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Howdy folks, welcome back to the shop. Today we are going to be building a Yagi antenna. A quick note from future me

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This is going to be a long video

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But we're gonna go through step by step every action and discuss why we're doing that

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To get to the end product and some design things that may change so that you can understand why and how this antenna is built

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This way so stick around let's build a Yagi

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This is the first prototype that I made which has some problems

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most of which is it is way too fragile as you can tell when the antenna blades kind of go back and

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forth too many times they become work hardened and they snap right off like that which makes them

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not optimal for an antenna there's definitely a you know balancing act between rigidity and

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usability this is definitely not rigid enough so we are going to be using copper pipe and that is

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of course significantly more rigid with some new 3d printed brackets that will grab onto this pipe

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and uh hold it in a very strong way so 3d print design for this will be down in the comments

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below and we'll be right back with all the things that you'll need to do to follow along

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to make this antenna all right folks we are going to need soldering iron some solder a tape some

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form of marker, a 3D printer, or you can get this from someplace, lots of retailers online that will

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print and ship. We're going to need a drill of some kind to poke some holes into the aluminum

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channel. We have the copper pipe, of course, your favorite RF connector, and some 50 ohm coax wire.

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Since this is going to be a handheld antenna and relatively short, we're going to be using this

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really thin stuff. It's going to be used with handhelds. And then, of course, the half inch

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aluminum square rod, which is going to be the beam holding all of this together. So that should

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do it. If there's anything I have forgotten, it will be on screen now. Normally antennas have two

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tricky parts. One tricky part is the measuring and the other tricky part is the soldering and

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getting all of that put together. But this antenna is going to have a third tricky part

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and we're going to focus on that one first. We'll put the measuring off for a moment. We'll put the

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soldering off for a moment. Let's just focus on these copper coils. All right, before we step

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outside though, we need to know some measurements. Go to the online calculator that's on the screen

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right now. There's a link to it down in the description. This thing's been around for at

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least half of my life, I think. Hopefully it doesn't go anywhere. If it does, there will

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probably be newer, better, or similar calculators around. Plug in the frequency target range that

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you're going for. This is really only going to be happy in the two meter, you know, several hundred

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megahertz range. As soon as you get below that, the size is just going to be not practical for

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this size of, uh, you know, 3d printing and copper. So for a 430 ish megahertz, 440 ish megahertz

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antenna, which is what we are going to be going for. This one is tuned to 435 megahertz. We're

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going to need a reflector, a dipole, and several directors. The reflector is unique in the fact

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that it also needs to be grounded. So it needs to be grounded to the ground side of the dipole

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where the director elements out here in the front are 100% passive. So they do not touch or, you

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know, do anything to what is going on with the wiring that we have to do back here. We need to

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go punch into the calculator and figure out how wide these need to be. For our 435 megahertz,

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the reflector needs to be about 13 inches or so, and then they get smaller the further out they go.

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But that means that we now have a length that we need to hit just a little over 13 inches. Let's

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add about two inches to each side, so we'll get up to about 17, 18 inches. Go outside and straighten

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up some pipes we've got all of the copper pits cut down to roughly about 18 inches this is for

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433 megahertz of course if you have your own make sure you double check your measurements

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measure twice cut once all that fun business but we're going to uh take this uh put it in the vice

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and then uh basically you just crush the end so the end of this is you know in the vice and then

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bent down 90 degrees down to a pair of vice grips which are attached to the end here and we're going

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to take Mr. Hammer here and give that thing a good smack. And this thing will become pretty

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straight after a couple of smacks. Let's, uh, let's give that a go. This vice grip is on here

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pretty tight. So just a tap, tap and a tap. Wow. It's already significantly straighter. I don't

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know if you can see that. Let's just do a couple more. We don't want to elongate this too much.

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You can kind of hear how it goes boom afterwards. And, uh, this is pretty much straight. So I'll

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you up there we'll take this one apart and we'll do it to the next one so we take this one down

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and we have now a reasonably straight

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i mean you know nothing's perfect but uh significantly straighter than say

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one of these which we can see has major bends in it so let's uh open the vice jaws back up get it

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it about a half inch in we don't want it coming out of the vice and get this thing down until it

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pretty much doesn't move i'm going to bend this then grab onto the end with the vice grips

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crush that copper then we're going to hold it from here and give it a couple good taps

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there we go i was about to say and there we go but i knocked my phone down so here we go

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this one is reasonably straight as well. Again, not perfect, but we're talking maybe a millimeter

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or two across an 18 inch span. Pretty good. I'm just going to knock the rest of these out

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and I'll see you back inside. All right, welcome back inside. I actually made it inside this time.

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Here are our raw elements that we are going to be cutting to their final dimension.

