Pringles were the superior chips when I was young. Not really because they tasted better but because I could use the cans to disconnect my brother from the wifi all the way from my room. Those were pleasant times.

I’ve always been fascinated by antennas. There is something amazing about the simple physics that make them work. That’s why, after reading a zine about them, I decided to start experimenting with some simple 3D designs.

3D design

This would have to work on a 2.4GHz or 5Ghz signal (normal wifi) which would make the antenna quite small. The higher the frecuency, smaller wavelength and therefore, smaller antenna (in a simple way).

[Simply by f = c / l, where f is frequency, c speed of light, l wavelength]

I pumped up Fusion 360 and started designing my ideas, based on the ones I took from the zine. I focused on a Yagi sort of antenna, which is quite simple, it has a lot of directors to sort of guide the signal, a reflector at the back, which makes it directional, and a driven element, which is the part that actually connects and its active.

After some failures I actually landed on a pretty sweet design for the antenna:

antenna1 antenna2

Things to consider:

  • One can add more directors, I chose this amount simply for maintaining the antenna decently upwards
  • It is advisable to change the infill of the different parts of the antenna, since some will need some more strength while other don’t carry anything at all
  • You also some cable (14 AWG should do fine)
  • At the moment you also need screws but I’m working on that
  • The back of the antenna is currently poorly designed since it is way too big and heavy, but it doesn’t affect the overall efficiency I believe

Installing 3D printed antennas on top of a mountain

Making the antenna was really fun but I wanted to take it a step further, use them for something. I’ve been thinking about it for a while and found a very interesting use case. I’m going to make a meshnet (or attemp to make one) using the antennas. I have the perfect spot, on a rural area of Mexico, where there are mountains everywhere and one can direct the antennas to one another without much problem.