US Nebraska

[quasi beacon]

It just pulled in by default for me... MediumFast with the standard public psk.

I wonder if making these changes manually in the Lora settings is part of the problem. Would probably be better to use the QR code.

[narrow ledge]

So do I need to enter 45 here, or leave it 0 so the default is used?

[quasi beacon]

Hmmm... Does it give you visibility to the slot it assigns after setting at 0? If not, probably best to manually set it to 45.

Android doesn't have that unless I'm missing something

(the message about 0 slot)

[narrow ledge]

Ok. I have three nodes running:

modem_preset: MEDIUM_FAST
channelNum: 45
ch-index: 0
ch-set name: “”

[narrow ledge]

I’m still confused if the channel name should be null or literally “MediumFast”

[narrow ledge]

The iOS app does not. If I set it to 45 in the app, and then query it with the CLI, I see lora.channelNum is 45. If I set it to 0 in the app, the CLI doesn’t have a key/value pair for channelNum

[narrow ledge]

If I set it 0 in the CLI, and then query in the CLI, the key/value pair does not exist. The iOS app shows slot as 0.

[quasi beacon]

Let me test something with the QR code quick. I'll hopefully have something to share with you in a minute

[narrow ledge]

OK. I was going to head up to the roof. I’ll grab a beer and wait.

[quasi beacon]

Good call on the beer, I should have started drinking hours ago! 😂 Try this QR.

[narrow ledge]

Done. The result seems to be the same as: meshtastic --ch-set name "" --ch-index 0 --set lora.channelNum 0 --set lora.modem_preset MEDIUM_FAST

[hard heath]

Switched back to PHYG for the MediumFast tests. PHHM didn't see anything new after more than an hour

[quasi beacon]

I saw PHHM about 20 minutes ago but must not have caught it in time.

[narrow ledge]

Ok. Five downtown nodes, two in high places, are set to MF and channel using the QR code. Fingers crossed!

[quasi beacon]

I'll try sending a few messages

[narrow ledge]

Same. Nothing seen yet.

Newfound respect for folks like @gilded tide who go out in all kinds of weather to work on radios. And you tree climbers, as well.

I had to reflash and reconfigure. Need to get better at making and restoring from backups.

[narrow ledge]

Just saw X4RE join.

[quasi beacon]

I haven't seen yours on this end either. I thought for sure DT16 would make it to EBT.

[narrow ledge]

Yeah, I figured the one in the west window would hear something, and that someone would hear DT16.

[hard heath]

Only crickets on PHYG.

[hard heath]

On the default LongFast though, right?

[gilded tide]

Hahaha, today was a day at the beach 🙂

Until it's blowing 45, the windchill is -35, everything has inches of ice, and you get the call at 5pm.... it's not a Monday!

[narrow ledge]

No. It was on the experimental MediumFast. But not complete data.

[hard heath]

Interesting. Didn't know he gave it a shot but I'm glad something got through!

[narrow ledge]

Weird. FFX2 showed up, too. But I haven’t done anything with it. Maybe some weirdness with the nodedb.

[hard heath]

That seems a bit more likely I think

[narrow ledge]

I’m game to leave this running for a while. But if we think this had run its course, I’ll set things back to normal. But maybe I’ll try the new alpha firmware on a a node up high and try out the router_late mode.

[dapper igloo]

Are you folks just testing MEDIUM_FAST? Or are you intending to test some other modes (maybe SHORT_FAST) as well?

[quasi beacon]

Just medium fast for now. Seems like the best balance of speed and distance for our current mesh.

@distant kettle did you see any of the medium fast messages shortly after 5pm?

