Guide to making a Cantenna

[Securityguy]

Hello there I am a n00b here and thought i would share my information on how to make a Cantenna. My Research lead me to this link (http://www.saunalahti.fi/elepal/antenna2.html) which is great for information and theory on how to make a Cantenna. I am going to tell you in detail how i made this thing and what you need in order to make this thing perfectly. I am including pictures and measurements but for proper mesurements you should refer yourself to this link (http://www.saunalahti.fi/elepal/antenna2.html) for further information. Please keep in mind that in some Countries these are NOT LEGAL so please refer yourself to the local Authorities for complete clarity on this Issue; for all others this is for Educational purposes ONLY! OK now on to the Good stuff.

STEP ONE:

What you need is:

1 SMA connector
1 six foot piece of RG58/U
1 SMC connector and adapter to go to the female N-connector
1 piece of 4mm brass rod for inserting into the N-connector
1 N-connector


I purchased 8 inches of 4 inch diameter (finish 4) 304 Stainless Steel tubing from a local steel mill and had it turned down on a lath to exactly 191 mm for MY application. i then took it and glass beaded it and it looked like the picture below.(SMC and adapter are not in picture but the N-connector cable and SMA connector are in the picture)

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b144/weldorguy/do%20it%20yourself/RawMaterialsandsupplies.jpg

STEP TWO:

Ok now that you have all your materials that you need machined up and ready to go you need to calculate where that N-connector needs to go so again go to the website suggested and there should be a calculator there that will tell you where that N-Connector needs to go. So after you do your measuring carefully Drill a hole for the N-connector and the mounting bolts after its done it should look something like the pic below. These holes are not at the proper position but the holes are drilled properly (((length ways with the pipe so your N-connector is sideways)))

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b144/weldorguy/do%20it%20yourself/HolesDrilledstillnoconectorsputt-1.jpg

So here it is with the Brass Rod soldered into the N-connector and the N-connector mounted to the can and with the SMC adapter attached to the female N-connector. (3 pics below)

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b144/weldorguy/do%20it%20yourself/ConnectorSolderedandmounted.jpg

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b144/weldorguy/do%20it%20yourself/BoltdwithSMCadapter.jpg

STEP THREE:

This Cantenna needs a cap for the end to make (the antenna part) complete mounting it to a tripod is next. but for now its the weekend and i need to get some brews in me. I will continue this probably Wednesday. Does anyone have any suggestions on what program to use for testing how far the Laptop is from the Router? Any comments you could post and if there are any mistakes in my information please pm me and i will edit my post.

[lordlame]

Very nice.

[johnyt]

Yeah that is nice but i'm suprised your using RG58U coax instead of somthing like LMR-195.

I once had a 5 meter patch cable included free with a yagi I bought on ebay. Nearly all the the extra dbi I had hoped to gain was lost in that lengh of coax.

Your probably going to loose 2-3 dbd attenuation just in that 6ft and thats true db not the theoretical dbi ( wich would be a greater loss if you look at it like that. ) This link is quite interesting
http://www.mf2fm.com/blog/index.php?m=08&y=06

But that a side keep up the good work :)

[shamanvirtuel]

yes nice job, u can see this too

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wifi:Building_an_antenna (many links)

or here

http://www.saunalahti.fi/elepal/antennalinks.html

see u
Sh@M@nVirtuel

[Securityguy]

First off thanks for the info guys. I must say I am so glad this did not end up in the Idiot Corner. (last place i wanna end up) The place I buy my stuff does not carry LMR cause of the price its 2.99 a ft. so i did some research and found that i loose 1.44 db casuse of the cable and 1 db cause of the adapter. its all good...:) I took my work in progress to a High School friend that sells this stuff on Ebay and outta his shop and he said to make 1 more for him to play with and if he liked it he would buy a bunch. I just came back from getting the pieces cut on the CNC laser cutter... (wow nothing says love like laser) and will be putting the thing togather tonight but i still am having a hard time finding a female sma for soldering to my existing card also need to know what the connector is that i need for the pigtail to run from the cardbus to SMA (or is there an adapter for that sorta thing?) hoping this is going to work out great...