5.8GHz FPV omnidirectional antenna shootout
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- Опубликовано: 8 мар 2016
- In this video I compare a range of 5.8GHz FPV antennas for RC model planes or multirotors or drones, and seen which produces the strongest signal as well as which has the best rejection of reflected signals (multipathing). The results are very surprising.
While the expensive antennas from Circular Wireless and ImmersionRC/Fatshark performed well, the Aomway skew-planar wheel gave the strongest signal and the uber-cheap Chinese antenna from SurveilZone gave the maximum rejection of reflected waves.
Another big surprise was the very poor performance of the Aomway 15dBi patch antenna which I can only assume was defective for some reason.
Not a surprise was the fact that the dual-band 2.4GHz/5.8GHz antenna was utter crap and hardly worked at all.
Once again, the helical antenna (naturally) gave the strongest signal, albeit at the cost of only having a 60-degree beam.
This video also very clearly demonstrates the almost total inability of the standard "rubber ducky" FPV antenna to cope with the reflected signals that cause multipath interference and dropouts.
Aside from the Aomway patch, the dual band antenna and the standard rubber ducky, any of these antennas will do a credible job on your FPV gear so choose according to your budget.
product links:
Aomway patch antenna (provided for review by HobbyKing):
www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/st...
Aomway skew planar 4-lobe antenna (provided for review by HobbyKing):
www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/st...
Circular wireless skew planar antenna (provided for review by Circular Wireless):
www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/st...
Dual band (2.4/5.8) circularly polarized antenna (provided for review by RCTimer):
rctimer.com/product-1429.html
BeeRotor circularly polarised antenna (provided for review by RCTimer):
- pre-release-
Immersion RC circularly polarized antenna (provided for review by Fatshark/Immersion):
www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/st...
Cloud Spirit low-cost Chinese antenna:
www.surveilzone.com/5.8g-circu...
Also used in this review was the Quanum Elite Autoscan FPV receiver from HobbyKing reviewed here:
• Quanum FPV ground stat...
The Quanum autoscan receiver reviewed here:
• Quanum 5.8GHz autoscan...
and the nice10-inch FPV monitor (with the crappy reflective screen) from HobbyKing:
www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/st... 
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Thank you for taking the time to do these tests for us. This information is gold for us RC enthusiasts.
I love your explanations sir. Thank you for your time and effort
Great review, can you please list the commercial names of the good antennas or links to where one can get them? Thank you
thank you for this video it really helps to see through all the vodo of fpv amnidirectional antenna's and to see a good starter cheaper antenna
One of the most useful videos you've made! Very helpful.
I recently maidened a plane with that cheap chinese antenna you reviewed favourably. I have most of the other antennas (VAS, CW, you name it) and many not mentioned. But I am glad to know this cheap antennas (came with a vtx) tested so well.
Love the real world tests, thanks Bruce!
I use those cheap amonyway antannas and they work great... thanks for the test results, now i feel like picked a good one to use with out ever wasting my money on trying something else. you are the man Bruce.
It looks like cheap is the winner today! Horray!
I saw a lot of people using these patch antennas these few weeks and last time i had chance to see some in action, i was not so impressed by the performances and your results confirmed my thought. From my experience for 5.8Ghz cloverleaf and helical is the perfect couple even for proximity, 3~5 turns for proximity and 10~15 turn for insane kickass long range...
I would love to see a video of your homemade cloverleaf :)
Thanks for sharing and happy midweek
That was awesome, thanks for the time and effort you put in. Very useful info for me.
Looking fwd to the home made green unit video one day too.
Thanks again.
Thank you for the awesome education that you provide to us all. :-) Always looking forward to your next video!
Fantastic Video and very informative! Thanks, Bruce.
Great Video. You are a very good presenter. Love to listen to you talk.
COME ON GUYS?!?! Bruce has over 116k subscribers and only 264 are willing to throw him a few bucks on Patreon to support this awesome guy's selfless work in our hobby?? Bruce deserves much more of our support. Sign up for a $1 a month AT LEAST!! I'm disgusted that more of us aren't giving our support in the form of a few bucks a month. Bruce is a retired guy supporting his wife by giving us his TIME and EXPERTISE on a daily basis. Hell, he even will take our CALLS if we need his help in all things RC related. MAN UP!!
