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Bob Archer VOR Ant. in an RV-7 wing tip

R

RogerM

Member
My RV-7 has Van's system 6 landing, taxi, strobe. and position lights in the forward edge of the W715-1 wing tip. The installation calls for an aluminum foil reflector secured with Pliobond in the perimeter of the tip.

I'm interested in using a Bob Archer VOR wing tip antenna, but in talking to Mr. Archer on the phone he said he has had no experience with this installation and was not sure if the aluminum foil would degrade the signal or not.

I'd appreciate hearing from anyone who has flow their RV with this configuration. Basically, does the antenna work and how well?
 
I believe you will be pleased with the performance of this antenna. When checking the VOR accurracy the local radio shop commented on its sensitivity. It works far better than I had expected !:)

Les
 
I don't have exactly your setup, but something very close:

wingtip1.jpg


The Archer antenna is in the right tip (the pic is of the left.) The installation works great. However, it is absolutely vital that you pay close attention to the installation instructions, particularly as they pertain to how to route wires along the antenna.

I don't have any tin foil in the antenna (used it all up making my hat...) but I would suggest trying it without the foil first. You can easily add it later if it is needed.
 
Archer VOR

Very good performance from the Archer VOR in the bottom of the right wingtip. I can actually pick up my closest VOR, at 27NM, on the ground about half of the time, and that amazes me. It is connected to a Val INS 422. I have not tried an approach on the ILS with it yet, as I am still in phase 1, but I suspect it will be OK. I bought mine, but a friend found some plans on the web to build your own. It is a very simple antenna. No foil in the wingtip on my 9A. Make sure your light and strobe wiring clear the radiating element in the front of the tip, and that you have adequate ground to the base leg of the antenna where it connects to the wing skin. The Bid Deal is making sure that you have no wiring of any kind passing over the radiating element at right angles after it is mounted in the tip. I found that it is best to slide it aft as far as you can and bond it down with some cloth and resin. That will give you plenty of room up front to route your lamp and strobe wiring. Building another 9, and the decision has been made to use Archer antennas again.

Hope this helps,
Chris
 
sprucemoose said:
I don't have exactly your setup, but something very close:
Click to expand...

OOC, What's that door for? I only have strobe+pos in the tip, and haven't installed the Archer antenna yet. So for this discussion, is the concern over foil in the cutout part of the tip, that it might create some reception hole?

Seems like the VOR signals would always be coming from below so the cutout shouldn't get in the way.
 
RogerM said:
My RV-7 has Van's system 6 landing, taxi, strobe. and position lights in the forward edge of the W715-1 wing tip. The installation calls for an aluminum foil reflector secured with Pliobond in the perimeter of the tip.

I'm interested in using a Bob Archer VOR wing tip antenna, but in talking to Mr. Archer on the phone he said he has had no experience with this installation and was not sure if the aluminum foil would degrade the signal or not.

I'd appreciate hearing from anyone who has flow their RV with this configuration. Basically, does the antenna work and how well?
Click to expand...

I highly recommend the Archer VOR wing tip antenna. In cruise flight at 8 to 9000', I get solid reception 80 to 100 nm out from the VOR. I installed them per the instructions in fastening it to the bottom of the wingtip.

My wingtips are the older-style W715 wingtips with the Whelen A650 position/strobe combo light along with some homebrew 3" "driving lights" for landing/taxi lights. I've flown this configuration for 3 years.

The front of the antenna is far enough back from the cutout that it seems like the angle with the VOR station on the ground wouldn't create reception problems. It doesn't for me.

Mike
 
rogerM

dhall_polo defines my concern. Will the Aluminum foil reflective material in the forward wing tip, as specified by Van's, degrad the Archer antenna reception?

Bob Archer reaised the question with me, but said he doesn't know the answer. I'm hoping someone with the Series 6 system in the newer W715-1 tip installed per Van's recommendations has installed and flown the Archer VOR wimg tip antenna. I know we're experimental, but I don't want to be an alpha test.
Thanks for everyones comments.
 
I just started a new thread with this same question. Van's wing tip landing lights, stobe and nav lights undecided, Archer NAV antenna right tip model. The foil in the Vans kit is a heat shield. Any suggestions on how to deal with the foil?
 
I am not big on ANY of the wing tip antennas.... "IT WORKS" is not a ringing endorsement. For gosh sakes if you are going to rely on your COM radio and your NAV radio (especially IFR) and you want to meet MOCAS and so on, don't screw around with internal antennas, you are just handicapping (attenuation) your RF transmitter and receivers.

Yes a VOR antenna l going to cost you 0.5 mph in cruise (wild guess may be less or more). Big deal. When I raced my RV-4 I took the VOR/LOC Antenna off.

I had the cat whiskers (V-dipole) on the belly way back under the horizontal. It was well protected, did not take away for the looks and I suspect drag was minimal.

