Nate: As often happens, I find myself agreeing with what you say.
I'm wondering, however, if anyone has configured D-Star systems with separate antennas and no duplexers. We have a UHF analog system here that's astounding in how it performs that's built this way with a high-level preamp at the RX antenna and that shares transmission line with the VHF at the same site. I've been looking for combined VHF/UHF antennas to consider for our district D-Star project to see how the pricing comes together. Chances are we'll be required to have circulators at the sites we're considering anyway, so we're looking at the following possible configurations * TX circulators * Pair of dual band antenna configurations or dual separate antennas with band combiners * One TX transmission line (7/8" or larger) * One RX transmission line (LMR-400 -- remember the preamp is at the antenna) * Preamps with bandpass filters The advantage of this would be that we'd only run one large transmission line for both VHF and UHF TX (suppose we could also share with 1.2G if we were doing that), it would use cheaper and lighter transmission line for RX, doesn't need duplexers, does have a bit more antenna, but also has about 12 dB better receive and less transmit loss. So, while we're talking equipment I thought I'd throw that out there to see if anyone is using or considered this approach. I'm not convinced yet that the overall price will end up that much better, but that may be outweighed by performance. Just curious what people think about this. I would also echo Nate's comments on the Sinclair antennas. Have always been impressed with them and have had no problems at all. Chuck - N8DNX [email protected]
