NooElec ADS-B Discovery set - any good?

I’ve just started to play with an ADS-B receiver and so far the installation of PiAware and ADSB receiver have been easy and straight forward. Great work for all who helped building this :smiley:

Running Dump1090 now on a Raspberry Pi 1b and not sure about the placement of the antennas (HOA, line of sight) I want to keep it low budget.
I was looking at making my own spider antenna or buying this set https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01J9DH9U2?psc=1

:cry: :question: There is however one thing I don’t like about the FlightAware website. The coverage distribution plot (position vs range vs direction) is very hard to read. The pie with low numbers (<50 detected) is nearly the same as the white background and I have 20/20 vision. (Checked this with others and they had difficulty too). Can I change the colors used for my profile (example) or how can I contact the site owners to improve this?

Specs for “NooElec ADS-B Discovery 5dBi (High Gain) Antenna Bundle” at Amazon:
“A pair of 5dBi, medium-sized, lightweight antennas with 978MHz and 1090MHz center frequencies, respectively.
Each antenna is only 20g and 19cm (7.5”) long, 5dBi, with a VSWR of 1.5:1 or better at their respective center frequencies."

HAS ANYONE TRIED THESE?

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/415JaO3zjwL._AC_UL115_.jpg . https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/41FsCKTEaCL._AC_UL115_.jpg

They did not do well without a ground plane. I used the cantenna ‘drink can’ ground plane with the FA dongle mounted to the can and the antenna directly connected to the dongle - no cable. The SMA connector on the dongle and antenna make a great reliable connection. The performance now beats the conventional ‘cantenna’. So they are pretty good but do need a ground plane.

@rwinterhoff
Do you mean you have done like I have done in April 2016 (see photo below), but with whip removed and Nooelec antenna fitted to sma female of prostick?

Yes - looks just like your picture but with the Nooelec antenna in place of your white one.

Any pigtail antenna w/o ground plain won’t do well. Keep in mind that my goal is not (yet!) a 400 miles range but to tinker around at low budget.

I played around with several antennas (coax/collinear, cantenna, chopped down magnetic mount, spider) but my best performance has been the FlightAware 26" which is currently in my attic.

For the record my second best was my poor man’s spider. I stripped a coax with the center conductor to 68 mm. Instead of an N-connector and soldering on legs, I made 4 legs out of 14 AWG stripped household wiring cut an extra 10 mm to 78 mm. Then I bent the 10mm end down to the 45 degree angle, heated up the coax outer insulation, and jammed the legs in against the outer conductor. Finished it off with a couple of ty-wraps to hold things in place. Looks like crap but works amazingly well.

Third best is chopped 67 mm magnetic mount on a tuna can at a remote location.

Then make this 50 cent “coax only, without connector” Spider, which I used for experiment linked below.

Why Antennas Have Ground Plane?

Note:
(1) Use 8 radials instead of 4 radials to improve performance.
(2) For outdoor use, around the area where radials are inserted into outer plastic cover of coax, apply few drops of a sealant (such as 2-part epoxy, or silicone sealant, or hot melt glue).

May 2015:
GROUNDPLANE ANTENNA MADE OF COAX ONLY - Without SO239 Conctr

.

Another vote for the poor man’s coax antenna. Tried to post a picture of mine yesterday, constructed per the guidance and advice of ABDC567, but my usb hub was messed up, for some bizarre reason.

I started with a 4 wire spider and made one with 8 legs, all for the price of a little coax and a zip tie.

I have done a soldered eight leg spider, several cantennas, the 8 leg po boy, the worthless little antenna thing that comes from amazon, and the FA fancy dan antenna.

My location is a little weird still, on my front porch, but there is NO NOTICEABLE difference in the po boy, eight leg spider and FA antenna. The cantenna is right behind, and without the gain adjustments I made subsequent to testing it.

Here is the spider, it is working today!

Good luck

400 miles is a big ask. I can get 400KM daily, however, I am less than 100ft amsl.
Does www.heywhatsthat.com suggest that you can make 400 miles?

Gmbl, mixed miles and km in my example. :smiling_imp:

@jcinnb:
Your coax-only/poor man’s/EZ spider looks good.

Well, not really, but you are kind to say so. Only drew blood twice!

  1. Well, the Spider need not to look elegant as a Fashion Model. As long as whip & radial lengths are fairly accurate (+/- 5%), it will perform good.

  2. I am sorry to hear that you got injured twice while making this spider. Yes, it is a bit tricky to push-in the radials below the outer jacket, and the sharp tip of radial may slip and injure the hand. The member GDoggRaspberry has mentioned he heated up the coax outer jacket, then inserted radials. This will make it easier to push-in the radial and reduce chance of hand injury.

@GDoggRaspberry:
How you heated up the coax outer insulation? Put it in microwave or some other method?

I’ve tested both the smaller and larger versions, post on the blog comparing them to other antennas.

Summary: They’re great and inexpensive.

I just used a heat gun to soften up the insulation a bit since I was stretching it out for the legs.

Edit: Added a picture. The inner insulation was adhered to the center conductor and I probably should have cleaned it up with some goo-gone, but it adds to the overall shoddy look and this antenna still worked very well. Also, the camera perspective makes it look like the leg pointing to 4:00 is longer but they’re all the same length.

“but it adds to the overall shoddy look”

I’m loving that! Good Job!

Thanks for input. It will be great if you give the link to the “post on the blog”

EDIT: Never mind, Googled and found it:

http://rtlsdr4everyone.blogspot.ca/2016/09/review-nooelec-5dbi-high-gain-ads-b.html

Wasn’t sure that I can link to it, that’s for the larger 5dBi, for the smaller version see:

rtlsdr4everyone.blogspot.ie/p/re … ennas.html