video downlink

Hi, I have one question for somebody experienced with 5.8GHz video downlink. I am using RC helicopter for aerial photography and I bought RF-Link AVS-5811 5.8 GHz video T/R kit for checking camera view on the ground. Unfortunately transmission range is very short and I would like to ask, if there is possibility to use some kind of dirrectional antena for receiver or amplifier for transmitter signal.

Thanks
guzak@azet.sk

Directional antenna may not solve your prob.
You need amplifier.

Well, obviously if you increase the transmit power or use a directional receive antenna (pointed at the RC), you will get better range. You could attach the some sort of yagi antenna to the bottom of your controller, and always point it toward the
RC model.

IF you were going in one general azimuth away from your position, you could mound a high gain receive antenna on a tripod.

Your problem with the transmitter is that most countries will limit the transmit power you can use at 5.8 GHz.

You do not mention how you are sending the video, but there is a lot of processing stuff you could do to it. You could mpeg 4 encode it to get the bandwidth down, and then send it with the simplest modulation type you can get (like BPSK). This will give you more system link margin.

Rich