Car antenna extension… No soldering

[mcojoc]

Just found a silly mod I figured I’d post… A way to extend the Bit Antenna without modification.

If you pull off the receiver board from the car, You should see the antenna knotted up and fed through a holder at the front of the car. Carefully unknot the antenna, and then Carefully feed the antenna up and through thehole in the front of the car. Don’t yank, you don’t want to pull off the antenna. Remount the receiver board on the car and re-seat the antennain the plastic clip at the top of theplastic reciever mount.

Doing this gave me a full inch more of antenna… I’m testing to see how improved the reception is…

[Admin]

Thanks, Mcojoc! I’ll be watching this mod closely! Once you’ve done your testing can you please advise

• “Before” length (from where towhere?)
• “After” length (from where towhere?)
• The car frequency

[/list]

The last item is arguably the most important if we’re going in search of replicatable results.’Tis all about thecorrelation between frequency and the length of the antenna required to receive a complete wavelength.

Oh – just be careful now that you’ve removed that knot. Lots of folks (me included) use the antenna to pick up the car from the track during the heat of a racing battle. That knot, of course, acts as a strain relief to prevent the antenna being ripped from the PCB.

But then…. if you find there’s a big benefit in removing the knot, then I’m sure I could modify my pit stop method :smiley2:

Cheers

Derek

[mcojoc]

A solution to lifting the car from by the antenna may be to put a small drop of NON CA glue on the antenna where it attaches to the plastic “clip” Just before it exits the chassis and goes through the body. The clip that holds the antenna in place. Combine that AND the small amount of glue and you may have enough power to not “stress” the circuit board with rough handling.I think white gluemight be best. You can certainly work the antenna free from the clip and glue if you needed to access the insides….

I pick the car up by the body, so I didn’t even think of that as a potential problem!!!

I had 20 feet with the 35mhz car before this mod. I’ll post the results of distance after later tonight…

[mcojoc]

Did this to my 35 and 45 mhz cars. Using stock controllers, both receptions increased. I don’t know how much because I am able to control them in my living room ALL THE WAY TO THE OTHER END OF MY DINING ROOM… All line of sight, but I can’t drive it any further unless I remove a wall:smiley2:… It’s maxed out at 24 feet… From one end of my house to the other with me standing up.

Here are the antenna lengths AFTER the mod. The measurement is from the plastic clip on the top of the receiver to the tip of the antenna:

35mhz Before: 2 3/8 inches After: 3 5/8 inches. 4 feet or more increase in range.

45mhz Before: 2 7/8 inches After: 3 6/8 inches. 4 feet or more increase in range.

[Author]

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