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so these need to be pretty accurate the higher in frequency you go the easier it is for smaller

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changes to throw off the performance of the antenna greatly this is a reasonably small antenna

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especially for a yagi we're under you know 20 inches or so in in total length so you know this

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this isn't going to be a unwieldy device but uh in doing so that means that our cuts here need to be

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extremely precise. And you can see in the conversions to inches here, I left two decimal

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places. Hopefully, I'll be able to get pretty close to that, and I want to leave very small

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marks. So let's just mark each of these, and we'll go through them. So some of these are

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significantly shorter. I'm going to just arrange them in a biggest to smallest orientation,

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And then effectively, I'm just going to mark on here what each of these are going to be.

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So this guy is going to be the reflector.

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This is the dipole.

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And then this is just going to be one, two, and three for the passives.

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And that will give us what we need for each of these.

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Now, we're going to mark their lengths and then cut them off.

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So I find this easiest to just put the tape down.

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then bottom this out on the end of the tape and now we have our length that we

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need so the reflector needs to be thirteen point zero seven so you come to

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thirteen and zero seven is a little less than a sixteenth so we're gonna just put

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the mark right in the middle there between the sixteenth and that one is

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good don't forget that your dipole is actually gonna need to be cut twice

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because each element needs to be isolated from itself so make sure to put

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your mark in there for that then the passives absolutely nothing special with

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them we're just gonna knock them down all right so one last comment on the

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dipole here is that we've got here's our dipole we want the final length to be

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this and we want a little bit of space between these two so what I'm gonna do

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is I'm going to add a quarter inch gap in here and then we're going to mirror that quarter inch gap

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when we affix these. So here is the two and there is the quarter right there. So we're going to

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leave that gap and that's where our coax is going to come up and split to go one way and split to

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go the other. Don't worry too much about that. Follow basic dipole or it will make more sense

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when we do it. I'm going to go cut these on the bandsaw and I'll be right back.

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Let us get the dimensions down on our actual beam here. And this is just a little piece of

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extruded aluminum, nothing too fancy going on here. I'm going to leave a section here on the

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back where I'm going to put a handle on it so that I can hold it a little bit easier. You don't need

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to do that if you don't want to, or you can come up with some sort of a fixment strategy. Whatever

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Whatever the affixment strategy is, though, would be best if it was left or made in some

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material that's not going to interfere with the RF signals.

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Keep it simple, wood, plastic, PLA maybe, and go from there.

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Let's get the tape laid back out.

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This is a pretty small antenna, as I said a while ago.

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We're under 20 inches for the whole thing, so we're going to put the tape up to about

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26 inches.

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just going to add six inches to all of these so our our reflector is going to be right at six

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inches and then our dipole is going to be six and a half inches up from that so that's going to be

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twelve and a half and then we've got eight point five four so plus six is fourteen five four so

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So there's 14, 5, 4, and then we've got 13.42 plus 6 is going to be 19, 4, 2, which is just

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right here, and then we've got 19, 2, 9 plus 6 is going to be 25.29, so 25 and a third

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is right there and then uh we'll just cut the material after that

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awesome sauce let's start putting things together

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yeah i think that's a good idea no we can't do that yet this needs to get cut down we need to

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do a couple of things we need to talk about the 3d parts let's do that next so all of these 3d

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parts have a hole printed in them. There are actually two parts. Let's take one of these

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apart real quick. Let's see what we're talking about. So this 3D print was designed by me to

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basically be as extremely functional as possible. And that means that everything kind of serves a

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purpose. And in here, the main thing that this has to do is just hold the copper pipe, you know,

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in a specific position on this tube and what we're going to do um there are a couple things to help

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with that and for the passive elements which are the uh the directors one two and three up in the

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front uh they're completely isolated so basically all we have to do is find the the midpoint and

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then just kind of give it a little push and it'll actually stick into the 3d print just a little bit

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because there's there's a smidge undersize uh for for how this was printed out which means when we

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put the uh the one on the other side and get the uh the bolts in there to clamp this thing

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is not going to move at all it'd be cool if i could get that all in the frame so here they are

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and they are not moving. We also have a couple little notches here and some raised notches here

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which allow these to get locked into the same plane and the tube holds it along the other axes.

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So that is the design. There is also a hole in here which allows us to get our coax in and out.

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It is a significantly oversized hole. There's plenty of room to get coax in and out of here.

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It does have to go through the tube though. So what I'm going to do now is we're going to have

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to go cut this tube and drill the holes that we need in it, but we need to figure out where those

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holes are. So I'm going to turn the tube sideways so that all of our marks are now pointed towards

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the camera and then i'm going to drop this down onto it and uh it's a tight fit but it will go

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down onto it make sure that it's right centered up and then we're going to transfer two little

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black dots onto there and that will be where we're going to want to drill so we're just going to need

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to get some black marks on here for each and every one of these so i'm just gonna go through and do

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that real quick and i will see you on the other side so all right we have a bit of a problem here

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Unfortunately, because of the design of how wide these are, we effectively need

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two to be intersecting each other. So what we're gonna have to do is cut these

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down a little bit, probably out on the bandsaw, so that we make them as short as