+currdog44 www.patreon.com/user?u=2951605
+Gary Balliet Thanks Gary I should have included that link.
+currdog44 How do i donate want to chip in as well
+orangeriderz thanks for steppin up dude! See Gary's post above, click on link and sign up! Its easy peasy.
+currdog44 - After all Bruce has done for us, we should probably send him our credit card bills. It's all his fault! Or maybe we can blame Barry?
Thanks for everything, Bruce and it's only fair that we support you as all of this has been very difficult over the years. I am now a supporter!
I changed over to the Aomway 4-lobes some time ago. All my quads and receivers are equipped with them nowadays. A great all-around antenna which is also very, very tough and is at a good price (about $15-22 for 2). I've even lost 1 at the park and stumbled on it 2 weeks later after the council lawnmower had run over it and spat it out - no damage and I'm still using it to this day.
Excellent review Bruce! An essential subject.
I like the Aomway skew antennas too, tried them, and have about half dozen now, I've spent much more money on more expensive 5.8 antennas, but now the Aomway is my go to for 5.8. I love how sturdy they are too.
Brilliant video. Very informative. Kudos!
Very, very good, useful video, good methodology and testing - keep up the good work.
Great work Bruce , what would we do without you
+Fredy Lievano I just learned that he's on Patreon. So you can support $1 or whatever to keep him going. www.patreon.com/user?u=2951605&u=2951605&ty=c
Sensational video and review, very helpful information. Thanks Bruce. :)
Nice video, thank you. From Poland with love Bruce
thanks Bruce for this great review again!!!! Unbiased, nicely told and including alle the numbers one needs. (Recently I ordered some of the Aomways just as cheap ImmRC replacements...not sure now... maybe they should become my new number one antenna's... too man good reviews coming out on them these days)
Really a great video!! Very informative. Thank you
Nice video, I was looking for a great starting antenna and I think the cp aomway fullfill my needs, Thank you for the tests!
Thanks again mate love your work
Great video. Actual numbers are great science, way better than the "other" youtube videos that just have two ambiguous videos side by side. My aomway patch also performed very poorly.
great test thanks for your work.
You bring such joy from the word CRAP made me giggle every time :D
Ur the best Bruce! fantasic!
ahh! finally! i've been requesting about this video for a long time.
Ace review of the antennas.
I have that antenna as my first bundle, at first I want to replace it with a fatshark/immersion one because it can be bent, but after this review I might actually stay with it, it's white and actually helps with the orientation.
Very useful. Thanks Bruce.
Great Video Bruce!
This video is the best could you please please please do prop shoot out for racing quads different brands as well as 2 vs 3 props in 5 or 6 inch cant find any good usefull information on youtube about it and your channel is the best most reliable source of information about quads. Ps Love your channel.
awsome video like usual. learned a ton.
Thanks a lot , great video
Another great review, Bruce! Thank you I was hoping Alex could send you an sample to test, of his "Blue Beam Ultra" antennas.
Hi Bruce, I've just done a comparison test myself using a 250mw IRC TX (using TBS Triumph at the TX) and found the Aomway skew planar is good but the TBS Triumph is better still!
Despite being very small the TBS Triumph really cuts out almost all breakups from reflections and gave me a useable signal out to 2000M LOS My Skew planar ratings are:
1,TBS Triumph,
2, Aomway,
3, Circular wireless and
4, fatshark.
Thanks Bruce
very interesting video! good job!
excelente video. thanks and long life to you :)
Good to see the Helical still working well for you Bruce 👍
Let me know if you ever need another
Cheers and a great shootout
do you still sell these bignose??
looking for a helical 4 or 5 turns
+wippo76 yes mate, message me interested
cheers
Great tech video. Bruce is no kid. He is one knowledgeable dude. It takes years to pick up the ability to analyze something and come up with logical ,demonstrable comparisons. He has a truelove analytical mind and the ability to explain his conclusions. I have an IQ of 136. I imagine ,if tested, he would score several points higher. We,who can, should help him as much as possible financially as well as supporting his channel. D.Fish
+Don Fish Jr. (The Flying Fish) www.patreon.com/user?u=2951605
+Gary Balliet Thank You very much.
