2.4Ghz Antenna Mounting

[SilentPilot]

I'm going to try the long antennas.

The model has successfully flown using 2x remotes with the antennas strategically placed around the airframe. The main Rx antennas were burried inside the Carbon nose with absolutely no allowances made for 2.4 reception. Indeed when I did a range check with the remotes undone there was no link whatsoever as soon as the nose was put on.

 

Once the remotes were plugged in all I had to do was switch off the telemetry and it worked well

The longer antennas routed out of the back of the nose cone should enable me to switch my telemetry back on.

 

Tony

[heli_bee]

Stu,

No offence intended. You are correct that longer antenna leads will result in more losses.

However, if Tony can get the last 35mm outside the fuselage then the very minor losses imposed by longer leads will be negated by better reception in this case.

Regardless of what is done a thorough range check will no doubt be carried out to confirm good reception.

With Graupner HOTT and my current Jeti setup total loss of telemetry signal, at longer ranges, does not mean loss of model control. This is because the telemetry "transmitter" in the model operates at a much lower power than the transmitter on the ground.

But then, most modellers that use 2.4GHz telemetry capable equipment know that.😆

[RustyKnee]

12 hours ago, heli_bee said:

Stu,

No offence intended. You are correct that longer antenna leads will result in more losses.

However, if Tony can get the last 35mm outside the fuselage then the very minor losses imposed by longer leads will be negated by better reception in this case.

Regardless of what is done a thorough range check will no doubt be carried out to confirm good reception.

With Graupner HOTT and my current Jeti setup total loss of telemetry signal, at longer ranges, does not mean loss of model control. This is because the telemetry "transmitter" in the model operates at a much lower power than the transmitter on the ground.

But then, most modellers that use 2.4GHz telemetry capable equipment know that.😆

none taken, was just clarifying what I meant

[Swalleau]

Hi,

I have a Pike WR extreme which is all carbon.  When I switched to Jeti I asked the factory if I could put 500mm antenna onto the Rx.  They said that they would be fine but wanted to fit them.  500mm allowed me to run the two wires past the trailing edge and out of the fuselage in couple of silicon guides.  These are positioned at 45° from the top seam of the fuselage about 40mm back from the trailing edge.

i check my telemetry traces and have never seen a signal drop on either antenna.  The Jeti records 0-9 and the lowest I can get to is 3 in normal flying.  At that point the Pike is so far away there is more of an issue with seeing it to fly it than with the signal.  Personally I'm fairly sure most of us would not really notice any impact of a slightly longer wire.  Theoretically yes there is some impact, but if you start to notice - go fly a 35mhz PPM set up with analogue servos.... then try the 2.4mhz set up.😉😉

Hope that helps validate the longer wire decision.

Iain

[SilentPilot]

Thank you!!

I'm working tonight but I'll phone T9 tomorrow to see if I can call in with my model and see what size suits best. 

Ideally I'd just have the main Rx antennas in front of the wing, the satellite already covers behind the wing. 

I think I need to relocate the antennas away from the fuselage though, taped to the fuse sides worked ok before but away would be better. 

 

Tony

[f3fman]

I don't know how big your satellite rxs are (my Orange ones are tiddly) but an option is to extend the lead between the rx and the satellite, which is easy to do as I think it is generally two power leads and a digital signal lead making 3 wires in total.

[SilentPilot]

Already done that!!!

The model has previously flown using twin remotes on long extensions, with the main Rx antennas burried in the Carbon nose. 

Ideally now I'd like the main Rx antennas outside the Carbon so I can utilise my telemetry again. 

[SilentPilot]

Had a quick trip to T9 to get some longer antennas. They are now routed outside, they in fact come out where the front remote antennas emerged before.

I didn't realise that these longer antennas (I took the model so we could see which length would be best, ended up with a pair of 400mm) I didn't realise they had the diapole fitment at the end. Threading them in I had to go backwards!

Once installed I tried a range check. It was going well at first, telemetry working, good control from various orientations and generally things looking pretty good

But then it stopped... I had no control whatsoever. Whilst going through a fault finding check I noticed the Rx battery was 3.5V

Flat battery  

 

Oh well, they're on charge now and I'll check again tomorrow. I measured 30 paces from the top of my drive to the other side of the street. It passed this test last time around while sat on its stand on the floor (only a few inches above ground level). I've since found out that range checks are more reliable if done 1m or so above the ground, on non conducive material, so I'll sit this stand on my wheelybin for the next test.

[czorzella]

 

50 minutes ago, SilentPilot said:

I measured 30 paces from the top of my drive to the other side of the street. It passed this test last time around while sat on its stand on the floor (only a few inches above ground level). I've since found out that range checks are more reliable if done 1m or so above the ground, on non conducive material, so I'll sit this stand on my wheelybin for the next test.

As per the user manual, to perform a range test you must stand 30 paces (approx. 90 feet/28 meters) away from the model.

From experience I tell you that some of my models used to fail the range test at 30 paces, so I measured "my 30 paces" and found out that it exceeds the 28 meters mark, so I adjusted the test to 25 paces (which is equivalent to 28 meters) and never had a bad range result ever since.

Carlos

[SilentPilot]

Preliminary range test passed

I do need to do a thorough test again prior to flight though, but before that another problem has reared its ugly head, the Port Flap sometimes has a mind of its own... it sometimes lowers itself fully (~90°) of its own accord. Fairly jittery with it too. If this happened in flight I'm pretty sure it would be uncontrollable  

I've got some deoxit F5 so I may give the servo a shot of that and see if there's any improvement. It works wonders on the resistive strip of open linear servos so I'll give it a go.

The flap servos do seem a little weak though, they move far too easily by hand for my liking, so I may replace them. If I do the flaps though I may as well do all four wing servos...

 

Ho hum. More work to do, with so little time to do it...