Combining antennas

[BigBob]

If I were to take two separate antennas (fixed position, no rotor), aim them different directions, and attach them to the "out" end of a two-way splitter, would the resulting single cable carry the signals from both antennas?  
I've got an attic mounted antenna and get great reception on all Milwaukee HD channels, but I'd like to try drawing a signal from a different market without screwing up my current reception.

BigBob

[Mark Strube]

Yes, in fact Radio Shack sells splitters made for antennas that they call "Splitters/Combiners" however I think any 'ol splitter should do the same thing. However, I believe it's a tricky thing to do since that also doubles multipath. This has been discussed here before so I'm sure a forum member who knows a lot more than me about the subject will chime in soon.

[TAS]

Didn't work for me!  I had the exact idea you have.  I took two different long range UHF antennas, and put them on an outdoor tower.  Splitters and Combiners didn't quite do the trick.  I was trying to point an antenna NORTH at Wausau, when I already had an antenna SOUTH at Madison.  My Madison stations all dropped out, even the analogue went bad.  There was a lot of ghosting and very poor reception.  I think the best solution is running two wires.  I took the second one down because the ghosting is a huge problem for the TVs still using analogue.

Maybe if you only want digital it will work;  the distances between the two cities and your location between, will be big factors.

[mhz40]

This has been done in the cable business for many years, although it was always designed to phase antenna arrays to perform better in a single direction and to pick-up a specific channel.  In general, there is somewhat more to it than simply combining the feeds.  Among many other things; antenna spacing must be considered (vertical) as well as the reception pattern of each antenna.  You can simply try and see if it works, but don't be surprised or disappointed if it doesn't...

[bradsmainsite]

I concur you might "get lucky"  if the signal strengths are about equal from both
locations and you don't have co-channel problems it should work just fine, however the sporadic E season is upon us, so this could cause major troubles at certain times of the day and certain days of the week (otherwise known as ducting, or skip).