In another thread @abcd567 encouraged me to upgrade my antenna from the pigtail to the flight aware indoor/outdoor one. I did and I get 20 nm more area everywhere, which is great. But it’s still indoors.
I’d be able to run the antenna wire out the attic crawl space vent and mount it to the side of the house, but the roof line extends 2 ish feet past the outside wall of the house. So right now I could mount it outside on the wall of the house but it would be right up against the aluminum siding and under the roof and 10 feet away from 3 gigantic evergreen trees that are taller than the roof by far and stand between the house and the road.
Any idea how I can get the antenna out from the wall? Up, I can do. Just add a longer pole.
I saw something like this on eBay.
Any issues if I have to add multiple segments to get it outward enough to clear the roofline? I assume not given the antenna weighs very little and there would be decent overlap on the protruding segments.
Also any worry about signal loss with, say, 25-50 feet of coax cable? I’m guessing it’s trivial compared to the gain of being above the roof, even with the 3 gigantic trees next to it.
Thanks in advance! You guys are helping out this newbie.
I had similar issue and decided to use low-tech solution. Two PVC pipes (with antenna inside top pipe) clamped together hanging off gutters on two wire hooks. It’s been working very good for past two years. Yes, it is not 100% vertical depending on force of wind but it survived couple instances 35 miles
wind. Not pretty but had no need to drill holes in stucco walls at almost 4th floor height.
this is actually amazing. Especially since you can just lean out the window and install it from there. Unfortunately we have box gutters only lower down. It’s a very old house with many peaks and valleys on the roof.
How did you ground it, by the way? If I place the antenna outside it would be very close to where the electric service comes into the house. I know I can connect a ground to there.
I have an 8 gauge wire connected to the bottom pipe that’s run over to a copper ground rod used to ground the scanner antenna mast. No too much lighting risk these days but possible.
I did not ground it. I think in my case antenna is still lower than my roof line from north side + tall tree on the right side.
I use flat coax cable (PERFECT VISION BY HOLLAND 12" FLAT COAX) to run it from antenna to receiver through the fully closed window. Actually surprised how well it works and still holding strong after two years.
I just mounted my 5-ish db gain flight aware antenna outside – it’s a hack job so far , passing through the basement wall using a short piece of cable TV coax, and then I have it propped up on the fence outside. It’s about 3 feet away from the house, under an overhang, on the NW corner of the house. Vs the basement where it was in the SE corner.
I’ve lost some area to the southeast. I 'm in pittsburgh and I used to be able to get down to Hagerstown MD or Cumberland MD. But I’ve gained a ton to the North and East. I now get all of the planes coming out of EWR headed to points north and west. I couldn’t get those with the antenna inside.
I’ll leave it outside for a few days and then compare distribution charts and counts. My sense is that I’m getting quite a bit more traffic. I don’t want to hazard a guess, but I’m thinking it may be more like 15% more. we’ll see.
Sounds like a good option could be running a receiver system at both locations and use a combiner program to feed a single piaware connection. You will get both areas. Otherwise, mount the antenna higher and get the improved range with the height and fewer obstructions to the ADSB signals. Have fun.
after 1 day I’ve gotten about 50% more flights (probably more like 60% more) and over 2x the number of positions. Pretty amazing change for just putting it outside, even though it’s still near ground level and shielded by a big brick house and trees.
