TV and AV installation, Eastern Suburbs.

Ray has been on the tools for forty years, is fully licensed and insured, and turns up himself. He quotes it, he does it, he cleans up. There is no crew and no subcontractor, which is why the person who tells you what is wrong is the same person who fixes it.

Nick in Vaucluse put it plainly after his job: “very professional and quick in responding. The quality of their workmanship was good and I am happy with the result.”

What makes the Eastern Suburbs different

Salt kills coastal antennas, not age

An antenna in Bondi, Bronte or Coogee sits in salt spray and full UV every day of its life. The elements corrode and the downlead's outer sheath perishes long before the unit is actually old. That is why we only fit Australian-made antennas with stainless fixings on this side of Sydney, and why the coax gets a UV-rated sheath rather than whatever is on the roll. We have replaced enough three-year-old imported units here to stop carrying them.

A harbour view is a reflection problem

Sydney's main transmitters sit across the water on the North Shore at Artarmon. From Rose Bay, Point Piper, Vaucluse and Dover Heights the signal reaches you twice: once direct, and once bounced off the water or off the glass on the city towers. A digital tuner absorbs a little of that and then it does not. The symptom gives it away: most channels perfect, one or two breaking into blocks. That is not a weak signal, so a bigger antenna and an amplifier make it worse. The answer is a tighter, more directional antenna and a careful aim, sometimes a few degrees off the obvious bearing.

Heritage and strata decide what goes on the roof

Woollahra and Waverley both run conservation areas, and a street-facing antenna on a Paddington terrace is a conversation nobody wants. We site on the rear pitch wherever the signal allows. In the apartment stock through Bondi Junction, Double Bay and Edgecliff the building runs one master antenna into a splitter chain, so the fault is often in common property rather than your unit. We meter at your wall plate first and tell you which it is before anyone has to talk to strata.

Sandstone and double brick have no cavity

Vaucluse, Bellevue Hill and the older Woollahra and Paddington terraces are solid: sandstone, double brick, shared party walls, nothing to drop a cable down. The default quote for that is a chase, a plasterer and a repaint, which is three days and a paint match. There is nearly always another route. The ceiling rose, an old chimney breast, a skirting run, or up the outside in conduit painted to the render.

Ocean-facing rooms are bright rooms

A screen that looked superb under showroom lighting can wash out completely in a Bondi or Clovelly living room with north-east glass and no eave. Panel type and mounting position matter more here than the spec sheet does. We look at where the light comes from before we agree on where the TV goes, because moving a bracket afterwards means patching the wall you just paid to have made good.

What we get called for here

• 03

  Digital TV Antenna Installations

  Coastal-rated units with stainless fixings, aimed to dodge the reflection off the water.

• 02

  TV Antenna Repairs & Extra Points

  Reception faults metered at the wall plate before anyone climbs on a roof, plus extra points in solid-wall homes.

• 01

  TV Installation & Wall Mounting

  Sandstone, double brick and heritage party walls, with the cable out of sight and no chasing.

• 04

  Home Theatre Systems

  Cinema rooms tuned to the room you actually have, not to the brochure the gear came in.

• 05

  Soundbars & Sound Systems

  In-ceiling and outdoor speakers for terraces and courtyards with no floor space to give up.

• 09

  Wi-Fi Access Points & Whole-Home Mesh

  Coverage through double brick and sandstone, which stops a single router dead.

Common questions

Why does my reception break up on some channels but not others in Bondi?

That pattern almost always means multipath, not weak signal. The transmitters are at Artarmon on the North Shore, and near the coast and the harbour the signal also arrives bounced off water or off city glass. The two copies arrive fractionally apart and the tuner loses the ones it cannot separate, which hits some multiplexes and not others. Adding an amplifier makes it worse, because it amplifies the reflection too. The fix is a more directional antenna and a corrected aim.

Can you mount a TV on a sandstone or solid double-brick wall?

Yes. Sandstone and solid brick need different anchors and a different drilling approach from gyprock, and there is no cavity behind them to hide a cable in, so the cable route is worked out before the bracket is chosen. In most Eastern Suburbs homes we can get the cable away without chasing the wall, using the ceiling, an old chimney breast, the skirting or painted external conduit.

Do you work in apartments and strata buildings?

Regularly. Most blocks through Bondi Junction, Double Bay, Edgecliff and Randwick run a master antenna into a shared splitter chain, so the first job is finding out whether the fault is inside your unit or in common property. We meter at your wall plate and tell you which it is, so you are not paying for a new antenna to fix a building problem, and you know what to put to strata if it is theirs.

How quickly can you get to the Eastern Suburbs?

Same-day is often possible, and we work seven days. Most reception faults are diagnosed and finished on the first visit, because Ray carries the antennas, cable, brackets and test gear in the van rather than coming back with them.