The Mobile-Whip is an active (receive only) wideband antenna mainly designed for the HF frequency range (100kHz - 30MHz). The design is heavily based on the very famous Mini-Whip Antenna by PA0RDT (and DL4ZAO) with the main design change of making it operate on a single cell lithium battery (or USB supply voltage) to be able to use it on a mobile radio.
This led to the following improvements:
- Operates on a single lithium cell, 5V USB Supply, 4.0V RTL-SDR V4 Bias-Tee or 12V-15V Mini-Whip Bias-Tee
- Includes lithium battery charger
- Uses a LTC6268 ultra-low input capacitance OPAMP instead of JFET input
- Requires only 20mA (instead of roughly 50mA)
- (Probably) Has better large signal interferer resiliency (causing intermodulation) so it might perform better indoors
- Designed for 0.1MHz to 30MHz, but works reasonably well also for listening on FM Radio (100MHz) and VHF bands (150MHz)
- Can be easily mounted on a HT (such as the UV-K5 with HF mod) or mobile scanner and is thus ideally suited for e.g. SHTF Emergency Operations
- Very compact, only 200mm length
- 3D-Printed Enclosure (TBD)
Important: This project is currently in it's first revision for preview purposes only. There may (and are) some issues with this design still that need to be addressed in the future.
Attention: There is currently no reverse-TX protection, should you mount the Mobile-Whip on a mobile and press the PTT button. The Mobile-Whip might break.
| Mobile Whip on a UV-K5 with HF-mod | Mobile Whip on a RTL-SDR with Bias-Tee |
| S9+ on UV-K5 | Integrated USB-Charger |
The PCB can be ordered fully-assembled (apart from SMA male connector and lithium cell holder) at JLCPCB by following these instructions:
- Go to JLCPCB.com and upload the
GERBER-mobile-whip.zippackage (underkicad/mobile-whip/jlcpcb/production_files)- Select PCB Thickness 1.6mm
- You may want to select LeadFree HASL
- Select Silkscreen/Soldermask color to your liking
- Check "PCB Assembly"
- PCBA Type "Economic"
- Assembly Side "Top Side"
- Tooling Holes "Added by Customer"
- Press Next
- Click "Add BOM File" and upload
BOM-mobile-whip.csv - Click "Add CPL File" and upload
CPL-mobile-whip.csv - Press Next
- Look Through components, see if something is missing or problematic
- Make sure that all listed components are selected and press Next
- Check everything looks roughly good (rotations are already baked-in and should be correct). Save to Cart
Note: The following warning is okay and can be ignored:
The below parts won't be assembled due to missing data: C3, D4, C4, D6, J1, H1, H2, BT1
This will give you 5 (or more) SMD assembled mobile-whip antennas for roughly 25€ per piece.