Can an old style tv antenna work for SW reception?

[Scott SWL]

I have a brand new old style horizontal arrow shaped TV antenna with the vertical UHF tail, in the attic.
Can it be used or modified for SW? Another question, how does it work? I see it is a whole group of different sizes di-poles ? all wired in parallel wouldn't the other size elements interfere with the one you are using?

[Pete, WA2CWA]

Unless your shortwave listening is in the VHF and/or UHF frequency ranges, the configuration of the antenna elements, design, etc. are not really important. You didn't mention what type of lead-in wire or cable you have attached to the antenna. In most cases, there are two connections coming down from the antenna whether it's twin lead or coax. Connect them together and connect those wires to the antenna terminal on your short wave receiver. TV antenna and cable/twin lead will act as the shortwave antenna.

[KD1SH]

Log Periodics, I believe most of them were. The television frequencies were spread across two bands - VHF low and VHF high - each of them covering a lot of bandwidth, so the antennas needed to work across a large chunk of spectrum. Shortwave, no, but it might be handy for listening from around 40 mhz all the way up to over 200 mhz.

[N1BCG]

This question brings me back to my youth and to the unexpected answer: "YES, absolutely!".

I was given a solid-state multiband radio for Xmas because my parents were concerned about me using a mid-50's era Grundig I got working but was out of its wooden case with lots of expose HV terminals.

The house had an "old style tv antenna" on the roof, just like what you described. Not knowing any better, I tapped into the 300 Ohm twin lead that ran past my bedroom window and connected to the radio's antenna jack with a length of hookup wire.

The result was signals galore with an enormous improvement over the telescoping whip antenna!

Alas, I have to confess that the actual antenna probably didn't contribute much, if at all, to the reception, but the extensive runs of twin lead made a fabulous long wire! Additionally, that old skool antenna would certainly work for 6 meter reception, and that's fairly active these days.

[M0VRF]

Another answer..

No.

You'll get more signal from the coax than you will from the antenna which will be essentially useless.

Just run out a long wire for as long and as high as you can as it will be far superior.

TV aerials are for TVs.

JB.

[Pete, WA2CWA]

As BCG pointed out, the actual antenna doesn't contribute much other then it's a pile of metal at the end of the cable run. The actual antenna will be the wire connection from your radio to and including what's on the end. You could replace the antenna with a bunch of metal coat hangers connected together and get the same reception.
"The wire run makes the difference". I've thrown roughly 25 or 30 feet of wire around the basement floor and got decent reception on a short wave receiver.

[Scott SWL]

Thanks for the replies!
I can see that 6m is around channel 2, but that would be the longest set of elements.
I,m trying to understand antennas a little more.
How does a periodic antenna avoid the other frequencies interfering with the desired ones?
Altogether there has to be 30 feet of elements on the antenna.

[Pete, WA2CWA]

Good info here:
https://www.tutorialspoint.com/antenna_theory/log_periodic_antenna_theory.htm
and here
https://www.electronics-notes.com/articles/antennas-propagation/log-periodic-lpda-antenna/log-periodic-basics.php

Google >> simple log periodic antenna analysis

[Scott SWL]

Thanks for the links!
They were very helpful, I didn't know it was a log periodic antenna, that helped a lot.