Great review.
I got a set of those Aomway 4 leaf CP antennas from Banggood for super cheap, and they are working just as well as the Fatshark ones I paid nearly twice the price for. And I can say from much personal experience they hold up in a crash. :)
+Stephen Clute Exactly the same as me. I got my first Aomway 4 lobe a while back, now I've switched to that antenna on all my quads. Very happy with it, and price vs performance is stellar compared to the others I've tried.
Stephen Clute --
Hey Bruce, at the start of the video showing which antennas you would be testing you included your own "home-made" one but you failed to show it in the test?
I'm a big fan of the bignose13 helical as well, I haven't had to use my 5 turn yet as I got 5km from a 3 turn - and that was a long way for me :)
do you find the 60degrees manageable while flying? Do you use it for quadcopter flights?
Well done...loved the reviews. If you can find some 3D patterns for those designs it might help show how they do what they do...
Thank you for taking time to do the reviews...good content...nicely done.
I'd love to see a video showing different types of video interference to help us diagnose problems. It seems you can have at least multi-path problems, f-zone issues, interference from other onboard electronics or motors, environmental interference, and just plain distance fall-out. There are probably plenty of others. Videos showing what these look like would be great.
good deal,thats for sharing👍
good review
Nice and clear review..This has got to be the most comprehensive antenna review I've seen on RUclips.
Btw, one question, regarding the aomway patch antenna, I just thought that it was supposed to be receiver antenna and not a transmitter antenna that's why it didn't perform well.
+Jan Bobis By what I could see, he put a little FPV setup somewhere around the runway (with the transmitter), and he changed the receiver antennas on the ground station.
I hope you can show the inside of the Cloud Spirit antenna in a later video.
B.t.w. I like the small locking connectors on those new transmitters. They waste much less space than those huge molex connectors on Fatshark transmitters. I just wish they were readily available as spares.
Did you test your home made one?
Thank you
I'd like to see the difference in construction in these mushroom antennas, especially the white one.
And I'm a bit sad you didnt test your DIY antenna.
I own the Aomway RHCP omni, and I like them a lot more than the farsharks, for price, and performance. I also have the Aomway Blue Patch, and mine is total garbage as well. but I must say, I did just pick up some VAS Airblades....they're absolutely incredible
+xjet Few notes I made. First the cheap chinese one you noticed to get great RSSI. I have one pair looking like that and I have noticed that the beam of the antenna is very narrow. Looks nice when I fly it but when you flip the video breaks.
Second point is that those antennas might be in different tone. For example. I got few really good quality antennas from a guy that lives close to me. He tunes all his antennas (both tx and rx) to match. When I flew with good tx antenna and with another cheap rx antenna i got no range what so ever. Figured out that they must have been differently tuned.
So heres my ideas how to improve your test:
1. test antennas first in matching pairs
2. move the transmitter antenna in different positions to determine if the radiation pattern is good.
Otherwise very well done!
Thanks for this exzellent test.
Greetings from Germany
PS.: 99% of mushroom antennas look the same inside so no matter the cost its all the same.
Holly crap Bruce really aren't just pretty face....Cheers great video
Great stuff
I actually quite like those BeeRotor antennas, they're cheap and anecdotally they work pretty well. I really like their short pigtail too.
Super Video
excellent review, thanks Bruce, where did you get the helical antenna from, I think that is the way to go!!!
A fine comparison video. I shall order the cheapest now. :O(
This man would be dangerous if given a proper production budget. If a slot opens up for a Mr. Wizard re-do, can we please have Mr. Simpson at the front of the audition line? Good smattering of choices to represent what's being used out there, I've been hanging a cheap Chinese antennas off my Fatsharks for a long time, (the Immersion antenna, without a 90 bend, were infuriating!) while VAS Blue Beams are on the valuable quads and planes. Look forward to your reviews of the new FPV hardware like the Quanum VTX!
