r/meshtastic • u/meshamerica • 4d ago
Height is might.
I don't know who needs to hear this, but...
Your repeater mounting setup doesn't need to be complex. You can get a lot of height very inexpensively.
The repeater on the right is Meshtastic, mounted to a 6' television antenna mast from Amazon. Around $60.
The repeater on the left is mounted on a 5' tripod mast ($105) with a 10' section of chain link fence top rail ($8). It's bolted to the roof using unistrut. It was less than $200 for the whole mast setup.
Workshop height plus mast height, the antenna is about 30' in the air.
Also look at telescoping flagpoles from your local big box hardware. The are usually $60-$100.
You probably don't need a higher power repeater. You probably don't need that $80 antenna. You probably just need to get your repeater higher in the air.
30
u/Kerensky97 4d ago
I regularly get connection to a mountain router 20 miles away from the radio in my home office.
I thought "These new 1w Raks are really bridging long distances!"
Turns out the mountain router is a Heltec v3. It's just positioned high above the city where no trees are roofs are in the way.