Aerial positioning

[Martyn Johnston]

I've bought a (beautiful) Pelikan Xtreme glider.

It has a fibreglass fuselage, but no obvious way of getting the aerial outside.

I'd prefer to push the aerial all the way down the inside (I don't like to see the aerial dangling from the plane), but some people say it shouldn't be inside, it must be outside.

Aestetically I'd prefer to put it inside, but is there any real technical reason that says I should have it outside.

If there is I'll have to drill a little hole somehwere. Don't know why the manufacturers didn't pre-drill it.

[Slopetrashuk]

If the fuselage is all glass and you have a decent filtering receiver you should be OK. Introduce a little carbon into the equation and you start to get problems. Add a cheap receiver with a low component count and you're bound to get glitching.

When exiting an aerial through a glass fuz side I drill a 4mm hole and fit a servo grommet to avoid chaffing of the aerial wire. Run the aerial along the body up to an anchor to the rear of the point that it will catch in flaps and thigs and then let it dangle in the breeze. If there is any amount of carbon in the airframe I use Multiplex micro 7 IPD synthesised receivers.

Andy

[Martyn Johnston]

I've bought a dual-conversion (Futaba R168DF) rx. Should be good enough.

I've heard carbon can affect reception, but can't see why fibreglass should. 

Martyn 

[Slopetrashuk]

glass won't affect reception but running a straight aerial with no loose end or midway bend might if the receiver is a low spec. Your dual conversion job should be fine. Keep the receiver and the ESC apart.

Andy 

[Martyn Johnston]

Think I'll try running it all the way down the inside, then drill a hole right at the back and let the remainder dangle out there.

Just a glider, so no ESC to worry about.

Might electrify it next year; already got a discussion going here on the best way to do that.

 Martyn

[Bob Cotsford]

I usualy run a snake outer down the fuselage, drill a hole at the back and slide the snake in from there.  Anchor it near the receiver, and when you feed the aerial down it will automaticaly  pop any excess out of the rear to whistle in the wind.  I use this method with bowden cables and steel core closed loop systems and never had a range problem yet with simple ppm equipment.  That's including 3m thermal soarers at 'which way is it going' range included.