Wouldn't it have been better to also test the metal reflector in front and to the side at 90° (parallel to the path)? That way you would also get results for the helical. What is the range of the RSSI signal from that receiver? Lowest I saw was about .625 volts when you had no antenna attached, and with a high of .95 V. Is it linear over that range vs. dB? Could .95 V be the max level and thus not showing the true signal strength of the helical for example? Easy to test if you take the attenuator out and put the TX and RX close together to see how hight it goes. Thanks for the review, Bruce.
Interesting, thanks!
Hi Bruce, I'm fairly new to the hobby (only about 60 hrs of flight-time) One question. Why do people use three leaf antenna on FPV tx and four on rx?
12:01 that actually comes as an assurance, I have one of these antenna sets on my 250 quad and I fly it around my field which has alot of bushes and obstacles
But how did the Aomway one do? It's my favorite antenna. Just wish It had a hard case over it.
The little white one I received with my boscam vtx/vrx. The TX ant I think is 3 lobes(unsure on polarization:left,right), I'll have to check when I get home. Will post my findings of the TX and RX antennas later.
Great video - useful and instructive. I wonder, do you suppose the results might be influenced by the degree of match between the transmitter antenna and the receiver antenna? Would you get a different ranking if you used a different transmitter antenna?
Really interesting stuff. The more I watch your content the more I like it, you have a good presentation manner. I wonder how the Team BlackSheep / IBCrazy TBS Triumph would have performed in this test.... I just ordered a pair of them, so I haven't had any real world experience with them yet, but I've read and heard good things, and the pricing is relatively reasonable... Cheers!
I got three of these beerotor antennas and all three seem to have some lobes with a slight bend in the middle, but a couple are straight? I'm wondering if they are supposed to have a bend in the middle.
On regards to the white antenna being better for reflections.. I am very very new to FPV and not the best on airbound radio but i come from a coaxial cable company providing two-way signaling. Main issues we get are radio leakage into the cable network wither providing specific frequency spikes or noise hills over a frequency span and in like 95% of the time this is due to bad connectors. You can make a perfectly good looking and very good working connector with screw-on-type connectors but most of the times it will be very prone to signal leaking in and disturbing the communication. With proper tools and crafty work a cable should be leakage free. Also a sloppy person can make a connector leak even with the proper tools :-) I don't know how this would translate to an antenna whos very job is to pick up outside signals but it was the first thing I thought of when I saw the connector was L-shaped and with a thinner/different antenna out compared to the others.
what if I use 2 totally different type antennas? Like a patch/mushroom on my monitor and clover leaf on the reciever? Or do they have to be the same? And is it any different if I cut off the sma connector and just solder the antenna to the reciever?
i love the Aomway Patch antenna the patch work realy good
+leo ulreich Yes, I expect the one I tested is faulty -- it should have performed *much* better than it did. Having said that -- a patch like this is not circularly polarized do a helical will give better multipath rejection.
+xjet Patch antennas can be built as circular polarized. The Aomway patch is advertised on GoodLuckBuy as being RCHP, but I suspect is may actually be linear. I have one of these and while I've not had a chance to measure it yet, it does seem to not perform very well.
kb9khm this one is RCHP. I normaly use that one on my Diversity with a Circular Polarized SpiroNET but some days ago i put that one allone on my Fatshark googles and it worked realy good also when i was flying arround me in a big circel i had no problems with range :)
***** yep i was a little bit confused when you said the Patch is not Circular. But that video was like every video very informativ and good :)
greetings from Germany :)
The problem with testing hand made antennas is the difference from one antenna to the next of the same brand more than other electronic equipment. That's why I like the Blue Beams as you will pay more but I know the quality is likely to be far more consistent plus look who developed it for FPV... good fortune comes with supporting innovation.
What is the name of the antenna shown at 3:41, is it omnidirectional? (similar wi-fi antennas are caller omnidirectional)
It's because it's an ugly antenna. That is why it works better. Everyone knows that ugly things perform best.
They have to work harder to get the same respect
But I’m ugly and still work really bad.
_...that's what she said!!_
Good to see your still here i was getting worried as your normally quite a prolific uploader.
How do diversity receivers perform with multipathing? Also what would be the ideal combination of antennas on a diversity setup for range and dropout minimization?
By the way Bruce thanks for the videos they really are a reference for technical information.