[quasi beacon]

If agov confirms that the Bellevue stuff is running normally and you still haven't picked anything up, then we can probably throw in the towel

[distant kettle]

have been busy. I got all 5

switching agv3 back to default LongFast now

[quasi beacon]

Thank you @distant kettle @narrow ledge @hard heath for participating in the experiment today. In summary, at this point the congestion is preferable vs the bugs we continued to see on the medium fast setting. I still haven't been able to get EBT back to long fast. Only was able to admin in once out of 10 attempts and I'm not sure if the setting change took. Kind of tempted to factory reset the nodes that participated to wash all that filth off. 😂

[narrow ledge]

It’s always good to experiment and try things out. I’m surprised we didn’t get a single packet between downtown and the southern nodes, given that there’s been some success in the standard mesh.

I’m going g to reset all my nodes back to standard LongFast and focus on standard RF improvements. I may set my window bide to the alpha firmware with ROUTER_LATE and see how that works.

[quasi beacon]

Yeah me too, but we saw so many other unexplained issues I don't think it was necessarily a radio performance issue.

[narrow ledge]

Downtown node DT16 is unavailable and likely in a reboot loop again. I’m hoping it’s a firmware/settings thing, and not a hardware issue. I’ll get back on the roof tomorrow to reflash and restore to standard LongFast config.

FFX2 is running the custom alpha 2.5.18 with patches provided by @dapper igloo It’s set to ROUTER_LATE on the standard LongFast. Fingers crossed!

[dapper igloo]

Keen to hear how you find it. We're fully SHORT_FAST around here, so I don't have a good way to get testing data for other modes.

What's the typical chutil at that site?

[quasi beacon]

Anyone seeing EBT since the testing finished? I'll probably need to head over there in the next day or two and BT into it to see what's going on.

[narrow ledge]

Here’s my map on Tuesday morning. I haven’t seen EBT or other southern nodes. I’m not sure how those western nodes are getting to me downtown.

[tawdry compass]

Just tuned in here after being in western nebraska the last week. Sorry to hear the medium-fast experiment failed. Too bad meshtasic is so buggy.

[tawdry compass]

Hey, Matt. On another subject, I use your winlink gateway fairly often. I have an end-fed feedpoint at about 6'. I can mostly always get to you when everything else fails!

[gilded tide]

Since you said "end-fed" I infer you mean the HF gateway. But I have no clue what your call is 🙂 Don't ignore the VHF nodes, they blanket the area.

[narrow ledge]

The VHF Winlink nodes are crazy fast!

[tawdry compass]

Don't do VHF often, mostly all HF. Call is K0RDM. It's an end-fed set up as an inverted V. All I can get away with the HOA. I have a rural property where I have various other wire antenna's

[gilded tide]

Most of the area can hit a node with an HT in the house... HOA friendly 🙂

[tawdry compass]

Yeah, copy that. I do have a couple HT's and a mobile or two, but I seem to only have time for HF anymore. Repeaters were never my thing, and they have all been long dead anyways. There is a fairly active gmrs repeater in bellevue, that's a good thing, but I just stick to HF digital modes and a little phone once in a while. 40 and sometimes 20 meters. But that's just me.

[quick sage]

Our friend Rust showed up again today.

[hard heath]

Is this still the case? I thought when creating a new default channel (or editing one, as with switching to MediumFast), we could just clear the key and type in AQ==. But this makes it seem like on Android we have to create a new channel and let the software generate the key (even though it is still AQ==).

I haven't heard anything on LongFast since switching to MediumFast yesterday for a while and then reverting. Not sure if it's just been quiet or if I screwed something up.

[quasi beacon]

I think EBT is in the same boat. I need to get over there and reset the channel via BLE. Crazy because my 2 nodes at home didn't have this issue, and EBT never had this issue when testing other modem settings in the past. Still scratching my head on all of this.

[hard heath]

Me too. I did about all I could except for a full factory reboot and it's still behaving oddly. I did get a few replies back on LongFast though so maybe it's just a quiet time for the mesh today.

[hard heath]

Some messages going through with acks to FFG2. Stars must have aligned!

Traceroutes too, but taking odd pathways.