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possible along the same kind of position here. So I'm gonna make a mark here that

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we want to get rid of pretty much that and as much as reasonable for this. And that will hopefully

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allow us to get these two still in. I think there's enough space there to have enough meat

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on either side. So here are all of our knots. Here are where they are centered up. We're going to go

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a center punch and then drill these with clearance for a quarter inch bolt then when i put the last

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one down i took a little sharpie mark and just created the arc i'm gonna go on the bandsaw and

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cut that out as well and that will pretty much make this occur i'm gonna go outside it's really

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dark cold and windy outside right now and you know just the joys of washington winters and uh

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then i will be back here on the bench and we can start talking about actually building this thing

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our tube has holes in it now, I could have done a little bit better job centering them up, but

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don't worry about that, uh, that's why I chose a drill size two sizes, two fractional sizes larger

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than the quarter inch bolt, so there's a little bit of play that can, uh,

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assist in my shoddy workmanship all right so let's uh let's work on the wiring first so

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we're going to work on the dipole and then we'll go back to the reflector and that means that we're

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going to need one of the ones that we cut i will make a 433 megahertz or 430 440 megahertz specific

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design that has one of these coupled together like this with that first element spacing baked in

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so instead of there being two bolt holes here effectively there's just going to be

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one bolt hole here because this is i don't know man i don't think we have a space for this

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regardless you will not have to worry about this moving on oh if you have a larger

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say a 2 meter

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Yagi that you want to build

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you can use all of these components

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they will be separated far enough

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you don't have to worry about it, it's only if you're making

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a really tiny one in the

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higher frequencies, I guess

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this really isn't going to work well up in the

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gigahertz range either, it's just way too

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big, but

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yeah, let's get on

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making on, the dipole

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remember we're going to put a quarter inch between them

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so the dipole is

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gonna be the one that we cut here and I'm just gonna put this down where it

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needs to be and then I'm gonna make a mark because we have to make another

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hole in here and this hole is not a mechanical device this hole is going to

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be specifically for managing our wires because we want our coax to go through

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here and we're gonna we're gonna have it pop out the end you could if you wanted drill all the way

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through and then have the wire come down right here um i'm just gonna route it out the back

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because that's kind of i don't know where i want it to be there we go that's a good reason so right

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in here i'm going to say we're going to want another hole right in the middle of this we're

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also going to need another hole right in the middle of here but that is for grounding and

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we're going to use a tech screw to mechanically attach to this aluminum. Aluminum is pretty

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difficult to solder to because of its rapid oxidization and you know it's very hard to

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break through that. I have tried a couple different solutions mainly some people saying that you can

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put like cooking oil on it and give it a good scratch and uh you know solder should stick to it

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that has not been the case in in my experiments um i'm actually going to try and deposit some

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copper onto uh some aluminum in a future video so stay tuned for that one for now we are going to

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get a tech screw and put uh probably about an eighth inch hole in here and we're going to put

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another big hole in here so we can get our coax to come up. I'll be back when these holes are in

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here. Hi folks, welcome back. We have the hole right here in the middle. We have the tiny hole

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for the tech screw, which of course I forgot to add to the list in the front, so it'll be there.

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Here's a little Phillips screwdriver, and here's the tech screw we're talking about. So

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with that, let's get the soldering iron hooked together because we're about to need to put some

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solder on some copper ye all right let's get to it all right all these hot iron

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heats up here we are going to get pretty much everything situated in the way that

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we do that we need to do there's some English words in here somewhere I

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promise all right here's a coax this coax is really tiny so I'm going to

198
00:20:28,059 --> 00:20:34,339
actually feed it up the back the coax data you have if it's uh thicker stuff like this i believe

199
00:20:34,339 --> 00:20:41,680
this is uh rd58 you know uh it it might have a little bit more trouble getting by the uh

200
00:20:41,680 --> 00:20:46,000
the quarter inch bolts here so you might have to drill all the way through

201
00:20:46,000 --> 00:20:53,079
and uh you know if you do you know that that's perfectly okay uh and then you're just gonna

202
00:20:53,079 --> 00:20:59,380
feed it straight up through me though i want it coming out the back so we're gonna shove it down

203
00:20:59,380 --> 00:21:10,980
here and uh hopefully we'll be able to pick it up through that center hole and since i cut it all

204
00:21:10,980 --> 00:21:21,420
the way through i can poke from the back so now i pulled it back a little bit and it's getting caught

205
00:21:21,420 --> 00:21:40,079
All right, there we go, uh, no, no, no, yes, good, good, good, there we go, okay, I got

206
00:21:40,079 --> 00:21:45,640
it to work, whew, that was close, I, uh, twisted the tube around until the, the wire kind of

207
00:21:45,640 --> 00:21:50,200
fell, uh, down, and then I smashed it real hard into the edge and poked it with the,

208
00:21:50,200 --> 00:21:57,839
uh, screwdriver, and now it popped through, so make this go through here, and we have

209
00:21:57,839 --> 00:22:05,099
with a little bit of effort there we go we can line this up with the holes that we have

210
00:22:05,099 --> 00:22:10,859
and then we know that our antenna is going to come out here and we need a quarter inch gap between

211
00:22:10,859 --> 00:22:19,200
these two so it's going to be just a little less than the width of the hole that we cut down there

212
00:22:19,200 --> 00:22:25,599
um just be about that or so we're going to make uh one of these negative and one of these positive

213
00:22:25,599 --> 00:22:32,200
And we're also going to bridge this back down to the beam here.

