Ask Slashdot: DIY 4G Antenna Design For the Holidays?

eldavojohn writes "This holiday season I will return to the land of my childhood. It is flat and desolate with the nearest major city being a three hour car drive away. Although being able to hear the blood pulse through your ears and enjoying the full milky way is nice, I have finally convinced my parents to get "the internet." It's basically a Verizon Jetpack that receives 4G connected to a router. My mom says it works great but she has complained of it cutting in and out. I know where the tower is, this land is so flat and so devoid of light pollution that the tower and all windmills are supernovas on the horizon at night. Usually I use my rooted Galaxy Nexus to read Slashdot, reply to work e-mails, etc. I would like to build an antenna for her 4G device so they can finally enjoy information the way I have. I have access to tons of scrap copper, wood, steel, etc and could probably hit a scrap yard if something else were needed. As a kid, I would build various quad antennas in an attempt to get better radio and TV reception (is the new digital television antenna design any different?) but I have no experience with building 4G antennas. I assume the sizes and lengths would be much different? After shopping around any 4G antenna costs way too much money. So, Slashdot, do you have any resources, suggestions, books, ideas or otherwise about building something to connect to a Jetpack antenna port? I've got a Masters of Science but it's in Computer Science so if you do explain complicated circuits it helps to explain it like I'm five. I've used baluns before in antenna design but after pulling up unidirectional and reflector antenna designs, I realize I might be in a little over my head. Is there an industry standard book on building antennas for any spectrum?"

30$?

[tanveer1979]

Something like this costs 30$
http://www.wpsantennas.com/700MHZ-LTE-4G-Antennas.aspx [wpsantennas.com]

Ebay has things for 20-25$
Did you look at these options before deciding to building your own?

Re:30$?

[Anonymous Coward]

WTF? Seriously, what happened to /. being a place for nerds?

ARRL

[Anonymous Coward]

Start with ARRL (http://www.arrl.org/)
Antenna Handbook: http://www.amazon.com/dp/087259694X/
*The* Handbook: www.amazon.com/dp/087259419X/

Re:30$?

[putty_thing]

Exactly, Pringles cost way less than $30

Re:30$?

[Kokuyo]

Nerds build stuff nobody else thought of or with material nobody ever expected to work that way.

OR

Nerds like to build things in unusual ways for the enjoyment of succeeding at it.

What nerds don't do is spending hours building stuff they need that they could have shipped to them for little money and is plug and play. At least the intelligent nerds don't do that.

Now if these products do not satisfy, that is a completely different matter.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

what's wrong with spending $120?

[damn_registrars]

something more like this but without the $120 price tag

It seems to me that if it works, it would be $120 well spent. It would improve your parents' internet connection, which is your main goal, right? It would also require a minimal time investment on your behalf, which should also be a goal for you as you did not mention making frequent visits there. Third, if something goes wrong you have a manufacturer and a vendor to talk to - rather than having to rebuild the damned thing on your own.

One way to look at this is that if you visit once per year (you do see your parents once a year, right?) this will cost you only $10 per month. That is nothing. Besides, if you're three hours from the closest town, what are the chances you'll be able to get anything useful for building / repairing an antenna when you're out there? You seem to be about to start yourself on a project with very low probability of success for no apparent reason.

Buy the antenna and then spend your time building them a home file server to back up their important documents instead. Much better use of time and more tangible results.

You could just...

[Anonymous Coward]

scrap the tons of copper and steel you have, then buy an antenna.