@narrow ledge here's another one. Still don't have user info on several nodes after resetting my DB, so I'm not completely sure who some of these are. Also not sure all my messages are getting through to you via mesh

[narrow ledge]

Nice, @hard heath !

I only got one successful TR.

[hard heath]

Really didn't expect a good connection with EBT and one of your nodes down.

[narrow ledge]

GPM2 is my buddy’s in Gifford Park near Duschene Academy. RED3 is inside a nearby tall building.

[narrow ledge]

Downtown node, DT16, is back in operation after a reflash. It seems to be staying online.

[narrow ledge]

I’m not seeing any southern nodes today. Are EBT and AGOV nodes offline?

[quasi beacon]

EBT never came back online after the medium fast test. Major remote admin issues. I'm planning to check it out tomorrow. Fingers crossed it can be addressed via BLE. I also factory reset my home node... Forgetting that it's in a box on my roof (can't pair without physical access.) it has been a tough week for meshtastic. 😂

[tawdry compass]

Some of the most buggy code around, unfortunately. Wish it weren't so. The lead dev's seem to be happy with the progress.

[tawdry compass]

I have been having battery issues with my off-grid test node. There are like 3 types of self-heated LifeP04 batteries. Type 1 is heated only by the charging current, it heats before allowing a charge. Type 2 is internally heated only, and type 3 seems to allow you to select between the two. My black friday special that I have been using is type 1, and once it gets cold enough, it simply refuses to charge, even when I deploy a massive amount of panels.

So, Type 1 self-heated (at least my example) is a fail for off-grid. I have reverted to a 20ah agm battery. Shouldn't be any issues with extreme cold. At least that's what I am hoping for. Looks like I will get those condx soon.

[quasi beacon]

So apparently it was a hard crash. No Bluetooth connection. Really didn't want to have to climb the tree again so soon, but today might be the only nice day for a while.

[quasi beacon]

Yeah, hard to beat the simplicity of agm. Do you have a way to cut draw at a certain voltage?

[tawdry compass]

Nope, not yet. Working on that. The small inverter I use for the 24W usb to power the node may have low voltage cut-off. (inverter is powered off, just using the usb). But, I have not tested for that feature.

[quasi beacon]

@narrow ledge got your manawa message from inside liberty middle school. Stepped out to respond and saw someone else respond as well. Are you receiving anything out there?

[tawdry compass]

Here's the spec's on the el cheapo car inverter I am using because of the USB circuit. It has 65W usb-c PD and 24W usb a outlets. Yep, the inverter is junk, but note the PD has 15V 3A which will power Station-G2's. That was why I acquired it to test with. They do claim low voltage cut-off, but I haven't tested it with my bench power supply yet. It may all yet go up in smoke, lol.

[narrow ledge]

I left a T1000E out on the NE shore of Manawa for a couple of days. FFX2. We’ll see if it helps fill in the mesh. I might be able to do something permanent out there in the spring.

[quasi beacon]

Nice! I see it 2 hops out, but can't get a trace. Any idea what the "unknown" node is? Decent signal there but very weak coming back from EBT.

[quasi beacon]

Better than nothing! But if it cycles down to 10.8v regularly that will put a hurt on the AGM.

[quasi beacon]

Did anyone ever get ahold of "meshtastic 12cc"? I had it ignored on all my nodes and see it sitting at the top of the node list again after resetting my devices. Still sending updates every couple minutes. I ignored it on EBT but the west O nodes seem to be bouncing these packets around and eating up a bunch of channel utilization.

[quasi beacon]

Hmmm... "Ignore" might not prevent from rebroadcasting. It looks like the 12cc packets at my home node might be hopping through EBT.

[narrow ledge]

That might have been FFX2. The signal strength would indicate that because REDX was so close.

Has anyone seen FFX2? I haven’t seen it since I left area.

[hard heath]

@narrow ledge I've not seen it, but I'm quite a ways out here.

@quasi beacon I have reached out to that node numerous times but never heard back. Always broadcasting every few minutes and always near the top of the list on my nodes. Similar story with 'mesh0001' and being in router_client mode.

