Winegard Company RZ-8500 Rayzar Automatic Hd Antenna , White

After 8 years of reliable service, the Winegard Rayzar on our RV stopped working with error cod E2. I found one on Amazon and as usual, the order and delivery was perfect. While awaiting it's arrival, I removed my old antenna and just for grins, I bench tested it and found that it worked fine. During trouble shooting, I tested the voltage on the coax connector at the antenna as recommended by Winegard and saw the expected 4.5 volts, so I assumed the cable was good. After bench testing showed the antenna was fine, I checked for continuity on the outer (shield) part of the RV's coax, I and found it was essentially on open circuit. I clipped off the old F-type connector on the coax that attaches to the antenna, installed a new one, and that solved the problem. I speculate that water entry into the unprotected coax connector on the roof eventually led to corrosion of the contact between the fitting and the coax shield wires. There was enough contact to show voltage when the control unit was turned on, there was not enough to carry the current necessary to allow detection of the antenna, hence the E2 error code. Dissection of the original fitting confirmed this. Fortunately, I figured this out before the new unit was delivered and I was able to return it unopened under Amazon's excellent 30 day return policy. Turns out that a $1 connector almost cost me almost $400. I hope this little review helps anyone with a similar problem.

The media could not be loaded. Updated 8/27/2020: Why they fail (or at least one reason)See farther below for my original review. Just updating with what I have found out tinkering with the failed antenna's since my original review. The following is my guestimation of what is going on. YRMVSince my original review had felt frustrated that I had such an expensive dead unit. Through a friend who worked at an RV repair center I ended up with several other out of warranty and dead RZ-8500 they had removed from RV's. I had hoped that might be able to salvage enough parts to fix things. What I found actually was not what I had expected as assumed was dealing with different potential failures and would have enough parts to kit bash something together. What I found was a similar mechanical problem on all 3 units.How it is supposed to work:System drives antenna using a small DC motor and a gearbox. It appears that system senses motor current to detect when its stuck. Uses same mechanism to detect when hitting hard stop from being all the way left or all the way right. All the way left, it hits a stop, motor pulls much higher current under load so it knows it's all the way left etc.Where RS errors come from:This same current sense mechanism seems to be what triggers an RS error. If motor pulls to much current because its having a hard time moving and the unit doesn't believe it has hit an end stop, it throws an RS error.Where E3 Errors were popping:It absence of position sensors. It would seem that when you hit the auto learn button, the unit moves all the way left, then all the way right to figure out the extents of its possible movement. This also seems to be how unit "learns" which way its pointing due to lack of position sensor. If it can't move all the way left or right due to restrictions on movement it then throws the E3 error. In my experience an E3 just seems to mean an RS error thrown when trying to learn extents of movement or learning channels. But could be wrong.All this hassle for a 25 cent part?:On all 3 units, it wasn't electronic failures it was a bad plastic gear on the drive motor.All the gears in the reduction gear box are black plastic(?) fine tooth gears. The drive gear on the motor is a small white nylon(?) gear. The pitch on the teeth of the gear is either out of speck or warping over time. As on all 3 units I found that the tooth spacing on the motor drive gear was off on one or more teeth. There is just enough slop on motor shaft bearing that this can cause the the bad tooth on the motors nylon drive gear to not mesh properly. Causing the tip of the motor' nylon drive gear collide with a tip of next gear. This failure to mesh pushes the gears apart, causing extra load on motor, and get RS error. If this occurs during an operation to learn channels it kicks an E3 error as well.After spending MANY, somewhat wasted, hours running the one unit, I kept finding the same thing over and over.....the jammed up teeth. The other two units I had were jammed up solid from when I received them as "trash" from my friend as RV store. When I took apart their gearboxes, saw exact same type of gear jam. On all 3 units, if I cleared the jam they would run for awhile, then freeze up, open up gearbox and when you turn the black gear you could see the gears were jammed due to a bad meshing on that rotation of the gears. Sorry, picture I took ended up out of focus so no picture of bad mesh.Since its a gear meshing problem and I couldn't find a source for a replacement gear I tried a bush fix. I removed motor from mount and elongated the hole for one of the mounting screws as well as the main hole for the motor. This allowed me to ever so slightly (fraction of milometer) to pivot the motor away from the black gear. This seems to have given the gears enough extra slop between them that the bad tooth isn't causing a collision and is able to mesh. (see photo) By doing this I was able to get two of the antenna head units function again. (see video)Before they would jam within a few seconds of moving with RS error. They are now moving and aiming properly (see video). Is this a great fix, no not really. Really need to replace the gear on the motor and not increase slop between gears. But It did turn the pile of dead antennas into something functional. This is very much a case of YRMV. If gear meshing is this bad from factory, it would make sense that thermal expansion of plastic under sun is enough to cause units to fail. These head units are all 2017-2018 antenna units. Not sure if design has changed since then as Winegard is mum on the subject.I wanted to share as know there are others than shared my pain from these units. Best of luck.Original Review: August 14, 2018These things fail. It's really not a matter of if, but when. I don't know anyone who has one that has worked for more than a few months before E3 error starts. I should have done more research before purchasing. Don't think the things are designed to put up with summer heat as eventually they seem to have the motor seize up or fail.Purchased originally in May 2016. Within less than two months the unit failed with E3 error. Went through troubleshooting procedure and had to get a warranty replacement from winegard in August 2016. Late summer of 2017, unit failed again with E3 error on hot summer day. Called winegard and they walked me through troubleshooting procedure, resetting unit multiple times, replacing cable, etc and for some reason unit started working again one cool evening. I falsely assumed it was just one one time deal and didn't get them to replace the head unit.Just got back from another camping trip. First day out, the dreaded E3 error again. This time getting RS error and unit won't move or reposition. Contacted winegard and I am now 60 days our of warranty for original purchase. Them replacing unit doesn't extend warranty at all. Which is normal in the industry but kind of awful given the failure rate of these units.Winegards solution to the problem now that I am out of warranty: Buy a new antenna.Somehow without even looking at it they know the unit isn't repairable which sounds like a design defect to me.Other individual in RV club was told by Winegard folks that units manufactured before mid 2017 had a design issues and he was sent a replacement for the 3rd time. But he was lucky enough to be a day under his warranty. But if/when the unit fails again he will be out of luck just like me. Guess this fall will have to rip this lemon off the top of the trailer and go back to a make/model of antenna that will actually function for more than 6 months. As these auto antennas are just a failure waiting to happen on your next vacation.If you own one, make sure to be aware of when your warranty expires, which is from the date of purchase and is not extended at all if they replace your antenna unit. Make sure to give the unit a work out on a hot day prior to expiration of warranty, so unit fails while still under warranty and you can get a replacement and maybe kick the can down the road for one more season.

