What size antenna for 92020 hillside

[philip]

I would like to get rid of cable and try to go OTA. I am not sure what antenna setup would be required for the UHF stations in my area. I am not far from them, but I am located on a hill that is opposite of the tranmitters. I am not concerned with the XETV channel which is located in Mexico. I was looking at the 91XG, but I think it may be overkill and it would be nice to have something smaller. The VHF stations are a different direction and I am hoping I can use an indoor antenna for them.

Here is the tv fool report:
http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=29&q=id%3d9c6be91103d919

Thanks for you help.

Approx. Coordinates: 32.776, -116.9694
Also, the hill is covered in tall eucalyptus trees and I plan on hooking up to two ATSC tuners for media center.

[tigerbangs]

WOW, you didn't make this one easy, did you? When I look at your TVFool.com report, you are really blocked from the transmitters. Channels 8 and 10 can probably be gotten, with some effort, but FOX, NBC and and PBS are going to be a bit tough. You are right on your thinking about using an XG-91, or possibly a smaller XG-43, for the UHF stations. These antennas have the ability to tilt the antenna on their mounting , which makes it much easier to aim the antenna uphill. Tilting the antenna will allow you to take advantage of the refraction effects of the TV signal from the top of the hill.

If you are going to be up on the roof with an antenna anyway, then you should also use a small high-band VHF antenna for channels 8 and 10, so you can distribute all of your channels through a single coax cable, and won't have to depends on rabbit ears, which I guarantee you won't be very reliable. I would use a Winegard YA-6713 or an AntennaCraft Y-5-7-13 aimed at channels 8 and 10. Mount the UHF antenna on top of the VHF antenna, and combine the signals into one coaxial cable using a Pico-Macon UVSJ. if you are running to two tuners, I would use a Winegard HDP-269 preamp to overcome the splitting and line losses associated with multiple TV sets.

http://www.winegard.com/kbase/upload/ya-6713.pdf
http://antennasdirect.com/43XG_digital_antenna.html
http://www.winegard.com/kbase/upload/WC ... DP-269.pdf
http://www.solidsignal.com/pview.asp?mc ... enna-(UVSJ)&c=Signal%20Combiners&sku=
http://manuals.solidsignal.com/AntInstallGuide.pdf

[philip]

Thanks for all of the information, it is greatly appreciated.

I'm going to order a 91XG and mount it to see if I can pull in the UHF stations before purchasing any other equipment. I am thinking that I won't need a signal amp if I am running a short (less than 10 feet) cable run from the antenna straight to a single receiver for testing, is that correct?

[tigerbangs]

If you use the XG-91 with a short length of coax cable, you shouldn't need a preamp, although, you really need to have the antenna installed in or very near it's permanent position to know for certain if it will work. You may need to try different locations to find one that works on your property.