Aerial cut by previous tenant's TV provider... eh?

boing333

keith1950 wrote: »

Usual place would be to drill a hole in the bottom corner of a window frame.

You don't need a wall socket just feed it straight into the tv.

Whatever you do don't rejoin a cable on the outside of the house otherwise water may end up in the cable and make it's way into your set topbox or tv.

Logic is completely sound - however, this is rented accomodation. The landlord is already none-too-pleased with what happened whenever TalkTalk butchered the walls and drilled the hell out of them. Window is also timber-framed and incredibly fragile. Also, the cable isn't long enough to get to where the television set is. It's just about the right length to get to the inside of the wall and that's it but, again, this poses a problem when it comes to drilling.

In an ideal world, I'd simply put the cable from the aerial through the hole Virgin is using but this may create a problem for internet access. Honestly, Virgin should have just left the original socket where it was and created a new one for their cables but unfortunetly hasn't happened.

keith1950

You could just marginally increase the size of the hole used by virgin to enable you to feed the cable in.

As long as the cable makes it inside you can easily extend it once inside the property.

There are always compromises to make in situations like this.

mcfisco

If you want something on the outside to come inside, you need a hole for it to come through. If the only hole is already full, you will need a new hole.

Letter box?

Trust me, I've seen it done

Originally Posted by keith1950


Whatever you do don't rejoin a cable on the outside of the house otherwise water may end up in the cable and make it's way into your set topbox or tv.

You can but you'd need to use self-amalgamating tape to seal it
The usual way is 2 F type connectors and a back-to-back connector.

Don't forget that any cable that needs to enter from outside needs to enter from below and the hole sealed.
use a drip loop if necessary.

Moneymaker

You can use a "Flat F" cable and close the window on it. Or you can use WF65-1 cable, which is less than 5mm in diameter.

macman

It's more than likely that the existing hole will accomodate an additional co-ax cable. If not just enlarge it slightly.

[Deleted User]

macman wrote: »

It's more than likely that the existing hole will accomodate an additional co-ax cable. If not just enlarge it slightly.

It does sound like the Virgin installer removed the TV aerial lead and used the existing hole for the Cable connections. If this is the case, I would be calling Virgin to demand that they restore the TV aerial's entry into the house.
Alternatively, Virgin will be only too pleased to provide Cable TV (at a cost of course)!

JimmyTheWig

Presumably there is no "freesat" equivalent with cable?

[Deleted User]

JimmyTheWig wrote: »

Presumably there is no "freesat" equivalent with cable?

No, you have to subscribe to their minimum TV offer. If you don't subscribe to Cable TV, the decoder (which belongs to Virgin anyhow) ceases to function except for a very basic few channels and a constant barrage of onscreen messages about not being subscribed.

boing333

Moneyineptitude wrote: »

It does sound like the Virgin installer removed the TV aerial lead and used the existing hole for the Cable connections. If this is the case, I would be calling Virgin to demand that they restore the TV aerial's entry into the house.
Alternatively, Virgin will be only too pleased to provide Cable TV (at a cost of course)!

Unfortunetly, this.

I have considered calling Virgin, however.

As it stands, I've been strangely fortunate with TalkTalk. I looked around the outside of the house and I've managed to find one of the [many] holes they drilled. It's actually right underneath where the Virgin line goes into the house. So I've managed to bring the TV aerial through that hole and it's now sitting happily alongside where the Virgin cable connects to my router.

So... adapters and sockets. The cable is a bit too short with regards to where the top up box will be and, naturally, doesn't have an F-connector on it, so first of all - would I be right in saying that I need to connect an F-connector to the coaxial cable and then to extend it, attach a cable join. Then, with the extended cable, attach another F-connector to that. Then finally, at the other end, to go into the female Ant. In socket on the set top box, I need to connect a male F-plug to the coaxial?

Is that right or have I just destroyed my Freeview signal?

mcfisco

As long as your careful to fit the connector OK, just get a IEC coax plug

http://www.qvsdirect.com/How-to-fit-a-Coaxial-Plug-p-72.html


And then get a made up standard female/male flylead to use as the extension
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Aerial-Flylead-Female-Socket-electrosmart%C2%AE/dp/B002LG6J2O

You should be able to find one for a quid or so rather than that Amazon price