Repeater signal question

[WRZE525]

Hey everyone.

 

i live in Ohio where there’s not much elevation change but quite a bit of “rolling hills”. I have trees that are about a quarter mile away from me all around that are about 20-30 feet tall. 
 

But anyways getting to my question. I have a retevis RT97 with about 50 feet of Coax and an antenna that’s about 20 feet up. 
 

I can only get a little more than 2 miles of signal and I’m wondering what would be best to boost my signal. A taller antenna or an amplifier or both? 
 

 

[SteveShannon]

On 11/15/2023 at 7:33 PM, WRZE525 said:

Hey everyone.

 

i live in Ohio where there’s not much elevation change but quite a bit of “rolling hills”. I have trees that are about a quarter mile away from me all around that are about 20-30 feet tall. 
 

But anyways getting to my question. I have a retevis RT97 with about 50 feet of Coax and an antenna that’s about 20 feet up. 
 

I can only get a little more than 2 miles of signal and I’m wondering what would be best to boost my signal. A taller antenna or an amplifier or both? 
 

 

Back to seriousness, @gortex2 is right.  You don’t specify what kind of cable you have, but unless it’s pretty good cable 50 feet will cost you half of your power on transmit and half of your received signal in attenuation.  The RT97 is built in such a way that it could be mounted on the tower right below your antenna.

To your original question, better antenna placement is almost always more effective than simply adding power.  That’s not to say that power is meaningless, but doubling the height of an antenna will almost always do more than doubling your power and usually for less money.

[wayoverthere]

8 hours ago, Sshannon said:

Back to seriousness, @gortex2 is right.  You don’t specify what kind of cable you have, but unless it’s pretty good cable 50 feet will cost you half of your power on transmit and half of your received signal in attenuation.  The RT97 is built in such a way that it could be mounted on the tower right below your antenna.

To your original question, better antenna placement is almost always more effective than simply adding power.  That’s not to say that power is meaningless, but doubling the height of an antenna will almost always do more than doubling your power and usually for less money.

Not to mention that antenna and cable improvements help both transmit and receive.

For illustration, I tested some unlabeled cable (15 or 17ft) that came with a Midland mirror mount. With 43 watts measured at the radio, it measured 23 watts at the antenna end. Switching to a 35 foot piece of abr400 (and all other factors the same), I now had 35 watts at the antenna.

[OffRoaderX]

If you can do both, then do both. If you can only do one, then  raise the antenna higher.

Edited November 16, 2023 by OffRoaderX
You can't slap an inline power-amp on a repeater.. it wont work...

[SteveShannon]

I didn’t think you could do an amplifier with the rt97.  Am I wrong again?  🫨

[OffRoaderX]

2 minutes ago, Sshannon said:

I didn’t think you could do an amplifier with the rt97.  Am I wrong again?  🫨

You are correct, you cant do it by just slapping it inline with the coax - I assumed he meant he would do it the "right" way.. But upon reflection and realizing that would cost more than the repeater, I have re-evaluated the situation.

UPDATE: DO NOT TRY TO SLAP A POWER-AMPLIFIER INLINE WITH YOUR REPEATER.. IT WONT WORK.

Good catch @Sshannon

[marcspaz]

One of my favorite quotes...

 

"In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is King."

[gortex2]

Cut off 30' of cable ?