RC Antenna- flat side toward bird, right?

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The antennas on the remote controls of two-antenna Phantoms have a rectangular cross-section. Intuitively, I'm guessing that having the broad sides of the antenna blades toward the aircraft is better than having the thin sides toward the aircraft. Also, the remote control seems designed to position the antennas that way, because that's the orientation in which they can be leaned back toward the top of the remote control.

But does it matter? Here's the reason I ask:
The remote control of the Autel Robotics X-Star has antennas with a similar shape, but they cannot be angled back toward the remote control with the broad sides of the antenna facing the aircraft. I'm thinking this is a design flaw, but it's also possible that it doesn't matter. I don't have enough knowledge of how the antennas work to know. All I know is that the antennas work better when they are more or less perpendicular to the invisible line between the RC and the aircraft. To do this I need to angle the antennas back towards me.

And here's why I need to know: I'm getting ready to put some passive parabolic reflecting antenna boosters on my X-Star, and would like to file the mounting hole of each booster so that I can lean the antenna back, rather than mounting the boosters so that the antenna are only able to stick straight up from the top of the RC.

I'd appreciate actual knowledge. Speculation and guessing are things I don't need help with.
 
The antennas on the remote controls of two-antenna Phantoms have a rectangular cross-section. Intuitively, I'm guessing that having the broad sides of the antenna blades toward the aircraft is better than having the thin sides toward the aircraft.
Optimum signal is with flat sides pointing at the Phantom and antennas parallel to and facing the Phantom's legs.
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That video isn't viewable, Meta4. Maybe it'll show up later.

If what you say is true, it's what seemed intuitively to be true, but it also means that Autel did a poor job of designing the antenna mounts for the remote control of the X-Star. They made it so they angle in the wrong direction.
 
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That video isn't viewable, Meta4. Maybe it'll show up later.

If what you say is true, it's what seemed intuitively to be true, but it also means that Autel did a poor job of designing the antenna mounts for the remote control of the X-Star. They made it so they angle in the wrong direction.


You can't make that statement (underlined).

There is no universal antenna housing design.

Without knowing the internal radiator design it's not possible to know the preferred orientation is just based on what you have observed.
 
You can't make that statement (underlined).

There is no universal antenna housing design.

Without knowing the internal radiator design it's not possible to know the preferred orientation is just based on what you have observed.
But if you add the part of my sentence that you did not underline, I not only can make the statement but it's an accurate one due to the unknown variables that I included when I used the word "if" to start the sentence. If I had an x-ray machine I could check what's under the plastic... or... wait... if I had a hammer... I'd hammer in the morning ... o_O

Actually, I just conducted an empirical test and will do it a few more times: flying the X-Star with the antenna ears turned 90 degrees on their vertical axes so that their edges, rather than their broad sides, face the bird. On the first test, my distance before losing signal was only a little less than average. Rain is on the way, gonna see if I can fly again before the wind or rain puts things on hold. I could also call Autel and ask; maybe I'll do that as well... will let y'all know what I find out.
 
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Yea, the DJI antennas are not true Omnis and do have some directivity (gain) so the orientation is important. If the Autels' are true Omni then it's a non-issue.
 
Most of the drawings in the X-Star Premium user manual show the antenna blades narrow side toward the aircraft, but there are a couple of pictures that show the antenna blades broad side toward the aircraft.

This test pretty much convinced me that it either does not matter, or the antennas of the X-Star remote control are meant to be narrow side toward the aircraft. I just don't get more distance than this because of the trees that surround me in my usual take-off location, and the FPV quality seems better if anything.

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So today I put passive parabolic signal boosters on the antennas of the X-Star Premium remote control, and exceeded my previous best distance by more than 50%.

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