installed into the conduit clamp. The reflector is mounted at a distance of 3. Two half-wavelength rods behind the top and bottom ends of the loops give some additional gain.
Many materials and options are available for the reflector, such as copper wire, copper tubing, square or round aluminum tubes, etc. The above reflector design uses a single piece of stock angle aluminum keeping cost to a minimum. It is not so simple or easy for round tubes unless perhaps using a drill press with a centering jig, etc.
As the Pennyloop is gaining in popularity, especially where signal strength is good enough for an effective indoor or attic antenna, more builders are choosing to connect directly with coax, no matching transformer, when mounting indoors. It eliminates the need to purchase a matching transformer along with finding a way to mount it securely indoors so as not to pull on the fragile twin lead connectors that are usually present on the typical transformer.
The Channel Master matching transformer has heavy leads and strong ring terminals that will work great indoors and outdoors. To make the connection with coax, the antenna end of the coax is carefully stripped of the outer jacket about an inch and a half from the end without cutting into the braid.
Next, the braid is slowly loosened up and gathered to one side where it is twisted together and an appropriate ring terminal is crimped on. Most likely, a blue or red ring terminal for a 6 stud will be needed depending on the amount of braid.
Next, an appropriate amount of the inner insulation is removed to expose the center conductor. Do not score the center conductor when removing the insulator. Enough insulation will have to be removed to be able to make a 'j-hook' on the end of the center conductor. Care needs to be taken to ensure that neither the foil nor the braid touch the same side of the antenna that the center conductor is attached to. If this happens, the antenna will not work until it is corrected.
The builder must ensure that, if mounting this way, the coax crosses the bottom of the loop at a degree angle ,as shown, if hanging on a wall, etc. A matching transformer can always be used to make the connection. I have included a few more photos that detail the use of the Direct Coax Feed for outdoor use.
Performance of the Direct Coax Feed has been equal to or slightly better than several matching transformers that were tested. I would like to give a brief description of how to accomplish this setup for anyone who may be interested in giving it a try. When making the open end of coax for outside use, whether it will be completely exposed to the elements or contained in a weatherproof box, the center conductor and the braid will need to have some additional protection.
After opening the end of the coax the aluminum braid is gathered on one side of the coax and a liberal amount of dielectric grease is used to thoroughly coat the braid strands before they are twisted together and the crimp terminal connection installed. Once the j-hook on the center conductor is made for the feed point it also gets a coating of dielectric grease.
Don't worry about using too much grease — the excess will squeeze out when the nuts are tightened slightly with a wrench and there will be metal to metal contact. Pay special attention to make sure that the very end of the center conductor wire gets grease.
Once the connections are made at the antenna, additional grease can be smeared or brushed on for a little more protection. Also, care needs to be taken to route the coax in an upward direction initially to keep water from getting into the coax.
Make sure to use several zip-ties to keep the coax steady in the wind. A PVC plug was used to fill the open hole in the box and a wood clamp was installed to keep the coax from being pulled on and twisted. Another single screw comes into the box to mount the wood clamp. Do not crush the coax in the clamp - only tighten as necessary. The photos above depict the Direct Coax Feed but the box will easily accommodate the use of a matching transformer also keeping everything out of the weather.
The coax could be run in various ways from that point depending on your mounting requirements. Also, when locating the holes in the reflector vertical support make sure that the reflector is centered behind the loops vertically and not centered on the cover plate.
As previously mentioned, a matching transformer can always be used to connect your Pennyloop to coax. If you have purchased or installed coax with the connectors already in place, I would not recommend using the Direct Coax Feed.
The matching transformer will be just fine. Also, I would use a quality matching transformer with a good weather boot or the Direct Coax Feed in a weatherproof box if the antenna will be in a hard to reach location. A few more notes on the Direct Coax Feed: The original intent of the Pennyloop Antenna was to provide a very simple and straightforward high performance design that was easy to build with locally purchased materials, including not having to purchase a matching transformer.
If the builder uses a high quality coax with good shielding the performance can meet or exceed that of a Pennyloop Antenna with a matching transformer. That being said, the matching transformer is a very convenient method of attaching your coax to the antenna and there is nothing wrong with it's use. I am very confident in the outside Direct Coax Feed presented here.
It has been in place for quite a while now in all types of weather and is performing exceptionally well. I included an early photo of a direct coax feed test on the Pennyloop Antenna. It can be noted that the crimp connection on the braid made that side a little long resulting in the braid leaving the coax at a fairly sharp angle before heading down to the feed point. I did go back at a later time and tested this connection to see if it had any noticeable effect on the signal strength.
It was tested as seen in the photo and then a longer and more symmetrical connection like the one shown in the box was tested. There was no noticeable change in the signal strength, but I would recommend that if you are going to use the Direct Coax Feed make sure that the coax ends are symmetrical and that they taper smoothly back to the coax.
I am also using Noalox dielectric grease with very good results. I would highly recommend that you wear gloves to smear it into the braid. Question 6 months ago on Introduction. Using your spec of 28 inched for each loop - what frequency did you "design" to?? Mine works great pre-amped, fed thru a to 75 ohm transformer with a rectangular piece of Mylar as a reflector..
Thanks for a great antenna idea My next build will be made with the 28 inch spec. Comments welcome Works great just taped to the interior West facing wall The reflector is about 5. My weakest station - Comet on I made mine with 8 gauge solid copper. I placed my 28" pieces in vice grip then drill on the other end to "stiffen" the piece before bending around a vase. Only difference is my actual washers and bolts were copper as well leftover telecom junk. I seem to think this will help improve the Rx ability with slightly more conductance rather than using stainless steel.
I didn't have the patience to mess with PVC pipes so at hardware store you you can find these PVC type board that would work good. In my case I used leftover vinyl transition strip.
If I wanted to change azimuth I could affix something to the back for tilt and azimuth pulled off a small panel antenna. Love this design, works great and thanks for the idea. Works much better than my bowtie 4 bay design believe it or not.
My only question with use outdoors is how does one weatherproof this? I hear the connection joints are the most vulnerable to corrosion based interference. I thought about spraying every bit of copper with clear acrylic, something that is not going to interfere with the incoming signal. Question 9 months ago on Step 3. Thank you for the post, we have built one of your loop antennas here in Vanuatu and it works very well, we don't have a Balun yet or correct Copper wire, we have used old clothes hangers.
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