Batwing vs.BatMan vs. Jack: The Results.. finally (LONG)

[SCVJeff]

I finally had time to buy a King Controls Jack antenna (on sale) for a shoot-out with my existing Winegard Batwing antenna with the Wingman add-on. This is the Jack replacement head that is a direct replacement on the Winegard mast.This test was done in Santa Clarita, just North of Los Angeles and 33 miles NW of Mt. Wilson, the 5000’ central transmit site for all the primary TV stations in LA, Orange, and significant parts of Ventura, San Bernardino, & Riverside Counties. What’s unique in Los Angeles is that we have an entirely loaded up UHF and VHF TV spectrum with VHF Ch.7, 9, 11, 13 all occupied and perfect for looking at these antennas. While there are stations scattered all over the area, Wilsom is where all the big boys live.

The following screen shots were generated by a Rhode & Schwartz ETL Spectrum Analyzer plugged into the Aux TV output of the Winegard switchbox in the RV. All lights: LED and Florescents are off to keep the RFI down to just the noise generated by the antennas internal pre-amp. That’s why there are also pics showing the pre-amp Off on each antenna and band, just to see how much noise they generate in addition to amplifying the signals at the antenna.

The measurements done were:
- Both Batwing & Jack pointed directly at Mt. Wilson on UHF. This same test was done with and without the Wingman attached on the Batwing.

- Both batwing & Jack pointed directly at Mt. Wilson on VHF. Wingman not tested has as it has no effect on VHF

- Additionally I took measurements at: -90, -45, +45, +90, and -175 degrees (mechanical stop problem). These are +& - measurements from the primary path of 116 degrees(mag) direct to Mt. Wilson.


The technical folks here will be able to read these pix, but for the non-technicals, pay particular attention to M1. M(arker)1 is simply a measurement point that measures antenna signal at the exact same frequency for consistency and displays the result number at the top of the screen. BTW- M1 is showing the TV carrier of Ch.36 (KTLA) on UHF, and Ch.7 (KABC) on VHF . LOWER NUMBERS ARE BETTER! Even though these numbers don’t move more than 10 points or so, any change of +-3db is (in marketing lingo) a 100% change in performance. The Wingman increased the Batwing performance by 3db (that can again be seen if you compare a Wingman and non-Wingman pic side by side) on UHF, so they claimed a 100% improvement. Technically true, but as a broad stroke explanation, assume that this 3db difference can easily make the difference between watchable TV or none at all, and the Wingman has proven that. Also when looking at the skew data the techies may notice that the scans are not exactly the same carrier-wise. Thats because I have adjacent channels in the high desert and toward Santa Barbara that will pop up if pointed in that direction. But they have no affect on this data.

If you look at the different signals on each picture, they should track each other. i.e.- The level differences between M1, or the carrier that it is measuring in the screen shot should look, or move vertically in level, exactly the same on all of the TV signals shown in the screen shot. If not, there are possibly response or physical design issues on the antenna. Not broken, just not perfect. Sorry for all of the pix, but it is what it is if someone wants to be able to review any combination in any direction in the future.

Here goes:

Pic #1:
Here is a shot of the Batwing with the Amp OFF just to see how the noise floor changes.



Pic #2:
No change in the noise floor. Thats good! OK, Batwing/ Wingman, Preamp on, pointed at Mt. Wilson on UHF



Pic #3:
Batwing/ Wingman pointed -45 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF



Pic #4:
Batwing/ Wingman pointed -90 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF




Pic #5:
Batwing/ Wingman pointed +45 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF




Pic #6:
Batwing/ Wingman pointed +90 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF



Pic #7:
Batwing/ Wingman pointed -175 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF (Backwards)

Looking at M1, a 21db difference is huge! This is a very directional antenna from 90 degrees around to the back of the antenna, to 270 degrees. Thats a good thing as it helps eliminate reflections and interference from other nearby transmitters.



Pic #8:
THESE ARE THE BATWING VHF TESTS
Batwing only pointed at Mt. Wilson on VHF





Pic #9:
Batwing only -45 degrees from Mt. Wilson on VHF




NOTE: + & - 90 DEGREE OR BACKSIDE TESTS WERE NOT PERFORMED ON VHF


---------------------------------------------------------------------
BATWING UHF TESTS WITH WINGMAN REMOVED

Pic #10:
Batwing only pointed at Mt. Wilson on UHF




Pic #11:
Batwing only -45 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF




Pic #12:
Batwing only -90 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF




Pic #13:
Batwing only +45 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF




Pic #14:
Batwing only +90 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF




Pic #15:
Batwing only pointed -175 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF (Backwards)


---------------------------------------------------------------------
JACK UHF PERFORMANCE TESTS

Preamp OFF test is obviously the same as it was for the Batwing. Noise is noise, so this was skipped assuming it looks exactly like the 1st picture.