214
00:22:32,279 --> 00:22:34,019
So the entire beam is going to be grounded.

215
00:22:35,000 --> 00:22:42,900
And that's required because the tech screw back here is using the tube here as its grounding element.

216
00:22:43,299 --> 00:22:46,519
So we need to make that happen as well.

217
00:22:46,700 --> 00:22:53,160
Generally what I do to do that is when I split this coating, I loop one around here.

218
00:22:53,160 --> 00:22:56,220
so it gets crushed underneath this plastic.

219
00:22:56,220 --> 00:22:57,960
So we're actually gonna take this back quite a ways

220
00:22:57,960 --> 00:23:00,740
because we need a bit of this on

221
00:23:02,099 --> 00:23:06,339
for both the dipole and to connect to here.

222
00:23:06,339 --> 00:23:08,839
And that stops things from being way too messy in here,

223
00:23:08,839 --> 00:23:10,700
also not putting another screw down

224
00:23:10,700 --> 00:23:13,019
that can affect this cable.

225
00:23:13,019 --> 00:23:18,019
So let's get a decent amount back here.

226
00:23:19,819 --> 00:23:22,279
And strip the coax.

227
00:23:23,160 --> 00:23:26,380
if I can actually just strip the outer jacket.

228
00:23:26,380 --> 00:23:27,220
There we go.

229
00:23:28,200 --> 00:23:30,480
And then everyone's favorite part,

230
00:23:30,480 --> 00:23:33,240
we gotta separate the shielding wire here

231
00:23:33,240 --> 00:23:36,549
from the center conductor.

232
00:23:36,549 --> 00:23:41,369
I'll just back it off a little bit at a time,

233
00:23:41,369 --> 00:23:47,460
kinda just get it to untwist.

234
00:23:47,460 --> 00:23:49,039
And remember, we're gonna wanna keep this

235
00:23:49,039 --> 00:23:52,740
into kinda two somewhat major groups,

236
00:23:52,740 --> 00:23:56,420
cause one is gonna be going to ground the beam

237
00:23:56,420 --> 00:23:59,140
and the other is going to ground the dipole.

238
00:23:59,559 --> 00:24:03,640
To be clear, when I say beam, I do not mean like a beam antenna.

239
00:24:03,640 --> 00:24:10,039
I mean like a rigid structural beam, which is just our half-inch aluminum pipe.

240
00:24:14,380 --> 00:24:15,759
We're about halfway there.

241
00:24:16,980 --> 00:24:22,799
As it gets longer, it gets harder to get them to kind of pull through

242
00:24:22,799 --> 00:24:30,460
because there's more resistance with a with a bit of luck though you can always kind of pull them in

243
00:24:30,460 --> 00:24:36,519
different directions you know and then if you can try and pinch and then pull out right from the

244
00:24:36,519 --> 00:24:56,000
base it tends to work pretty well so all right so we got this back down pretty much the edge of the

245
00:24:56,000 --> 00:25:00,460
shielding that we stripped off and we're going to kind of group this into two bunches we want one

246
00:25:00,460 --> 00:25:05,839
bunch and another bunch kind of like that about 180 degrees apart and then we're going to twist

247
00:25:05,839 --> 00:25:13,640
so that we don't have any stray squigglies because if we do and they go touch the positive side of

248
00:25:13,640 --> 00:25:22,240
the antenna bad things happen e.g. the antenna stops working you might damage part of your radio

249
00:25:22,240 --> 00:25:28,480
too so we'll we'll make sure that there's no stray you know angries before we connect it up to a radio

250
00:25:28,480 --> 00:25:34,319
or anything so don't got to worry about blowing things up as long as you make sure to uh you know

251
00:25:34,319 --> 00:25:40,319
isolate everything so we're going to tuck this down a little bit and then effectively i'm going

252
00:25:40,319 --> 00:25:45,859
to put one end like that up uh under the plastic and the other end is going to get soldered there

253
00:25:45,859 --> 00:25:53,019
and then the other other end is going to get bent that way and go there so to before we get down

254
00:25:53,019 --> 00:26:00,440
there, I am going to strip off a pretty long section of this, probably about 10 millimeters

255
00:26:00,440 --> 00:26:05,440
or so, just under a quarter of an inch. Well, I guess a little more than a quarter of an inch,

256
00:26:05,519 --> 00:26:11,660
probably right around a half. We want to make sure that we have enough material here to actually

257
00:26:11,660 --> 00:26:18,900
grab onto the copper. There should be no real torque applied to this other than its own weight

258
00:26:18,900 --> 00:26:27,440
because all of the mechanical holding of the 3d printed parts so we're not relying on the

259
00:26:27,440 --> 00:26:33,559
solder joint to be both electrical and mechanical it's only going to be mechanical so there we go

260
00:26:33,559 --> 00:26:42,519
let's get the plastic piece lifted up and then we'll pull this down and get it tucked under

261
00:26:42,519 --> 00:26:49,619
And that is, of course, going to ground out our aluminum as well.