[narrow ledge]

FFX2 is running the alpha firmware. I did set it to CLIENT mode but maybe it’s not working correctly. The battery will give out by tomorrow, probably. When I go retrieve it, I might swap it out with a device running stable beta.

[quasi beacon]

Yeah, last update from 2 hours ago. Battery at 74%. 1 hop from me, so likely going through EBT. Can't get a trace though, so must be a marginal signal.

[quasi beacon]

Oh duh, that was a plus 10 SNR so definitely the other node you had with you. Were either of them able to communicate with the downtown nodes when you set it up?

[quasi beacon]

That's a bummer. Would be nice to clean up the public LF frequency since it's apparent that different modem settings would be a mess in our current state

[narrow ledge]

I didn’t spend much time playing with the radios, since I was there to fix the webcam and play on the ice with my girlfriend. But I did notice some DT nodes trickle in. Here’s a screen shot I grabbed at one point.

[narrow ledge]

An ignore that truly prevents a well managed router or client from forwarding rogue packets could be a game changer in mitigating the ill effects of poorly managed nodes.

Here’s the Manawa webcam, if you’re interested.

https://www.youtube.com/live/uGSWTPwnSSw?si=0DZ3r8ekOmfz06e5

[tawdry compass]

It surly will. Gotta keep an eye on it. Any Ideas?

[quasi beacon]

I use a cheap 12v solar charge controller on a couple of diy UPSs. It has programmable LVC for the load output. Customizable max charge voltage too for different chemistries (I run the voltage a bit low on LFP for longevity.) I'll see if I can find a link

[quasi beacon]

I've had 2 of these running for 5 years straight without a hiccup. Not available from Amazon anymore but there are probably similar options.
https://a.co/d/2rgcAEy

I run a separate 5v USB supply off the load output of the controller. Can't confirm if the controller's USB output cuts at the same setting as the load.

Although you don't care about the USB ports. You would just wire the inverter into the load terminals on the controller. Looks like Amazon has a similar cheap option for 12 bucks or a renogy for 19. Both would have programmable charge and LVC voltages.

[tawdry compass]

That is a PWM charge controller, I have many, both PWM and MPPT. for this test, I am using a cheap PWM(BougeRV, it has an AGM setting) as it really doesn't require MPPT for such a small battery. I have over 3KW of solar I can deploy, if necessary😆 . For this battery, I have a 100W panel. Might not need that, I also have a 25W panel and smaller panels as well. I'm a solar nut, of sorts😅 . What I was wondering is about the low voltage cut-off for the battery.

I can of course, directly monitor the battery as it's in my backyard, but that's not very realistic for a remote deploy. Any ideas/suggestions for remote monitoring? would if be possible for the node to report battery voltage? As it is powered by the usb buck/boost circuit (or whatever it is, I assume there must be regulation as well) I am thinking some kind of module the node could be hooked to read direct battery voltage?

[narrow ledge]

@dapper igloo Congrats on your changes making to beta! We are still playing with ROUTER_LATE in our area to see if it helps in some difficult to reach locations.

@dapper igloo Would it be possible to query the IP address of network connected nodes via LoRa? Like if it were an attribute that could be read via a --get ?

Hey folks! The new firmware, 2.5.18, which includes ROUTER_LATE, is availble. There's also a new iOS version of the app. Interestingly, the web client doesn't show the new ROUTER_LATE. At least, not for me.

[tawdry compass]

I am interested in any experiences with the ROUTER_LATE role.

[quasi beacon]

If the AGM setting for LVC on your controller is at a voltage you're comfortable with, and your inverter is running off the controller's load terminals, you probably don't need a battery cut option. Those pwm controllers consume next to nothing when the load is cut.

[quasi beacon]

Regarding voltage monitoring, Keith's LTO charger regulator has a built in ina3221 i2c sensor with 3 channels for voltage/current monitoring. I'm not positive what it would take to wire that into the G2 but it was very easy on the rak. Every hour EBT sends an update with solar panel and battery voltage/current.

