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I was curious about that myself because about 99% of the TV antennas I have seen were on the chimney. It is really the only substantial thing to hang an antenna on if you don't want to be drilling holes in the roof.
I grew up in the suburbs where rabbit ears were not that effective so everyone had an antenna on the chimney.
The one I had in Southern Md had a 10' stick of rigid on the chimney mount, a rotor and then another 10' EMT above that with an antenna mounted on it. There were guy wires on the rotor mount. I could get the Redskin games from Richmond on that rig (blacked out in Md).
That was long before cable.

OK, re-reading this thread & looking at the pics again.

The 'antennas' that I reference are not 'dish', but the old fashion beam/boom for VHF/UHF (I think). They are becoming scarce with cable/dish & digital TV now.

I could see a 'dish' interfering with the chimney airflow, but not the 1 or 1-1/4" pipe mast.

The law is the law, but if the brickwork of a chimney is in good condition, the additional wind load imposed on it by an antenna, adding perhaps 5% to the total area, will unlikely be the cause of failure. If a stack is in poor condition, it won't need an arial to get it to fall into bed with you!

A plain chimney pot would impose far more stress - [ it's amazing how big a chimerney-pot is when you climb up and get close!]

Here's a big ol yankee pot, up close!

http://img2.timeinc.net/toh/i/g/0208_chimneypots/installing.jpg

And here's some Victorian monsters from England, nigh on 5 feet tall!

http://www.brightonfireplaces.com/images/two-large-chimeney-pots.jpg

What sort of antenna IS that anyways?

Cliff,
That looks like a Wi-Fi (2.4GHz) antenna, I could be wrong too, could be 5.8GHz.

Believe me Alan,
No-one knows chimneys like firemen do, it seems to be here once winter kicks in, the rate of chimney fires go "through the roof" (so to speak).

Bad(damp) wood, lack of chimney cleaning, bits of the flue that have become seperated (after the rivets rusted out).

We've seen it all, usually on a great night of freezing cold rain and a nasty southerly wind off the Antarctic.

I believe the antenna is the latest incarnation of 'quadravision,' an alternative to cable or satellite TV.

By comparison, this would be a 'wi-fi' antenna:

I was looking at all sorts of WiFi antennas in the Cyberguys catalog. They do seem to come in all shapes. When we were dabbling with the idea of a community WiFi hub I was browsing web sites looking for ideas. They even had plans for converting digital satellite dishes for a directional antenna that would work for 10 miles or more if you had LOS.
You did almost as well with a coffee can.

Mike we had a 'cannon pot' on our house in Gloster England in the seventies. It was a 5 footer, perched atop a massive 12-foot stack to get some 'drawer', as the house proper overshadowed it.
Mrs B wanted it down. Mr B was, quite frankly, terrified half to death of the idea of going up a ladder and looking at it, let alone lifting it off.

I met an amiable cogenital lunatic one evening in the pub. He said he "could get her down, old butty, no sweat", and the next day he turned up with a rickety old ladder, climbed up, pulled the bloody thing onto his shoulder and climbed down again all in about 10 seconds flat! When praised to high heaven by Mrs B for his courage, he winked and admitted that he'd sunk eight pints of Jummy's best bitter beforehand, and promptly collapsed in a giggling stupor. Those were the days!

I sold the pot for a fiver to some herbert who grew strawberries in it.

Alan,
I am going to have to revive the US vs UK vs AU common english language thread again.

What is "no butty", "Jummy's best bitter", and "herbert"?