Does anyone know how to cost effectively make a TV antenna that is capable of picking up local channels ranging from channel 2 to channel 36?

 

Whats the mileage, straight as the crow flies, to the broadcast antennas?
Are you in a valley?

 

I live in Derby Kansas, and everything is flat. I believe that some of the stations are up to 45 miles away. I am able to get 3 stations clear and 2 not clear and 3 stations almost nothing. These are all free local stations. I do not have anything but rabbit ears. I wanted to see if I could make some thing cheaper than the $100 for a store bought antenna.

 

Can no one help me?

 

I know if you put "how to build your own tv antenna" into Google you will definately come up with something.

I will say that from my experience with this, beacuse antennas have to be constructed to pretty close tolerances, you may find that it would be very frustrating to build one.
Perhaps you could find a used one or even put up an "antenna wanted" bulliten at a local mall.

I would suggest, in addition to worrying about the antenna you would improve the reception of any antenna if you got it way up in the air.

I have a wireless high speed modem that I had to mount on a 15 foot mast, on top of my two story home to get a continuous reliable signal.