** To clarify, a stand alone ina3221 sensor can also be wired into the i2c on rak. I assume that's doable with the G2 as well.

[quasi beacon]

Here's what it looks like on the app when viewed from another node on the mesh.

[tawdry compass]

I am running the Inverter directly off of the battery, But the inverter is switched off to avoid the parasitic draw. The usb circuit is powered separately, so it's always on when connected to the battery. The BougeRV pwm controller does not have a load feature, but I have several others that do. Never really had a use for load, I'll look into it.

[tawdry compass]

Would you know where I could source the ina3221 i2c sensor?

[narrow ledge]

Downtown seems strangely disconnected from the metro mesh. For a while I thought it was because of EBT being down, but it's still not quite like it was before. Are y'all seeing stuff coming out of downtown today?

[quick sage]

https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256807443185588.html?src=google&pdp_npi=4%40dis!USD!0.71!0.66!!!!!%40!12000041566069133!ppc!!!&src=google&albch=shopping&acnt=708-803-3821&isdl=y&slnk=&plac=&mtctp=&albbt=Google_7_shopping&aff_platform=google&aff_short_key=UneMJZVf&gclsrc=aw.ds&albagn=888888&ds_e_adid=&ds_e_matchtype=&ds_e_device=c&ds_e_network=x&ds_e_product_group_id=&ds_e_product_id=en3256807443185588&ds_e_product_merchant_id=5408128731&ds_e_product_country=US&ds_e_product_language=en&ds_e_product_channel=online&ds_e_product_store_id=&ds_url_v=2&albcp=20542171673&albag=&isSmbAutoCall=false&needSmbHouyi=false&gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAiAnKi8BhB0EiwA58DA4fYGr4G2KjXTPePRuAjH4ANB-5bBZCUIKyQOp0Ju_1tYeOh31OG-RxoCZFsQAvD_BwE&gatewayAdapt=glo2usa

[quick sage]

https://www.amazon.com/Diitao-INA3221-Triple-Channel-Current-Monitoring/dp/B09VC2P4W4/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1PRJWGZVNCLCY&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.HrdlGbFD5srlHkZVPSHR_fOeCC7ivac2dcM3i6NJ777r7nuGnfNv6L0AIwGu6Fe2IyxcmJahkXlQgTTQ8aQs9uE8FDTx7e5hWEk9TamVlfCHqB5Me-GEgfApXf3mrTwVnAWiPQ6tIvniczy3xgGeJgfmPIXppWFstucoFfXeaH-KwHKuc7Uha5RGaG0iTCBqtBITnC3Eq7HnqU5U0k558YkR2WmVSDndq-9NNGB0N78.VvcoQHBUMV9EnHkwgGk1qxWR-YtUPog_RB712GQia7U&dib_tag=se&keywords=ina3221+triple-channel&qid=1737148061&sprefix=ina3221+%2Caps%2C253&sr=8-1

[quasi beacon]

I see the usual downtown nodes, looks like it's all going out through DT16. But RX performance down there must still be lacking if is not going in the other direction.

[narrow ledge]

FFX3, running ROUTER_LATE, is up in a high spot. I made a custom charger cable for the card and put it and a battery inside a weatherproof case. Fingers crossed!

[tawdry compass]

Thanks!

[hard heath]

@narrow ledge I'm going to start resending your discord invite message periodically out here too. 12cc replied once on LongFast a while back. Maybe he'll see it and pop in!

[quasi beacon]

What a perfect fit!

[dapper igloo]

To the best of my knowledge, that isn't currently exposed in a way that you could obtain it via LoRa unless it's a static IP set in the config. You can retrieve fixed config parameters, but not externally assigned stuff like DHCP leases.

[dapper igloo]

The version of ROUTER_LATE in 2.5.18 contains a serious bug. If you're wanting to test that role, 2.5.19 would be a much better bet - the bug is fixed in that release.