262
00:26:51,640 --> 00:26:55,980
And you can see it tucks down in there right next to the through hole.

263
00:26:56,559 --> 00:27:02,099
I'm going to push that down real good, and we'll try not to make that move.

264
00:27:03,460 --> 00:27:10,680
And then these guys are going to go that way and that way right here.

265
00:27:10,680 --> 00:27:18,099
and before we get any further I'm going to tin both of these because again we don't want these

266
00:27:18,099 --> 00:27:25,400
two touching each other at all and wow that tip is dry so let's clean that up a little bit

267
00:27:25,400 --> 00:27:35,589
all right now we are also going to put just a little bit of solder onto our our dipoles here

268
00:27:35,589 --> 00:27:40,529
and basically I'm just going to push down onto it put a little bit of solder down so that there's

269
00:27:40,529 --> 00:27:45,710
heat getting into the pipe and now we pretty much just have to wait because we're waiting for the

270
00:27:45,710 --> 00:27:51,130
pipe to get up to temperature to actually start flowing and if you put just a little bit of solder

271
00:27:51,130 --> 00:27:55,329
right next to the soldering iron and it doesn't melt we know we're not up to temperature yet

272
00:27:55,329 --> 00:27:59,970
so just keep pushing on it and give it a little bit of extra every once in a while just

273
00:27:59,970 --> 00:28:06,809
when you see the flux start to to burn off and uh after a moment or two

274
00:28:06,809 --> 00:28:13,890
we should get some solder to be deposited here on the end of the pipe

275
00:28:13,890 --> 00:28:20,009
there we go that looks pretty good now we're going to do the same thing over on the other side

276
00:28:20,009 --> 00:28:24,630
and once we have solder basically on both of the connections all we have to do is kind of get it to

277
00:28:24,630 --> 00:28:32,210
reflow and it will grab right onto itself so this is probably the most difficult and fickle part of

278
00:28:32,210 --> 00:28:39,549
this entire assembly. I guess the measuring could be pretty fickle as well. So, you know, just

279
00:28:39,549 --> 00:28:47,470
stop, be slow, take your time, make sure everything is, you know, accurate when once cut. And you

280
00:28:47,470 --> 00:28:54,069
know, things should work out pretty well. The math is pretty darn good. Like physics doesn't

281
00:28:54,069 --> 00:28:59,829
generally get things wrong. And RF energy is pretty well understood. I just saw this entire

282
00:28:59,829 --> 00:29:06,309
thing kind of float down onto the tube which means if I pull away we should have a nice little blob

283
00:29:06,309 --> 00:29:12,650
here now one thing that we do want to make sure that does not happen is what's occurred right here

284
00:29:12,650 --> 00:29:21,170
and we have a little edge any spurious edge like that we we don't want in our system it creates

285
00:29:21,170 --> 00:29:28,609
little areas for the RF energy to come to a point and then get shot out so you know try to not do

286
00:29:28,609 --> 00:29:34,109
that when soldering all of these things together. We're going to let these copper tubes cool down

287
00:29:34,109 --> 00:29:41,390
a little bit because they are both toasty. And we're going to take a step back just for a second

288
00:29:41,390 --> 00:29:47,630
and prep a couple of these. I will bring you back when these copper pipes are cool to the touch.

289
00:29:49,430 --> 00:29:55,150
All right, our pipes are cool to the touch, which is good. And that means it is time to get these

290
00:29:55,150 --> 00:30:02,150
guys aligned up and I'm going to put these upright so when we uh we'll be able to see them

291
00:30:02,150 --> 00:30:06,450
before we clamp things down though I'm going to take both of the tubes and I'm going to rotate

292
00:30:06,450 --> 00:30:13,549
them forward like this so that we remove as much tension as we can off of the the joint so what

293
00:30:13,549 --> 00:30:21,549
I'm going to do is push these down and they should remain reasonably snug up against the uh the PLA

294
00:30:21,549 --> 00:30:26,670
or abs if you chose to print it in that and then we're going to put a little bit of tension down

295
00:30:26,670 --> 00:30:33,150
onto the wire i have my uh flathead here to help because these little guys get really hot

296
00:30:33,869 --> 00:30:40,349
and then uh all we're gonna do is wait for both of those uh bits of solder to flow together

297
00:30:41,470 --> 00:30:52,730
and we should be good there we go i just watched the uh the solder flow through so that one should

298
00:30:52,730 --> 00:30:58,170
should be good and then we're gonna do the same thing to our second one, our

299
00:30:58,170 --> 00:31:04,410
positive side of the dipole. Just gonna give a little bit of solder on to the

300
00:31:04,410 --> 00:31:09,549
soldering iron here and then don't forget to kind of push the wire into a

301
00:31:09,549 --> 00:31:15,230
way that it will preload. You don't really want to be fighting the wire

302
00:31:15,230 --> 00:31:19,910
to get it where it wants to be. Looking at this it's actually a little bit

303
00:31:19,910 --> 00:31:22,369
longer than I think it needs to be.

