Did you place the antenna over Baked Beans/Butter Cookies Can?
@abcd567 No, but I ate some butter cookies over Thanksgiving. 
My antenna setup options are limited by building guidelines that dictate nothing atypical for balconies can be visible from the street. The ADS-B Aerial antenna is small enough, and blends in color-wise with the railing that I think it will be my permanent solution.
Today’s readings surpass a 100-mile radius towards the coast, which is good enough for me.
Thx.
It is not necessary to use a food or cookie can. Placing antenna over any metallic surface increases groundplane and improves reception. The railing will do the same thing. Try placing your antenna over the railing.
hi abcd
does the quality of the railing metal or the paint over it, play a role ?
I mean if is sand-papared where the antenna will sit for better grounding, would that be more efficient ?
@evangelyul: The shield of antenna cable is connected to a circular metal base plate at bottom of antenna. There is a black circular platic adhesive cover over this plate, so there will be no direct contact between metal of railing and cable shield. However a capacitance is formed between the circular metal base plate and railing (or the food can) through which rf connection is established. This capacitance at 1090 MHz provides sufficiently low impedance to flow of 1090 mhz signal.
I did try direct metallic contact by removing the black plastic cover from base plate and thereby establishing direct contact to the baked beans can, but did not find any noticeable improvement.
Please see photos below.
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thanks
I tried to ‘ground’ my antenna to railing. I only noticed a drop in signal and noise but no significant change in message rate / positions. and mine is cantenna not the one in the picture.
Thanks for the information. I once place Cantenna over window sill (aluminum). I did not notice any difference in message rate, plane count and max range when I inserted/removed a sheet of thick paper between the can and aluminum sill.
Hi All,
I have a similar situation as the OP with disappointing long range tracking. I can’t seem to track a plane outside of the state, which is only about 50 miles from California.
Setup:
- Pro stick plus (blue)
- 40 - 50 feet or so of RG6 coax
- Flight Aware antenna mounted of roof, about 40 feet from the ground
- Raspberry Pi 3
Connection path:
- Antenna > F-Type Female to N-Type adapter > RG6 cable > some adapter > dongle > usb hub
- usb hub > raspberry pi
The red LED on the raspberry pi isn’t on, and I read that in previous versions of the pi (raspberry pi 2) the light is on when the voltage is at 5+ volts. If you have a raspberry pi 3, do you have a red LED on?
Scan images: Imgur: The magic of the Internet
Location:
- Las Vegas, Nevada. It is mountainous around here, so I suspect the mountains do account for some of the loss.
My profile:
https://flightaware.com/adsb/stats/user/jungleboogie
My /etc/default/dump1090-fa:
RECEIVER_OPTIONS="--device-index 0 --gain -10 --ppm 0 --net-bo-port 30005"
DECODER_OPTIONS="--max-range 360"
NET_OPTIONS="--net --net-heartbeat 60 --net-ro-size 1000 --net-ro-interval 1 --net-ri-port 0 --net-ro-port 30002 --net-sbs-port 30003 --net-bi-port 30004,30104 --net-bo-port 30005"
JSON_OPTIONS="--json-location-accuracy 1"
My /etc/piaware.conf:
allow-auto-updates yes # updated by fa_piaware_config
allow-manual-updates yes # updated by fa_piaware_config
$ tail /var/log/piaware.log
Dec 4 18:24:48 raspberrypi piaware[21151]: 36083 msgs recv'd from dump1090-fa (1590 in last 5m); 36083 msgs sent to FlightAware
Dec 4 18:29:48 raspberrypi piaware[21151]: 36519 msgs recv'd from dump1090-fa (436 in last 5m); 36519 msgs sent to FlightAware
Dec 4 18:34:40 raspberrypi piaware[21151]: mlat-client(21190): Receiver status: connected
Dec 4 18:34:40 raspberrypi piaware[21151]: mlat-client(21190): Server status: synchronized with 13 nearby receivers
Dec 4 18:34:40 raspberrypi piaware[21151]: mlat-client(21190): Receiver: 43.8 msg/s received 21.5 msg/s processed (49%)
Dec 4 18:34:40 raspberrypi piaware[21151]: mlat-client(21190): Server: 0.1 kB/s from server 0.0kB/s TCP to server 0.3kB/s UDP to server
Dec 4 18:34:40 raspberrypi piaware[21151]: mlat-client(21190): Results: 38.7 positions/minute
Dec 4 18:34:40 raspberrypi piaware[21151]: mlat-client(21190): Aircraft: 5 of 7 Mode S, 3 of 4 ADS-B used
Dec 4 18:34:48 raspberrypi piaware[21151]: 36865 msgs recv'd from dump1090-fa (346 in last 5m); 36865 msgs sent to FlightAware
Dec 4 18:39:48 raspberrypi piaware[21151]: 37170 msgs recv'd from dump1090-fa (305 in last 5m); 37170 msgs sent to FlightAware
Okay, after re-reading Do I Need A Filter? and seeing the pictures above, it seems I need a filter to improve my range. However, I thought I read from many people (not necessarily on this board) that the pro stick plus with an external filter doesn’t have much of a change.
What’s the recommended course of action to proceed with at this point?
a) External filter
b) Some kind of isolation for better reception?
c) gain adjustments? where, how?
d) something else?
I understand it’s best to have the filter connected as close to the antenna as possible, but I don’t know if I want to have the filter outside in the extreme weather we have in Nevada. Is this a legitimate concern or is the filter weatherproof?
Filtering is one of those things that you need enough but not more than you need. It is hard to know how filtering you need until you test it with and without filtering.