[narrow ledge]

Would that be the alpha version?

[dapper igloo]

Yep

Or if you're really wanting to use 2.5.18, it's possible to do a custom build with the bugfix on top of it. I think I might have given you that build at some point? I lose track sorry.

[narrow ledge]

Yes. You sent us links to a patched build. Today I saw that version went beta so thought that might have the fix, so I moved to the beta. I’ll load the new alpha later.

Is the bug in .18 related just to the new role? Or buggy in general?

[dapper igloo]

Yeah, the 2.5.18 beta release is the same thing as the 2.5.18 alpha release - there's no change to a release when a release gets promoted to the beta channel.

The bug I'm referring to is only triggered when using the ROUTER_LATE role. It relates to how QoS in the TX queue is managed. Best case, you won't notice it, but some packets will be relayed very late or not at all. Worst case, you'll either run into a use-after-free / double-free on a packet (and the device will then crash), or the TX queue will become completely filled with delayed packets and the device will be essentially unable to transmit anything at all until you reboot it.

Worst case outcomes are triggered by having a mesh that's busy enough to cause the TX queue to fill enough that it needs to start evicting low-priority packets.

There are other unrelated bugs in 2.5.18 to watch out for too obviously (e.g. the Bluetooth / filesystem issues that seem to have plagued the whole 2.5.x series of releases). Partly fixed in 2.5.19, root cause now identified by @warm cove, and further fixes imminent. However, as far as I can see, 2.5.18 is no worse than any of the previous 2.5.x releases unless you are wanting to use ROUTER_LATE.

[narrow ledge]

FFX3, which was running the 2.5.18 in ROUTER_LATE mode, was found to be unresponsive. I have put 2.5.19 on FFX1 and put it up on the roof in its place. The nodedb on FFX3 did show that it was hearing a lot of remote nodes up there. Please let me know if you all can see any traceroutes, or of it's helping (or not).

I've also put BZYB in what I think is a better location. It's near Elmwood Park at 60th St. I was able to see some downtown and southern nodes, including the one at Manawa (FFX2) a hop or two away with some regularity, but didn't have any luck with traceroutes.

[narrow ledge]

Anybody know who !944df6f8 is? I don't have a full node record, but they are doing the mesh a solid favor bridging West O with DT at the moment. I'm sure hoping this sticks.

meshtastic --traceroute !944df6f8
Connected to radio
Sending traceroute request to !944df6f8 on channelIndex:0 (this could take a while)
Route traced towards destination:
!bd503eb8 --> !433aad90 (-12.5dB) --> !944df6f8 (-8.5dB)
Route traced back to us:
!944df6f8 --> !e562a28a (-13.0dB) --> !bd503eb8 (2.25dB)

[dapper igloo]

Is FFX1 also running the ROUTER_LATE role? Keen to hear how you find it if so.

Unsurprised re FFX3 being unresponsive if it was on vanilla 2.5.18 - that sounds like the bug I mentioned above when the TX queue gets completely bogged down with delayed packets.

[narrow ledge]

Oh, duh !944df6f8 is EBT. 🙂

[narrow ledge]

It's moving around on my maps.

[narrow ledge]

The battery died on ROUTER_LATE node, FFX1. I have put FFX3 back in service (with alpha firmware) up high in downtown. I can't be sure, but I do think the new mode was helping.

[quick sage]

Made a drive out to north central Nebraska today. Picked up 4 nodes along the way. I was trying to switch my node over to MQTT while I was out there and there was an error, "Refused connection" on the Apple app when I tried to turn it on. I was in Client_Muted.. switched to just Client and still the same thing. Eventually somewhere along the trip I tried again and it let me switch on mqtt. Wonder if anyone else ever had that happen?

nodes I discovered.

