MikeHalloran
Mechanical
I've got a digital TV, and a rotatable antenna and premises wire already installed in the trailer here in N'awlins.
I've also got a collection of about half a dozen preterminated cables, a stripper, a crimper, a box of crimp connectors, some twist-on connectors and maybe 100 feet of RG-6 and similar cable.
It's all crap.
Brand new quad shielded cables, otherwise well made, appear to have shorts from the center conductor to the shield, via stray bits of foil, stray wires, all that stuff.
Or, they don't have visible shorts, but they lose the signal when the cable is bent a certain way, or when the floor flexes, or when a car goes by, or something.
The only F connectors I've seen that are at all reliable (and they aren't all that great, really) are some twist-ons that a cable installer used on my house... and they're all in use and I don't know where to get more.
Now, my thumbs and forefingers are sore from yet another round of exchanging cables to see if there's an improvement with yet another new one, and tightening connectors. The cable installer used a small wrench on every connection, and it seemed to make a huge difference. Of course you need a tiny bent flare nut wrench to get in the pockets in the back of most TVs.
The recommended strip for RG-8 puts the cut ends of the braid and foil right at the plane where the center insulation is cut away to expose the center conductor, so it's kind of a sure-fail deal.
Plus the super-fine threads are hard to start, and with thin walls and small hexes they're easy to distort, and, and, ....
really, does anybody know who came up with this POS?
Does anybody make a _good_ preterminated cable, or a _good_ connector?
Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA
I've also got a collection of about half a dozen preterminated cables, a stripper, a crimper, a box of crimp connectors, some twist-on connectors and maybe 100 feet of RG-6 and similar cable.
It's all crap.
Brand new quad shielded cables, otherwise well made, appear to have shorts from the center conductor to the shield, via stray bits of foil, stray wires, all that stuff.
Or, they don't have visible shorts, but they lose the signal when the cable is bent a certain way, or when the floor flexes, or when a car goes by, or something.
The only F connectors I've seen that are at all reliable (and they aren't all that great, really) are some twist-ons that a cable installer used on my house... and they're all in use and I don't know where to get more.
Now, my thumbs and forefingers are sore from yet another round of exchanging cables to see if there's an improvement with yet another new one, and tightening connectors. The cable installer used a small wrench on every connection, and it seemed to make a huge difference. Of course you need a tiny bent flare nut wrench to get in the pockets in the back of most TVs.
The recommended strip for RG-8 puts the cut ends of the braid and foil right at the plane where the center insulation is cut away to expose the center conductor, so it's kind of a sure-fail deal.
Plus the super-fine threads are hard to start, and with thin walls and small hexes they're easy to distort, and, and, ....
really, does anybody know who came up with this POS?
Does anybody make a _good_ preterminated cable, or a _good_ connector?
Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA
