Winegard YA7000C Low VHF Capable Outdoor Yagi TV Antenna Review 

Was this premiered

I believe it's proximity to the FM band is part of the reason 6ABC has such a trash signal.

Keep in mind that a smaller antenna might get similar signal levels as a larger antenna but the larger antenna may keep the signal more reliable in bad weather conditions. Thanks so much for being a channel member!

@@AntennaMan Yeah great point! You’re welcome happy to be a Patreon supporter!

@@AntennaMan Interesting point. Thanks.

@@AntennaMan Always remember to put the antenna up on the barn if you want to get the stable signal.

@@kensmith5694 I'll get your coat.

Does it keep the signal even during bad weather ?

@@OGCJ10 most of the time, yes. I have many large trees around my property and will occasionally lose signal very briefly due to tree branches swaying in high winds. When I say very briefly, I mean just that. Not even a full second. Great little antenna.

There isn't much market for outdoor FM antennas these days, so the antenna manufacturers don't bother to mention it. But in general, a quality passive antenna with low-VHF capability will also do a fine job on FM. Active antennas are another matter because their amplifiers may incorporate FM traps to avoid overload of the amplifier by radio signals.

I'm glad my videos helped you get better reception. Feel free to give a contribution at the link below as I spend A LOT of time making the videos and responding to these comments: antennamanpa.com/support.html

This is the reason why.... TV signal capture is less of a science, and more of an Art form. I have 25 years of experience.

The reason North America never got rid of Low VHF, is because it was valuable in the analog days. Not only that, when NTSC was used in North America, it was backwards compatible with black and white with RCA's color technology, whereas the color wheel that CBS was using, was not backwards compatible. I learned that had the color wheel been chosen, North America would have been like Europe, it would have primarily used the UHF band. Maybe High VHF would have been used, but Low VHF would have been phased out. Most of Europe phased out all VHF when PAL and SECAM were implemented for color TV, and were not compatible with black and white. The US has no desire to remove VHF at all, but they're slowly taking away more UHF spectrum, and I expect more to be removed from TV in the next 10 to 15 years. I would not be surprised if Canada eliminates over the air TV completely, as the cable and satellite operators own the over the air TV stations, and have not made any effort to utilize ATSC 1.0 to the fullest, and have no plans to upgrade to ATSC 3.0 anytime soon, like the US is slowly doing.

Back in the analog era, VHF was considered by broadcasters to be superior to UHF for numerous reasons. One big advantage was that analog VHF signals hugged the ground and were better at getting into the "nooks and crannies" of terrain. With the switch to ATSC 1.0, people in these areas went from having snowy but watchable VHF TV reception to nothing. UHF TV, on the other hand, didn't get close to parity with VHF until around 1980, when UHF transmitters started putting out up to five million watts of power. That plus better UHF TV tuners got more viewers to watch UHF stations.

@@brianinct4631 Early UHF tuners were hot garbage. It was difficult to get tubes or early transistors to behave well at those frequencies, so the sensitivity of the UHF section was poor. Selectivity was also bad, which is why UHF stations in a market had to be spaced six channels apart. By 1980 we had transistors that worked well up to 1 gigahertz and beyond, making it possible to make better UHF tuners. (That also made the cell phones that started crowding UHF TV stations off the airwaves possible.) That has continued. Modern digital TV tuners allow the TV bands to be packed with stations on adjacent channels. TV stations never used transmitters with five million watts of output. There were analog UHF stations that transmitted as much as five millions watts ERP (effective radiated power), but that number includes antenna gain. At the very least, a TV station uses an antenna that keeps all the signal near the ground rather than uselessly sending it straight up into the air; that antenna will have 6 dB or more gain, reducing the power requirement by a factor of four or more. (Sending a signal straight up IS useful on shortwave bands between 2 megahertz and 10 megahertz, but that's not relevant to this discussion of TV.) A TV station that is located near a national border or a shoreline might save even more power by using a directional antenna that minimizes the amount of power that is sent in directions where nobody lives, or that aren't part of the target market. Digital TV doesn't require as strong a signal for the same reception range, and it gets a further boost from better tuners, so stations no longer use as much output power. An example: WOLF-TV, authorized to Hazleton PA and broadcasting from near Wilkes-Barre PA, currently transmits at 220 kilowatts ERP. Back in the days of analog TV, some stations in that market broadcast at 4 megawatts ERP. (I know WBRE-TV did, but they have moved from UHF to high VHF so their current power level is not directly comparable. I don't know what the power level of WOLF was pre-digital.) Side note to the Antenna Man: although I moved away long ago, I grew up in NEPA. A family friend was a station engineer at WDAU-TV (before its call sign changed to WYOU), and I still have a WDAU ruler.