Pic #16:
Preamp on. Essentially no change in the noise floor. Not too bad. Jack Antenna pointed at Mt. Wilson on UHF




Pic #17:
Jack Antenna pointed -45 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF




Pic #18:
Jack Antenna pointed -90 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF




Pic #19:
Jack Antenna pointed +45 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF




Pic #20:
Jack Antenna pointed +90 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF.
NOTE THAT THIS IS ACTUALLY ~80 DEGREES DUE TO MECHANICAL STOPS




Pic #21:
Jack Antenna pointed -175 degrees from Mt. Wilson on UHF (backwards)



---------------------------------------------------------------------

JACK VHF PERFORMANCE TESTS

Pic #22:
Jack Antenna pointed at Mt. Wilson on VHF




Pic #23:
Jack Antenna pointed -45 degrees from Mt. Wilson on VHF




Pic #24:
Jack Antenna pointed -90 degrees from Mt. Wilson on VHF




Pic #25:
Jack Antenna pointed +45 degrees from Mt. Wilson on VHF




Pic #26:
Jack Antenna pointed +90 degrees from Mt. Wilson on VHF
NOTE THAT THIS IS ACTUALLY ~80 DEGREES DUE TO MECHANICAL STOPS




Pic #27:
Jack Antenna pointed -175 degrees from Mt. Wilson on VHF (backwards)



---------------------------------------------------------------------


This is a known good batwing antenna used here. So depending on the age and condition of your Batwing, and whether or not it has a Wingman attached, there may be significant differences compared to these tests.

I kind of expected the poorer performance with the Jack on VHF, but -10db is significant. So on VHF, the Batwing clearly shines over Jack. There are too many VHF stations across the country to ignore this. The other thing that bothers me is the way that the other carriers decay when rotating the Jack. They appear to not be linear, and that's strange

Some keep bringing up the point that the Jack is "easier to point". I didn't see that in these tests. Looking at the Batwing/ Wingman (BatMan )combo against the Jack, and looking at a UHF 45 degree slew on both, there is a -5> 6db drop from the peaked carrier. Essentially the same.

I haven't really looked at the non-Wingman data much just because BatMan and Jack are more closely matched. (edit: Thanks to Dutch for catching me comparing a wrong pic for UHF). Even on UHF there is close to a 6db difference between the two antennas. But the -10db loss in gain with the Jack on VHF is an immediate show stopper for me.

Wheres the Tylenol... ?


(edit: Added numbers to each pic)

[1492]

Good info. though as pointed out, this thread is outdated and should have been automatically archived.

Feel free to start an updated thread on the subject. Thread closed.

[JaxDad]

Tom_M wrote:
This thread is almost 10 years old. I do not have access to a spectrum analyzer but my tests were vastly different from SCVJeff's. For me the Jack was on par with the Batwing for the UHF band but did poorly on VHF.

SCVJeff has not been active on this forum for several years.

I found much the same thing, plus, I can use my Jack while rolling down the road at 65 mph and never have to remember to put it up & back down.

[Tom_M1]

This thread is almost 10 years old. I do not have access to a spectrum analyzer but my tests were vastly different from SCVJeff's. For me the Jack was on par with the Batwing for the UHF band but did poorly on VHF.

SCVJeff has not been active on this forum for several years.

[Blaze1024]

Very interesting, I did similar testing a few years ago, the only difference was I was using Agilent equipment versus R@S
and my results were significantly different than yours ?

On UHF both antennas performed nearly identically which is to be expected because if I remember correctly both are simple 3 element designs.

whether it's a yagi or log periodic design it doesn't matter as a 3 or 4 element yagi is gonna perform pretty much identically to any other 3 or 4 element yagi and likewise a 3 or 4 four element log periodic is going to perform nearly identically to any other 3 or 4 element log periodic.

so if you're seeing a couple dbm difference between two four element antennas then you need to question your setup because something is not right. In engineering we call these sanity checks.

I mean something as simple is forgetting to move one antenna out of the near field of the DUT will cause problems. I mean you do understand that leaving say the winegard antenna anywhere within a dozen or so wavelengths of the king while the king was being tested would impact the performance of that antenna.

The bottom line is that there are so many variables when doing antenna system tests that without a video or detailed explanation of the setup it's hard to take the results seriously.

There is a reason why antenna tests are performed inside an Anechoic Chamber or for larger antennas at a remote antenna test range


By the way, I'm a retired engineer, my primary area of expertise is in RF electronics primarily microwave. I was also former VP in charge of prototype development for a well known aerospace company, many of the projects I worked on are flying in space right now.

The bottom line is your results don't seem to pass the sanity check, you're seeing significant differences in received signal strength between two nearly identical antennas at least on UHF, In Fact if I remember correctly the UHF add-on to the batwing is purely parasitic to it's active VHF side.

the king antenna is primarily a UHF antenna, so it's performance on VHF is not gonna be nearly as good as the winegard which has a dedicated VHF dipole. If anything the VHF dipole acting as a parasitic element on the UHF side is going to cause problems. Keep in mind dual band antennas are never as efficient as single band antennas, primarily because you can never eliminate all the interaction.

Anyhow if I recall correctly when I performed a similar series of tests the results were nearly identical on UHF between both antennas with the king being ever so slightly more sensitive on UHF, so you might wanna go back and review your setup, it's even possible that one of the antennas may have been defective

oh but hey good job with all the snapshots.