I ordered this antenna in spite of the negative reviews, and it works really well. Perhaps they did have reliability issues (E3 error) in the early units, I don't know. All I can say is mine works fine. The only thing that did not work for me was the metal patch for the old antenna. It didn't fit like it should have.Also, I wanted to cover the original hole with the new antenna, and the instructions clearly state to avoid placing the antenna on metal (it is a dipole internally so it does not need a ground-plane). So I ended up making a patch out of a sheet of PVC and placed the antenna over the patch.I also ended up replacing all of the coax between the antenna and TV. I have yet to see a RV with properly installed coax, and mine was no exception. Excessive bends in the coax, several splitters in the line, staple in the coax - I found all of those issues in my coax.The chief advantages to this antenna as I see them are the super low-noise amplifier, and that the antenna does a 360deg scan to find the strongest signal.

Hey, this thing is awesome, but awesome is pricey ! I almost put up the old standby, the four foot long Winegard, but seen this FULLY AUTOMATIC antenna on a Pleasure Way website. So I got it put it on my RV roof, hooked it up, which was simple, let it do it's search. Wow, 14 FREE stations, and that doesn't include the sub channels. For instance, where I am, channel 4, has the regular stuff, then sub channel 2 and 3. So, I get lots of TV time, all for free. Of course after the antenna had "parked" itself in the perfect direction, you need to let your TV do its scan function.This antenna takes all the work out of manually pointing your antenna, so helpful when you are somewhere where you have NO idea which direction the stations located. My, RV roof is clear every direction around the antenna, so I cannot comment on how it would work if it was located TOO close to an AC unit, etc. The Razar is only a bit over a foot round, so it is possible to place it anywhere on your RV roof, no crank handle to worry about. Good job Winegard.

I replaced another brand that was old, but junk. This unit was a drop in replacement, but much better. We have used it for 2 months now and am very happy with it.