That's a UHF simulcast courtesy of the local MeTV affiliate

There is about a 100MHz of separation between RF channel 6 and 7 that makes a pretty significant difference in the characteristics including the stability

Low VHF, channels 2 through 6, run from 54 through 88 MHz. (There is a gap between channels 4 and 5.) The FM broadcast band is just above that, from 88 through 108 MHz. The high VHF band runs from 174 through 216 MHz; the gap between them has an aircraft band, an amateur radio band, and a band that is used for land mobile (police, fire, taxi dispatch, etc). A passive antenna (one that is just wire or tubing) works best if its largest element is about half the wavelength of the lowest frequency the antenna receives. Low VHF needs one that is nearly 3 meters long (10 feet). High VHF calls for one that's somewhat under a meter long (3 feet), so an antenna that leaves out low VHF can be a lot smaller. A UHF-only antenna only needs a longest element about a foot long. Each of the three TV bands behaves differently. Low VHF can carry over the longest distance. When band conditions are right it's possible to receive signals from hundreds or even thousands of miles away, though it's less common in the digital era because the digital TV signal doesn't handle some atmospheric conditions well. But that's not always a good thing; sometimes that far away station interferes with clear reception of your local station. Low VHF is also the most vulnerable to interference from nearby noise sources like vacuum cleaners.

@ interesting information. It of course makes me wonder if we'll ever see custom made antenna. If elements we made a specific length to pickup an exact station rather than a range of stations perhaps the gain would be maximized.

@@ASMRPeople Single channel antennas were manufactured at one time, mostly for cable operators. They would often set up a separate antenna for each channel that they received over the air for retransmission, especially if they were in a market where each station had its own tower. (At home you might use a single antenna and a rotator, but they need to receive all the channels at the same time.) I don't know if anybody is currently making them.

You have options. You could have a fixed-position antenna for a station which is in the distance, for a few stations, and add an antenna for a station in another market, if the signal is strong enough.

This is a good indoor antenna for VHF: amzn.to/3w92JgS

What frequency? Often removing background noise sources is a good start. Then your building structure is important. Metal and concrete, metal reinforced stucco, metal or aluminum siding greatly effect indoor signal. You must also try relocating the radio and antenna as frequently a small change in position can make a huge difference. Good luck and let us know if you get you station bombing in.

See video below: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-wrAVRKhRQ8A.html

They've had it for over four years now. According to engineers their power increase will only bring up the signal by about 3dB. There's not much they can do on a TRASH low VHF signal.

You were probably just barely getting the TV station to the point you no longer get it with changes in atmospheric conditions from the upcoming winter season. You will need a better antenna setup. Consider an antenna recommendation from me at the link below. This can prevent you from spending hundreds of dollars and time wasted on setting up the wrong antenna for your area. antennamanpa.com/antenna-recommendations.html

You might've selected their YA7000 model and not the YA7000C. The model I reviewed in this video is linked below: amzn.to/3NSpQDR

Mainly local news, Judge Judy, and Inside Edition. That's about it. I maybe watch 1/2 hour to an hour of TV each day.

An occasional NCAA and NFL football game, and then holiday parades (Thanksgiving Day and Rose Bowl). That's pretty much it. With a better antenna, I'd probably do more OTA exploration.

I watch: The late show with Colbert MeTV has some old programs that are worth it Some mysteries on PBS Local news from various stations Old movies from the wee hours of the morning I do all this with a tuner/DVR so I set up recording for late night and early morning stuff and watch it at a more reasonable time. I live with some stations other there (points in direction) and some over there (points about 90 degrees to the other) so I use two antennas that I combine with a splitter. The result is I get about 125 stations of which maybe 10 are worth the bother.

One of the StarTrek's every night on 2.4

Fun fact, WGBH sold out their antenna viewers for $200 million in cash from the FCC to move to the trash low VHF band. See video below: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-FrFib1jaBP0.html

I'm sure you'll be watching the Philadelphia Thanksgiving day Parade on 6 ABC this year which I didn't know it actually happens.

That's hilarious! The jail must've been in the shadow of the broadcast tower. Either that or the antenna you made had just the right wavelength for 6ABC.

Trees and 70 miles away sounds bad. Not sure you'll be able to get that reliable.

Don't forget to demand one with a 150 mile range! LOL

@@commietube_censorship_sucks Yawn, same pointless reply every time i comment on an antenna man video 🤷‍♀️

🤣

Take my thumbs up 👍 kind user. 😂

Sure, you can do that too!

It's still available for purchase on the Winegard website

Nope, just a RU-vidr who covers TV antennas and cord cutting tech.

@@AntennaMan nice work 👍👍 You should get your license, HF antennas are a lot of fun!

Not in person but I have serviced homes with older antennas from the 90s. They were definitely built better back then compared to most antennas on the market. The same can be said for just about any electronic device. How long will a new TV last? I still have one from 1972 that works great!

I would guess sometimes it's just survivor bias. All the ones left are the ones that didn't break and kept working well enough! But also I'm guessing there was a much larger market for premium antennas before cable was mainstream. There might be some very good ones made, but they probably also cost quite a bit relative to inflation.

@@SuperMrgentleman There was a lot of "new" mathematics discovered in the 90s and early 2000s with regard to antennas. Notice cell phones don't have those stubby protrusions anymore? TV antennas are still mostly the same AFAIK.

@@GerardPinzone Noted, but didn't cell networks themselves change?

@@SuperMrgentleman Yes. They don't work at a one to three frequencies like the old GSM phones did. Newer phones can work across a wide spectrum. I believe they use fractal antennas. A yagi antenna is a kind of fractal antenna, too, but it's nothing like what's used in modern phones.