1 or 2 Wingtip NAV antenna(s)?

[ppilotmike]

Thoughts on whether or not to use 1 or 2 of the Archer wingtip NAV antennas for an IFR ship..? It seems most people use one with a diplexer, but can you bring in two VOR signals this way (i.e. looking for VOR intersections)? I will have WAAS GPS navigation capabilities, but want ground based navigation as well...

[Stu McCurdy]

Originally Posted by ppilotmike

Thoughts on whether or not to use 1 or 2 of the Archer wingtip NAV antennas for an IFR ship..? It seems most people use one with a diplexer, but can you bring in two VOR signals this way (i.e. looking for VOR intersections)? I will have WAAS GPS navigation capabilities, but want ground based navigation as well...

I have had since I built my RV-8 a VOR Archer antenna in the right wingtip and an Archer Comm antenna in the left. I get 80 miles pickup range, based on altitude, for VOR and excellent ILS. The Comm antenna for my secondary SL-30 radio, which has to have vertical orientation, gets good range but is dependent upon angle from the plane, excellent high or low, not as good level.

I have a Garmin 420 WAAS as primary radio and GPS nav.

[cfiidon]

Originally Posted by ppilotmike

Thoughts on whether or not to use 1 or 2 of the Archer wingtip NAV antennas for an IFR ship..? It seems most people use one with a diplexer, but can you bring in two VOR signals this way (i.e. looking for VOR intersections)? I will have WAAS GPS navigation capabilities, but want ground based navigation as well...

You only need one antenna. I have the archer NAV in my right wingtip and use a triplexer, stripping out Nav1 (gns430), Nav2 (sl30), and the Glide Slope for NAV 1. It seems to work very well.

Don

[ppilotmike]

What about the in-wingtip marker beacon? Like/Don't like..?

[cfiidon]

Originally Posted by ppilotmike

What about the in-wingtip marker beacon? Like/Don't like..?

I made my own using a piece of coax with the shield stripped back. My poor memory says 42 inches was the dimension, but search the forum for examples. The MB is very high power and close, so a simple antenna works quite well.

Don

[ppilotmike]

..for the replies.

[BobTurner]

Two antennas will give you a bit more range, and a bit more redundancy; but I would vote with my pocketbook. You did not say what radios you have, and if you need a splitter anyway for the GS. If you need a splitter for GS, I would just put in one antenna. But if you have two SL30s (no splitters needed) I might put in two antennas, especially if you were up to cloning the first one to build the second yourself, at no cost except for the coax.

[N15JB]

I made my marker beacon antenna from a piece of coax and placed it in the bottom of the tunnel. Works fine.
Jim Berry
RV-10

[dspender]

what is a triplexer? Where does it go? How is it wired?

[BobTurner]

These boxes are "impedence matched splitters". They split one signal from the antenna to multiple receivers while constantly maintaining a 50 ohm impedence, so there are no odd reflections running around in the coax.
Diplexer has two outputs, triplexer has three.