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Improve signal strength on Bluetooth GPS?

 
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faultymonkey
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Joined: May 24, 2008
Posts: 2

PostPosted: Sat May 24, 2008 10:23 am    Post subject: Improve signal strength on Bluetooth GPS? Reply with quote

I have a GPS MX-BG001 (i dunno what brand it is, it just says GPS on the front of everything)


Its a stand-alone GPS bluetooth receiver that I run using Tom Tom on my phone (SE W960i). To be honest the signal strength is pretty poor, it takes quite a while to see all the satellites and even longer to get a fix off some of them.

So I decided to take it apart to see if I could get to the aerial:


I found this little thing on the side and I was wondering if I could do anything to improve the signal strength.



So here is my question: If I attached a piece of wire as an extension to this little aerial, would it improve my signal strength or just be a waste of time?

Thanks
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mikealder
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Joined: Jan 14, 2005
Posts: 19638
Location: Blackpool , Lancs

PostPosted: Sat May 24, 2008 10:35 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Welcome to the forum, you cannot simply attach a piece of wire to improve reception, the receiver circuit is tuned to work at a specific frequency 1572,42 MHz some receivers have a socket to which you can attach an external aerial but your unit doesn't appear to support such a connection.

A few things to try though, make sure you have a position fix before setting off, once you are moving without a position fix the receiver will really struggle to locate the signal.

Put the receiver on the rear parcel shelf in the car and see if this improves matters, it could be your vehicle is fitted with an Athermic windscreen which will attenuate the signal making position fix more difficult. By moving the receiver to the rear window (which often are not coated you can boost signal level).

The backup battery could be defective, this is used to power some internal memory that stores certain information which speeds up reception time, if it is dead the device has to download a full set of this information before signal lock - this can take around 12 minutes - Mike
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Darren
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Joined: 11/07/2002 14:36:40
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Location: Hampshire, UK

PostPosted: Sat May 24, 2008 10:37 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

If that is an antenna it'll be the Bluetooth Radio antenna. The GPS antenna will be a patch antenna.
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faultymonkey
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Joined: May 24, 2008
Posts: 2

PostPosted: Sat May 24, 2008 10:52 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thanks for your help guys. Just one more thing

There is this little 5 hole socket next to the edge of the casing and I was wondering what it was for



It looks like there could be a component put there for something
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mikealder
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Location: Blackpool , Lancs

PostPosted: Sat May 24, 2008 11:22 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

The PCB pads look like they are arranged to accept a socket, along the lines of one of These BUT I wouldn't try fitting one, they need to be soldered to the PCB at the assembly stage, you will probably break the device by attempting a DIY installation, and still there is no 100% way of knowing if the PCB pads are indeed for a socket, they just look like it - Mike
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