I've been working on building a nice ground control station including a Tx, and a video monitor, into a Pelican case.  So far it's gone well, but last night I tried to get the video working.  I've installed a Foxtech 7" monitor into a panel which is fastened in the lid of the Pelican.  I de-cased my 5.8GHz VRx, and attempted to hard wire.  Both the monitor, and the VRx are powered from the same 9.6V 8S-NiMh battery pack as the 2.4GHz control Tx.  For the video link, I simply soldered a wire from the RCA video jack circuit board solder point on the Rx, to the RCA video jack circuit board solder point on the monitor.  The wiring between the two is pretty short, maybe 4".  I realize these should be Coax, but figure it's such a short run...

I can get a signal, but it's pretty bad.  

Another aspect of this, is that I wanted the VRx hidden behind the panel, with just an SMA connector installed in the panel to which I will attach the antenna.  I used this cable to bring out the VRx SMA connection to the panel:

http://www.digikey.ca/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?WT.z_header=search_go&lang=en&keywords=CSA-RPSM-216-SAFB-ND&x=-1691&y=-51&cur=USD

When I attach this, the signal is almost non-existent.  When I put the antenna right on the VRx SMA connector, it is better but still not good.

So...  How many, and which rookie mistakes did I make?  What can I do to make this work better?

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