I have now completed my new antenna switch board wiring. My approach is modular and should be easy to maintain.

In this post, I will take you through the components and connections to achieve my dual channel antenna switching, as described earlier. The yellow letters describe each component.

Power enters the system through one external connection (A) to a 12VDC power supply. A voltage converter provides two distribution buses at 5VDC and 12VDC. Overall, the system needs two to three amps.

My Active Antenna Amplifiers and MW filters for the wideband loop array (B) run on 12 volts. Six relays are used to control antenna modes, and one relay connects to the MW filters. Loop amplifiers are hard wired to the power bus so they are always running when power is applied. External connections come in through CAT7 cables.

Control relays are activated on a NodeMCU relay board (C) and associated wiring terminal blocks. Power for the Krida relay board is hard wired to 5VDC, so the system is always available for control over my home network. All of the wiring is carefully documented in a spreadsheet so I don’t get mixed up.

A USB power hub (D) provides 5VDC to a pair of distribution amplifiers, which provide dual signal channels to four receivers. A 3D printed BNC patch bay, shown at (E) distributes the signals.

More Antenna Switch Board Wiring

While the East Loop of my wideband array is dedicated to diversity channel A, the other channel can accept a variety of antennas. These are switched at (F) with a remote relay module, controlled by four relays on the NodeMCU board.

Finally, at (G) I have a pair of individually switched 12VDC outputs. One is dedicated to my Wellbrook loop power. The second drives  a voltage converter to provide 8VDC to the Afedri AFE822x dual channel receiver.

Now I just need to do a final “smoke check” and mount the board in the shack. Then comes the control software.