HDTV Antenna from CoatHangars, Tinfoil and a 2×4

Well, this is another non-microscopy post, but it does have something to do with “imaging” in a general sense …

About 3 months ago i turned off my satellite TV programming, for two reasons: One, I watched too much TV. Two, it’s a ripoff. While I’ve managed to find a few shows I like online, and I watch far less TV, I missed my morning routine of drinking coffee and getting ready for work while listening to the local news in the background. I remembered the old days of turning our remotely controlled tuner that rotated my family’s roof mounted antenna trying to get a better signal, and realized, “oh yeah, didn’t they move to Digital antennas about a year back?” So after looking into it I found I could buy a fancy antenna, but why spend the money, and how boring is that, when I could build a very sensitive one, for free! I used this as a guide: Maker Workshop – DTV Antenna

What was even more entertaining was that I convinced my wife to help. She normally stays away from my projects, only to be affected by various grinding and drilling nuisance noises coming from the garage. Ultimately we both had fun on this easy project, and she got to use the drill press and bench grinder, who DOESN’T like stuff like that?

Here are some shots I took during the build:

Of course, your probably thinking, “what an ugly piece of crap” right? Well, the best place for an antenna is up high, and what better place to locate this than in my attic? So up to the attic I went…

My antenna didn’t have a rotating base or anything, so I used Antenna Web to find my local transmitters. I removed unwanted stations from the list, and averaged the radials to each. This indicated that if I placed the antenna on a heading of 190 degrees, I’d be within ~40 degrees of all of the transmitters. I simply hung the antenna from a rafter in the attic, and tied a string to the cardboard to rotate it to it’s heading, then tied the string to another rafter.

So, after a whopping hour and a half of work in total, and spending $5 on the Balun, I receive 20 HDTV channels, and even pick up 3 VHF channels.

I really enjoy projects that teach (myself and others) a principle, are easy to get working, and cheap, while providing a useful new capability.  In this case the principles included antenna phasing tor UHF reception,  the fundamentals of transmitting towers, interference and radials to a point.  I highly recommend this project for those of you who enjoy tinkering in the garage, or even those who aren’t sure about building stuff yourself, but would like to try. This would also make a great family or local school science project, just don’t impale yourselves with those coat hangers!

-Austin