Antenna Height

[RichWest]

Curious from those that know about antennas and the technical related stuff.

How far could I extend the antennas away from the controller? I'm talking an extension coax cable. I'd like to have possibly 40-50 feet distance in total. I presume there are some loses, so I'm thinking boosters would be needed. Any thoughts would be appreciated as to hardware and idea of the cost to implement.

I have access to an antenna pole mounted off an old neighbor's house, he was a ham radio guy. I bet it's at least 40 foot. It's a motorized type, so mounting an antenna high enough would be easy work. It's below the tree line now, but in its day it towered over the neighborhood.

Just got me curious and I have access to using it if a want. Have antenna, will broadcast...

 

[Jubalr]

At the Solo's freq of 2.4g, it's actually much more loss than at the Ham Bands typically used. It also depends greatly on the cable type used. Here is a chart that will give you an idea..

 

[Rich]

There is a ham band at/near 2.4 GHz. But the cost of the type of feed line you need for this would be very expensive to keep the losses low.

It may be easier to remote mount a WiFi repeater on the tower and run power to it, than to run feed line and only mount antennas. It's hard to say without fully understanding what you are trying to accomplish.

 

[RichWest]

Thanks for the replies. Land here is fairly flat within 80 miles of the coast, my thought was to reach above the foliage to maintain some reasonable video and flight distance at a lower altitude. This antenna is really convenient for daily use and testing, plus it's motorized and sitting idle.

Really thinking about game management and a Flir in a rural application. I could set my altitude to 50' and never hit an obstruction within a section of land.

The repeater appears to be the proper solution. Latency would likely be the shortcoming however. Thanks for the ideas.

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

The loss going up the tower would be counterproductive. Look at the coax that goes up cell phone towers. That's the kind of thing you'd need. It costs $5-10 per foot, and the connectors are hundreds of dollars each. Plus the fasteners required to hold it to the tower. Plus the jumpers to actually connect to your controller.

I think the way to go is putting a WiFi access point up on the top of the tower in a waterproof equipment enclosure. Then you only need to run low voltage power up the tower. You would need to modify the solo and controller's code to use WiFi in a more conventional manner.

 

[RichWest]

Thanks for the reply Matt. Was reading your FB reply on antenna gains and was hoping you'd see this post as well. So the consensus is an access point, it does make sense based on the hardwired option and losses. Thanks for saving me time in researching that as an option.

My area to cover is a 1/2 mile by mile rectangle. Implementing the access point makes additional sense in that I'd hopefully be able to add devices around the property that could access a network. Multi functional network.

My work begins.

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

The thing with a repeater setup, is it doesn't just "boost your signal". It creates a whole new signal, which Solo probably won't connect to out of the box. You would need to make some significant modifications to code for this to work, I think.

 

[PdxSteve]

Not my experience. A repeater just... repeats. It rebroadcasts the same signal. If you're connected to begin with, it should be just fine, just like your cell phone switching cell towers as you're driving. I've set up quite a few repeaters in downtown office buildings where the office spans multiple buildings so the workers all have the same signal and wifi works while roaming buildings, etc. Actually our entire downtown also has a public hotspot using multiple repeaters to spread the signal around the buildings. Once you're authenticated on the network, you can move around seamlessly without reauthenticating or interruption assuming there is enough overlap of the repeated signals to provide "full" coverage.

Think of the repeaters as being part of the exact same physical network. It's really no different than a ethernet switch/router where you can use as many as you want to extend the local network, except it's wireless. It takes the signal and splits it and so it doesn't matter if you're connected to port A or port B as they are the same.

Google "wifi repeater drone" and you will see all sorts of working setups and instructions.

 

[RichWest]

It creates a whole new signal, which Solo probably won't connect to out of the box. You would need to make some significant modifications to code for this to work, I think.

I understand. Hopefully others within the DIY community will have some guidance when I get to that point.... The main goal is to get above the foliage tree canopy, I've got the height mast thing covered....

Just started digging without any knowledge or specific timeline. Just a curiosity at this point.

A repeater just... repeats. It rebroadcasts the same signal. If you're connected to begin with, it should be just fine,

Great examples for the repeater in application. I think that seems the solution, at least within the mix.

The benefit to asking these questions is to learn the terminology from those that se habla wifi-tech. I'm still not sure how I got my router setup at home, it just magically works...

.

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

I think if you analyze the WiFi connections of such systems, you'll find they are, in short, multiple identical access points, all connected by copper back to the switches. Those aren't repeaters, those are multiple access points. Devices that are actually repeating the signal without a wired link, they take the primary network in one side, and create a second network out the other side. Usually with a totally different SSID. I have one in my house. It's "repeating" it, but out a second network. You also lose 50% of the bandwidth.

You can't just take signal in one side and blast the same signal out the other size transparently.

