county galway rte, bbc etc best way to setup aerial

irelandhouse

hi all

could I ask a question.

We are living in loughrea and find ourselves not using sky as much, work kids etc. so what I was looking at doing was just cancelling our subscription with sky and using the chanels that are available free.

this is sound and I have added the extra utv, bbc's etc that are available as 'other channels' in sky.

What I would like to do is to put an aerial in the attic or on the chimney to pick up the regular terrestrial channels.

is there any good sites to help on this ? or could anyone sugestion the correct type of aerial to use? and is it a DIY job to connect ?

also, can you actually put the aerial into the back of the sky box and watch the channels aerial and via sky, through the sky box ? or does the aerial just go into the back of the TV directly?

coylemj

Your local RTE transmitter is Maghera (Gort) but because it was one of the original Telefis Eireann transmitters it's still broadcasting RTE 1 and 2 on VHF while TV3 and TG4 are on UHF. It's a high power signal and it's only 17 miles from Loughrea town so you may get away with an indoor (rabbit's ears) aerial, you'll need to buy a combi VHF/UHF indoor aerial. I doubt if your Sky box has an aerial (RF In) port so you'll connect the aerial direct to the TV and you'll have to use two remotes.

irelandhouse

Your local RTE transmitter is Maghera (Gort) but because it was one of the original Telefis Eireann transmitters it's still broadcasting RTE 1 and 2 on VHF while TV3 and TG4 are on UHF. It's a high power signal and it's only 17 miles from Loughrea town so you may get away with an indoor (rabbit's ears) aerial, you'll need to buy a combi VHF/UHF indoor aerial.

- how does one tell which is a uhf or vhf aerial ? my inlaws have an aerial here they never put up and said could give it a go. should I be able to just put it in the attic and put a coax cable off this ? does it have to be pointed in a specific way >

I doubt if your Sky box has an aerial (RF In) port so you'll connect the aerial direct to the TV and you'll have to use two remotes.

- the sky box we have does have an 'aerial in' port on it ?

how does one go about getting bbc etc via aerial ?

John mac

if you remove the sky card switch it off, put the card in upside down and switch on, you should have bbc1 on 101 bbc2, itv,ch4, all on the epg,

Mike 1972

You would point the end of the aerial with the shortest rods towards Maghera (Galway Clare border -near Gort)

If the aerial has a lot (10 or more) of short rods (elements) its probably UHF. If it has a small number (4-8) of longer rods its VHF. If its a flat "Grid" type its UHF

For Maghera a VHF aerial needs to have its rods vertical A UHF aerial needs them to be horizontal.

I believe there is also a "deflector" near Loughrea carrying the four main UK channels. In all probability you will need an extra UHF aerial for this but you can get these on the Sky box anyway (even without a card)

Sky boxes do have an aerial (RF) input. You connect the aerial to this and connect the "RF out" on the skybox to the aerial input on the TV

Sponge Bob

Loughrea will get its own DTT transmitter in 2010 ( sometime)

Randyleprechaun

Go to this site, it explains alot. i use it all the time

www.tvtrade.ie

Mike 1972

Randyleprechaun wrote: »

www.tvtrade.ie

Some of the TX locations on their map are a bit out ????????????

coylemj

Mike 1972 wrote: »

Some of the TX locations on their map are a bit out ????????????

And Maghera, Mulliganish and Mt. Leinster are shown as Vertical when they are actually Horizontal, I informed them of this several months ago but they've done nothing about it.

exaisle

coylemj wrote: »

And Maghera, Mulliganish and Mt. Leinster are shown as Vertical when they are actually Horizontal, I informed them of this several months ago but they've done nothing about it.

Mount Leinster is vertical on VHF anyhow...cant remember UHF...

coylemj

I just spotted that those symbols only relate to VHF as there is a note in the top left saying that all UHF is horizontal except Clermont Carn which is correct, my mistake.

exaisle

To err is human, but to completely f**k up requires a computer....