Is it possible to extend the range of the CyberBrick system by adding an external antenna?
I dont think thats possible currently.
Based on the wiki info the range is approx. 4m
Just out of curiosity, What would be your usecase for more range?
Controlling a locomotive on my garden railway.
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Now this sounds like fun…
Yeah i can see that the 4m might be limiting there.
With some fancy soldering you could Frankenmod a 2.4 GHz antenna to the CyberBrick Core (A11), like Happymodel 2.4g omnidirectional antenna for ELRS EP1 RX IPEX/IPX/U.FL compatible with TBS Tracer – Happymodel
An alternative would be enamel covered copper wire, ca. 31mm in length.
With X-acto would need to cut off the PCB antenna (at least make couple of mm large gap) and scrape a bit of solder mask off from the track coming from the circuitry (antenna signal and ground plane) to be able to solder the antenna coax onto it. Then add a blob of epoxy as a strain relief.
Thanks, might be worth at shot.
I have 4 cyberbrick things printed so far and it I have tested up to 110 feet and ran out of space. Someone else got it to go 100 meters and lost sight of it. I think the wikia is wrong and using the Bluetooth distance for programming. If you look online for the ESP32 range its much further.
The ESP32-C3, like other ESP32 variants, has a Wi-Fi range influenced by factors like antenna type, environment, and power output. While the theoretical range can extend to hundreds of meters, real-world performance is often less. With a standard chip antenna, expect usable ranges up to 100 meters or more in ideal conditions, but this can be significantly reduced by obstacles and interference. External antennas and power adjustments can improve range, potentially reaching hundreds of meters, especially in open areas.
“Under promise; over deliver!” That’s not really their motto, but it is a good practice.
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Cyberbrick core uses a PCB antenna, not a chip antenna. Range will be significantly less.
On the #cyberbrick channel on discord a few of us tested it. I only had 110 feet (33.53 Meters) and it worked flawlessly, I didn’t have the space to test further. PrivateMiku who made the Wiesel Mk20 went outside to test his yesterday and got it to go 100 meters, at which point he couldn’t see it anymore it was so small so brought it back with no issues at all with default and no antenna. We both live in rural areas so I guess its the most ideal situations but it goes way way further than 4 meters and with these small prints further than you can see them and keep track. That’s why I was saying the 4 meters has to be a mistake and based on the Bluetooth programming. That only goes about 4 meters. I hope people don’t decide not to buy it based on that stat because it’s not correct at all.
The ‘can’t see it anymore’ issue has me installing flea weight cameras on my models. I have designed a couple of mounts that are self contained and can be stuck/taped/clipped on various things. It is really fun to operate this way, like a drone. Look for the monitor mount that goes on the remote. My monitor and cameras came from Amazon.
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woah cool, you got a link to the ones you used on amazon? are they expensive?
I agree completely.
I was only commenting on your highlighted phrase citeing 100M which is very unlikely with this design. It’s one of the reasons I prefer the XIAO designs that do include a chip antenna or a wFL connector which allows adding a higher performance antenna.
If you are equipping the models with tiny analog video cameras (VTXs as they are called), have a look at FatFish F16 that would be an interesting radio handset that has built in analog video display capability in it’s color screen: F16 remote control
The screen can also be switched over to parametrize EdgeTX firmware and ExpressLRS RF module, running on that system.
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What if you use a commercial remote with an antenna? Risto on the Discord forum has all the details and info to make one work.
Risto (GMT+1+DST)
— 8/8/2025 12:49 PM
Regarding my previous post about controlling CyberBrick models from a “normal” R/C modelling handset (post above in 🧱│cyberbrick) I was able to drastically simplify the usability of the project (Simplify drastically the usability of this project by rotorman · Pull Request #7 · rotorman/CyberBrick_ESPNOW · GitHub). The update adds support to (presently) all available ESP32 and ESP32-S3 based ExpressLRS transmitter modules. At the same time it also removes the necessity to:
- explicitly bind the CyberBrick Core to the handset. Binding is still is recommended, but now optional. Optional binding can now be carried out using a virtual Bind button from a Lua script (https://github.com/rotorman/CyberBrick_ESPNOW/blob/main/transmitterLua/SCRIPTS/TOOLS/espnow.lua) running on EdgeTX handset, while pressing the physical USER KEY button on the CyberBrick Core receiver.,
- use Visual Studio Code with PlatformIO for flashing the ExpressLRS module. You can now use ExpressLRS Configurator (Release ExpressLRS Configurator 1.7.11 · ExpressLRS/ExpressLRS-Configurator · GitHub) in Local folder mode. Download or git clone the project repository (GitHub - rotorman/CyberBrick_ESPNOW: Custom firmware for internal ExpressLRS RF module to act as a CyberBrick ESP-NOW protocol TX module · GitHub), point ExpressLRS Configurator to
transmitterFWsubfolder and pick your ExpressLRS RF module manufacturer and model type and hit Flash.
Yeah, that’s me. “Risto” was already taken here in CyberBrick forum as a name…
Using a “commercial” remote, will also not get you better range, as the ESP-NOW protocol, that I am using in my code, does not use the SemTech LoRa/FLRC chip output, but ESP32/ESP32-S3 WiFi RF stage. Those have, also on those “commercial” remotes, only internal PCB or tiny ceramic antennas. The benefit of using a std. R/C modelling remote are the configurability options, such as channel mixing and trims, programmable dual/rates, expo and so on.
Yeah I don’t think any further range matters, from tests we have done it can go further than you can see/track these tiny things we are printing. So unless we start printing much larger items.
Im on this because Im trying to build a gauge 1