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Just dawned on me that the PCB antenna I got with my new X8R isn't going to go through the holes on my quadcopter body...they are designed for the 'wire' ended antenna.

Short of boring bigger holes both sides of the quad body *sigh* I did think about buying a second RX with the wire antenna or dismantling my existing RX and replacing the PCB antenna with the wire ones but they appear to be 'glued' in place - even though they are supposed to be detachable?

I am loath to leave the PCB antenna inside the quad's case as there is a lot of electronics around and not much room!

(quad is a Walkera QR-X350)

Anyone else tried this combination?

Regards

Chris

You can break the glue join that holds in the connector or you could just cut off the PCB antennas and make a normal 'whisker' instead.

Some information here might be of use to you ----> viewtopic.php?f=97&t=5595&p=80010#p80010

If you decide to cut off the PCB antennas I would love to get my hands on one so I could test it then return it to you. Ohh! I would be happy to do an exchange. I could send you a couple of 3mm or 4mm sleeve dipoles on 130mm leads.

I was thinking about buying a second X8R (for my plane) and trying to get one with the normal (is this the 'whisker' ?) antenna

If not get the separate antenna and change them myself. I am a bit uncomfortable with home made antenna, I know they are tuned and don't have any test equipment other than the RSSI reading on the transmitter.

I see there appears to be wire antenna with a smaller 'blob' near the end of various lengths, are these the dipole antenna I keep reading about?

(my era was 27Mhz - big long TX whip and a RX cable you used to have to attach to the top of the fin and let the rest dangle in the slipstream, so these tiny little bits of wire make me nervous...)

Chris

cparsons wrote:I was thinking about buying a second X8R (for my plane) and trying to get one with the normal (is this the 'whisker' ?) antenna

Not sure if you can get them without the the PCB aerials.

cparsons wrote:If not get the separate antenna and change them myself. I am a bit uncomfortable with home made antenna, I know they are tuned and don't have any test equipment other than the RSSI reading on the transmitter.

Yup. That is probably what you will have to do. The tests I made were done with some test equipment which enabled me to fine tune the aerials, and there is no reason to suspect that it isn't repeatable, as I have built a few now that show the same results, so you should be able to copy them without having any worries. If you decide to buy a 'whisker' type aerial that Frsky makes, just cut the end whisker (which is about 33mm) to something like 28mm/29mm.

cparsons wrote:I see there appears to be wire antenna with a smaller 'blob' near the end of various lengths, are these the dipole antenna I keep reading about?

If you mean the ones as shown on the Giantshark site that shows a black blob (which is heatshrink) you will more than likely find a sleeve dipole as described on the other thread hiding underneath it.

cparsons wrote:(my era was 27Mhz - big long TX whip and a RX cable you used to have to attach to the top of the fin and let the rest dangle in the slipstream, so these tiny little bits of wire make me nervous...)

Ahh! ... The good old days of 27MHz Amplitude modulation with a super-regenerative receiver so only one aircraft could fly at any time. Yes I do remember those times when the RCS Digisix was the set to have at a low price of £180 odd with an airborne weight of about 15 ounces.. Even back then I was playing with radio along with experimenting with centre loaded and bottom loaded aerials. It was also a time when the 'E' in RCM&E meant something .. Sorry.. I digress... Must be my age playing tricks again.

The X6R (yes 6) ships with the PCB antennas, but includes 2 whisker antennas in the packet allowing you to swap over if required.

Mike.

I have now ordered a new X8R with the 'normal' antenna, when they arrive and have been swapped the PCB antenna will be spare? They are coming from Australia to the UK so will take 10 days apparently.

Flaps 30 - if you want to experiment with them I can send them to you, as long as you promise to leave them intact - I might want to swap them back at some point!

Send me a PM?

Chris

I just swopped the PCB antenna on an X8R for the Dipole ones from Giant Shark. There appears to be something in the RX where they connect to the board, but certainly not strong enough to call it glue...

The new ones attach with a positive click, and appear to work perfectly