Radio antenna V 3105

[pdonoghu]

We picked our V 3105 up 10 days ago. Had it in the driveway for a week checking it out and loading it. I noticed the antenna booster had to be on for the radio to get any stations, but didn't give it much thought.

We've made our maiden voyage down to FL for 5 a week stay. I hooked the RV up to the campground's cable system, and also have internet access (cable modem) from the cable.

My problem is the radio does not work. If I turn on the antenna booster for the radio to get signal, it kills the internet.

I've never had an RV that used the antenna/cable/satellite connection as the antenna for the radio. There has to be a way to get reception for the radio, maybe install a separate antenna?

Has anyone run into this situation?

[gonervn]

Not me! Radio, TV Internet all work great.

[pdonoghu]

Thanks Bill. Do you get radio reception without turning on the roof top external antenna booster? I don't. When I turn the booster on, it kills the internet and the TV cable channels. If I don't turn on the booster, all I get is static on the radio.

[Aronious]

Ok! So here is my story and your not going to like it!

We just returned from a month and a half in Florida. While there I shook the ol'e wallet and got enough to fall out to get Brighthouse to hook us up with cable and internet for the time we were there. So the install tec runs the cable over to the cable tv connection on the T-hauler and hooks his meter up inside in the cabinet. NOTHING! Or almost nothing, signal coming thru would not feed either the DVR or the internet cable modem! Long story short, after spending the better part of an hour, we wound up putting a splitter in the line to the cable connection on the side of the T-hauler and running a cable thru the slide seal, under the steps to the front,drilling a hole in the cabinet wall, (which I now have to hide if I ever get the OEM wiring to work right)! The result was that we had great HD picture on the main TV connected directly to the DVR box by HDMI, (by the way, we had to eliminate the surround sound box as it doesn't have inputs for a cable or HMDI imputs, another thanks to Dutchmen for their fore-thought)! The picture on the other three tv's was just basic tv, snowy,and the radio's wouldn't work! Thanks Dutchmen for your fine craftsmanship!!!!! So now I am looking to replace the faulty Dutchmen cable installation with upgraded cable and ends, find a surround sound unit that has a cable and HDMI input, (if anyone knows of such a unit I would like to hear about it). and figure out how to hide the hole under the step for the cable run. The little woman of the house was not happy when we drilled that hole to run the cable! Oh! By the way! I can set my truck beside the T-hauler and get 50+ stations on the radio and only get 3 to 5 on the radio's in the T-hauler!

So, I like the Voltage 3905 layout and a lot of the thought that went into it, but with our unit Dutchmen quality really sucked!

[micahmiles]

I own a commercial Audio Visual integration business, so I can appreciate your problems. I have a couple of comments which may help.

1. More than likely the cable tech missed the lead cable coming from the outside outlet. He wasted a lot of time running a new cable. Unfortunately you have completely cut out or remove the rear panel of the equipment compartment to have access to all the coax cables. It's pretty easy to do it cleanly with an oscillating cutting tool. I promise you the cable is not bad, but it might have needed a new (correctly installed) "F" connector.

2. No A/V receiver has a cable tuner in it. The good news is you don't need one. Your Samsung television has a "backfeed" capability over the single HDMI cable to the Samsung receiver so it will send the audio feed to the receiver. The TV and receiver will also control each other using Samsung's "anynet" control technology, which is also do e over the single HDMI cable.

3. If you want to send the cable or sattelite feed with a high quality signal to other televisions, I suggest doing what I've done and add a ZeeVee HD RF modulator. This will insert your own channel (I use channel 10) on the RF system that feeds all televisions. This way you only need one sat or cable receiver (which is all you can have if you use a dish tailgater system, which I also recommend).

4. With only one sat or cable receiver you'll eventually want to add an RF universal remote control, such as those from universal remote control company.

Dutchmen did, more than likely, wire it correctly, but they use cheap crimp connectors instead is compression fittings. Wherever you have poor signal you just need to cut off and replace the connector on the back of the wall plates or at the splitter.

I'm not a site vendor. My company does sale these products, but I recommend finding someone locally that could help you with all this. I hope this helps.

[Aronious]

So I think what your saying there are more HDMI imputs on the Samsung TV and I can just run another HDMI cable down to the A/V compartment to hook to the Cable/Sat receiver and back feed the sound signal to the Samsung A/V box. Cool!!

Didn't get behind the panel to the wiring, just drilled a cable sized hole under the step into the coat closet and up the inside to the A/V shelf. My understanding of the way Dutchmen ran the cable is that one of the outside feeds goes to the double outlet with the loop cable on it. I had ask my dealer what that was for and never got an answer. I'm going by what I read on the forum. Anyway we tried both outside connections and both inside connections with a non-useable signal on the tec's meter.

I will have to look into a ZeeVee HD RF modulator if replacing the cable ends and splitters doesn't cure the problem.

Thanks micahmiles for the very informative post! Looks like I now have a good direction of attack on my problem!!

[Aronious]

So I guess I got help for my cable problem but I also have the same problem as Pdonoghu in the fact that the radio doesn't work in the back of the unit. Do you have another great answer for that problem?
Thanks!

