Antenna installation and alignment

Public notice: the "Share your home equipment setup" and "Cellular antenna installation and alignment" threads have been merged into a new topic.

Thank you kindly Mr Ginggs.
 
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GreGorGy said:
A link and telling us who ATC or what ATC is would be useful.
Click to expand...

See this post and the few that follow for a bit of background and some links.

Also see this press announcement from 2012.

If you look carefully, you can just see the "8ta" logo on the side of the green cabinet on the left of this pic :

DSC01366 (Medium).JPG

This particular ATC site has Telkom Mobile (8ta), CellC, MTN and Vodacom kit on it.

By the way, the link given on their notice boards is dead :D
You have to go here instead.
 
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Nope, took the Omni off, A-OMNI-0069-V3, up for grabs, have no use for it.
Bracket and 4.5m mast also up for grabs.
:)
 
kurtg said:
Oddly enough even though my RSRP remained constant, swapping the antenna inputs on the router would have a large impact on the download speeds, horizontal polarized ant is now on the top right side of the router, not sure why?
Click to expand...
This is because one channel is always a primary. It is used for information exchange between tower and user equipment on the control channel and initial data connection mode data transfer (before evaluating any advanced - receive diversity - modes). I said about it in my earlier post asking someone else to swap antenna plugs. :)

It looks like control channel do not use any beam forming, so it needs matching polarisation. Can you post which antenna is connected to the right/left port for optimum throughput?
 
If this is true, it is indeed odd that Huawei don't document the feature in their manuals nor label the antenna ports. I will be testing this myself and report back.
 
jcheek said:
See this post and the few that follow for a bit of background and some links.

Also see this press announcement from 2012.

If you look carefully, you can just see the "8ta" logo on the side of the green cabinet on the left of this pic :

View attachment 134357

This particular ATC site has Telkom Mobile (8ta), CellC, MTN and Vodacom kit on it.

By the way, the link given on their notice boards is dead :D
You have to go here instead.
Click to expand...

I see the ATC tower in my area is Cell C only. What a pity. :( I was hoping for other viable towers. What is admirable and worth mentioning is the information they share, including elevation. They even hotlink directly to Google Maps.

Did you take that photo jcheek? You seem to have a nice collection of cell tower snaps.
 
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A left field question but can anyone tell me if heatshrink is okay to use (specifically the heat applied) on SMA joins and how fragile antenna cable is? As a standard I typically seal F-connector joins on RG59 satellite cable without issue. I use a Dremel VersaTip Gas Torch with the heat blower tip to shrink the heatshrink.
 
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kurtg said:
Teejabee,

During the initial stages of setting up my system I also got some bewildering results.

What has turned out the best was to mount the horizontal polarized LPDA on top, 600mm spacing between the 2 LPDA's. Vertical alignment of the 2 LPDA's also important.
I bought the clear plastic bird spikes from Builders warehouse and ty-rapped it onto the top horizontal LPDA, hate bird droppings all over below the ant location.

Oddly enough even though my RSRP remained constant, swapping the antenna inputs on the router would have a large impact on the download speeds, horizontal polarized ant is now on the top right side of the router, not sure why?
Click to expand...

Thanks - I did try swopping the two antenna inputs - made no difference to RSRP or download speeds. I will do a write-up today (if this darn site can stop logging me off automatically every 10 mins or so - I don't have enough time to post with pics and text etc). My results are interesting and I have spoken (went to visit them myself) to the Poynting guys here in CT.

I'm now of the opinion that one can do whatever you like but ultimately your download/upload speeds are determined by the ISP's capability of the tower you are connecting to - simple as that!

Results coming soon.
 
Azimuth said:
A left field question but can anyone tell me if heatshrink is okay to use (specifically the heat applied) on SMA joins and how fragile antenna cable is? As a standard I typically seal F connector joins on RG59 satellite cable without issue. I use a Dremel VersaTip Gas Torch with the heat blower tip to shrink the heatshrink.
Click to expand...

