Beware of 3DR CloverLeaf Antennas

Posted by Enrique Avalle on April 30, 2014 at 5:22pm

Hi!

I purchased a pair of CloverLeaf Antennas (these: https://store.3drobotics.com/products/clover_antenna) for my fatshark FPV goggle and transmitter.

They state in their store: "Want to get the most out of your FPV setup? Our circularly polarized cloverleaf antenna and skew planar antenna will take your video signal the full distance, ensuring you get top real-time imaging each and every time you fly."

So, I took of the original "vanilla like" fatshark antennas, placed the CloverLeaf ones and ... WEAK reception! My FPV system was good for half or third of the distance, compared with the vanilla fatshark antennas. 

The Red Colverleaf antenna was placed in the transmitter, on the Y6. The blue one on my FPV goggles.

I tried them both in upward position, downward, opposite position: Same extremely poor results.

 I elevated a TICKET with their support desk. 3DRobotics response was (let me copy and paste, so there is NO misinterpretation): 

"I'm afraid the clover antennas are not compatible with the fatshark equipment, they has been tested with our Video Tx/Rx."

What ? those are 5.8 Ghz Antennas, and Fatshark system is also 5.8 Ghz ... And EVENTUALLY, if their Cloverleaf antennas are built with some weird effect that makes them only good for 3DRobotics FPV ... shouldn't they advice about it on their store ?

Their "marketing speech" should start saying "Want to get the most out of OUR FPV setup? instead of "Want to get the most out of YOUR FPV setup?"

Of course, I answered them with my concerns and recommendation about changing their opening text on the product page, but since some time passed, and they are not fixing their product page, I decided to warn the rest of potential buyers about this incompatibility...

Regards,

Enrique
 

You need to be a member of diydrones to add comments!

Join diydrones

Tags: 3drobotics, antenna, cloverleaf, fatshark, fpv, goggles
Email me when people reply –
Follow

Replies

    • David Boulanger > Enrique Avalle May 2, 2014 at 7:35am

      Enrique,  You will solve your problem if you get the proper adapters.  What can be confusing is what is considered the male and female end of the connectors.  It seems that some are sold using the threading as the determination of male and female and others are sold using the little center wire or hole for the wire as male or female.  There is a great 7 or 8 part tutorial on You Tube by IB Crazy on FPV and antenna's.  I'm not sure how I found it.  There may be a link to it on the Ready Made RC website.

      Regards,

      David R. Boulanger

    • Enrique Avalle > David Boulanger May 2, 2014 at 7:48am

      Hi David, yes, thanks, I actually found on amazon the correct adapters, they visually match on what I need for both antennas. USD 7.5 or something like that, and voilá problem solved :)

    • Rob Dunbar > Enrique Avalle May 2, 2014 at 7:27am

      Enrique,

      If both your antennas are from 3DR then the RP-SMA to SMA adaptors should work since both antennas are right hand polarized. The antennas are what determine polarization and not the radios. Just don't mix up and use one brand on the transmitter and another brand on the receiver.

    • Enrique Avalle > Rob Dunbar May 2, 2014 at 7:47am

      Thanks Rob !

This reply was deleted.