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[taylor]

Hi gang,

I'm a newbie to the arena (Forum & X10).

I have four cams completely overlooking the
outside of my house which means sometimes
one of my cam will send a bad signal to the
receiver due its position.

I've read an earlier post somewhere on this
forum that someone extended the antennae of
the cam to boost the signal.

I will try to search out that post to see
exactly what they did.  However, that will
still be a lot of work for me because my
cams are mounted high and the cord holes
have been caulked with silicone but still
do-able.

My question to you, Is it possible to
somehow strengthen the receiving signal
instead, that way I will only have one unit
to tinker with?

Thanx in advance
Taylor

[duckman dave]

Hi Taylor. I posted awile back about
extending the cams flat antenna away from
my ninja, so the movement would not move
the antenna.That involves soldering on the
board, a longer wire.If you move the
antenna,say 10 or 15 feet you should be
able to find a good spot and mount it .
Now to increase your reception,I've tried
making a cup shape,or dish shape of tin
foil on the back side of the flat antenna
of the receiver. I find this helps a little
bit. If you come up with a good
fix ,there's lots of us who would like to
know.

[taylor]

Thanx Duckman

You've just saved me alot of time searching
for the post.

I will most certainly consider the
soldering and I like the tin foil idea.

I have a friend who's dad had an old TV
antennae attached to the chimney (Before
cable).  Being an engineer by profession he
decided to attach his garage door opener to
it to see how far away he could operate the
door.

Although this is rather useless concerning
opening a garage door, I beleive he told me
he was able to open the door over three
hundred yards away and all he did was
extend/attached the antennae of the opener
to the antennae on the chimney.

Now I don't know what this means if
anything at all.  It just seems to be a
starting point for me.

I'll have to look at the schematic again as
to how the cam, transceiver and receiver
communicate with one another.

I don't work with electronics for a living,
therefore my thinking may be totally off
base.

Eventhough I have a like new chimney
antennae, my neighbors may frown on me
putting it up.  I belong to a "Home Owners
Association" and sometimes they...(well we)
can be unbearable.

Nonetheless thank you again for your post
and I will most assurely share with the
group anything I discover regarding this
matter.

~Taylor~

[duckman dave]

Hi Taylor,  just to add, if you do extend
the antenna, you will need a fine tip
soldering iron. On the board it's a solder
patch with a center like a bullseye. Very
small. The shield (of the wire) goes to the
patch around the bullseye and of course the
wire to the center.Make sure it is not
shorted.

[taylor]

Thank you,

That is worth noting.  I will use the iron
that I use on my computer boards.

Now I just have to make time to do it.

(Famous last words :-)

Taylor

[jimbo]

I really think your freinds dad was pulling
your leg. That tv anteanna is for reception
not transmitting. It will not transmit a
signal any further as it is still getting the
same signal into it and it would actually be
less efficiat as it would have to drive a
much larger transmitter with the same power.
So bassicly he was lying.

If you want to learn about anteanna design
and get some real information rather than
superstitions you can check out the ARRL
website and look at anteanna design. And you
could also head over to
www.radioreference.com and get even betetr info.

[anonymous]

Take a look and see if this may be of help.
http://www.rc-cam.com/gp_patch.htm

Alligator clip with a tooth inside it, a
sharp point inside it I am not sure of the
tech name for this but my idea would be to
clip it to the wire on the out side of the
CAm antenna wire at base of pad and then
run it to the base unit, at this point I am
not sure what to do – drill a hole in the
base pad and use another clip or open unit
and clip it to antenna wire inside? I was
also wondering what would happen if I made
another antenna pad and riveted it to the
back of the original pad on the CAm? Would
I be sending a signal to some other base
unit or to someone’s TV.? I did take some
inside phone wire (25’) and drill a hole in
CAm pad and one in the base unit pad and
then inserted the wire into each pad. It
did improve the signal to the point it know
longer broke up when I moved the CAm. I
moved  pad so as to make the picture go off
and still got a good picture. As to outside
well I have not given that a try. I did
notice that may CAms go nuts soon after
most people get home from work around me.
So it has to do with there phones and such
that they are running most likely. I have a
few photos from a site of a guy who has a
lot more knowledge then me that might be of
help. Let me know if you want the site
address.


1pyr