To take mine off was about 2 minutes, two screws. I put a small thread on the coaxial and BNC connector and just pushed back into the fuselage, then taped over the hole and "lanyard" with some speed tape. When it was time to reinstall, pull tape and pull coaxial out, connect BNC and screw VOR dipole back on. I came in 2nd in my class in the Spruce cross country race with 150 HP. So what ever I did worked.

The other classic place is on the vertical. I don't like that for taildraggers because it will poke you in the eye.
 
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My VOR antenna works just fine in the left wingtip. GMC may be correct that it might be better to have a more robust antenna if one is using it for IFR, but I certainly seem to get plenty of distance reception on mine. I typically do fly at relatively high altitudes cross-country (12-18k) and I'm sure that helps.

greg
 
I pick up VORs long before the guys with external antenna do. The Archer wingtip VOR ANTENNA works better than anything else.

My Archer VOR antenna has been flying over 13.5 years.
 
What Gary said.

I have both a cats whisker and I installed a Bob Archer when I added the 430W...equal reception and the Archer is outta sight.

Best,
 
my experience

When I built my RV7a 4 years ago I install a Bob Archer antenna in a wing tip. That wing tip has vans lights with foil and the vor/ils antenna has worked well for 850 hours. So when I upgraded my RV10 panel to ifr this winter, I installed the Bob Archer antenna and it works very well also.
 
Question to these folks that are getting real good reception from their Archer NAV antennas, are you grounding it using just 4 platenuts?
 
It was 4-5 on mine but it was crammed under the strip that runs the full length of the tip.
 
4 plates nuts

Mine would fit between 4. I placed it under the aluminum strip and rivited it with the platenuts and the strip.

I tried to get away with grounding wires from the wingtip to the antenna and it didn't like that.

works great with great reception now.
 
I hear you RV8iator.
I installed mine one inch away from the platenuts and I grounded it with 3 wires to the ribs. Bad idea:(...and it's glued in PRC!! Had 4 miles range!!
I'll redo the installation properly this week end if I don't break them when removed. Thanks for you help.
 
I grounded mine with just three wires to the rib (no complete strip) and it seems to work fine. I do admit that I don't use the VOR very much, though.

Greg
 
Glide slope

Greg Arehart said:
I grounded mine with just three wires to the rib (no complete strip) and it seems to work fine. I do admit that I don't use the VOR very much, though.

Greg
Click to expand...

With grounding wires my VOR&LOC were spot on but the glide slope was very erratic. Proper grounding fixed that.
 
Archer VOR Antenna

I have the Archer VOR antenna in my RV 7 and it works great. Now I'm building the RV 14 and have the wingtips held in place using the strip hinge method and wonder if it will work OK. Has anyone got any experience with this, I know there are a lot of wing tips out there using this method, but no luck in finding someone. I have emailed and called Bob Acher, but he has not responded in any way. Any experience with this installation would be appreciated.
 
Mine works great!

I used hinges to hold my wing tips on and my Archer VOR anteena works great. I used west system epoxy to attach it to the inside of the wing tip. I don't have access to my pictures right now.
 
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I have hinged wing tip and the Archer VOR, works very well, be sure to attach ground of antenna with the wing hinge.
Dave
RV7A
 
For those who have the Archer Nav Antenna..

.. and the hinged wingtip, do you attach the Archer antenna sandwiched UNDER the hinge used to hold the tip on, or ON TOP of the hinge? Seems like if you sandwiched it then the hinge halves wouldn't line up.. I'm about ready to do this step and would appreciate some install advice. I plan to have the Archer NAV antenna and the hinged wingtip attach method..
 
Securing Archer Antenna with fibreglass

Hi Guy's,

further to this thread, I'm just windering if anyone has secured the outboard element of the Archer Vor antenna with a fibreglass lay-up over the top. I will include the nutplates for wingskin grounding on the inboard element. If the glassing is done properly, I guess, it will require being scuffed up with 80 grit. Does anyone believe arrangement will be detrimental to the performance.

Thanks in anticipation
 
bugsy63 said:
Hi Guy's,

further to this thread, I'm just windering if anyone has secured the outboard element of the Archer Vor antenna with a fibreglass lay-up over the top. I will include the nutplates for wingskin grounding on the inboard element. If the glassing is done properly, I guess, it will require being scuffed up with 80 grit. Does anyone believe arrangement will be detrimental to the performance.

Thanks in anticipation
Click to expand...

I put a couple of strips of fiberglass across the long element to keep it from bouncing around. I wasn't concerned with the bond to the aluminum; the strip bonds to the wingtip on either side, keeps it from moving around. Fiberglass is okay; don't use carbon fiber!
 
Archer antenna with wing tip tank

Is it possible to glass over the Archer antenna and fill the tip with fuel, or will the fuel block out the VOR signal?
 
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