Hi,

Firstly, I don't fly, instead I drive.

I am wondering if others here can share their input about their experieces with not only Long Range Antenna's, but also the best Penetration?

My setup is...

VTX - RushFPV Max Solo 2.5w. 
Antenna - VAS Ion.
Camera - Foxxeer Cat 3
Monitor Eachine 5" Diversity. 
Antenna's - 2 x VAS Crosshair Extreme's

The car is a Quantum Flux 3s with TBS Crossfire

Other antenna's I have and tried...

Vas Pepperbox, TBS Triumph Pro, Luminear AXII Double, VAS Skyhammer.

I am waiting for delivery of a VAS Minion Pro and VAS Avenger antenna's.

So far, 2 x VAS Crosshairs work well and give me decent range with some penetration. I am wanting to get more video Penetration and would like to know if there are any 5.8 antennas out there that are better than the above ones I have listed?

I know that using a different freq such as 1.3 will give better results, But I drive with my Great Grandson and have invested quite a bit in 5.8, so will stay with this for now.

Since you are always operating down in the ground clutter, I would have thought that any quad flying experiences would be of little true value.

Also one person will say "X"  is great, "Y" is useless, when its more likely a case of the antenna they are using matching or not matching the output cct loading on their specific VTX/VRX they have used.

As an example, people berate the DJI Goggles v2 antennas for being poor, yet they do everything I need well.

I have experimented with a lot of antenna with HDZero on the EMax Transporter dual VRX/screen.  From ancient RHCP Fat Shark through expensive TrueRC to cheap (and nasty??) Klover Eachine.......... and the differences have been largely minimal.

YMMV, but getting the antenna up away from ground is likely to be more productive than playing with types.

A big factor I'd look into is gain. The reason I say such a thing is due to the fact that cars tend to retain their orientation quite well, so you don't need to worry about what way your antenna will be facing at any given moment. What you'll find with an omnidirectional antenna is that you have a donut/toroidal radiation pattern. As you add gain, that donut will flatten out, and increase the strength towards the edges by sacrificing the vertical coverage.

https://www.researchgate.net/figure/A-to..._333665846

Antenna pickup and amplify signal and noise too.

The ideal antenna would only receive a narrow band matching the tx frequency, and reject multipath.

Have you tried helical like VAS Black Cannon?

Thanks for the replies, much appreciated.

BadRaven,
Oddly enough, I did try that with dismal results. I made a mast and raised the two Crosshairs
to 5m above ground, they were connected to SMA extensions which plugged into my monitor. I could not understand why I had such crappy reception, when i should have gotten a much better signal. I am still doing some testing to try and figure out what is going on.

Suros,
Yes, I have found the the higher gain antenna's perform quite well when it comes to penatration through bushland. I have the Avaenger and Minion Pro now, and will be testing them out over the weekend.

romangpro,
I was only just recently thinking about a helical, it may be worth a try.

If you have a 3D printer and soldering iron, making a helical can be exceptionally cheap, and you can build them with whatever amount of gain you like. Amazing for stationary TX and RX!

(16-Apr-2023, 03:01 AM)Evaredy Wrote: … I am waiting for delivery of a VAS Minion Pro and VAS Avenger antenna's.
…

I’m very curious to hear how the Minion Pro and Avenger combo works for you. I’ve been thinking about trying this exact setup!

I’ve been running and using diy Helicals for years with great success, but the form factor and DIY nature isn’t for everyone. If curious check out my YT channel, GiantAntCowboy; I do a lot of range and penetration tests. Initially for analog but now mostly HDzero and WalkSnail.

I give another vote for a long helical for this purpose. I figure cars will generally not be changing position wrt the rx antenna much, especially at longer ranges. So having as long a helical as you can would improve penetration, and not be super hard to keep aimed well. Driving you can easily use a tripod antenna mount to get the rx higher for better reception. You can also safely park, drop goggles, and re-aim the helical anytime you get too much static. That's a luxury I wish I had flying betaflight quads lol.

Curious if/how you guys are tuning your DIY helicals? I made some pretty good helicals over 10yrs ago, but they sucked until I tuned them using a directional coupler+DIY microwave diode circuit. The tune was very sensitive too... you had to really baby the antennas, otherwise the smallest bump and they'd go out of tune. Those were antennas that just had hand cut ply forms (pre me owning a 3d printer), but from my experience it seems bending wire around a printed form isn't going to be that good without tuning anyways. You guys have more current info on helical construction you'd like to share? I'm a decade out of date lol.

(12-Jun-2023, 05:29 PM)truglodite Wrote: You can also safely park, drop goggles, and re-aim the helical anytime you get too much static. That's a luxury I wish I had flying betaflight quads lol.

Curious if/how you guys are tuning your DIY helicals?

Part of the reason I went with iNav for longer range. Position hold can give such an opportunity.

As for the helicals, I 3D print what's called a former/forming rod and wrap some old copper house wire around it. Gives a fairly precise shape, and printing can also build structure to help it stay true once the rod is out.

ground is not nice for the signal, extended antenna up to 40cm or more will be benefical.

i believe the eachine vrx is not bad, especialy for the price but a furious fpv rapidfire or a tbs fusion might open the bottleneck.

a furious fpv dock with a rpidfire, a helical and tracking - that would be the best i can mention :-)

Yeah, rapidfire, a pair of long helicals, and a tracker would be very hard to beat. That said, tracking is a deep rabbit hole which adds many more points of failure. Personally for most of the poor video reception situations I have flown, easily the best setup is a tripod mounted rapidfire and a buddy to spot and move the antenna. For true LR flights though, the tracking becomes less of a benefit, since your aircraft vector hardly changes throughout the flight.