304
00:31:22,369 --> 00:31:26,029
So we're just gonna cut that little tip off the end.

305
00:31:26,029 --> 00:31:34,539
Now let's push it down and get soldering.

306
00:31:34,539 --> 00:31:37,319
All right, so I just watched it flow over

307
00:31:37,319 --> 00:31:39,119
and it should pull off pretty quick.

308
00:31:40,740 --> 00:31:44,660
We have everything we need here pretty much done.

309
00:31:44,660 --> 00:31:49,299
What I'm gonna do is grab both of these

310
00:31:49,299 --> 00:31:52,279
and kind of push them together.

311
00:31:52,279 --> 00:31:57,220
and then, I don't know, let's see, I said I was going to rotate them that way, but it actually

312
00:31:57,220 --> 00:32:04,059
looks like it would be best to kind of pull them in this direction, and then we're just going to

313
00:32:04,059 --> 00:32:12,279
give a little bit of a snug push, and then we'll take the top plate and put them on. Now, I know

314
00:32:12,279 --> 00:32:17,319
that this needs to be about a quarter inch, and I'm just using the width of the hole we've got

315
00:32:17,319 --> 00:32:26,900
down there to give us that dimension. So now it's a pretty good idea to get this bolt punched

316
00:32:26,900 --> 00:32:33,079
all the way through, which of course is a little bit tricky because we now have a coax wire in

317
00:32:33,079 --> 00:32:41,000
there. So if you've got something small and pokey laying around, you might be able to push it far

318
00:32:41,000 --> 00:32:55,039
enough out of the way. I said push it far enough out of the way. Come on, don't make me re-solder

319
00:32:55,039 --> 00:33:04,759
everything. You fit, I have faith. Right over to the side. Yeah, there we go. I knew it would work

320
00:33:04,759 --> 00:33:20,099
out. So then let's get this pinched down. And then on this side, we want this one to be, you know,

321
00:33:20,099 --> 00:33:29,240
very secure so because this is the side that has the wire contacting down to the uh the beam

322
00:33:29,240 --> 00:33:36,420
i want it to have the washer because out of the two if you know if i had to choose

323
00:33:36,420 --> 00:33:45,700
i want the extra right here now we'll just get this one a little bit snugged up

324
00:33:45,700 --> 00:33:52,019
and then i'm going to push down and get this one snugged up as best we can and we'll get those

325
00:33:52,019 --> 00:33:59,579
fully done up later but here we go there is our active element now let's uh go back towards the

326
00:33:59,579 --> 00:34:06,640
the backside here and we are going to use a a little bit of wire here to go from our screw

327
00:34:06,640 --> 00:34:17,139
up into our our reflector so let's get another one of these and we're going to need a small piece of

328
00:34:17,139 --> 00:34:24,699
wire here's the tiny little piece of wire i put a little end that we're going to put on to solder

329
00:34:24,699 --> 00:34:31,659
the tube and then i've got another end over here that we're going to put under the screw so this

330
00:34:31,659 --> 00:34:39,019
guy i'm going to wrap around into a half hoop then somewhere around here somewhere around here

331
00:34:39,019 --> 00:34:45,440
there it is we have a screw and we're just gonna get the screw in

332
00:34:45,440 --> 00:34:55,260
and then we put the hoop if we put the hoop around this way with the screw turning

333
00:34:55,260 --> 00:35:01,900
i need to eat with a screw turning to the right it's going to cause this hoop to open because

334
00:35:01,900 --> 00:35:04,260
it's gonna put pressure on it like this.

335
00:35:04,260 --> 00:35:05,519
We don't want that.

336
00:35:05,519 --> 00:35:08,159
So if we put the hoop the other way around,

337
00:35:08,159 --> 00:35:11,920
as this gets tightened, it's gonna bite and pull it in,

338
00:35:11,920 --> 00:35:13,280
which is what we do want.

339
00:35:13,280 --> 00:35:15,619
So let's put this hoop through.

340
00:35:17,619 --> 00:35:19,800
Then I'm gonna get it as tight as I can

341
00:35:19,800 --> 00:35:21,239
just kinda by pushing it.

342
00:35:22,719 --> 00:35:24,940
Then we're gonna pull this towards the back

343
00:35:24,940 --> 00:35:26,760
just so that it's nice and taut.

