Winegard Batwing TV - Wingman Aerial Booster

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RVOA

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Has anyone purchased a Wingman upgrade for their std Winegard Batwing TV aerial ?

improve your Winegard Sensar batwing antenna's UHF performance with the Wingman. This lightweight, sleek add-on attaches with 4 simple snap-on screws to the Sensar head to increase db gain up to 100% on DTV channels.

Product Link

Im thinking of getting one as my 2006 Fleetwood Expedition didnt come with an internal TV booster and the signal isnt at its best.

Paul
 
Paul,
If you have a Winegard antenna, it has a built-in booster. In your Expedition, I think the power for it comes from the video switch box and is on whenever you select the Antenna input.

The Wingman upgrade is supposed to help with UHF reception - it does nothing for VHF. Do you know which you are having problems with?
 
I can tell you they're really easy to install.  Takes just a few minutes.

ArdraF
 
Thanks for replies guys.

The actual problem I have is as follows:-

All was working OK until I added (and removed) some equipment - plus we went to digital broadcasting at around the same time.

I installed a combined digital receiver/recorder and removed my sat receiver.

The signal didnt appear strong enough and there was a lot of freezing and picture break-up.

So, I purchased a TV booster device and that seemed to have sorted the problem.

EXCEPT - whenever I switch on the kettle the picture freezes (on the inbuilt digital receiver channel, on external receiver channel and on std TV).

I believe the kettle is on the same power circuit as the TV.

Someone has suggested that the power draw of the kettle is interfering with the new TV booster and thats the problem.

Hence the idea of trying the Batwing attachment.

Paul
 
Regarding the Wingman, I installed one and at that location it increased the stations I could pick up from 2 to 10.  It is directional and may need to be rotated to get the maximum number of stations.
 
One of the more common errors when installing a digital converter is location

If you have 2 TV's there is a temptation to put the converter between the antenna and the switch/splitter

It can not go there, Unless it has DC-Pass through, and though I could add that to one, I don't know of any that come with it.

IT must go between the switch/splitter and the Television (one for each TV) else it disables the antenna pre-amp.
 
We keep our MH in a garage so the TV signal has to go through sheetrock and particle board sheathing.  In the garage we cranked up the winegard antenna and tuned in the local thru-the-air HDTV stations.  We received them okay BUT you could see that the picture was a bit degraded.  The sound was fine.  I then installed the new winegard clip-on antenna. It took only 5 minutes to clip it on.

The result was, we could clearly see that the picture was MUCH improved.  Bottom line:  It was worth the $30.

JerryF
 
we could clearly see that the picture was MUCH improved.

Jerry, I'm really confused; Since it's digital TV, I can understand how the signal might be improved, but don't understand how the picture would be improved  ???
 
Tom, I'm thinking he might mean the picture doesn't break up as much.

One thing I've learned about DTV is that VHF (channels 2-13) stations are going to give us problems like those that have been mentioned.  VHF is very susceptible to interference from FM and such simple things as flipping a light switch; with analog TV, it wasn't a major problem, but with digital, it's a big deal.

I anticipate that the FCC will, at some point, move most stations back to UHF (14-51).
 
[quote author=JNewkirk77]... I'm thinking he might mean the picture doesn't break up as much.[/quote]

Understood, but that wasn't what his message said, which is why I was confused. But it doesn't take much (to confuse me).
 
Tom said:
Understood, but that wasn't what his message said, which is why I was confused. But it doesn't take much (to confuse me).

I'm right there with ya, about 99% of the time ... I blame my kids!  ;D
 
I just read an article on problems with the digital TV due to interference and they are huge.  Many of your household devices can cause interference such as thermostats, like the kettle, fluorescent lights, LED lights etc.  I won't even touch on the problem that the Hams may face as it is really sensitive to nearby transmitters especially if you are using an adapter box.

There will be a lot of gnashing of teeth about this in the future.
 
Jim,

Any interference is likely to cause no picture, or a breakup/pixelation of the picture.

I won't even touch on the problem that the Hams may face as it is really sensitive to nearby transmitters ....

Reminds me of the days when all it took was a diode to pick up a hilltop transmitter and cause some annoying, albeit minor,  noise in an FM hifi system.
 
Tom said:
Jim,

Any interference is likely to cause no picture, or a breakup/pixelation of the picture.

Reminds me of the days when all it took was a diode to pick up a hilltop transmitter and cause some annoying, albeit minor,  noise in an FM hifi system.

Tom,

It is that and more in the case of the digital TV receivers.  It seems there has been a relaxation of tuning the input frequency band and many of the current receiver pass ALL RF.  Not good!
 
Mandatory digital TV is just another example of how the government can screw up a good deal.
 
BruceinFL said:
Mandatory digital TV is just another example of how the government can screw up a good deal.

I won't argue that point, but I do like the crystal-clear picture.

One other point that I neglected to make previously, for those of you folks who went with converter boxes (like I did), is this:  If you're connecting the box through the TV's RF (antenna) jack, THROW AWAY THE JUNK CABLE THAT CAME WITH THE BOX.  It belongs in a landfill, not hooked to your TV.  Get the best coax cable you can (I used RG6).  You will be amazed at the difference.  I had a friend at the local cable company take several shorter (3' to 8') pieces of coax that I had lying around, and he put on the nice high-quality connectors that they use.  It really helped a lot with the breakup in picture and sound.

Of course, if your TV has RCA-type A/V inputs, that will give you the best picture quality.  Again, it is worth investing in the best cables you can get, which are not much more expensive than the cheap ones in the long run.
 
This is the item Paul is on about the Winegard Wingman $26.99 from Camping World.

>> Click here <<

We bought on whilst at Orlandos 1,000 Trails site to improve reception, yes we picked up more channel signals none of which worked, all we got was a message saying No or Signal strength low.

Now in the UK I'm none the wiser if it does give a better reception, where we are and on Digital Free View I can only get 4 BBC channels  :(

I had little faith in the product when I saw that it attached to the main Bat wing aerial via four plastic rivet type fastenings so no actual metal to metal contact  ???

Mick
 
The clip on adapter is a reflector that enhances the signal to the antenna, and as such it does not need a direct metal to metal contact to work.  However, that increase in signal has to come from somewhere, and it comes from a narrower angle that the antenna will accept.  Instead of a nice wide cone of acceptance, it amplifies (focuses) a narrow portion of it.  Aiming is more critical.

I had a unique situation that pointed out the strength of the design.  I was parked in a small town without a TV station, and the closest ones were 70 miles to the north and 45 miles to the south.  I could not see any signal from either before putting on the add on director gadget, and was able to pull in digital signals after installing it.  The direction you point the antenna is very critical, because of the narrower acceptance angle.

Radio engineers have been using this technique for years, and I picked it up working with HAM radio.

As mentioned it is very easy to install (you would have to modify it and really work at it to get it on wrong), works well using established antenna physics (not a "magic" black box no one can explain), is inexpensive and works.  The main thing you give up with it is the antenna has to be more carefully aligned in the direction of the signal, and that is a one time deal until you move again.
 
There has got to be a decent omnidirectional digital antenna somewhere. It's a PIA moving the Winegard antenna around for each station. Would rather accept a diminiished signal than move the antenna for non co-located transmission towers. Either that or someone invent an automatic antenna positioning system for each station's best signal.
 
Tom,

That day we tested the WingMan add on to the WineGard antenna we were looking at an HDTV signal that had 1080P resolution and for whatever reason it did improve the picture after the Winegard WingMan was installed.  Now, here's the definitive technical explanation as I understand it.  "It's magic"  It was not pixelateing.  The picture just looked better. 

JerryF
 

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