Heatshrink's fine to use around coax cable, especially something substantial like RG-58. Just be gentle with the hot-air gun and use the minimum heat required to get the job done. If using a gas torch, avoid using a naked flame if possible and rather go for the type where the heat is indirect, like a Weller Pyropen.

If you have a connector made up professionally, chances are good it will come with a heatshrink sleeve for protection anyway. It helps keep moisture out of the joint between the crimped sleeve and the outer jacket, particularly if the connector's going to live outdoors.

SMA(m).jpg

I assume you mean a joint where the two RG-59 cable ends are terminated into 2 F-connectors and joined with a back-to-back coupler, and you're using the heatshrink to seal and weatherproof the whole assembly ?
If so, also fine - it's a great thing to do.
 
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Teejaybee said:
Thanks - I did try swopping the two antenna inputs - made no difference to RSRP or download speeds. I will do a write-up today ...
Click to expand...

Interesting (in a disappointing way!).

Teejaybee said:
(if this darn site can stop logging me off automatically every 10 mins or so - I don't have enough time to post with pics and text etc).
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Yep, the auto-logoff is a bit aggressive. Tick the "remember me" box when logging in - helps a lot. :D

Teejaybee said:
My results are interesting and I have spoken (went to visit them myself) to the Poynting guys here in CT.I'm now of the opinion that one can do whatever you like but ultimately your download/upload speeds are determined by the ISP's capability of the tower you are connecting to - simple as that!
Click to expand...
Also "interesting" is the fact that your previous 3G speeds were (I think) the same or even slightly higher than you see now. Kinda says the bottleneck is somewhere else.
I'm really interested to see if/how your speeds are going to vary with time.
 
Thanks - yes I do tick the remember me box. I'm struggling to load pics....I do everything but can't find the "upload file" button - where is it?

I'm trying to do my feedback report right now - with pics. It's a long story.
 
jcheek said:
View attachment 134427

I assume you mean a joint where the two RG-59 cable ends are terminated into 2 F-connectors and joined with a back-to-back coupler, and you're using the heatshrink to seal and weatherproof the whole assembly ?
If so, also fine - it's a great thing to do.
Click to expand...

I do all my F-connector terminations, indoors and outdoors, as per your pic.

aru8ute9.jpg


jcheek said:
If using a gas torch, avoid using a naked flame if possible and rather go for the type where the heat is indirect, like a Weller Pyropen.
Click to expand...

Yup, no naked flame with the VersaTip. Provides an interesting laser pointer effect onto the cable though.
 
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Teejaybee said:
Thanks - yes I do tick the remember me box. I'm struggling to load pics....I do everything but can't find the "upload file" button - where is it?

I'm trying to do my feedback report right now - with pics. It's a long story.
Click to expand...

You do not have enough posts and your account is too young - pics need 3xmonths and/or 50 posts (iirc) and for that we can thanks a former loser member.
 
Teejaybee said:
I'm struggling to load pics....I do everything but can't find the "upload file" button - where is it?
Click to expand...

Capture.jpg

It's button (2) above ? The one that doesn't look like a button but (also) is.
Hit button (1) to choose the file on local disk, and then "button" (2) to upload it.
Thereafter it should appear in your text as

[ ATTACH ] uniquenumber [ /ATTACH ]

and show correctly as an image when the message is previewed.
Might be that you've got a different browser and it shows differently.
 
jcheek said:
View attachment 134443

It's button (2) above ? The one that doesn't look like a button but (also) is.
Hit button (1) to choose the file on local disk, and then "button" (2) to upload it.
Thereafter it should appear in your text as

[ ATTACH ] uniquenumber [ /ATTACH ]

and show correctly as an image when the message is previewed.
Might be that you've got a different browser and it shows differently.
Click to expand...

Thanks - I don't have the upload button option - maybe it's what GreGorGy said....such a pity man...pic's speak volumes. I have pic's of my installation, speed tests etc....oh well...should I even bother posting then?
 
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