What is easiest and best way to access TV on the road?

[Marianelaine]

We will be setting off on a cross country trip this spring and would like suggestions on the easiest set-up for watching TV. We have one of those wing-things that attaches to the roof aerial and it doesnt seem to do a thing. We are NON techies so we need something easy to set up. I am wondering about those movable satellite receivers- not the dish type. Hope someone can make some suggestions for us! Thank you!

[wa8yxm]

By "Wing thing" I assume you mean the Wingman UHF director array, What it does is double the strengh of a UHF signal IF YOU ARE POINTING TO THE TRANSMITTER (the Wingman points toward the target).

Get an app or your smart phone, Antenna helper (Free) let it find your location and then choose the MAP option Now you know where to point.

Raise the antenna, Make sure it is turned on (Instructions follow) and point it in the direction indicated on your Smart Phone, (NOTE arrow on dial is 90 degrees clockwise of the antenna's direction)

On the TV, do a Channel scan

Pick a station and then turn the antenna a bit either way to peak

Do another channel scan

Option 2: NO smart phone

do Four scans, start with the antenna rotated fully conter clockwise, scan, and note number of stations see, turn 1/4 turn and re-scan, and re-note, another quarter then finish the rotation pick the best direction return to it, re-scan and then pick a station and peak as above.

Thankfully TV transmitters tend to cluster.

Turning ON the antenna....

Your RV has one of 3 or 4 ways to do that...
1: Most common is a wall plate, there is a switch a light, a 12 volt outlet and an antenna connection,, MAKE SURE LIGHT IS ON

2: Also common: A box of many buttons, these are grouped MAIN TV, TV2, VCR (or DVR) and such,, In each group is ANT, DVD, VCR(Or DVR)(Save that button is not in it's own group) CABLE, and SAT. Choose ANT make sure the power button (Far left) is on (light is on).

Sensar Pro. Touch any button, if the digital displays light up it's on, if not touch top button to turn it on.

Independent switch,, (Very rare) May say WINEGARD on the switch plate, make sure it is on.

I do rather well with the Wingman and Sensar Pro

NOTE: If you have the Sensar Pro there are additional instrctions and some other differences, the method above will work but you can do better, Reply and I'll cover it as well.

[Tom_M1]

"What is easiest and best way to access TV on the road?"

Easiest will be your TV antenna. Best depends on what your programming preferences are. If you are a sports junkie or movie addict, satellite is best. If you are out west in the middle of nowhere, you will be lucky to find any TV stations.

One thing not mentioned about your TV antenna is that the arrow on the knob inside your RV does NOT point toward the front of the antenna. The arrow is only used to stow the antenna. The front of the antenna is 90 degrees from the arrow. If you look at your antenna, the front is opposite the side that the lift arms attach to.

[Naio]

I'm another who just downloads tv shows. Bonus: no commercials.

[Dutch_12078]

lbrjet wrote:

Dutch_12078 wrote:

DISH subscribers can change their service address to get the locals where they are as often as daily if needed. My "personal best" is five changes in one week.

Got you beat. Did six changes in seven days.

Heh! Yep, you beat me... Anyone do a "seven in seven"? :B

[lbrjet]

Dutch_12078 wrote:

Merrykalia wrote:
If you use Directv or Dish at home, it is easy to take one of the receivers into the RV and using either a portable dish or the Tailgater or one of the other movable satellite dishes, gain signal to it.

We these, you can pick up all your satellite channels EXCEPT your locals, all over the US. If you want locals, you can pick them up within a 100-200 mile radius of home. You can also get them to set it up and change your location, but I think they will only do it a couple of times each year. If you will be moving often, this really isn't an option.

DISH subscribers can change their service address to get the locals where they are as often as daily if needed. My "personal best" is five changes in one week.

Got you beat. Did six changes in seven days.

[TechWriter]

Marianelaine wrote:
We will be setting off on a cross country trip this spring and would like suggestions on the easiest set-up for watching TV.

Get either a DISH Tailgater with a 211 receiver or a Pathway X2 with one (or two) 211 receivers.

