it's VERY valuable for older people that we can relate to ..to share what happens to us physically as we get older...mental/spiritual/physical/strategic preparations etc!

I've seen your videos when I was a kid and now I'm flying because of you!

recently, I really have gotten more into Antennas in general and I am fascinated by the creativity that adheres to formulas and mathematical rules that antennas have to go by. I have much to learn.

When using epoxy to secure an otherwise (plastic) incompatable material, I find it useful to drill a series of small holes around the circumference, quite close to the base. These are loaded with epoxy and when the epoxy from the base makes contact, all become a "keyed" construction.

thanks for keeping the DIY dream alive in this world of "just buy one".. sometimes i want a thingy RIGHT NOW, shipping takes time, so having the skills to actually make your equipment is awesome :) remind me of when i was experimenting with long range 2.4ghz wifi (back in the early days, about 15yrs ago), hand made biquads on scrap copper sheet, baby-food tin can-tennas and house guttering waveguides.. all good homebrew stuff that worked, well before commercially available gear cheers from across the ditch!

I’m learning to make a Helical at 2:26am, Woo Hoo 👍🏻

I made my first one and I am blown away with the results! Thank you so much!

Great video, Bruce!!! The fact that you didn't over engineer the antenna or sweat blood over exact measurements and still have it work quite well, should encourage those of us that aren't amazing at crafting objects to give it a go anyways....and enjoy the results! Cheers....Jealous Josh in chilly Saskatchewan..enjoy summer my friend!

Thanks Bruce for the motivation and inspiration to build a 5-turn helical antenna. I built one, using a 3D printed former, over the weekend and my testing showed that it far exceeded the performance of a commercial 7-turn helical that I already owned. The VSWR ended up being 1.6:1, which is not great for Tx but adequate for an Rx antenna.

Started watching your vids from the diy fpv backpack days. So much has changed since... except the quality of your content. Keep those great vids coming Bruce!!

Greetings from Italy Bruce, with your help I finally got around to building my own helical antenna and it works quite well! I'll be doing some long range testing over the weekend. Thank you so much for this great video and everything you do for the RC community! Ciao!

Bruce good to see you getting back into the tech side of the hobby and showing us how to DIY stuff! Thank you good sir from Southern California

Excellent, more like this, please. I need some omni love at 868.2

Totally cool, I am going to build a 1686 radisonde receive antenna. Keep it up you are providing data to a radio junkie

Absolutely fab Sir Bruce. Have missed the DIY vids. Always best to make them yourself. So much more rewarding.

Your DIY videos are by far my favorite of what you do.

16:30... bruce im shocked but Trev would be proud

Thank you Bruce I thoroughly enjoyed that video, i love tinkering I may have a go at one of them myself. im just started in to FPV bought the stuff over a year ago it's just been sat in the drawer 😏 thank you again big salute from South Wales UK 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

I would like to build some of these, Sure wish you would post links to a parts list. I could be sure I order the correct parts. Love the DIY videos. Great job Bruce

Hi bruce ,I am three years late with this video but I like it and it is not that bad at all bruce I think it looks pretty good and it works ,thank you Sir .

Nice job Bruce you truly are an awesome guy I appreciate all you do for our community

sorry your dealing with Parkinson's, my best friends dad had it however he still lived a long life. ah new Zealand, hope to visit there some day, looks like paradise on earth. i do mostly dlg and gliders so i think id have a lot of fun there with the diversity of terrain and weather conditions although here in the state of Washington there's always fun places to slope or find some thermal activity..

For sure Bruce those little heat guns though cheap are nice to have, It sure does make your project much more professional when you have the right tools for the job, My Heat gun is a HAKO much more expensive than the standard unit off ebay but i own one of the cheap ones as well that i use in the garage if it gets stuffed oh well ill buy a new one.

Never hurts to experiment , good idea.

A good heat gun has been on my bucket list for years and years. Guess I should do something about it . Altering dementions this antenna would be quite handy for WiFi as well.

Nice to see the " Velocity factor " being used 👍

thats an awesome build video. i understand how those antennas work better now. thank you!