344
00:35:26,760 --> 00:35:30,639
And then we're gonna tighten this down nice and slowly.

345
00:35:30,639 --> 00:35:32,460
And then as soon as you see it bite,

346
00:35:32,460 --> 00:35:34,719
just give it a little bit of an extra,

347
00:35:34,719 --> 00:35:35,840
and that should do it.

348
00:35:36,739 --> 00:35:40,099
Now, we're gonna raise this a little bit up,

349
00:35:40,099 --> 00:35:41,300
and we're gonna tin it.

350
00:35:43,980 --> 00:35:46,860
Now the rest of these are going to be

351
00:35:46,860 --> 00:35:48,480
a little bit more tricky,

352
00:35:48,480 --> 00:35:53,480
because the dipole, we knew where the center mark is.

353
00:35:53,900 --> 00:35:56,079
And you guys, it's cut in half.

354
00:35:56,079 --> 00:35:59,420
But each of these guys, we don't have a center point for.

355
00:36:00,639 --> 00:36:07,639
Alright, we've got all of our center points marked, and we've still got the 1, 2, 3 in

356
00:36:07,639 --> 00:36:08,639
the reflector.

357
00:36:08,639 --> 00:36:14,480
So let's continue down the path of the reflector here, right in the middle, which is effectively

358
00:36:14,480 --> 00:36:15,480
where this is going to be.

359
00:36:15,480 --> 00:36:24,340
We're going to want to put together our holder.

360
00:36:24,340 --> 00:36:30,579
Then for me, because I routed things, let's say, uniquely, we're going to have to make

361
00:36:30,579 --> 00:36:34,099
sure that the coax stays out of the way when we put the bolts down.

362
00:36:34,099 --> 00:36:37,460
So now that we kind of know roughly where this is going to be, we know where this wire

363
00:36:37,460 --> 00:36:38,460
can live.

364
00:36:38,460 --> 00:36:42,679
And this wire really kind of has to get out of the way, so make sure that it lays down

365
00:36:42,679 --> 00:36:43,679
in that pocket.

366
00:36:43,679 --> 00:36:48,719
We don't want it to be affecting the clamping force here.

367
00:36:48,719 --> 00:36:55,059
So effectively, I'm just going to pick that up a little bit, and we're just going to solder

368
00:36:55,059 --> 00:36:56,900
it right down onto there.

369
00:36:56,900 --> 00:37:01,320
Now, when soldering this tube, it is going to get pretty hot.

370
00:37:01,719 --> 00:37:07,739
When doing it on this one, you want to leave it as little time as you can on the 3D print.

371
00:37:08,340 --> 00:37:16,579
But what I'm going to try to do here is lift it off of the 3D print using just a couple pieces of metal here, bolts.

372
00:37:16,920 --> 00:37:25,340
And then when we get this to heat up enough to actually flow the solder, we won't melt the PLA.

373
00:37:25,340 --> 00:37:33,219
all right now it's centered up and the wires soldered on so we can move to putting the top

374
00:37:33,219 --> 00:37:41,400
plate on and then we just got to push the uh the wire out of the way and get our bolts pushed

375
00:37:41,400 --> 00:37:58,880
through all right that was a little bit of a snug fit but uh we got all of the bolts to go through

376
00:37:58,880 --> 00:38:04,480
and then we'll just make these nice and snug because we don't want these center points moving

377
00:38:04,480 --> 00:38:10,539
at all as it will throw off the geometry of the antenna there we go the hardest and trickiest part

378
00:38:10,539 --> 00:38:17,260
is now done we only have the passive elements left there's no soldering left to do and you know

379
00:38:17,260 --> 00:38:23,900
that means we're within minutes of finishing this job thanks for sticking with me through here so

380
00:38:23,900 --> 00:38:29,159
effectively you do the same thing just minus the soldering and we're going to start with

381
00:38:29,159 --> 00:38:37,039
the number one reflector here which is going to be the biggest which should be this guy

382
00:38:37,039 --> 00:38:42,559
and then for me this is the one that I cut you will not have to worry about that

383
00:38:42,559 --> 00:38:54,530
so we'll just pop this plastic apart and then as we have before we just push this down and then

384
00:38:54,530 --> 00:39:00,190
just slide it back into the position that it needs to be. There we go. Then we take our number

385
00:39:00,190 --> 00:39:08,630
one, and we want to make sure that that is centered up as accurately as we can. Then we'll

386
00:39:08,630 --> 00:39:16,869
take the top plate, make sure that we put it on the right way, and then it should push right into

387
00:39:16,869 --> 00:39:27,719
there. Now, that's one of the passives, so let's just move right along. Make sure you pick up

388
00:39:27,719 --> 00:39:35,039
number two. That looks like number two. Then we'll, remember, just give it a little push to

389
00:39:35,039 --> 00:39:44,780
seat it, and then we'll come over here and set this down, and then put the bolts through.