If you're going West to East Coast, then the Pathway X2 may be better for you.

Regardless, you can use DISH's Pay As You Go plan to turn on & off your service.

[Dutch_12078]

Merrykalia wrote:
If you use Directv or Dish at home, it is easy to take one of the receivers into the RV and using either a portable dish or the Tailgater or one of the other movable satellite dishes, gain signal to it.

We these, you can pick up all your satellite channels EXCEPT your locals, all over the US. If you want locals, you can pick them up within a 100-200 mile radius of home. You can also get them to set it up and change your location, but I think they will only do it a couple of times each year. If you will be moving often, this really isn't an option.

DISH subscribers can change their service address to get the locals where they are as often as daily if needed. My "personal best" is five changes in one week.

[BB_TX]

If you are not getting anything on the TV from the antenna I would guess one of four things;
Your TV is an older analog TV,
You have not selected the correct input from the menu and done a correct scan for stations,
Your antenna booster is not on (switch located somewhere in the RV),
Bad or incorrect wiring.

There are places where over the air TV is not available. But if you are ever any where near a large city you should be able to get some channels.

[RoyB]

Bucky Badger - Nope... I guess you are referring to the Solid Signal Xtreme Signal HDB8X 8 Bay VHF/UHF HDTV Antenna (HDB8X). Got it all put together and finally got the right PRE_AMPLIFIER to use. It is laying up against the patio here waiting for spring haha...


I did fire up it up sitting on the ground to test out how it picks different UHF channels with the two movable arrays with one antenna pointing.

I think it is going to be a good antenna for me.... Should out perform the BATWING antenna thumbs down...

We are probably hogging the OPS thread here...
Roy Ken

[RoyB]

NOMAD297 - Seems like everyone keeps asking the same questions. same goes with questions about batteries, loud generators, irate neighbor campers, etc... just to name a few...

Just hoping some of my comments helps someone from time to time...

Roy Ken

[RoyB]

lbrjet - Thanks for the history lesson... I never had a need for the RV TV until I got my 2008 OFF-ROAD POPUP. My old analog TV only went from CH1-CH13 I guess... Only a few channels in the UHF range I could pick up with my analog TV setup... All of my TV was from CABLE TV HOOKUP in the house of recent times.

This all changed big time when the BROADCAST went digital and I added the digital HDTV to the RV then. This was the first time I ever used digital TV from an outside antenna when I got my 2008 POPUP trailer.

Pretty neat stuff now...

Roy Ken

[nomad297]

RoyB wrote:
We use the OTA BATWING UHF Antenna to pick up the National Broadcast digital TV when on the road.

It does have some drawback but we get 6-36 channels just about everywhere we go here on the East side of the US.

Perhaps you are not doing it right.

You should have a digital High Def TV set... You need to set the menu for ANTENNA and point the OTA Antenna towards the local town transmitting BROADCAST TV. Then you have to use the HDTV menu and scan in the digital stations every time you stop somewhere. Make sure you have the ANTENNA WALL PLATE panel push button is "ON". This applies 12VDC to the BATWING PRE-AMPLIFER mounted in the base of the roof antenna.

The BROADCAST TV is transmitted in full blown high def HDTV signals. Really great TV to watch...

We use to bring along all of SAT TV stuff from the house until the NATIONAL BROADCAST TV went to the digital mode a few years back. After seeing how good the TV signals were we stopped bringing along all of our SAT TV items.

If there is some of the CABLE TV SHOWS we want to see we can downstream them using our VERIZON MIFI UNIT on the internet.

Roy Ken

Do you keep a copy of this on your clipboard at all times just so you're ready when somebody has a question about TV on the road?

Bruce

[enblethen]

Why would you want to spend bucks for High Fed?

[lbrjet]

Roy Ken, in case you didn't know most stations across the country had already been broadcasting a digital signal for many years prior to 2011. The new law simply forced broadcasters to stop sending analog signals as well. Digital broadcasting has been around a long time, as well as HD programming. We bought our first antenna back in 2006 when we got our first HDTV.