[quasi beacon]

Yeah I've swapped the board a couple times in the past 2 weeks. I'll try not to mess with it for awhile too keep it running. 😂

[narrow ledge]

I can't be sure, but after a few days of running ROUTER_LATE on 2.5.19 (currently running on node FFX3) I think it's helping to keep our downtown area nodes (on the NE side of this map) more reliably connected to the larger metro mesh. Here's a screenshot my local Meshsense map, and it's looked pretty much like this during this period. Occasionally it will have paths to other nodes, but the connection to EBT router seems to be the vital link.

[narrow ledge]

Is there any data I can easily collect that will help you test?

[dapper igloo]

Thanks! 😁

ChUtil of the ROUTER_LATE node, and general reliability of traffic to / from the served cluster (especially messaging traffic).

If it's easy, an indication of whether the TX queue is filling up and evicting lower priority packets would also be helpful (it will output log messages when that happens), although that requires serial logs - so if it's not convenient, don't worry about that bit. The TX queue is currently 16 packets in size.

I'm pretty comfortable with how it's working on SHORT_FAST, as I have four of them deployed on our mesh here for testing with great success - but more data from meshes using slower modes would definitely be helpful.

[dapper igloo]

How many nodes in that cluster? Is the ROUTER_LATE part of the cluster, or just somewhere that can see it?

[narrow ledge]

Most of the nodes in our downtown cluster are mine and in the same place. Two are up on the roof of a 14 floor building where there is a lot of other commercial RF equipment. One rooftop (Heltec3, CLIENT) is wired to AC and connected to a whip antenna. The second rooftop (T1000-E connected to battery bank, ROUTER_LATE) is about 50 feet from the first.

Would it make sense to have both in ROUTER_LATE, or would they interfere with each other?

[narrow ledge]

The ROUTER_LATE node is running on battery. I expect 5-7 days of operation before I need to swap it out with another battery/card installation. At that point I could grab logs over serial. Will there be historic logs there, or do you mean I would need to capture logs in real time?

[narrow ledge]

5 to 10 nodes or so, depending on what I might have powered on and a good RF path to a couple more on a fringe area.

[dapper igloo]

Generally you want at most one node in a mandatory-rebroadcast role (including ROUTER_LATE) in any given location. More than that just needlessly burns airtime on the channel, without contributing anything useful.

[dapper igloo]

No historic logs unfortunately - they are realtime only. If it's not easy, don't worry about it 🙂

[quasi beacon]

Nice! Yeah the trace routes I've seen the last couple of days indicate that FFX3 has the best receive performance and then DT16 has the strongest transmit. Having the best receiver in router late seems to be a good approach since it's most likely to hear and rebroadcast the most traffic from outside of the area.

[twin fern]

Any idea what the commercial use there is?

[quasi beacon]

Is everyone out West still seeing 12cc? After resetting my nodes I ignored it only on EBT, yet was pretty certain EBT was still rebroadcasting 12cc updates (even though it shouldn't for an ignored node.) it did that for a few days, and then suddenly stopped.

[hard heath]

Not recently. Looks like last contact was about 36 hours ago

[narrow ledge]

12cc last seen downtown 2025-01-19 07:18:38

[quasi beacon]

Seems like we all saw the last update at the same time. So either the node went down or we were all seeing it via EBT hop before the ignore finally went into effect.

As much as I hated the extra traffic, it was kind of nice to have a regular beacon of sorts, always knew when I'm range. 😂

[narrow ledge]

It was one of the first I remember seeing. 🙂

[hard heath]

Anybody know this one? Decent-ish signal here and pretty consistent, but still unset.

[narrow ledge]

Purple Thirsty Five Node 🟣 │ !7efebf34 │ PTFN │ HELTEC_V2_1 │ UNSET │ 41.1623° │ -96.0317° │ N/A │ 101% │ 5.88% │ 0.13% │ 6.25 dB │ ? │ 0 │ 2025-01-20 20:42:32 │ 20 mins ago

[hard heath]

Thanks Scott!