I love your diy videos Bruce. It hurts me to see the difficulties you get with shaking hands 😢 I wish i was your neighbor. You could learn me, and i could help you. You are a great guy Bruce !! It still hurts me that i wrote a couple negative comments (backpack / diversity Rx) some years back, Im sorry..hope you can forgive me. Keep you hobby / work and videos going. Marry Christmas / Happy holliday to you Bruce and your family 🎅🏻🎁 From 🇳🇴

Nice, that will be one of my next projects. I already have a triple diversity receiver, so this would be a good solution for FPV flying planes.

bruce, thank you for going back to making good videos again. RC planes, electronics, good and bad buys, and good overall knowledge of the hobby. I subscribed again and enjoy your content.

So informative please please can we have more. Just love watching your videos.

marley spouting glue is the best ,and non conductive ,i use it on all my drone plugs and wires going into plugs ,it keeps moisture out and is super strong with a wee bit of flex ,and its good to glue down broken off plugs u solder back to a board

Excellent Demonstration, ..... Thank You

If you really want a nice straight piece of wire put it into a drill chuck and grab the other end with pliers. Spin then wire while giving tension straight out with the pliers. after a few rotations the wire should be super straight with no visible kinks or bends! works a charm!

These are my favorite videos of yours. Keep them going!

I'm going to 3d print some parts and make a few of these. Winter is a great time to build while waiting for good flying weather. Thanks for the info!

Fantastic video. Definitely better than rants. 😁👍👍

34:00 - a lot of black magic. That gave me "Smith Chart Black Magic Design" PTSD

Nice Bruce! I have been using Farvew's open source files to build my helical antennas for a few years now and have been loving them!

that's what i use Frsky receiver packaging for too.

21:20 all good calculating the exact multiple of a half wave for the coax, only to forget about the transmission line formed by the SMA male, SMA female on the gear and feeder or microstrip internal to the goggles lol. When it comes down to it without putting all these on a VNA it's all best guess for the builder :-) Amusing to watch though, keep it up.

MUITO BACANA SEU TESTE COM ESTA ANTENA! BREVE VOU FAZER ALGUMAS COM VÁRIOS TAMANHOS E FAZER UNS TESTES! OBRIGADO PELO SEU TEMPO E SUAS DICAS! ABRAÇO!

Man your a legend to this hobby Bruce. Love your work mate. Merry Christmas to you and your better half :)

Awesome video Bruce ! I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did :) Best regards and health from Holland

Great! I recognize an OM when I see one! Fantastic job, both the build and the test! 73 de LA6UOA!

Great video, I'm definitely going to try this out. Thanks for putting this video together and I would like to see more DIY stuff.

Thanks for the video, Bruce. Very helpful especially for the simplicity. Just to double click on this a bit, if possible could you share the calculations you did for the distance between the spirals, etc? Thanks again

Great instructional video Bruce. It's awesome to see such good results by making something that's accesible for everyone to have a go at.

excellent video Bruce! love the building and figuring things out side of the hobby as much as i love to fly. Going to give this one a shot once Crimbo is over! Happy Christmas to eveyone :)

How about putting the copper side of the reflector to the rear, would be a lot easier to solder the coax shielding on, and you would be gluing to the fr4 instead of the copper.

Another very useful guide. Thanks! Oh, and I want more DIY. ☺

I am quite amazed and inspired. Thank you Bruce!

I LOVE this video! This explains a lot why the FPV camera I tried in our clubs rc trucks gave us horrible video!

Very nice job on the project and great demo of a helical. Look forward to seeing the effects of more experimentation with length, etc. Making something by hand is so gratifying isn't it? :) ☮️ Wheelchair John in Idaho 😎

Very cool and educational video..thanks for sharing 😊

One way you can effectively straighten out bent copper wire is to drill a hole of the same dia. as the wire in a peice of wood, then thread the wire through the hole and pull it back and forth to use friction to heat the wire and help straighten it.

From FPV drones now im playing with antenna's - thanks for this! I was thinking of applying clear coating on the back plate that is bare copper since it can and will probably get oxidized.. what you think?

Loved it, will build my own soon :)

One trick to get those 90deg coax connector closures started is to stick the plate to a pencil eraser with a little piece of foam tape. Also Loctite is now selling a epoxy designed for polyethylene and it's brethren which works quite well(albeit a tad expensive) Shop your professional auto parts shop. Great How-to!

