Hi Rich,

You are correct in that the lower portion of the antenna gets very close to the canopy frame. The upper portion does as well. This was done to get as much forward and rearward view for the antenna as possible. I believe moving the antennas inboard 1-2 inches would really hurt my front range, which is important of course. The fact that one antenna is performing much better in range than the other can't be ignored, and leads me to suspect some other root cause than placement. BTW, the system performs better than average in transmission (according to OGN). Is there a way to measure attenuation?

Cable crimps are good, and SMA connections are tight.

Matt,

I'm looking at picture 2 and have a couple of concerns:
-The antenna is not shown in the mounting bracket, but from picture 3 it seems certain that the lower arm would be very close and probably touching the fiberglass frame of the canopy. The upper arm is very likely close or touching the canopy itself.
-If the canopy frame is carbon, mounting so close would definitely affect performance, probably severely.

Even though the plexiglass or polycarbonate canopy is not conducting, they both have a higher dielectric constant than air and will definitely affect the tuning of the antenna. Most likely tuning it to a lower frequency than intended. The suggestion to use a wood mounting block to space the antenna away from the mounting surface is a good idea. I'd suggest trying to move it somewhere where there is at least an inch or two air around the antenna (especially the ends of the arms, the mounting bracket is OK as long as it is only near the middle).

I can't say for sure this will fix your problem. The RF design of these systems assume a considerable amount of attenuation from things like this, but if there is too much attenuation you will definitely see unacceptable range. I would also check the cable for crimps and loose SMA connectors.

Rich L.