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Hi there, thanks to the fantastic links and info on this site I managed to set my satellite arial up to receive sat tv in france.  Now before all you tv haters go loony on me - I dont really watch tv, I only did it for the radio stations - so I could get Steve Wright in the afternoon whilst sunbathing in the Loire Valley.  Being a single parent with 3 kids in france is no problem, but sometimes you just long to hear english being spoken in a phrase that doesnt include the words "mum" and "please can i have....?"  Radio 2 over the sat tv did the trick....

But, I have to admit that it might be handy to NOT have to take the satellite dish in this country, so the question is, can I use a freeview box connected to my caravan aerial....it seems to have a booster of some sort, but new van and havent checked out what type/  Does anyone have any experience of this please?  I know I can take the sat dish and set that up.....but its all room in the boot and for a quick weekend away freeview might be easier if it works?

Any help much appreciated!

all depends on what your signals like, tried to set my freeview up yesterday with no luck. Having said that Im not totally sure ive got my aerial in the best position, there are no neighbours close to see what direction they are using.

I have one of these new status aerials which as well as swivelling 360 degress also tilts, so was hoping to get a better picture than I am really.

Might go down the satellite dish route myself, I believe you have to get a freesat card or something to watch, but not sure what channels you get?

a TV engineer told me the whatever you use over here,dish or .... aerial...

if you can get channel five on your tv then the freeview box should work.the only time i got 5 was in moffat.

 I have an omnidirectional aerial built on caravan , but could not pick up freeview.I then used a status Image 530/18 caravan aerial (fishtail) on poles a quite good aerial and aerial goes back into box nicely but found a compact house aerial the best for picking up all channels fitted it on the poles i had for fishtail aerial .It is a bit more cumbersome but easily assembled with supplied wingnuts and has a mounting bracket that will attach to poles i have , i bought a cheap awning bag and aerial disassembled fits in there.

http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/5341829.htm

 One thing i noticed the built in 12v status booster fitted that come with attached status omnidirectional aerial is not compatable with the fishtail aerial or house one . Use a high db mains aerial booster.

Post last edited on 28/12/2006 23:23:42

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Do you suffer from an OCD. Obsessive Caravan Disorder.

http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/5341829.htm

We got this one a couple of days ago scuba

Went from no freeview at all, and very very poor normal TV, to a perfect picture, and full freeview.

Well impressed and only £20

Scuba, could you explain a bit more about the "fishtail" aerial in your picture being incompatible with the booster system on the Status on the van?  Plain English only please!!!

We have the "fishtail" type aerial on a pole and  we have taken an aerial wire from an outside locker behind the furniture and up to the locker where the fitted Status comes into, but we have problems with the picture sometimes so this incompatibility may be the problem.

 Yes the booster system that came with caravan and with flying saucer aerial did not work aswell with fishtail aerial or the argos aerial. If i remember rightly i tried inbuilt booster and only got bbc freeview channels (bbc 1 , 2 ,3 etc about 6 of them in total). Then tried a seperate mains booster (has 22db gain on it) with fishtail aerial and got approx 30 to 50 channels ( approx on the channels, have it written down but left piece of paper in caravan unfortunately). With argos aerial got approx 80 channels (includes radio channels)with mains booster. I just experimented for ages till i found best system(trial and error don`t know why 12v inbuilt booster was poor with directional aerials . I had fishtail aerial from another caravan i used on another site, then i moved sites and most people had argos aerial on site so i bought one and spent ages trying all 3 aerials, obviously aswell it has to pointed in right direction the fishtail and argos aerials. The flying saucer aerial could only pick up the 4 analogue channels, channel 5 was most of time non-existent and when appeared sometimes, very bad picture.

 Hope this helps Jennifernn.

Just got back from Devizes site. Perfect Freeview picture using status omnidirectional ariel.

No channel 5 on terestial TV but got it ok on Freeview