Help Before Going Crazy on TV reception

[nieforth]

remember tv signal from antenna is different connection than cable box or

[BobHanke]

Your step-by-step list you followed seems to be missing a step. When going to cable, you need to turn off the antenna booster. A loss of signal or too low will normally cause a digital TV to go black rather that to snow. Stayed at one RV park this past summer that had a coax connection on the pedestal but got no signal. Found out that you needed a box from the cable company to use the service. Check every coax connection for a broken or bent center wire.

[rick42wood]

I don't think you will solve your problem until you find the splitter and can disconnect the cables one by one to find the one causing the problem. Coax doesn't fail but in a coach where it is constantly subject to vibration a screw or staple can end up causing a problem. It sounds like one of your cables, probably the one feeding the TV that is black has a shorted shield to center wire. You could also disconnect the cable from all the TV's and check with an ohmeter. It should be an infinite resistance at each cable end from the center wire to the shield (connection nut)

[SecretSquirrel]

Get one of these and test the cable between the back of the amp/switch and the cable connection entry to camper.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Klein-To...-007/304086632

https://images.homedepot-static.com/...07-64_1000.jpg

[Hi Rider]

I use a dish so my comments may not apply to cable. Had similar problem. Cause: there has to be two-way communication between TV and dish. Most factory installed TV hookups do not have a splitter that enables two-way communications between TV and dish. Replaced the one-way communication splitter with a two-way communication splitter and that solved the problem. My solution may not apply to a cable hook up.

[Tim Coltrain]

I give up. I've done everything I can possibly think of to get the snow out of my TV in camper. I've come to the conclusion it is not meant to be. I give up. I can hook up computer and get perfect picture, I can hook up antenna and get perfect picture, Direct TV perfect picture. Cable SUCKS now I remember why I have direct TV. I think the person who works at the factory needs to be FIRED and slapped silly for sticking a nail, screw, staple in the cable. It’s hard to find good help these day. Especially people who care about their work. It's not there anymore. I'm surprised sales don't just drop off. I hope someone from manufacturers is reading this because you need to do better. People spend too much money in these little homes only to have to fix problems that should never had to be fixed. If I was a man who could run one of these factories you can believed Quality would be Number 1.

Thanks again for your help.

[5picker]

Tim, you say the DirecTV picture is perfect. Are you using the satellite connection on the outside to feed between the receiver and dish?

If so, hook your cable feed to the satellite connection outside and and go from the inside satellite connection to the back of the tv. Do a cable channel scan and you should be in business. If that coax is ok for satellite, it will work perfectly fine for cable and also verify whether your actual cable coax is somehow bad.

Granted, you likely can't feed that to the bedroom or other areas without some jumpering but at least you'd have cable to your main tv without running another wire.

[llscott]

Critters will chew on cables...just a thought...

[RnRushin]

As you have good picture with antenna and satellite the coaxial feeding the tvs is probably fine. I can think off two possible problems, the line from outside connection to splitter is bad or you have a weak signal coming to the the camper. Each time the signal is sent through a splitter the picture quality degrades.
From prior post it seems you have tested the line coming to the outside. As the satellite feed works, i would try swapping the input lines at the booster. This will tell you if the coaxial input line is damaged. I had a screw in a line coming out of the booster causing similar issues. My splitter was right under the booster. I had to remove the fireplace and remove a panel to get to it.

[Paul GA]

Hey Tim, what kind of connectors did you put on?

[WhiteEagle]

Originally Posted by redhooker

We had similar issues in a KZ a few years ago.

Move your cable boxes from your house out to the fiver. Call your cable company and request service for your cable, describe the issue.

Our cable company (Spectrum) sent out a nice technician with quality testing tools. He was able to identify a section of coaxial cable that was bad and screwing up all the TVs in the coach. Replaced that one section of wire and all the issues went away. I did the replacement by running the new wire under the trailer above the chloroplast. This solution worked well for us perhaps your cable provider can help you here. He told us that occasionally coaxial wire fails without reason and the HD digital signals are particularly susceptible.

RedHooker is right on the money. You need someone with a cable tester (signal gets reflected back and the instrument calculates how far away the break is). There is a good chance with cable connections in RV's that they may break, primarily because they are a solid core wire. Any flex points (say on a slide out) will eventually break the inner core wire. The cable TV guys instrument will tell you where the break has occured, helping you to isolate/identify which cable needs replacing. Once you find the problem cable then you should make a note of it for the future as this will likely happen again if it's associated with a flex point. Hopefully that helps.... good luck.

[fredoe61]

Those cheap antenna boosters are notoriously bad. You can replace one with a new and still get a bad one. This problem probably is between where it connects on the outside to where the booster is. I doubt very seriously you have bad wire. I finally bypassed booster all together and wala good picture.

