The neighours think I'm nuts...

[SteveyG]

I've installed a GPS antenna for my GPSDO. New video on my YouTube channel - https://www.youtube.com/user/sdgelectronics/



 

[Warhawk]

Nice clean work, nice picture, I like it. 

[VK5RC]

Nyah, just move next door to a Ham! HiHi
Seriously nicely done, I like the drip loop.
To minimise visual impact I have painted the bit below the guttering/roof line the same colour as the walls etc. It does make quite a visual impact reduction.
Keeps the neighbours on side and not complaining that "your antenna broke their TV".

[SteveyG]

Nice clean work, nice picture, I like it. 

Thanks  I've not really looked into how these are normally installed, so possibly OTT...

Nyah, just move next door to a Ham! HiHi
Seriously nicely done, I like the drip loop.
To minimise visual impact I have painted the bit below the guttering/roof line the same colour as the walls etc. It does make quite a visual impact reduction.
Keeps the neighbours on side and not complaining that "your antenna broke their TV".

Yeah I could possibly paint the pole, although the neighbours aren't really bothered but just thought I was trying to bring down aircraft  . I may be switching the antenna over to a slightly different one at some point as it seems some are geared more towards timing operation rather than generic GPS use.

[Towger]

The neighours think I'm nuts...

But it is only tiny GPS antenna... I was expecting a 100+ foot tower with huge array in a small back garden.

[Rerouter]

Its about on par with how they would fit location antennas to council vehicles, (the first thing to hit a low entry point....)

also "your antenna broke there TV".... people always look to blame what they dont understand dont they...

the only time i can say i have seen one antenna do that to another was when a 15W CB antenna was zip tied to one of my units GSM antenna's, it lost all reception for a good few minutes after anything was transmitted (think it crashed the modem), and it ended up killing it after about 6 months of that abuse,

[Dr. Frank]

They ".. think .." ??

Actually, you ARE going nuts.. "Time-Nuts". Nice assembly!

We also have a GPS antenna on the roof of our house, but I simply attached it to the rain gutter..
Main thing, that it has free sky-sight, 25° above the horizon ..

Frank

[Fred27]

My neighbours thought I was nuts when Ross Noble and a TV crew turned up at my house to ask me about the NFC implant that lets me into my workshop. (It was for Freewheeling Series 2 - on the Dave channel in about a month.)

A bonus is that with a GPS antenna on your house you'll always know exactly where it is.

[madires]

My cheap GPS receiver works fine when placed on the window board. No problem with tracking several satellites, around 7-10 with a good/strong signal plus about 3-5 with a weak signal, even at a cloudy day. BTW, I'd suggest to add a proper grounding for the pole in case of a lightning. A 16mm² solid copper wire plus grounding rod should be sufficient. The ground of the antenna cable should be grounded too. Simply connect it to the grounded pole using a L-shaped metal with a patch connector for the antenna cable (sold by antenna shops, optional over-voltage protection) and connect the metal with a solid copper wire (4-6 mm²) to the pole. The L-shaped metal should be mounted where the cable enters the house (inside the house). If you got a grounding system for the house, you could also use that instead of the dedicated grounding rod. If you'll use a grounding rod and got a grounding system for your house, connect both to keep the potential the same. And please check out local regulations regarding grounding and lightning protection for antennas. Might be also a requirement by the building/fire insurance.

[John Coloccia]

Could someone explain why anyone would attach a GPS antenna to a house?  I'm sure there's a good reason, but I can't figure it out.

[SteveyG]

My cheap GPS receiver works fine when placed on the window board. No problem with tracking several satellites, around 7-10 with a good/strong signal plus about 3-5 with a weak signal, even at a cloudy day. BTW, I'd suggest to add a proper grounding for the pole in case of a lightning. A 16mm² solid copper wire plus grounding rod should be sufficient. The ground of the antenna cable should be grounded too. Simply connect it to the grounded pole using a L-shaped metal with a patch connector for the antenna cable (sold by antenna shops, optional over-voltage protection) and connect the metal with a solid copper wire (4-6 mm²) to the pole. The L-shaped metal should be mounted where the cable enters the house (inside the house). If you got a grounding system for the house, you could also use that instead of the dedicated grounding rod. If you'll use a grounding rod and got a grounding system for your house, connect both to keep the potential the same. And please check out local regulations regarding grounding and lightning protection for antennas. Might be also a requirement by the building/fire insurance.

