Need a new TV antenna

[TurnThePage]

The old Winegard Sensar went walkabout during the drive home. Doesn't appear to be any damage except for the end of cable. The two square rods are still there, just no antenna. Looking for replacement suggestions. It's been a good antenna, but I wouldn't mind trying something different. TV reception is still important to us, but not as important, so something simpler might be fine.

Thoughts?

[wa8yxm]

Dutch_12078 wrote:
One area where the Sensar really outshines the Jack is with the 400+ low VHF stations across the country. Here's a broadcast engineer's test results comparing the Sensar and the Jack:

Batwing vs.BatMan vs. Jack: The Results..

Thank you that was the post I did not care to take the time to look up.

As I said at the point where the jack does best the Winegard is still 2x the antenna the Jack is... I was very happy with my Sensar IV + Sensar Pro

[JaxDad]

I too opted to replace a broken unit with a Jack, in real world parked next to someone with a Sensar and haven’t ever found much of a difference.

The one big difference I like is being able to have a fully functional (albeit needs rearming) TV antenna while going down the road.

[mobeewan]

TurnThePage wrote:
I haven't torn into it yet, but it looks like the damaged cable may just connect to the mast base with a boot covering it. Is that correct? Is it just a plain old RG59 cable? My RV is 2004 vintage.

Could also be RG6 if trailer is wired for Satellite. RG6 will work for cable or tv antenna. RG6 copper center wire is thicker and stiffer than RG59.

I wired both satellite and roof top tv antennae in my fathers house and the house across the street I used to live in, all with RG6. Both dishes had dual LNB. Bought a 500 foot spool of RG6 cable back then for $50.

[Dutch_12078]

One area where the Sensar really outshines the Jack is with the 400+ low VHF stations across the country. Here's a broadcast engineer's test results comparing the Sensar and the Jack:

Batwing vs.BatMan vs. Jack: The Results..

[wa8yxm]

IAMICHABOD wrote:
The Jack head Is Cheaper than the Winegard replacement head\

Yes it is but you get what you pay for. The two have been put to the comparison and the winegard outperformed the Jack, depending on the carrier channel, between 2 to one (1.414 the range) to a much higher difference (Been too long since I read that post on these forums)

Oh and consider replacing the indoor module with the Sensar Pro. Even better performance and easier shooting (Aiming of the antenna)

[wa8yxm]

When that happened to me I got a Winegard Sensar IV (With intergrated Wingman)

Put a new end on the cable (Nice compression fitting. yes I have those)
and man did reception improve over the old III + Wingman. Turns out it needed replacement. or the cable end did. not sure which.

[wildtoad]

My experience tells me two things. First is the Winegard Sensar is the better overall setup. I’ve used the Jack and found it to be good but not as good. Second in the real world they all suck, but OTA TV has always been an iffy situation, unless you’re in close proximity of the broadcast towers. Many factors can interfere with reception as one day signal comes in clear, next day not so much. If you were happy with what you had, just replace it with a newer version.

[craig7h]

On a different coach I replaced the wingman batwing with a King Jack. King has a unit that is designed to go on the wingman setup.The Jack work well it was however a little more sensitive to direction than the wingman. On the other hand it pulled in a few more channels.

I also replaced on a different coach the King Jack with a Omni directional ant. The Mjg. had put the King to close to the ac cover so it blocked signal.

The coach I have now haa the wingman and if I had to replace it would be with the King Jack.

[IAMICHABOD]

When I bought my RV it had a Winegard Batwing that was not working, I cleaned up all connections and tested to see if it was broken, it was,so I replaced it with a new bat wing then ran a Channel Scan I was not impressed with the amount of channels that I got. This was done in my driveway here in the south bay of So Calif about 30 miles from the transmitters, using my SensarPro.

I then went out and got a Wingman add on, that put my channel scan up to 85,but I had a clearance problem with the Wingman,it would hit my A/C unit when lowered.

So I opted to put a Jack Antenna Head on and my channel scan went up to 174





TheJack replacement head Is Cheaper than the Winegard replacement head

I always get beat up by the techies,who will bring up a very old post that is not reverent now. The debate will go on and on, but I know what works best for me,in the real world.

[TurnThePage]

I haven't torn into it yet, but it looks like the damaged cable may just connect to the mast base with a boot covering it. Is that correct? Is it just a plain old RG59 cable? My RV is 2004 vintage.

[Dutch_12078]

There's still nothing better than the Winegard Sensar IV. The replacement head only should work for you since the rest is still there.

Winegard 24130 RVW-205 Sensar IV with Wingman - Replacement Head Only, White