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Somewhere where I spend some considerable amount of time each year,
there is absolutely minimal reception.
There's no 3, no O2, no Vodafone and no T-Mobile. There are patches of
Orange round and about; if I stand on the fire escape, use a handsfree
and hold the phone above my head I can get 2 bars. If I put the phone
next to my head, the reception goes. (UK postcode NE48 1BS if anybody's
interested)
There is no reception in the building. So I have to make a point of
going to the fire escape, braving the wind and the rain and (most
disturbingly) the midges, to make a phone call or collect my texts
etc.
I say there is no signal indoors: I was very surprised last time I
went, that there was a tiny bit of signal - 0 bars, and the phone
symbol crossed out, but a sniff of GPRS and the network name was on my
handset - though not enough to do anything (texts even).
Anyway, I have been trying to sort out a portable antenna to attach to
my phone so I can use my phone indoors there. It has to be portable as
it's a holiday location so I can't put anything permanent up.
I have a Sony Ericsson P1i so I got the relevant cable to connect to
its antenna socket - a HCE-12 - and the car holder it needs to attach
to - HCH-72. The cable ends with an FME male connector so it needs an
aerial with an FME female "plug"; though I have also ordered an
adapter to accept an SMA male "plug".
I'm after a decent aerial, the best I can get for Orange's 1800Mhz 2g
network. I've ordered a 4.5dB 10cm magnetic mount "car" aerial, which
I will use with a biscuit tin lid as a ground plane. But I don't think
this will be very good, and I was wondering if anybody has any
suggestions for anything better?
The building is double glazed by the way so I don't think a windshield
mount would work...
Thanks for any suggestions
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Posted: 2009-03-16 18:51:41
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I've got a working semi-portable system, ready to be tested. I've learned a lot from lots of people and summarise it here for people who might find it of use.
Where I live, Orange is very variable, Float's Mobile Agent shows between 13 and 39% (varying a lot). With 2 different aerial solutions, I have managed a rock solid 100%. I have hopes for when I go on holiday.
For anybody else who wants to do similar (Sony Ericsson phone)
- you need a phone that has an aerial socket on the back - commonly covered by a small rubber plug in Sony Ericsson phones, but not present on the very latest ones.
- to attach the aerial cable you need the correct Car Holder for the phone. It is not possible to connect the aerial cable without a Car Holder. They aren't really bulky anyway. For the P1i you need HCH-72. Try Ebay.
- you need the aerial cable to connect (via the in-car holder) to the socket on the back of the phone. For all Sony Ericsson phones these are HCE-12. Again, try Ebay. The cable ends in an FME Male connector - most aerials end in FME Female so that's fine.
- The two best aerial solutions I have found have been a biscuit tin lid with a magnetic "car" style aerial (the tin lid is necessary as a "ground plane"), or a Yagi. Try Ebay for both - but I had to get the Yagi sent over from the US. I also needed to buy an N-Female to FME-Female adapter to connect it.
- The aerial needs to be the correct one for the frequency: outside of 3G areas, from what I understand Vodafone and O2 use both 900Mhz and 1800Mhz; Orange, Three (piggy-backing on Orange) and T-Mobile use only 1800Mhz.
- You can find the frequency of your operator's nearest mobile base station on
http://www.sitefinder.ofcom.org.uk/ . Also you can find the Location of the mast here. This can be important.
- The magnetic "car" style aerials are omni-directional and thus the simplest to try .
- If that doesn't work, then you need a Yagi. The yagi is directional. So you need to know where to point it. I used Google Earth; found the transmitter, found me and drew a path between the two. I can't remember how but I then found the Bearing of the transmitter from my house. Remembering to correct for declination (see
http://www.rambler-info.org.uk/declination.htm to find it where you are) I lined up the aerial using a compass.
- If the signal is still too low, you can buy aerial amplifiers. Again they need to be the correct frequency. You can get one for £35, which is intended for a car but can be used indoors with an adapted Nokia charger (supplied), from Peter Parry - details below. This got me to the full 100%.
- Have as short leads as possible - a 5m lead as opposed to a 1.5 metre one reduced my signal from 100% to 69%; it really does make a difference.
- Peter Parry sells cables, amplifiers, "stick" aerials and so on at good prices and is also exceptionally helpful.
http://www.wppltd.demon.co.uk/
- I needed a semi-portable solution as opposed to a permanent one (it's for use when I go to an outdoor activity centre that I don't own!). Here are photos of the jury-rigged systems I come up with - they seem to work well:
http://www.kingqueen.org.uk/aerial1.jpg
http://www.kingqueen.org.uk/aerial2.jpg
I think I've spent about 100 quid; the Yagi itself was £50. Other suppliers will try to charge you a lot more than that.
- Permanent systems are also possible; have the aerial as high as possible.
I hope this is of some use to somebody at some point. It's been a learning experience for me. If I can help anybody, e-mail me.
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Posted: 2009-04-08 22:57:56
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