Receiving OTA HD with old Direct TV Dish

[mahmoodkhan]

I had been receiving all my local OTA HD signals by hooking up my HD-TV directly to the coax cable from my FTA 39" satellite dish. Was receiving about 34 local channels here in Minneapolis.

I have that dish now just for FTA setup. Have an old Direct TV 18" dish laying around that I hooked up and connected the coax to my HD-TV but recieve only a few channels, missing KSTP-ABC, Channel 17-digital and NBC-Kare-11. Is there a particular dish elevation and azimuth that I need to align this to pick up all 34 local channels? I also have an old Dishnetwork 500 dish that I could hook up as well.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you

 

[CharredPC]

Erm... AFAIK, your getting 34 local HD channels using an FTA dish is an absolute, total, 100% fluke. An awesome fluke to be sure, but definitely a fluke. It's like putting yogurt into your car's gas tank and having it go... if it works, great, but they're two very different beasts. I would think an average LNB would be a horrible OTA antenna, though maybe the 39" reflector was doing all the work. Either that or you're close enough to the broadcast towers that the coaxial line itself was picking up the RF.

Anyone else's thoughts?

 

[mahmoodkhan]

Erm... AFAIK, your getting 34 local HD channels using an FTA dish is an absolute, total, 100% fluke. An awesome fluke to be sure, but definitely a fluke. It's like putting yogurt into your car's gas tank and having it go... if it works, great, but they're two very different beasts. I would think an average LNB would be a horrible OTA antenna, though maybe the 39" reflector was doing all the work. Either that or you're close enough to the broadcast towers that the coaxial line itself was picking up the RF.

Anyone else's thoughts?

Maybe it is a fluke. I am probably within 5 miles from at least one of the stations so maybe the coax is picking up the channels. Right now with the 18” direct tv dish I can pick up CBS, FOX, CW and MNT HD signal in excellent quality but ABC, NBC are still not detected. The 39” FTA dish with the KU LNB was picking up all the channels in HD.

Also could this setup end up toasting my Plasma TV if there is a lighting spike or something? The coax is grounded outside but inside hooked up directly to the TV.

Thank you

 

[Hall]

It is a fluke as Charred said and your close proximity to the stations is the key. You could use a coat hanger with similar results probably....

 

[mahmoodkhan]

It is a fluke as Charred said and your close proximity to the stations is the key. You could use a coat hanger with similar results probably....

if I disconnect the coax from the Direct TV dish LNB, I can pick up only CBS and FOX HD. If I connect the coax to the LNB I can pick up CW and MNT as well. I am unable to pickup ABC, NBC and Channel 17(1-5), and Channel 41 with the Direct TV dish. All 34 channel digital HD signals were being pickedup when the coax was hooked up to my 39" FTA with KU Lnb. Maybe as other member suggested, it could have been the 39" dish which contributed towards it.

Another thing I just tried and it worked perfect was one of my old ClearVue $10 plug in antenna. As soon as I plug this in the electric outlet and connect it to my Plasma TV, I can pick up all the 34 HD channels without hooking up an external antenna!!

 

[Hall]

I said "probably". The dish is just a large mass of metal that's a simple antenna.