In result you have a good omnidirectional CP antenna. It have not amplification in front axis.A bit more complicated than just lambda / 4 ... And the resistance of this "antenna" of yours is 300 ohms. Good luck with your flights!

The reflektor is a full waveleenght .. from middel or 2 wavelenghts across

Best tip, what to make of broken propellers!

Sure more diy. I did a 5 turn scratch built one a while back and it works well. If you wrap the wire around something slightly smaller it will be tight on the tube.

Bruce, another great video. You know your antenna theory better than most. I've got a request , why not do a video on a Helical Antenna for VHF Air band where there is little grounding? Lots of experimental and amateur built lack room for a normal length antenna and if you have at least 5 watts, output, it should be possible to radiate an acceptable signal from a really short helical wound antenna..

Baked bean tin for the reflector? Would you say it's...cheap as beans?

I always asked myself, if I could build multiple of these and connect them together to get a better signal, or to point them in sightly different angle to have a wider area to fly.

As always , Awaresome Bruce . Gave me an idear what to do on my christmas leave :)

Thicker copper makes more bandwidth, but you have to make it a little shorter, and if you pull and stretch the copper a bit you get it stiffer.

Bruce, I'm 23 and have no conditions and I'll be damned if I can get those screws in the right angle connectors. Took me 15 minutes one day to get one of those POS on.

I saw some videos on your channel.not everyone fly an airplane though.there are others who play with a boat (like me;).there are different things to consider then, when you try to find the best solution for rc signal .

This video just made me subscribe. You have some great knowledge. I m a lifetime student. I love learning. Thanks for your quality content. Keep it up 👍.

will try this. thank you

Thank you Bruce, might try this for a WIFI link too.

Yes, yes, yes, more DIY please 👍👍👍

A butane lighter with a refil valve shrinks the tube just as well or better, costs a few cents and even if used daily it can last for years. I, being a smoker, always use a lighter for heatshrink tubes, never sooty matches. Shrunk tube is a very good insulator, I tested it even at 20kV! But soot is very conductive. And the lighter is on just as long as you need to shrink tubes while the heatgun could be on for hours like the soldering station and be used only for a minute a day.

Perfect , im gunna build myself a big patch antenna and a helical !

A video on making day 433 mhz directional antennas for telemetry would be really useful

Bruce ...... inspirational, keep it up mate :-)

Build a 12 turns helical with my 3D printer which works very well, but it was relatively difficult to bring in the wire....

I'm quite new to the fpv hobby and have a question concerning your build. With the helical antenna mounted to your base station, what kind of antenna is mounted to the quadcopter, or is it the stock antenna?

Great video! Who knew it was so easy? Thanks for the information. Please do note vids like this.

You know, i really respect you man. Thanks for the tons of info, i never knew its possible to use 2 helical for a diversity goggles, you just gave me an idea!💡now i have a project to attend to.

do you have videos with the theoretical background? I mean explaining the calculus, choosing the dimensions of each element?

Great video learned a lot

Thanks Bruce!!!

Great video Bruce! As allways. ... Nice sidecutters by The way :)

Thanks for your help

Great video . Thanks mate .Cheers from Australia

So awesome. Your videos are great! :)

You can try Rfareas antennas. The best antennas for FPV, imho.

I LOVE THIS SO MUCH!! THANKS BRUCE! Gathering materials now! 👍👍

Awesome work Bruce.......Merry Christmas

to straighten the wire, put one end in a vice and the other in a drill. pull while rotating. you never saw such a straight wire. to soften the wire (it gets work hardened), run a flame along it.

Thanks! I'm making one 👍

Great video I've just made some and they work a treat thanks for the great content

A really good instructional video Bruce.

Thank you Bruce your a fpv treasure!

Hey Bruce that’s brilliant. Yours tested to a horizontal range of approx 50-60 degrees, but what would the vertical angle be approximately? Could you fly almost overhead with it? Many thanks.

Thanks bruce for the Info. I will now trie to make my own. BTW I love the fact that Nz uses the metric system. I cant underastand this 3/5 17/6 stuff from Imperial 🤣

Mate, after making my crossfire rx antennas I'm SOLD!! Thanx very much ......moff to the electronics store now bye!! :-) :-)