Rookie on my crew called the splitter a "signal sprinkler" and I had to pull over
Was training a new guy named Travis out in Mesa last Tuesday and he pointed at the 8 way coax splitter and asked if that was the "signal sprinkler." I laughed for a good minute, but then it hit me that I've been saying "splitting the signal" for 11 years without ever really explaining what that does to the dB loss. Went home and actually looked at the numbers on a 4 way versus a 2 way and realized I'd been guessing at tap values on jobs for way too long. Any of you keep a chart in the van for loss per split, or do you just eyeball it like I have been?
Wait, you were doing tap values by feel for over a decade? A 4 way splitter drops you about 7 dB and a 2 way is only around 3.5, so that gap alone can wreck your levels at the box if you're just guessing. I keep a little laminated card taped inside my van door with the loss per split because I got burned on a Mesa job once and never wanted to do that again. Travis might've handed you a gift with that signal sprinkler line.