On good days my rank is in the mid 200’s and I’m looking to increase that a bit. The only things that come to mind is to get a Mini Circuits VBFZ-1065S bandpass filter and change the receiver to a better one (Nooelec v5 most likely). Another option is the filter/receiver and to get the DPD antenna.
I can’t raise the current antenna anymore and if I were to get the DPD I would use a 1 to 1 1/2" PVC pipe securely mounted to the roof access structure and get the base of the DPD antenna clear of the window line up top.
Thanks all.
Pic is a little older. At center of the pvc I secured it so the antenna is perfectly straight.
You could change the orange receiver for a airspy mini
You would need an LNA and filter like this one since the airpy mini needs some amplification to work well.
Combine that with some SMA couplers and you should see a good improvement on your performance.
I have a lot of hardware but the combo above is my best performing setup.
When I changed it over from the Prostick Plus (the blue one) to this setup I saw a 40 % increase in traffic positions and around 25-30 % increase in aircraft.
Mind you, these are not the cheapest components but they are worth every penny in squeezing the most out of your setup and location.
I installed the DPD antenna, replacing the FlightAware 1090MHz antenna. Installed in the exact same mounting location so height was increased by default due to overall longer length. I Understand you cant do that. A noticeable improvement. I dont have any stats to back that up but the improvement was obvious.
Thanks guys. I’ll have to see which one to start with since the cost is about equal. I might start with the Airspy and preamp to help clean up the reception by me. That site is smack in the middle of NYC so that should help the most to start.
Can you shorten the coaxial cable? Make it short enough to mount the SDR and RPi right next to the antenna? If you can’t do that, swapping the orange FlightAware stick for a blue one will already yield an improvement. If you’re willing to spend a bit more, I’d go with an Airspy Mini + LNA. The best setup: antenna + pigtail + cavity filter + LNA + Airspy Mini + RPi4. But it all depends on your willingness to invest both money and effort…
Unfortunately I can’t. I have the coax running on the roof and going into the third floor apartment. There is still some extra coax but I have to leave it that way in case the living room config changes.
If I did the suggestion above would it be like this: antenna - coax - pre-amp - pigtail - airspy mini - pi?
For that I assume that in addition to the second antenna I would need to run another coax and use another stick for it go into the pi? In NYC it should pick up some UAT since there is GA traffic usually off to the east.
So, you would need to swap the “orange stick” for an Airspy Mini or an RTL-SDR v3/v4 with Bias-T. The correct setup would be: antenna > filter > LNA (powered via Bias-T) > long coaxial cable…
A long coaxial cable isn’t necessary for the setup I shared with you earlier. You can easily house your RPi, “orange stick,” FlightAware filter, and short coaxial cable or pigtail inside an IP67-rated enclosure (though passive or active ventilation might be required depending on the location or climate). Then, use a copper Cat6 or Cat5e UTP cable to power the equipment and transmit data to your indoor router or switch via PoE…
Yes, you will need that extra equipment to receive UAT.
For that investment, you can probably expect a few percentage points increase in plane count (GA).
I get about 1% additional but could improve on that with better antenna placement.
Meanwhile, looking at NYC’s high-speed traffic from my station (rank ~32k)… I feel like I’m driving a humble little Kei-truck compared to their F1 cars! But hey, my modest setup gets the job done. YUKIO
If you go for the LNA + Filter, mount that as close as possible to the antenna.
Edit: So what i cannot really guess from the pictures is the surface of the roof. Is that reflective to 1GHz? Looks to me like that.
Edit: Still a prime spot. Congrats!
You can tee off the SMA at the dongles. But that could introduce losses in the line. I use a separate antenna that also feeds ADSB Exchange and FlightRadar24 on a separate RPi. My UAS is less than 1% of total.
I will look at getting the Airspy mini with the preamp in a vented waterproof box. The box I will most likely have to mount on the side of the roof access where the old satellite dish is. I will get a separate SMA to type N coax that is around 6-8 feet or so and put one loop just under the connection at the antenna. The coax heading into the house I’ll look the extra somewhere on the roof prior to dropping down into the window area.
For the UAT I will probably get one more of those amazon antennas for now and just run straight up coax to the orange dongle on that pi receiver.
I will probably do this in September when I stop by my parents to visit.
YUKIO