My complaint is not about the integral dish, but the specific implementation of the cover and gland. The 450d was not a problem. The 450b mid gain is not a problem. Naming them both 450b was stupid though.
BTW, note that it’s not really 25 dBi, didn’t they finally fess up and change the spec sheet to say 23 dBi? I also quibble with the characterization as “cheapo” and keeping costs down. Depending on which license key you were buying on the 450 SM, the cost ends up being about the same as the previous SM plus a reflector dish. Of course if you are replacing FSK or 430, you already have the dish, and now you have to remove and replace it rather than taking 2 minutes to pop in a new SM without even needing to realign. I’m waiting for the first time we have to replace a 450b high gain due to something like lightning damage. That would mean removing and replacing the radome, which BTW is almost impossible in cold weather, I have actually had to use a heat gun to warm them up so they are flexible enough to go on. So I assume now we end up replacing the whole dish assembly and realigning. Not much point trying to save the dish anyway since you have to buy the SM and dish together. The other goofy thing is how inconsistent Cambium is. Even the two variants of 450b are different, and the other frequencies (900, 2.4, 3.65) are totally different. And of course now when we replace a 450 AP the replacement is a 450i AP which requires 48V rather than 24V. There really seems to be no master plan, just flavor of the day. The only consistency seems to be carry a 13mm wrench and a 5mm hex key with you. Or an electric screwdriver with a 5mm hex bit, or your hands will get tired. My guys complain about how long the threads are on the screws for the hated cable cover. From: AF <[email protected]> On Behalf Of Josh Luthman Sent: Thursday, February 21, 2019 10:04 AM To: AnimalFarm Microwave Users Group <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [AFMUG] Cambium 450b high gain cable gland & cover To a point I agree. Look at how much nicer a 25dbi dish is over a reflector+patch radio, though. It keeps costs down (since everyone's doing the cheapo 25dbi instead of trying to get by without a bare SM). Gain is good. Ubnt Nanostation copied the Canopy idea, mostly. They moved to dishes. Cambium had to "catch up" with the WISP world. My perspective may be different though - we almost never install bare Nanostations/Force 180/bare Canopy radios. We've always had to do reflectors/dishes. Josh Luthman Office: 937-552-2340 Direct: 937-552-2343 1100 Wayne St Suite 1337 Troy, OH 45373 On Thu, Feb 21, 2019 at 10:59 AM Mark Radabaugh <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > wrote: It drives me crazy that Cambium continually spends more time staring at what other companies have done and trying to copy them than looking internally at what made their own products the best in class. The original Canopy case design was damn near perfect - inverted cup that didn’t fill with water. Easy to remove and replace. Lots of mounting options. And now we have lots of little parts to drop. Reminds me of exactly what I hated about WiMax gear. Mark On Feb 21, 2019, at 10:42 AM, Brian Sullivan <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > wrote: I hate it too. Seems like they should have that design for ePMP and something nicer for 450. =) What would be nice is a door with a hinge, so there aren't multiple pieces you can drop and ruin your day. On 2/20/2019 9:38 PM, Ken Hohhof wrote: Does everyone hate the 450b high gain cover with the cable gland as much as we do? Not sure why they felt the need to do this on the high gain but not the mid gain. I wish somebody (Chuck?) would sell an aftermarket conversion kit to make it like the mid gain or the original Canopy SM. With a snap on cover, water kept out by gravity, and readily accessible alignment tool port. There are other mechanical things I hate about the product, like the screw in the back that you have to tighten ever so gingerly, and the 4 threaded inserts that seem to have manufacturing quality issues like getting covered over with plastic. Or the occasional feedtube that doesn't quite want to latch into place. Or how much work it is to convert them to mount on the left side of the pole. But the stupid cover with the cable gland is an annoyance every single time. -- AF mailing list [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> http://af.afmug.com/mailman/listinfo/af_af.afmug.com -- AF mailing list [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> http://af.afmug.com/mailman/listinfo/af_af.afmug.com
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