Repaired Losi LSR-3000 radio - broken antenna/bad reception

[clm]

Hey all, Just got back from running one of my Losi Minis up the street and back. About 10 times the range I had before I "repaired it"

When I got the radio it came with my Mini Crawler and had maybe 10 feet of range, that didn't really bother me because the crawler never got that far away... at a rather slow pace But trying to use that radio in any other vehicle and I could not even drive the thing across the street without losing reception. When I bought it the antenna already was broken with the standard shrink wrap repair job.

Well I was bored tonight so I pulled the radio apart to look inside. The first thing I noticed was the antenna wire was not soldered directly to the pc board, instead it was connected by a very familiar U.FL connector and a micro coax cable. After I pulled the shield off the antenna and saw the filament was cut it got me thinking.

A few years ago I had ben into modding laptops for greater wifi reception, the cables I salvaged from goodwill wifi routers tended to have that U.FL connector running to a SMA or RSMA connector to screw the antenna on outside the case. Well I happened to have a pigtail and a short rubber duck antenna laying around, and having a 10 foot radio is rather pointless so I decided to merge them.

I should report the surgery was an outstanding success, the radio bound with the reciever quickly, and I was able to drive it to the end of the block easily and had no loss of signal at all... and best of all, I can remove the antenna just like you used to be able to!

Pictures tomorrow when there is SUN.

Chris

P.S. Yes it's just a RTR radio, but I have it and it cost nothing to repair

[Diamond Dave]

Smart thinking. I bet it is 100% better than what it was.

[clm]

You are not lying!

As promised;

The original antenna, you can see the antenna broken only about 1/4 inch inside the cover.


Here you can see the pigtail installed, the RPSMA connector fitted in a hole drilled diagonal to the original and the U.FL connector plugged into the dsm module.


Here is a closeup of the DSM module with the pigtail plugged in.


And here is the radio back together.


Much better!

One thing that may help increase signal strength is the limited length of coax now between the antenna and the dsm module, it started out probably two to three times longer then the pigtail I used. I mainly posted this as I saw some older posts on the internet about damaged antennas on these and how there was no replacement antennas available.

Chris

[clm]

Well I just tested it and must say, It's range is further then mine

Got to the point it was far too small and twitchy for me to control it accurately, maybe if I was running the whole road I would have been able to go further but that risks a flat car

Chris

[SFC K]

Nice job on the repair. I would have just cut my losses and bought a new one.


BTW, what vehicle is that?

[clm]

Which vehicle? The one I was using with the remote? Or my photo booth?

As for cutting my losses, it was cheaper to fix it then replace it... and now I can let someone else run when I am lol

Chris

[SFC K]

I was wondering about your booth.

[clm]

Ahhh, well to keep /this/ thread from dissolving into a thread about it as well, take a look here.

http://www.rc10talk.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=32224

I swear my car has more friends then I do lol

Chris

[SFC K]

Ahhh, well to keep /this/ thread from dissolving into a thread about it as well, take a look here.

http://www.rc10talk.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=32224

I swear my car has more friends then I do lol

Chris

LOL

That is cool! I dig your collection as well!

[clm]

Thanks

Chris