[micahmiles]

The rear radio / DVD player has severe problems with the wiring. It was obviously wired by someone that has no knowledge of what they are doing. I was shocked to see how the speakers were wired. All 4 speakers negative lines were ganged in a single wire nut while two each positive speaker lines were terminated jointly on a single amplifier channel. The really stupid think is that the radio has a 4 channel amp.

When terminated this way you get a lower impedance which drives the amplifier harder, you get phasing issues, unnecessary distortion, no stereo desperation and potential damage to the radio itself. There is no need for the pointless in / out toggle switch.....the radio has a fader which handles this for you. I've take off the switch plate and am replacing that with a microphone input for the karaoke function of the radio.

I just couldn't believe how bad the sound was coming out of the speakers so I had to look at why, which lead me to this discovery. Also, my small RF remote receiver wasn't even plugged into the back of the radio, so it didn't work on my 3950 upon receipt if the unit.

My rear radio actually does have decent reception, I would check the coax cable and f connector at the radio and splitter nearest the radio first.

Now for a quick, cheap and easy upgrade: Get a short 1/8 mini stereo to RCA cable and plug the mini plug into the "headphone" output of the tv, plug the RCA cable into the radios Aux input on the rear of the radio and you have TV Audio on the good Sony speakers on the outside system. You can easily toggle the radios Aux input between the front input and rear input by hitting the mode button (I think that's it, my voltage is not at my house) while on the Aux source. Note you must be on the same channel on both TV's for the audio and video to match. Which on my Voltage is always true since I broadcast the same Dish channel to every TV.

[gonervn]

Do you know of anyone around Findlay Oh? Zp code is 45840

[micahmiles]

I have friends in the business in Dayton. I'll PM you their info.

Also have relatives in Blufton, but they can't help you unless you need a root canal.

[Nana & Poppy]

Originally Posted by micahmiles

Also have relatives in Blufton, but they can't help you unless you need a root canal.

[pdonoghu]

Appreciate the dialogue, but I'm still left with an issue with the radio. I suspect that Dutchmen tied the radio into the coax distribution system. My TV picture on OTA and cable is good. As I said, the radio reception is fine as long as I turn on the roof top antenna booster, which kills cable picture and antenna. I'm making the following assumptions:
1) Radio is hooked to TV coax distribution
2) when on OTA roof top antenna, it pickups up signal and reception is good as long a antenna amplifier/booster is turned on
3) when on campground cable TV feed, there is no FM transmitted over the cable, therefore no radio signal
4) Assume I need to get the radio on an independent antenna of some sort, that is not tied to the internal OTA/cable/satellite feed.

Assuming my logic is sound, any ideas for what I can do for an antenna for the radio?

Thanks.

[micahmiles]

you are correct, it is tied in via coax and a splitter from them main antennae. my reception is pretty good regardless of whether the booster is on or off. you might want to check the f connectors behind the radio and make sure everything is tight. beyond that you'll have to wire in a new antennae lead, which really wouldn't be too difficult. you can buy the slip in style at radio shack and just run a wire lead to it (unshielded 16-20 guage) and solder it to the center pin (conductor) on the antennae adaptor.

[gonervn]

Pass on the root canal. Looking forward the PM

[gonervn]

I get radio without the booster

[Tanman]

I f I may pipe in here about the radio antenna. I have a V3200 which i am quite sure the wiring is very close to yours. In a nut shell here is the wiring scheme. From the outside the coax runs to the loop under your power panel then to the power booster. From there it is split into several runs, one of which is the rear tv/radio. The radio connects to the coax and actually uses the outside tv antenna as your antenna for the radio. Strange but that is how they wired it. If you turn off your Winegard power booster it interrupts the circuit to the outside antenna thus you have no radio antenna. Its as simple as that.
If you need the power booster in the off position for your cable then your going to have to install another radio antenna either on the side of the camper, on top or if your lucky just stick on in the box behind the radio.. It probably will get FM fair but not great.. AM will be really weak.
How do I know the routing of all this.?? I Had Coachmen send me a schematic of the camper and changed out every coax connector and had to find all the coax ends and splitters.
Good luck and if you want radio and cable tv your going to have to install another radio antenna.

[micahmiles]

Tanman's comments are correct about the wiring schematic, with a small exception. The antennae booster does not interrupt the circuit, as it merely creates an amplified gain of the frequencies your televisions are looking for. It's intent is to boost weaker channels, thereby giving you more reception range. A side effect of this is interference with cable and satellite feed signals.

[Aronious]

So Tanman or micahmiles, do you have the two cable feeds on the outside? If I remember correctly one is labeled cable, the other satellite. I'm also guessing the cable labeled one is the run that goes to the loop connection behind the A/V box, where the heck does the other one go?

[Tanman]

I have only one connector on the outside labeled satellite/cable. I suppose the engineering intent by Coachmen was to eliminate the need for a second antenna for the radio by utilizing the tv antenna for the radio.

[gonervn]

Tanman how did you get Coachmen to send you the schematic of your V3200? I called and was told they couldn't send it to me.