I had an antenna sitting on the windowsill, but the GPS receiver was unable to lock reliably at certain times of day. It was a cheap antenna though, but as this thing is going to be constantly powered I figured it was worth doing a more permanent arrangement for the antenna.

The antenna is actually mounted to a lower roof section than the main part of the house, however an in-line lightning arrestor is something I'm considering. In the UK there are no requirements for any kind of lightning protection on domestic properties.

[SteveyG]

Could someone explain why anyone would attach a GPS antenna to a house?  I'm sure there's a good reason, but I can't figure it out.

See the video a GPSDO for 10MHz frequency reference in the lab 

[John Coloccia]

Could someone explain why anyone would attach a GPS antenna to a house?  I'm sure there's a good reason, but I can't figure it out.

See the video a GPSDO for 10MHz frequency reference in the lab 

Ah.  I never would have thought of that.

[madires]

Could someone explain why anyone would attach a GPS antenna to a house?  I'm sure there's a good reason, but I can't figure it out.

For example to feed your ntpd.

[aroby]

I have one too!  My house hasn't moved since I've been tracking it ...

[cosmicray]

Could someone explain why anyone would attach a GPS antenna to a house?  I'm sure there's a good reason, but I can't figure it out.

For example to feed your ntpd.

Yeah, for the time base signal. I asked guys installing the WiMax base station why they had a GPS antenna on top of the rack cabinet, and that is how I learned that.

[xrunner]

See the video a GPSDO for 10MHz frequency reference in the lab 

Subscribed - interesting channel.

[Richard Crowley]

Could someone explain why anyone would attach a GPS antenna to a house?  I'm sure there's a good reason, but I can't figure it out.

If he lives in a flood plain and the house breaks loose, he can track it downstream for the insurance company.

There are a dozen or so fixed points around the planet where they monitor and control the GPS constellation of satellites.  They compare what the GPS says their location is with their actual location to establish an error factor to send the correction back into the system.  Well, it is probably much more sophisticated than that, but you get the idea.  Many of these monitoring points are out on exotic tropical islands.  Must be a really tough assignment to run the GPS monitoring station in Tahiti or Hawaii or even Diego Garcia or Ascension Island.

[VK5RC]

Putting your GPS antenna up high I recall also has some benefits if you get all "time-nut"ish due to some timing / reflection issues.
My GPSDO antenna is clamped to the base of a VHF, UHF antenna (it gets 50W at 440MHz or 147MHz), note the UHF antenna starts above the 3 radials (2 v difficult to see), coax up the centre of the pole.
My shack hasn't moved much yet.

[matseng]

I've also got one, just one neighbour recognised it as a GPS antenna and asked about it :-)

[GK]

With a GPS-disciplined clock you could set up your own backyard seismic station. One of my roles for the last ~11 years has been in the upgrade and maintenance of the states seismic monitoring network. We even built our own GPS-disciplined clocks to provide the timing pips for the old analogue pen-and-paper recorders when they were still in service. However there are a growing number of amateurs over here now getting in on the action with modern digital recorders streaming data over the internet. Virtually all seismic recorders these days have their timing synchronized by GPS.

At least your little GPS antenna is a lot less bother than HF dipole for WWV.

I'm still searching the local market for a 10m lattice tower to support a 630m (HAM band) antenna for my little AWA transmitter: http://www.glensstuff.com/ctm2k/ctm2k.htm The 3.4kW air con I installed into the shack on the weekend offsets the heat pumped out by the four 4CX1000A's reasonably well.

[coppice]

I have one too!  My house hasn't moved since I've been tracking it ...

After the earthquake which broke Fukushima we found our GPS position in Hong Kong had very clearly moved.

[SteveyG]

Some great pictures on here. At the moment I have a fairly generic L1 antenna, but I notice some are specifically marketed as being for timing applications or even mission critical timing applications. Is there actually any basis for this or is it just to marketing purposes?

[aroby]

Some great pictures on here. At the moment I have a fairly generic L1 antenna, but I notice some are specifically marketed as being for timing applications or even mission critical timing applications. Is there actually any basis for this or is it just to marketing purposes?

L1 is one of the GPS frequencies.  My understanding is that the information / codes originally available for civilian access are transmitted on this frequency.  L2 and other (L5?) frequencies are now more commonly supported on widely available GPS units, so by monitoring several frequencies you can get better positional accuracy.  I don't think the time accuracy is affected at all.

[Dinsdale]

I have a key fob.
My porch lights flash and the burglar alarm chirps.