The standard kit includes two 6dBi antennas that offer an efficient aftermarket upgrade for the LoRa radio communication between Emlid Reach RS RTK GNSS receivers. Benefits can include reduced age of differential corrections and a more stable fix.

Video Walkthrough Introducing the Extended Range Antenna Kit

Alistair Hart from Mangoesmapping took some time to outlining the contents of the kit.

Unboxing the Triangl Extended Range Antenna Kit
“Today I’m going to introduce you to our new extended range antenna kit from Triangle. This kit has been designed to work with the Emlid Reach RS RTK GNSS receivers.

The Emlid receivers ship with a 0.1 watt antenna. The manufacturers claim up to eight kilometres line of sight range with that radio. In places such as heavily wooded areas or complex topographic environments – we need just a little bit more oomph from our radios.

With a traditional radio you might hook up a UHF radio modem and broadcast your correction. This is a lower cost solution for our Emlid customers. It’s a pair of extended range antennas.

In the box for the extended range kit you get two high gain, six decibel omnidirectional antennas. There are also two 50 centimetre cables to connect those antennas to the LoRa port inside the Emlid device.”

Cables
“The cables are especially designed to have a long connector. This makes it very simple to screw onto that recessed port and allow you to improve your performance. The main benefits that we see are a reduced age of correction and increased stability in the fix. This can be really beneficial when you’re working in complex environments.

In addition to the two 50 centimetre cables that come with the antennas, we also have an optional five meter cable. This will allow you to elevate your base antenna height to improve your radio propagation. Early tests on this are showing great success.”

Using a Single Antenna
“In practice, most of our testing to date has been completed using just the 50 centimetre cable. I’ve been working out in the field using almost exclusively just an antenna on the base. I tend not to worry about putting the antenna on the rover as well. Just set up the antenna for the base – it doesn’t have to be particularly high, and just that alone provides an increase in performance.”

Alistair Hart,
Managing Director, Mangoesmapping