I enjoy the high sensitivity when I'm taking my mad mushroom to the F zone.
I have aomway antennas both the CP and patch using diversity. Find them very good and in fact when I point the patch to another copter or someone flies close by it picks up that signal. I think it's due to the gain but I'm not sure... Anyhow find it hard to use unless you are alone and use it for more penetration mostly. But to be honest I get RSSI warnings more often from my taranis than have problems with video regardless of antenna setup.
Valuable information Bruce thanks
Would you consider reviewing antenna options for 2.4GHz aircraft control ?
I remember reading somewhere that the 'front' of the Aomway patch antenna is not intuitive, so its possible you had it backwards? I tried to find my source on this info but I couldn't.. It might also be crap..
I'd love to see a review on SpecUAV antennae as well. I've heard they're great
You have the magic touch with that chinese Omni thats what happened :D
Bruce i'd love to see a build video on a Helical and a 4 clover leaf antenna if at all possible mate,i've seen other videos on YT but i'd like to see yours because you will not only do a good job of it you will also talk us through it. ;-)
I'm looking at getting the Omway set.
This post is before I watched your post
Sir which is the best VTX and antena for a 100mm build? to get a good video feed upto 1km. On goggle i use aomway clover and realacc tripple patch.
Have you tried any of the quadrifilar helix antennas? I'm curious to know how well they perform.
Do you still recommend the Cloud Spirit TX low cost Chinese as the best performing antenna on the list?
Nice Vid..
I think Birds eyey view with blue stripe is LHCP or ccw as Wicher calls them. Mine are cw and have a red stripe. I am trying my best to kill the DOME extreeme (reinforced DOME you have there). For goggles I use a dome like yours just with the red stripe. SO far I am quite happy. I need mor flying time to be sure of the range, durablity is there.
Hello +SirCrashaLot, may i ask you on which frequenty you have the best results with these antenna's? I have two mushrooms with the red stripe and a patch kinda one, i bought them sec. hand from someone who didn't liked them. I, also find it hard to find the right frequenty on which they perform the best. I have also a lot of chinese antenna's which perform better. My vtx's are from Aomway, hobbyking ft953 400mw and a avl-58 and i use these with a diversity rx. Thank you, cheers!
+Jarco de Rover I use Boscam rg58 receiver with cw DOME (red) and foxtech 200mw vtx one one quad and aomway 32channel 200mw VTX on the other with IRC or DOME extreme. On both I am sitting on IRC3 = 5780 - that is not based on research, but a channel reservation. We have a large group of people.
So far everything is good but I need more flying to really say something about the signal.
I did fair amount of crashing already and this aspect of things is great.
Hey Bruce, I bet you've got a TBS Vendetta, when you review it can you fly it 6s?
Also where's the TBS Crossfire review?
Re: reflective screens. I've found that wearing a dark shirt and a wide brimmed hat with a dark underside makes my reflective screen usable. When I added a black foam panel below the screen (parallel to the top panel) the screen became even more usable. There is a surprising amount of refection from below.
+Chuckles - I concur with your statement about the dark shirt. After all the screens are much like a mirror and what you see the most in the reflection is yourself. I also found it helps a lot to back up to a tree or wall depending on where you fly. When I was using the Samsung Note 4 for flying Phantom 3 the reflection was so pitiful in the Florida sun I couldn't see much of anything. Even made a real deep hood which helped some but not much for that smallish screen. Now I have a Shield tablet with a deep home made hood and I can finally see where I"m going but I do wear a dark sweatshirt most of the time.
I understand the benefit of having a clover leaf antenna due to the UAV pointing in all directions while flying.
But as I sit, the UAV is usually on the side of me some where and rarely straight above me.
Would having the "Rubber Ducky" antenna on the receiving end be a benefit?
Helical or patch would be better
I just got into building my first 5inch drone. Ended up buying so many antennas because I thought the range was shit on my drone. Then ordered A pair of new FatShark hdo2 because I thought maybe it was my goggles then the next day realised that’s what 5.8ghz it like lol
I would like to see a detailed review of the Bee Rotor antenna. I don't know why, but the look of it sparks my intrest and curiosity.