SCVJeff wrote:
I finally had time to buy a King Controls Jack antenna (on sale) for a shoot-out with my existing Winegard Batwing antenna with the Wingman add-on.

[LouLawrence]

BcBorn wrote:
King Jack has improved/redesigned their King Jack in the last couple years.

Time for a new shoot out.

Since the basic size and shape remains the same, the interior elements are still limited in size and capability.
It's highly unlikely that the results would vary by enough to be notable.

[Dutch_12078]

BcBorn wrote:
King Jack has improved/redesigned their King Jack in the last couple years.

Time for a new shoot out.

Unless they've done a radical redesign that isn't obvious in the photos, it still sucks at low-VHF reception.

[BcBorn]

King Jack has improved/redesigned their King Jack in the last couple years.

Time for a new shoot out.

[MrWizard]

I think...Unless he went West, aka sideways
His 60/50 would become either 80/30 or 40/70
He did say his campsite was between D.C. and Richmond Va.

[SCVJeff]

Move 20 miles farther out and repeat 🙂

[RoyB]

I did my comparison test here in King George VA with my antenna mount about 12-feet in the air attached to the side of my OFF-ROAD POPUP antenna.

King George is almost located right in the cent of Richmond Va and Washington DC HDTV Towers being 50-60 miles apart...

The Richmond Towers are for the most part all in the same location where as the Washington DC towers are spread apart many miles on the East and west side of the town.

I used the BATWING with the added dipoles and the JACK antenna both powered by the same 12VDC going up the RG cable from the Antenna Panel inside my POPUP trailer...

This was all done with just being able to pick the HDTV channels with no logging in of signal strength readings...

Both antenna picked up all of the transmitting HDTV Digital frequencies. i.e. I scanned in all of the same digital transmiter frequencies on my VIZIO HDTV set.

The problems I encountered was I had to move the KING antenna more precisely to zero in on the transmitted HDTV signals than I did with the BATWING antenna.... Once tuned in they looked the same quality on my VIZIO HDTV set.

I did not have to move the BATWING antenna around to pick up all of the transmitter station. I did have to find the good center position to do this however. I had problems with my CBS station which is the one Ilike to watch the most here. I could zero in on the CBS tower but would lose some of the others. I finally found the happy medium spot where all them worked with one position setting. I also noted that when using the JACK antenna overhead aircraft would sometimes give me pixel break-up in the received signal reception. Never seen any of that with the BATWING antenna.

All of this simple testing made the BATWING the winner for me haha

I now use the JACK antenna here on my house pointing towards Charlotsville and the BATWING Antenna on my off-road popup trailer...


Roy;s image

Actually the best reception I got was using a different 8-bowtie antenna panel but I am sure it would not survive all of the putting up and taking down so it lives on the peak of my house here in King George. This $60 dollar antenna has two banks where you can point to different directions and it really works great pointing towards Washington DC to pick the wide spread of HDTV towers on both side of the local town. I am picking up a good 80 plus OTA TV signal free to the public doing this... All in high def TV reception...

Google Image

My plan B for when the local cable company goes down...

Roy Ken

[MNtundraRet]

Hi everyone:

I just revived Jeff's old post since many have been reading the recent posts on using different RV antennas and added amplifiers. :B

I hope it helps some of you.

Mark B.

[pa_traveler]

I had rv dealer try both side by side and the sensar 4 with batwing worked much better, had him install it,got rid of the jenson junk.

[SCVJeff]

So there ya go...Thanks Bill

Also thanks for the clarification on the settings as well. I haven't opened the box on mine yet, but might test it too as I now have the parameters saved and can create exactly the same screenshot as the rest of the pix. It would have been nice to have 0 (zero) equal unity, but there's only so much you can do with 2 digits.

As for the amp, there is no reason whatsoever that it cannot be used with any other antenna, including a piece of wire. But when attempting to test an antenna in front of it: Batwing, Jack or that piece of wire, you simply don't touch the Sensar Pro's gain settings. I makes no difference what the gain setting is (although unity is always better), as long as it's not changed for the comparisons.

[Bill_Satellite]

So I learned something today. You are, of course, both right about the Wingman working just as well with an amplified Sensar as a non-amplified Sensar. Thank you for the correction and the additional knowledge.

However, I am correct that using the Sensar Pro as Tom_M was doing would not be a fair test of the antennas capabilities as turning the setting down from 10 to 1 would attenuate the available signal.
Here is the information I received that might better explain the use of the Sensar Pro.

The “GAIN” setting adjusts the amplification/attenuation of the signal. The SensarPro can amplify (increase) signal up to 10 dB when set to 20, or attenuate (decrease) signal if the setting is lower than 10. With the Gain set to 10, it is neutral, not amplifying, not attenuating. With the gain set to 1, like the user did in his test, it is actually attenuating (removing signal) the signal significantly, not amplifying like he thought it was doing. It is not linear, so I don’t know the exact amount of attenuation. With the Gain set to 15, I would guess it is about 5 dB, as the gain is probably fairly close to linear (amplifies up to 10 dB, 10 steps on the gain setting above 10). Of course, this is all in addition/subtraction to the amplifying that is done in the antenna head directly.