I saw a Laird TE Connectivity Y4503 Yagi type antenna and thought it might help me with some signal strength issues I'm having since I am unable to use an outdoor antenna. Currently I use a discone in the attic but it's wide in range. I am more interested in all of the trunked systems in my area within the 450-470 MHz range. Would this directional yagi be worth trying and would I expect to be impressed with the change?
450 - 470 MHz Directional Antenna
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A high gain Yagi in the same location as your discone should work much better within its frequency range. There are lots of good but cheap used UHF Yagis on ebay. I would not bother with a 3 element, get at least a 7 element 10dBd job.
If you like diy, Google how to make a moxon antenna tuned for the range in question. I made one and from indoors it does great. Very small in size
I'm probably just tired but I cannot find anything on ebay that is at least 7 elements that is not 800 Mhz tuned. Looks like there are a couple of 6 elements that claim 10dB. Yagis are completely new to me.
I'll check that out. Thank you!
@M105 posted a while back for 770. Just set your desired center freq.
772 Mhz Moxon antenna project.
I was introduced to the Moxon antenna at an amateur radio club recently. Since I had been looking around for an easy to build directional antenna to monitor the local 770 MHz P25 system I decided to run the numbers for 772Mhz and see how big the antenna would be. It turned out to be small...
I have a 5 element yagi in that frequency range and it picks up towers in the next town from in the house that my discone cannot. And my discone is on the roof.
Laird TE Connectivity Y45010
Laird TE Connectivity Y4505
Laird TE Connectivity Y4506
Would be my choice
Just following up:
I went ahead and bought a new Browning BR-6356. I originally was going to go with the Laird Y4506 but the 6356 was half the price new and I couldn't find any other differences between the two.
Hopefully it's just bad luck (or I learned a valuable lesson) but the antenna arrived with three of the elements bent beyond belief. One was actually snapped at the weld joint and just barely hanging on. Strangest part was the shipping box wasn't in that bad to condition other than being twisted slightly.
Was this just a fluke? Please advise as the price difference is significant.
I went ahead and bought a new Browning BR-6356. I originally was going to go with the Laird Y4506 but the 6356 was half the price new and I couldn't find any other differences between the two.
Hopefully it's just bad luck (or I learned a valuable lesson) but the antenna arrived with three of the elements bent beyond belief. One was actually snapped at the weld joint and just barely hanging on. Strangest part was the shipping box wasn't in that bad to condition other than being twisted slightly.
Was this just a fluke? Please advise as the price difference is significant.
mmckenna
I ♥ Ø
Browning/Tram have been selling knock off antennas for quite a few years now. If you look at a lot of their products, they look very similar to some of the name brand antennas.
I've looked at a lot of their antennas at trade shows, and wasn't really impressed. I believe they just copy existing antennas and make them with cheaper labor/less quality control/lower quality materials.
A lot of hobbyist report they "work fine!". I'm sure they do in most cases. No way I'd put my reputation on the line at work by using their antennas and risking issues. Usually the price difference on the mobile antennas isn't very much, but I know their base antennas are quite a bit cheaper.
Might be a fluke, but I've never had a directional antenna fail like that. You should be able to return it and try your luck again.
Seems fishy to me, clearly the antenna got damaged somehow. Did the shipping company drop it and drive over it? Was it crushed by a load shift? Re-boxed by shipper?
Be aware yagi antennas are directional and the more elements the tighter the beam. A yagi with a lot of elements will need to be pointed directly at one transmitter while one with just three elements could work on two transmitter sites spread by 60 degrees or so but it would still offer a lot of gain over the discone.
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