No combination of rabbit ears, pre-amplifier and fancy Leaf antenna will allow me to pull in the signal from the local FOX affiliate reliably, which is supposedly closest tower to me. This is not really a big deal until football season rolls around in a couple of months when FOX carries one to two games every Sunday. In the mean time I have not given up hope of finding a do-it-yourself HDTV antenna that will do the trick. Last week I stumbled on a neat idea on instructables that looked like it was worth a shot, the Fractal Magic DIY HDTV Antenna. I even had all the pieces needs to make this baby in house.
So yesterday evening and tonight I put this magic antenna together. With just the Mohu Leaf hooked up we get the big 3 networks and their 4 total sub-channels for a total of 7 channels, with the Fractal Magic DIY HDTV Antenna – only 4. CBS and it two extra “really old TV show” channels were gone.
The antenna was magic alright, it made 2 sheets of plain paper, a 10×18 inch piece of poster board, 10 feet of speaker wire stripped of its insulation, a couple of crimp connectors, 6 foot piece coax cable and 2 hours of my time disappear.