IF THINGS GO SOUTH YOU NEED TO BE PREPARED - A FAIRLY SIMPLE REASON WHY YOU MIGHT BE STRUGGLING.

On this video we look at a fairly simple reason why you might not be getting many nodes on your meshtastic setup and a simple way to test and fix it, also Sinad Meter news.

[spueli]

Great Yagi 👍🏻 but the Polarisation must be Vertical. You lost a lot of Signal between horizontal/vertical Antennas. Greetings from Switzerland

[LibertyEver]

I ordered four WisBlocks the day before yesterday and four 8.5 dBi antennas yesterday. I'm a ham radio operator so I feel guilty not making my own antennas. Your little Yagi looks great. A three element Yagi should have around 7.5 dBi of gain. My goal is three solar powered boxes mounted to PVC masts on the roofs of houses so my brother, sister and I can text with Meshtastic. They're each 2.5 miles from me in a typical rolling suburban terrain. I'll design and 3D print custom PETG enclosures for the WisBlock, solar panel, battery and antenna.

[thetravi]

I picked up a couple of these and have been having fun finding other nodes. I ordered 5 more including Tbeams and T Echos.

[ruabonite]

A great watch for a Meshtastic newbie, thanks a lot, I do like some of your case designs, the loft one and longer design look just great for my needs as I navigate my way into this field of interest 👍🏽

[MIdaffy]

Very informative video. I haven't done any HAM radio "like" stuff in 10 + years and found Meshtastic interesting and for those very same reason you did. I picked up two of the Heltec V3 and had a devil of time trying to get them programmed. The difficulty came down to the fact the browser your using can't be off chute Chrome version, its has to be Chrome. Up until your video I had only suspicions about the antenna that came with the Heltec. I'm in a Condo, and put one unit in the loft and walked around the neighborhood. The furthest test I got was maybe a 1000 ft. Depressing, but then your video explained it. You have to buy a name brand antenna or make your own, in order to do anything useful with the Meshtastic. Amazon has a lot of sellers selling total crap, and those rating you find for the vendor can be fake, bot generated. Again Thank You for the good and helpful information.

[dougbas]

Well said. I am MSEE and HAM N8VY and I agree with what you say. Vertical orientation of YAGI is wise to couple with other vertical antennas.

[PreparedOverlander]

I have 6 of these with 3 WisBlocks on order to turn into repeaters. I am planning to use my systems with ATAK, which would be awesome in the field or hiking. If you are using Meshtastic, and have not checked out ATAK, which is free, you should. You will need to side load the Meshtastic forwarder plugin to make it work. I do have that link on one of my videos if you want to get this setup.

[fotografm]

Great advice about antenns and very informative. Your Yagi looks great but horizontally polarised and most users will probably be using vertical whips.

[PeterJavea]

Very good point concerning the antennas SWR.
I'm in Belgium and we use 433 Mhz. Could it be that the "bad" antenna is made for that?
I have a question...
I like your "loft" box and the 220vac to 12vdc conversion, and then the 12vdc to 5vdc board.
Couldn't a 12vdc cigar plug to USB adapter like I have in my car to charge my phone, do?

[sparkyprojects]

It would be interesting to remove the cover on the antenna with bad swr, i just opened a couple of mine, they have coiled wire, looks legit, but i don't have a vna atm, so can't check centre freq
Easiest way to remove the cover is to get sidecutters between the plastic and brass as if to cut, gently squeeze and the cover will start to come off, a bit of wiggling does the rest ;)

[TonyLing]

I've noticed a significant shift in state of tune with certain antennas when they are presented above a counterpoise.
It is maybe not a justifiable test to expect the grounded internal surfaces of a NanoVNA to replicate a real life counterpoise scenario.

[geoffreylohff]

Quick comment on your EXCELLENT yagi antenna...

You will want to have the elements in a vertical orientation. Since all the duck antennas are vertical, you will want the same polarization of the RF. (Unless you are installing all antennas in your mesh horizontally... but vetical gets you more omni directional coverage)

[sveinarsandvin]

Good video. Hope You make more of these.

[KH]

PLA is ok for beta testing a print but I use PETG for the actual print. Higher melting point for outdoor use and stronger overall.

[richardsherburn]

Regarding the loft node, why not power it with a small 12v lead acid motor cycle battery (or bigger )connected to a trickle charger. That should keep it running for quite a while if the mains power disappears.

[AndyWragg]

Nice video. Do you have a link to the IPX/SMA adapter shown in the PiP. All I can find on amazon is pigtails with the female end.

[MrSlickPulla]

Got 2 heltec v3 I'm playing with currently, and a t beam and rak wisblock on order

[diodematrix]

Very good and informative video, great little cases and antenna, where can I get the 3d printer files from?

[PortugalCarp]

Neat video, thanks for posting. That Yagi looks ruddy brill, do you have any details regarding how to make one for 868?

[TonyLing]

Good man. I have one on order, as well as a RAK WisBlock