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..--- AIS VHF Antenna & WiFi Radio/Antenna Mount ---
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We wanted to mount a second VHF antenna and the WiFi radio and its antenna off the back of the solar array in such a way that shading from the antennas was minimal on the solar panels. Even small shading on a panel can effect its output. The mount that is shown on this page is what was made to accomplish the above.
A new mount was made for the WiFi radio and antenna. The old one will be removed. The new one is a cleaner install and has a couple other benefits.
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The long distance WiFi radio gives us another option for WiFi in addition to a Net10 Hot Spot and Internet via our phone connections. We use it all the time in the yard as it doesn't effect our data usage on the other devices, saving us money.
The mount was made from 3/16” thick 6061 aluminum of different widths.
A hole for the VHF radio and a slot for the cable was put into the end of the mount.
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The mount will bolt to the back of the solar array in the middle. There is not a panel in the middle area so that location and the length of the mount will move the antennas away from the panels minimizing or eliminating shading on them from the antennas.
The boat has a VHF antenna at the top of the mast and the Standard Horizon radio has AIS. AIS info from it will be sent to the Standard Horizon CPN700i chart plotter. In addition we will be running OpenCPN as a chart plotter on a very low wattage Raspberry Pi computer and monitor as backup. You can buy an inexpensive AIS board that mounts on the Raspberry Pi, which we did. It needs to be connected to a VHF antenna and we could of used a splitter on the mast antenna but it was cheaper to just buy a separate antenna. Since we aren't looking for really long range it will be placed on this mount and we will see how it does in that location and the antenna will be as high or higher than it is on a lot of power boats.
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I'll post another picture once this is mounted on the boat.
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