The antenna provided in the kit doesn’t have a big range. What antenna should I upgrade to? Where to purchase?
Which kit you have purchased?
That cheap antenna that comes with the flightaware kit.
There are many sellers who sell kits and lable these “Flightaware kit”. Can you please provide link to the seller’s web page for the kit you have purchased.
the kit that was on sale by flightaware.
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I cant find the link. the antenna is only 7" tall
This is what i have. Currently at about 3,200 different aircraft per day in Boca Raton, Florida.
Antenna is mounted on a pole exceeding roof apex. Make sure to use the thickest cable available ie RG8X.
Probably a better suggestion would be to use coax that is “low loss at 1090Mhz”.
(RG8x wouldn’t be my list of coax for this type of use . Rather a product such as LMR400 would likely be a better choice)
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What coax to use depends on length of coax between antenna & the ProStick dongle.
Also investing too much money in a very costly antenna is not worth it.
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There are meanwhile many threads here showing antenna options. It starts from DIY antennas to very professional ones like Vinnant or Jetvision (both i am using). You can simply query them with the search function.
What’s also important as said is the antenna cable. The longer it is, the more important the low loss capabilities are.
Finally it can be required to add an amplifier or/and a filter. But this is optional only in case it does not deliver the expected result.
I am currently operating my Vinnant with 7.5dB on a 3m LowLoss cable. Similar results are given with the Jetvision A3 antenna.
The vinnant antennas are made in slovakia for a valuable price.
FA doesn’t sell such kits.
They sell SDRs / antennas.
Kits are sold by third parties.
Get the FA antenna / proper coax and put it on the roof / highest point you can get it.
ADS-B is line of sight so the antenna needs to overlook as much stuff as possible in the immediate vicinity.
If you have an attic, put the current setup in the attic.
In case you want to try to optimize your current antenna: How to improve performance of whip antenna of DVB-T
Get yourself graphs1090 so you can see the difference when you modify something
https://github.com/wiedehopf/graphs1090#graphs1090
tar1090 and the calculated outline of what you can expect from your geograph is also useful:
https://github.com/wiedehopf/tar1090#heywhatsthatcom-range-outline
They have recently started to sell such kits
But not with the shown Raspberry 3 from the thread opener
That’s about the same antenna set-up I have. My antenna is about 12 to 14ft above the apex of my roof. My a/c count (since Ian) is averaging something like 3400 a/c daily here in Lakeland, FL. I’m told that coax is resistance and that it can partially offset the additional range of a higher antenna requiring longer coax. I’m not technically competent enough to wade off into that discussion, but people who know much more than I can discuss if and when there is an acutal drop-off.
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