 

[PdxSteve]

Then what you are using isn't a true repeater...you are probably using an extender. A repeater uses the same SSID, as well as encryption. I've been setting networks up, wired and wireless, for over 25 years. And yes, yes you can take a signal on one side and blast the same signal out the other. That's exactly what a repeater does lol by definition! It receives on one antenna and sends/rebroadcasts/retransmits/repeats on the other.

Here's an explanation on the difference:
10 Ways to Boost Your Wireless Signal

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

And how is one side of this repeater not interfering with the other sides?

 

[PdxSteve]

I'm not sure what you mean by interference. Just think of it like a FM station with multiple broadcasting antennas. To your radio, it's just one signal at 107.1MHz. It doesn't matter how many antennas are broadcasting that signal at that frequency - it's just extending the footprint of the broadcast. That is what a true, actual repeater does.

There is quite a bit of terminology confusion and bastardization over the last 10 years or so, mainly due to manufacturers marketing (what's new). You are using an extender (that may have a "repeater" mode, but it's not a true repeater), which as you say, creates a new but separate network (different frequency, SSID, encryption, etc) that retransmits the same data. A true repeater doesn't create a separate network. It's basically just a signal booster, or amplifier...same network, same data, same frequency, same encryption.

A true repeater is a lot more expensive than an extender. A lot of companies selling extenders market them as repeaters, but they really aren't technically. Most people don't know the difference, so they will go with the cheaper extender because the marketing on the box says it will extend their wifi network.

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

I'm not sure what you mean by interference. Just think of it like a FM station with multiple broadcasting antennas. To your radio, it's just one signal at 107.1MHz. It doesn't matter how many antennas are broadcasting that signal at that frequency - it's just extending the footprint of the broadcast. That is what a true, actual repeater does.

But they do interfere. You can't do that with FM communication radio. The two signals garble each other up and the receiver gets nothing but crap. The only way you can have multiple FM voice transmitters on the same frequency at the same time is with precise timing of the two signals, compensating for how far they have to travel, feedline, etc. You can't just put a rock station FM transmitter on both sides of town and expect it to have a bigger footprint. Anyone within range of both will get nothing but garbage.

My experience with RF is in the commercial and public safety voice stuff. And repeaters in those cases absolutely do use different input and output frequencies. What you're describing, single frequency in and out just magically boosting the coverage is physically impossible in those circumstances.

Perhaps it can be done with WiFi. But I don't see how. RF is RF. I believe you that there is a way and you do. My brain isn't seeing it, and neither is my googling.

There is quite a bit of terminology confusion and bastardization over the last 10 years or so, mainly due to manufacturers marketing (what's new). You are using an extender (that may have a "repeater" mode, but it's not a true repeater), which as you say, creates a new but separate network (different frequency, SSID, encryption, etc) that retransmits the same data.

This I agree completely with.

 

[franknitty69]

what kind of antenna is it and what is the polarization? it might not jive with the solo's antennas.

if the antenna is the proper specs then yes a repeater would be the proper way to get the controller signal to the big antenna.

 

[Rusty Jones]

Are the repeaters rxing and txing on the same wifi channel?

like it was said above,can't be done on exact frequency. FM repeaters input at one frequency, and transmit at an offset, simultaneously. The remote radio does the same, but receives and transmits at separate times.

But I guess it might work on wifi, wifi routers have to send and receive on the same channel, right?

I thought I read somewhere the wif protocol flips back and fort rapidly from rx to tx during communication with devices that are connected??

 

[RichWest]

But I guess it might work on wifi, wifi routers have to send and receive on the same channel, right?

If it only has one radio...

The high-end repeaters have two radios, they then rx on one channel and tx on another...

I do want to thank everyone that offered a reply... I'm still somewhat confused as to what to use.

But started to realize that the over all idea has application in the foreseeable future. I could imagine a flock of birds covering an area and would need the base station to have constant contact with each bird... This would be a commercial autonomous application...

 

[Rich]

Keep in mind that with WiFi you can repeat on the same frequency, it's just done in a different time slot. So there will be latency added, but most network data transfer is used to this and it's not normally a problem.

Just don't try to fly by FPV and you should be ok.

 

[RichWest]

Seems this idea bled over to FB and a discussion of different methods is starting there...either way a narrowed answer is close.

 

[cameraguy]

I think if you analyze the WiFi connections of such systems, you'll find they are, in short, multiple identical access points, all connected by copper back to the switches. Those aren't repeaters, those are multiple access points. Devices that are actually repeating the signal without a wired link, they take the primary network in one side, and create a second network out the other side. Usually with a totally different SSID. I have one in my house. It's "repeating" it, but out a second network. You also lose 50% of the bandwidth.

You can't just take signal in one side and blast the same signal out the other size transparently.

You have the right idea, but you will interfere with other wifi networks. Just a thought