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Posted

Just installed in my house and im pretty disappointed. My btech v1 handheld attached to a midland ghost antenna on my roof was getting 7 miles out yesterday and im having trouble with like 3 now. Im actually running the handheld with its normal antenna now and picking up stuff the base/browning isn't. Any ideas? There is only 50' of line between base and antenna and its powered by a pyramid 70w 5/7a power supply.

Posted

What have you changed (or are doing different) between when you had 7 miles and now 3? Everything is suspect.

 

Exact location of radios, antennas, plus cables, adapters, weather conditions are just some of the variables.

 

I must admit that 7 sounds like a fluke, 3 sounds more realistic, but I do not know anything about your surroundings, environment and test conditions. Consider elaborating. Perhaps some ideas will come to mind.

 

 

Michael

WRHS965

KE8PLM

Posted

Pretty flat area. I'm in rhodeisland and I can get 4 miles from my handheld btech to car base in my driveway. This was done base to base. Car has a 6db midland magmount 3' and browning is above my rooftop at like 25-30'. Im starting to get chatter now but my concern is my hanheld btech is picking up stuff this base isn't and im inside. The wire wraps around the antenna base twice then runs like 1/3 of the way up then drops back down the inside of the mast, so there is a bunch of cable around the antenna, I dont know if that would matter or not.

Posted

Do you have an SWR meter, an antenna analyzer, or a NanoVNA?

 

The antenna system is the first thing to check in my view. The antenna system includes everything from the connector that connects the feed-line to the radio all the way to the tip of the antenna. You need to know that that is working correctly. Checking the SWR is the simplest thing to check.

 

Case in point. Over the last 6 weeks I have been doing quite a bit of testing. One day I was talking 50 miles with nice clear, clean signal. The next day I could barely reach 5. What changed? I was using the same antenna, adapters, radio, location, power, etc. Something had to change. Yep, one of the connector-to-coax connections had failed. Yes, the connectors were still on the cable and looked fine, but when I hooked up the antenna analyzer in place of the radio it told a different story. There it was plain as day, a super high (off the chart) SWR. Fiddled around, took a gamble on which connector I thought it might have been, replaced it, checked cable again and all is good with the world. And the cable was a high-priced pre-manufactured one. For all my subsequent tests I started the day by hooking up my analyzer first.

 

If you do not have at least an SWR meter, I recommend obtaining one.

 

More times that not, it is the simple things.

 

 

Michael

WRHS965

KE8PLM

Posted

I am getting like 8 miles now. I was just hitting some dead spots when I made this post. I raised my antenna another 5 feet today so its a couple feet higher than the peak of my roof and I have lmr400 coming tomorrow. Hopefully that gets me out a little further. I just can't get past 4 miles through one city with highrises and stuff, every other direction I'm good though. Hopefully the added height and cable bump up my numbes

Posted

The following website will help you determine if there are an hills (elevation changes) that could contribute to coverage differences between one direction and another. It is worth experimenting with.

 

https://www.scadacore.com/tools/rf-path/rf-line-of-sight/

 

Recently, after raising my antenna to 56’, I discovered that I still could not reach one particular repeater in town. I used the above tool to get a sense of why. It became immediately obvious. The tool showed there are two consequential hills between my home and the repeater. I now know that the repeater is not one I will ever be able to work reliably unless I am mobile and in a different part of town

 

BTW, I do not know if the tool takes into account earth curvature. If not, the blockage is even worse.

 

 

Michael

WRHS965

KE8PLM

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