The FlightAware ADSB filters are not waterproof.
a) An external filter is by far the easiest thing to add and get a big improvement.
b) Isolation can give a small to zero change. It most cases you will not see a difference.
c) piaware-config has advanced settings
You can edit the file directly or use the “piaware-config” command
d) The main performance of a site is receiver quality, antenna type and placement, and then filter in that order.
The filter placement doesn’t have a difference. It can be placed near the antenna or the receiver and they will perform the same.
The amplifier placement does make a difference and is recommended to be close to the antenna. This is not usually possible and having an amplifier is much more important than where it is placed.
1 Like
Hi David,
Thanks for the helpful reply, and the information that the filter isn’t weather/waterproof.
So regarding C, I edit that file via piaware-config and don’t touch /etc/default/dump1090-fa, correct?
Can I run the FA filter without an amplifier and expect improvements?
Do you anticipate there being much of an issue running RG6 coax cable? I know there’s an impedance (50vs 75) mismatch but I’m only receiving.
Locations with lot of RF noise (Cell phone & other communications signals), do require an external filter both with ProStick (orange) and ProStick+(blue).
I live in a high rise building with lot of Cell Phone antennas on roof top of my building, as well as on roof top of many surrounding buildings.
My setup does not have an external amplifier, as the ProStic/ProStick+ have an integral amplifier. Adding an FA filter to both ProStick (orange) AND ProStick+ (blue) did improve performance. Here is result of a test I conducted last year. Gain setting was constant throughout the test:
1 Like
So regarding C, I edit that file via piaware-config and don’t touch /etc/default/dump1090-fa, correct?
There is a service that reads the /boot/piaware-config.txt file and then creates the run script. If you change the run script directly it will be overwritten on next boot.
The “piaware-config” command will edit the piaware-config.txt file directly.
So you can run something like:
“piaware-config rtlsdr-gain 40”
“sudo systemctl restart dump1090-fa”
The change will then persist after reboot.
Can I run the FA filter without an amplifier and expect improvements?
Filter can help or not. You only need as much filtering as you need for your location.
Too little filtering will drastically reduce the performance of your site. Like 10-50% reduction depending on amplification. The more amplification you have the more filtering you probably need.
Too much filter will lower the performance by a few percent.
It is better to have too much than too little.
Do you anticipate there being much of an issue running RG6 coax cable? I know there’s an impedance (50vs 75) mismatch but I’m only receiving.
RG6 is just a few percent difference in most cases. The shorter the cable the less the type and quality matters. The longer the cable the more important to have a higher quality cable.
If you need more than 50 feet of coax I would definitely think of using the best quality cable you can find. At 10 feet or less you can get the cheapest cable and not see much of a difference.
It is much easier to find good quality RG6 cable almost anywhere in the world. Where I live the cost difference between LMR240 and RG6 is just a few dollars. Some people say that LMR240 type cable is almost double the price where they live.
Hi @abcd567,
Nice results. Thanks for your chart and experience.
Can you provide the signal path of your setup from antenna to computer? Are you using a raspberry pi?
If so, any idea about that red LED question I posted earlier?
What kind of cable are you using, and the length of the cable?
I think my RG6 cable is pretty good as is, so I’ll adjust the gain based on the output of optimize-gain-piaware3.py and see if my range improves. I don’t really think it will improve that much, based on the images in the link I posted above. Thank you for the cable type suggestion. At a quick glance online, it looked like the cable was less than $1/foot. It might be a little cheaper locally, I’m not sure at this point.
Thank you two for helping me through all of this. It’s very exciting and I hope to have a better range soon!
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Red LED light of Pi remains steadily ON during normal operation. No flickering.
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4 ft RG6 + 1 ft pigtail RG174 or RG316 (I dont remember well). Please see photo below.
The red led off or blinking means there is low dc voltage, 4.5v or less instead of 5.5v.
How long is dc cable between power supply adapter and Pi? A long and/or thin dc cable can cause voltage drop.
The Pi may still work OK with 4.5v, but peripherals, particulartly dvb-t or pro stick wont. Also, the usb hub may be a factor.
First Remove usb hub and plug the pro stick directly into Pi.
If removing usb hub does not solve the problem, replace your power supply adapter with a better one, and shorter dc cable.
The red led off or blinking means there is low dc voltage, 4.5v or less instead of 5.5v.
Okay, cool. I read that many times regarding the Raspberry Pi 2, but I didn’t know if it also applied to the 3 version as well.
How long is dc cable between power supply adapter and Pi? A long and/or thin dc cable can cause voltage drop.
DC cable? I’m using a USB cable that’s about 3 feet long. The same cable functions fine on a different raspberry pi that’s not using the flight aware dongle. How long is your cable? Can you link to the power supply you’re using for your raspberry pi?
The Pi may still work OK with 4.5v, but peripherals, particulartly dvb-t or pro stick wont. Also, the usb hub may be a factor.
The hub is currently in play, because years ago when the pi first came out, folks recommended using a hub to power peripherals and usb thumb drives. When the hub wasn’t connected, the red LED on the pi was not lit. The hub itself is self powered.
What is the dc ampere rating of power supply adapter? Try a larger capacity power supply adapter.
I use 3 Ampere adapters.
I use 3 Ampere adapters.
Can you link to that one?
Since these are cheap (US $3.79 & US $4.09) I ordered 2 from two different suppliers, in case one is not good, other one may be good.
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For Pi #1
https://www.ebay.ca/itm/172312291357
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For Pi #2
http://www.ebay.ca/itm/131813103356
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