New antenna, old cable connection?

[Crew]

I'm looking into replacing my satellite dish with an OTA antenna and hopefully using the existing cables. My Direct TV set up has two cables running from the dish to a splitter box outside the house (one splitter input marked 18V, one 13V) and then cables running from the box to each TV. My question is can I just swap in the OTA antenna for the dish (connecting either the 18V or 13V cable to the antenna) with the splitter box continuing to do its thing?

 

[boba]

Sounds like you are describing a multiswitch,maybe a 2x4. Two inputs on one side and 4 outputs on the other. You should replace it with a 2 way or 4 way TV splitter depending on how many TVs your connecting.

 

[Cadsulfide]

If the cable is ok, take boba's advice. A sat switch will not pass tv signals well.

 

[Crew]

Thanks for the help. Made the connections with a splitter and I'm getting most of my local channels at 75-95 strength. The PBS stations are iffy, hovering around 55-65. I'm using the J-mount the satellite dish was in on the side of my house (about 15 feet off the ground). Do you think if I were to add 2-3 feet to that mount it could make a significant signal strength increase? I realize you don't know my surrounding topography or line of sight issues, but since the signals are intermittently there, I wondered if there is a general rule for minimum height increase to be effective.

 

[boba]

Try TV Fool - Home it will point you in the "right direction" to get your strongest signals. There is also an option to put in the antenna height.