Quote:
Originally Posted by daltore
On a similar note, our team 2158 has experienced a drastic reduction in radio range recently for one of the new radios. We were doing a demo in a parking lot and we only had about 30-40 feet of effective distance. That's bad, seeing as we have a 13-foot forklift. We can't really have our signal cut out at full speed.
On our OI board, we have the radio box screwed down underneath the OI controller (on standoffs), and the antenna sticks out from the side. Any problem there?
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Yes, there is a problem.
These radios have two antennaes. The external one, and the internal one. In addition, these are standard dipole antennaes. That means that the shape of their "field" is like a donut, with the antennae sticking through the hole of the donut.
Putting the radio on it's side means that at times, one or both of the antennaes will be pointing AT the operator interface antennae. Contrary to what may be intuitive, this is the absolute worst orientation to have the antennae. Both the antennaes and the robot antennae "box" should be vertical for best reception.