Seeking suggestions for first base/home station setup in a city

[WRZI798]

Anyone dealt with the AnyTone AT-779UV before?
Looking to setup a base station for home and periodic mobile use, in which this seems like it might fit the bill.
Looking to pair it with a Nagoya UT-72G antenna for the mobile portion, along with a BTECH RPS-30M if necessary (honestly not sure if it is or not--at least for home use probably?).
I wanted to see what folks would suggest for an antenna on the home setup side however.
Unfortunately living smack dab in the Minneapolis southern metro with minimal yard space (and plenty of overhead power lines), I'm wondering what I could feasibly get away with using inside of my house next to a window?
Alternatively I could potentially run 30-40ft of coax out to an outdoor antenna in the back yard, but the problem being is the power line to the house and minimal yard space basically limits me even being able to do that while maintaining 10ft from the line feasibly.
My end goal would be to be able to consistently be able to TX nearby repeaters in my area, which I can already (mostly) reach inside on my BTECH GMRSV2 (with NA-771G), specifically our North Minneapolis 725, WRCZ-321 600 Falcon heights, & Metro 2.
Thoughts on all of this are greatly appreciated, thanks!

[WRYS709]

37 minutes ago, WRZI798 said:

Anyone dealt with the AnyTone AT-779UV before?

I have the 779 at home and its clone, the Radioddity DB20-G in my vehicle with THIS dual band $20 mag-mount.

What is the availability of installing an antenna on your roof? Are power wires a problem up there, too?  With my rooftop Comet dual band vertical antenna I get great range from my Anytone in every direction.

An indoor antenna at a window would probably only propagate well in the window's direction. But I suppose you could try with the mag-mount on a metal tray at your window and see if that hits your favorite repeaters.

"Looking to pair it with a Nagoya UT-72G antenna for the mobile portion, along with a BTECH RPS-30M if necessary (honestly not sure if it is or not--at least for home use probably?)." The RPS-30M is obviously for your home to provide 12 volts at the necessary amps to operate it? I use a similar power supply, so I have no experience with the RPS-30M.

You should see a dramatic increase in range and usability over your BTECH GMRSV2.

[BoxCar]

Look into an attic installation for your antenna. Depending on the available space you can get a decent base antenna inside. No need for more than basic protection of the antenna and feedline.

[bd348]

Try a base antenna near a window, with a short coax to the radio.  Use a setup where you can shift the base antenna's position a few inches this way or that, because in an urban environment with multi-path bouncing signals a few inches left or right can make a huge difference.  Mine is mounted to a microphone stand.  Once you find a good spot, keep it there.  If using a hand held radio, you can run an 18 inch piece of thin coax from the radio to the thick stuff.  This provides strain relief for the radio's antenna port, and lets you move it around a little.  You can order some with the correct connectors on each end.  Add a speaker microphone and you don't have to touch the radio.

[WRYS709]

OK: follow those suggestions as to window antenna and coax lengths, and if you have more 779 questions, feel free to let me know.

PS: It is best to quote me, like this @WRZI798 so as to get my attention, as this thread is not named Anytone 779 and I may not read new posts here otherwise.  I only have a limited knowledge/experience base set and ignore many other posts accordingly.

[SteveShannon]

1 hour ago, WRZI798 said:

Another follow up question, once this is setup and I'd like to test wattage and SWR, would I do these tests on the transceiver side only, or should I test both ends?  (I.e. Antenna <=> Cable for one and Cable <=> Transceiver for the other).  Thank you!

 

1 hour ago, WRZI798 said:

Also my apologies, I discovered the cable types & losses thread and found this page, in which I believe I can figure out the loss inquiry from here : https://w4rp.com/ref/coax.html

It’s true that you can calculate the theoretical losses from that page, but I find it interesting to take forward and reflected power and SWR measurements at both the antenna end of the coax and at the transceiver end of the coax.  It allows you to really see the effect of the coax.  Your power and SWR measurements at the antenna will more accurately reflect the power that is delivered to the antenna and the true SWR of the antenna.  An SWR measurement taken at the transceiver end of the coax is affected greatly by loss of reflected power and doesn’t measure the losses in the coax.

So, measure at both places and subtract the forward power at the antenna end from the forward power at the radio end to understand how much power you lose in the coax.

Measure SWR at the antenna end to know the actual SWR of the antenna. That’s the place where the forward power entering the antenna and the reflected power from the antenna are most nearly accurate.

Best wishes! 

[WRZI798]

13 hours ago, WRYS709 said:

What is the availability of installing an antenna on your roof? Are power wires a problem up there, too?  With my rooftop Comet dual band vertical antenna I get great range from my Anytone in every direction.

An indoor antenna at a window would probably only propagate well in the window's direction. But I suppose you could try with the mag-mount on a metal tray at your window and see if that hits your favorite repeaters.

 

Unfortunately it's a rented house and with the minimal space + overhead power lines that basically will keep me from being able to get a roof installation done in the easiest places to mount an antenna up there.
I'll give the window method a whirl or try to see if I can run some cable out to our enclosed porch if I'm able to find a way.
For coax, would 30-50ft be pushing the limit of usability with a transceiver and antenna along the lines you had mention, or rather would it be something where I'd need to amplify the signal at that point going outbound?  Thanks again for your tips!

[WRZI798]

12 hours ago, BoxCar said:

Look into an attic installation for your antenna. Depending on the available space you can get a decent base antenna inside. No need for more than basic protection of the antenna and feedline.

Unfortunately I don't have access to the crawl space up there.  It's a rented house but also just looking into how the walls/structure are setup as it was built in like 1910, it's probably not going to be feasible to run a line up there.  However, I'm definitely keeping this in mind once I try to buy a house next year if the roof method isn't feasible :)

[WRZI798]

8 hours ago, bd348 said:

Try a base antenna near a window, with a short coax to the radio.  Use a setup where you can shift the base antenna's position a few inches this way or that, because in an urban environment with multi-path bouncing signals a few inches left or right can make a huge difference.  Mine is mounted to a microphone stand.  Once you find a good spot, keep it there.  If using a hand held radio, you can run an 18 inch piece of thin coax from the radio to the thick stuff.  This provides strain relief for the radio's antenna port, and lets you move it around a little.  You can order some with the correct connectors on each end.  Add a speaker microphone and you don't have to touch the radio.

This will probably be the route I take based on other suggestions I've read.  On this note for say, just running coax from the Anytone AT-779UV right to the antenna, is there going to be a hard limit to the length of that--or vice versa if that antenna ends up being in an enclosed porch, do I need to worry about the elements as much?  It gets pretty cold in the winter here and temps can easily hit -20/-30F.  Thanks for the advice!

[WRZI798]

Another follow up question, once this is setup and I'd like to test wattage and SWR, would I do these tests on the transceiver side only, or should I test both ends?  (I.e. Antenna <=> Cable for one and Cable <=> Transceiver for the other).  Thank you!

[WRZI798]

Also my apologies, I discovered the cable types & losses thread and found this page, in which I believe I can figure out the loss inquiry from here : https://w4rp.com/ref/coax.html