390
00:39:44,780 --> 00:40:00,469
same thing pop this over that 3d print was a little snug push it down make sure it's aligned

391
00:40:00,469 --> 00:40:09,929
appropriately then get the third reflector push it down so that it is nice and snug

392
00:40:09,929 --> 00:40:18,989
and then these will sit on top push down again we've got everything aligned that we need

393
00:40:18,989 --> 00:40:29,199
we've got the entire antenna assembled there is only two things that we really have to do

394
00:40:29,199 --> 00:40:35,059
and uh you know my my rf connectors are already attached here so if you still have to do that

395
00:40:35,059 --> 00:40:40,619
uh you know choose your favorite rf connector and get that uh assembled and whatnot there's

396
00:40:40,619 --> 00:40:44,159
so many different kinds and flavors and shapes and sizes and whatnot we're just not going to

397
00:40:44,159 --> 00:40:50,780
dig into that right now the litmus test to make sure that this is roughly right is you want to

398
00:40:50,780 --> 00:40:58,480
hold it on end and if you let it rest on its smallest element you should notice that there is

399
00:40:58,480 --> 00:41:07,219
a an even gap pretty much through most of these if you find that it does not rest on its last

400
00:41:07,219 --> 00:41:12,599
element like say that it's resting on this reflector um there's something very wrong it's

401
00:41:12,599 --> 00:41:18,980
either to do with the alignment or to do with the overall length of one of these but you should

402
00:41:18,980 --> 00:41:28,300
always even in both directions always have you know a really good you know slope across so you

403
00:41:28,300 --> 00:41:34,000
know pretty much this this looks pretty good all right so let's not fret too much about that the

404
00:41:34,000 --> 00:41:37,079
last thing that we need to do to make sure that you're not going to fry your radio or cause any

405
00:41:37,079 --> 00:41:42,659
issues is we're going to grab our multimeter we're going to move it over into the resistance mode

406
00:41:42,659 --> 00:41:49,219
and then what we're going to do is take our connector here we're going to put one pin on

407
00:41:49,219 --> 00:41:56,440
the positive and one on the negative here and we want to see zero or you know open lead which is

408
00:41:56,440 --> 00:42:01,039
what i've got right now just to check that everything is connected appropriately if i

409
00:42:01,039 --> 00:42:08,579
push these together it shows 0.000 resistance. Now to be doubly sure of everything we're going

410
00:42:08,579 --> 00:42:13,059
to just make sure that everything's connected as we'd expect. So if I go ground and then I touch

411
00:42:13,059 --> 00:42:20,260
the aluminum chassis here we have you know no resistance. If I hit the back element here which

412
00:42:20,260 --> 00:42:29,699
is our reflector I have looks like a couple ohms probably due to this yeah there you go so almost

413
00:42:29,699 --> 00:42:36,039
no resistance there. Let's go figure out which side of this is the negative. Obviously, it's

414
00:42:36,039 --> 00:42:43,800
going to be yep, I'm getting open lead over here. And then over here, we've got 0.000. So if we go

415
00:42:43,800 --> 00:42:52,219
to the positive in our connector, and then over to our other element, we have 0.000. Let's make

416
00:42:52,219 --> 00:42:57,480
sure that we don't have positive on our ground, we have open lead, we don't have positive on the

417
00:42:57,480 --> 00:43:03,139
chassis which is open lead and one last sanity check let's just connect the meter and we have

418
00:43:03,139 --> 00:43:10,199
zero ohms of resistance which is what we pretty much expect cool well thanks for sticking with

419
00:43:10,199 --> 00:43:20,059
us again this was the 433 430 430 440 megahertz uh yagi we're going to take it outside in a little

420
00:43:20,059 --> 00:43:25,440
bit and we'll do a couple directional tests for this see if we can poke a repeater or two with

421
00:43:25,440 --> 00:43:31,179
the little bow thing handheld and then uh you know that's pretty much all that uh that it has

422
00:43:31,179 --> 00:43:36,320
for this project of course give me scale up scale down to pretty much whatever you want um you know

423
00:43:36,320 --> 00:43:42,079
if you're gonna make this twice as bigger or you know so far you know i'd recommend scaling the uh

424
00:43:42,079 --> 00:43:48,940
the plastic bits up and down especially to match the size of the tubing that you're going for

425
00:43:48,940 --> 00:43:58,539
And yeah, this, this is really cool. I'm, I am significantly happier with that compared to

426
00:43:58,539 --> 00:44:05,480
where we started earlier today. So this, uh, this was a great learning experience,

427
00:44:05,619 --> 00:44:12,860
but obviously not very stable. This is significantly better and I'm very happy

428
00:44:12,860 --> 00:44:20,900
with how it turned out so all right folks that does it for this as always get out there make

429
00:44:20,900 --> 00:44:27,940
something in your shop right now on screen there's a video that's a youtube algorithm has decided

430
00:44:27,940 --> 00:44:31,340
you might like to watch so feel free to give it a look