[muollot]

Don't know if yours has two inputs outside. Mine has input for satellite and one for cable. Cable one doesn't work. I plug my input into satellite and it works fine.

[fredoe61]

Originally Posted by muollot

Don't know if yours has two inputs outside. Mine has input for satellite and one for cable. Cable one doesn't work. I plug my input into satellite and it works fine.

I think I had 2 connections but even though that wasnt my problem point it had a splitter right at the wall and I pulled all that out and replaced it then bypassed the booster in the ceiling. I couldnt get a signal past that set up to run our dish and it was at that switch where the problem was so I just ran the wire up under the seat up against the wall. I have a smaller rig than you and just have the one connector in the ceiling.

[Tim Coltrain]

This is what I got done today. I ran a new line to Living room, I ran a line to bedroom. I still have snowy TV but better than before and All three TV's are now consistant. I play with a splitter to see difference and when I touched splitter with old it went snowy crazy. So I know for sure it is grounded or something. I have also looked at how to re run all the old but it is so lost within camper I would have to take it completely appart to even know where to start. I'm still convinced there is a bad splitter somewhere hid within that camper.


Now on a different note if you are reading this. Is there an upgrade to antenna vs the old roll up and twist or is that is good as it gets?

Again Thanks for all your responses.

[bubbubouy]

Originally Posted by muollot

Don't know if yours has two inputs outside. Mine has input for satellite and one for cable. Cable one doesn't work. I plug my input into satellite and it works fine.

X2

[Pmccullers]

I have a similar problem. Sometime cable works fine on all channels. Most of the time local channels are fuzzy and other oddball channels on cable are fine. When on antenna local channels are good but I don't get many. Good signal comes and goes. I keep doing the scan thing but sometimes it works sometimes not.

[mnolasco]

Originally Posted by Tim Coltrain

I may have posted before just can't remember because so frustrated. I own a 2016 XLR Thunderbolt bought new had for two years going on three. Gone through my ups and down. Just about when I think my problems are done a new one pops up. Well this one beats the cake. Subject: TV reception (CABLE) I cannot get a clear picture. TV #1 Bedroom can hear shows Black and whites dots, TV #2 Living room snowy to point you see outlines, TV #3 Garage snowy but you can deal with it. I bought and tried new coax cable from outside, I have bought and replaced every fitting inside and out at each to, I as last resort bought a switch to see if that was the problem. I cannot figure this one out. I can hook up to TV's directly and have a beautiful picture. So I know something is going on within camper. I even disconnected the orange coax and ran directly to switch but still snowy. I connected the white still snowy. I honestly don't know how to get rid of the snowy. I have been told there is a splitter hid somewhere within camper. I have torn camper apart from removing vent covers, to looking behind stove, to looking behind microwave, to looking around ceiling vents, and even behind each TV connection point. I hate knowing I have a 75k trailer sitting in my back yard and I can't watch TV. Now I can switch to antenna and have a clear and beautiful picture on all three TVs. But you can't always get a signal when camping. ANYBODY HAVE THIS problem or figure it out. Frustrated.

Thanks in NC

The black coax in your rig is low capacity from your roof antenna for local broadcast only to outlets in bedroom, living room, and garage. Grey is for cable TV, white is G6 high capacity for SAT, both of which have connections in the water service bay. After buying and installing a Winegard G2 satellite dish, and DIRECT TV HR24 reciever, i was only able to get a 60 to 70% signal on 16 of 32 transponders through the factory installed G6 coax. After spending hours on the phone with Winegard, I ran a direct G6 feed from the dish to the HR24 through a roof vent and bypassed the stock XLR 375AMP wiring in the water bay. I was then able to get 90% signal on all 32 transponders. This proved that the signal was being compromised by a factory installed splitter. This was further proved by the two G6 SAT leads coming out of the wall behind the living room TV which have never worked. After spending hours on the phone with FR, they suggested pulling out the splitter from behind a fan cowling, and bypassing it with a barrel coupler. I pulled off 5 ceiling cowlings, and finally found a splitter behind fiberglass insulation in the garage bath fan cowling. For now, i have the satellite cable coming through a roof vent. It looks crappy. Why doesn't Forest River know that satillite signals cannot be split? The factory G6 coax wiring has done me no good.

[merlinhomeauto]

Have you check the cable source may be looking in the wrong place for the problem.

[Reverse_snowbird]

Here's an off-the-wall question.....

Have you by any chance changed the light near your antenna to an LED fixture or light bulbs?

A friend put new LED light bulbs in to replace the old style lights. He started having trouble with reception in both his tvs. He replaced his new LED light bulbs with better shielded LED bulbs and the tv reception cleared up.

Just a thought....