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Wing tip mount

VA Maule

Well Known Member
Has anyone mounted their little stubby ADSB antinnia inside the wing tip with successful results?
The antinnia I have is a RAMI AV-11, it will definitely fit just curious if anyone has had acceptable results or if it's going to be an exercise in frustration. Right tip slated to get a Bob Archer VOR antinnia & Garmin GMU 11, Left tip will have a Bob Archer comm antinnia and an "experiment" with the transponder antinnia ( unless someone has knowledge that it would not work acceptability) .
My intention is to have the exterior as slick, clean and free of " whiskers " as possible
 
Nav radios use horizontally polarized radio waves; an Archer lying flat in the wing tip works well. Com, xponder, adsb, all use vertically polarized radio waves; expect poor(er) performance from horizontal antennas. In addition, all 3 of these antennas need a ground plane (large piece of metal under the base) to work properly. I have the Archer com in a -10 wingtip, mounted so the leading edge goes from top of the tip to the bottom, to get some vertical polarization. It works fair, not as good as #1 on an external, vertical antenna. Finally, xponder puts out a lot of power. Don?t mount it too close to the adsb antenna.
(Try it. I don?t think you?ll like it).
 
Just a little anecdotal evidence: I bought a tube and fabric airplane with a "bent-whip" com antenna installed horizontally inside the aft fuselage. It picked up so much RF interference, it was unuseable. I could hear the localizer ident in the pattern. And, I did not have a nav radio in the aircraft. Also, my transmit was often reported as weak and unreadable.

The solution was to disconnect the horizontally positioned com antenna and use a whip antenna on my handheld. Worked great.
 
Finally, xponder puts out a lot of power. Don?t mount it too close to the adsb antenna.
(Try it. I don?t think you?ll like it).

Bob thanks for taking the time to answer, but the antinnia I'am inquiring about is the transponder and ADSB out in the same unit so it's not going to be possible to not have have them too close to each other. This RAMI AV-11 is only about 3" in length so there would be no reason not to orientate in the same downward direction as it would be if mounted on the belly. The ground plane could be easily accomplished in the wing tip just like done in full composite aircraft.

Are you referring to mounting too close what would be my ADSB in (receiver) ? If this, then I understand that it's not desirable to have antinnias in too close a proximity to each other and at that I believe I'll just have to put the RAMI on the belly other wise it's going to be too close to the comm. antinnia.

As I wrote this response I've come to think you're right I probably won't like it.
 
Just my opinion.... it will probably work fine. Many people are using suction cup antennas in the cockpit for receive set ups. For a UAT broadcasting on 978 mhz... it is a data pulse signal at about 20 watts or so. Just mount vertically and put a small circular (maybe 4 inches) ground plane below it. Does not matter if it points up or down... Ground the said piece of ground metal with a wire to airframe ground if you can.
The ADS-B is usually picking up multiple ground stations from a variety of directions. Some software displays will show you which direction they are and what distance.
I suspect your antenna will work fine.
 
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