[uneven zinc]

I've been asked to do a presentation on Meshtastic for the Aksarben Amature Radio Club at thier February meeting. Do any of you have cool pictures of your nodes that I could add to my presentation? Or any other interesting facts about nodes in Nebraska?

[narrow ledge]

Fun! I think you’ll find some crossover of interest between Meshtastic and ham stuff. Many of the folks here are hams, too, and are utilizing their RF engineering skills to improve the area mesh network.

Downtown ROUTER_LATE node, FFX3, might have been zapped by last night’s extreme cold. It last checked in 22:58 last night with a full battery and temp (inside its little case) at -3°F. I’m hoping it will vibe back online on its own, but if now, I’ll go up and swap it out with a fresh card and battery.

[tawdry compass]

Yep, lots of hams here.

[hazy frost]

Yup

I picked up two t-beams in 2020 for meshtastic use. Omaha was a barren land back then for the mesh. Amazing growth over the past year.

My nodes are titled Mousetastic xxxx / dmxx

[narrow ledge]

I’m seeing it again this morning.

[narrow ledge]

Since about 9am. Uptime 4 hours.

[tawdry compass]

Seeing RED-X2 here 192nd & dodge

[narrow ledge]

Cool! That’s the ROUTER_LATE node I just replaced earlier this afternoon. Are you seeing it directly? Or via other nodes? Direct would be a bit of a stretch, but maybe an RF path opens up.

[twin fern]

I'm hopeful that once I get the node up in Ashland to connect Lincoln and Omaha it also incentivizes some build out in Lincoln. It's pretty dead down here.

[tawdry compass]

2 hops. but I see it high on the nodelist.

Here's a trace from Helix to RED-H

[narrow ledge]

Interesting that neither side of that trace used the ROUTER_LATE node.

[narrow ledge]

FFX3 was partially bricked. I had to install the erase firmware, followed by the Meshtastic firmware. It appears to be working now. FFX2 is up on the roof.

[tawdry compass]

Here's a trace of one of those mouse nodes. 😀

[tawdry compass]

So, do you think ROUTER_LATE is working for you? I am considering it for one of my nodes, since I'm on the western edge of town.

[hazy frost]

I was on the move from Iowa to Nebraska on I-680

[dapper igloo]

The LFS filesystem issue?

[dapper igloo]

That's not unexpected, if there's another workable path. It is, after all, late - the packet can already have been passed on by another node before the RL one rebroadcasts it 🙂

[narrow ledge]

That's the best case scenario, right? It's odd from what we've seen our area based on historical performance. 🙂

[narrow ledge]

I do, but based solely on empirical observation. It seems that when it's down, the traffic into downtown (and maybe out) is diminished. When it came back up, traffic improved. Also this weekend I was able to have direct messaging conversations with folks out west, with a high percentage of message ACKs.

[dapper igloo]

It is. A couple of those hops in your screenshot look pretty weak, so it's entirely possible that those links may be right on the edge / unreliable (and therefore when the packet doesn't get through, it goes via your RL).

Obviously the RL will always rebroadcast, but if it does so after something else has already successfully passed the packet along, it won't show in the trace, because it wasn't the first path to make it through.

[quasi beacon]

This one is interesting. @narrow ledge is red 3 one of yours downtown? Doesn't show a location. @hard heath is PHHM running a Yagi? Have you ever linked directly with downtown before?

[hard heath]

No Yagi on PHHM. 4 foot fiberglass 10dbi omni. Never have managed a direct link with downtown nodes, even with a huge Yagi aimed right at it. Too much ground to cover and hills in the way, I think.

[quasi beacon]

If you're reaching many nodes that aren't 0 hop to delta or EBT then it probably makes sense. Otherwise if your coverage area is already in listening range from one of those, it would just be extra traffic.

[tawdry compass]

With Merlin's yagi, I can reach pretty much anybody in the MOB area. With my omni nodes, it varies. But I don't want extra traffic, anyways. I might experiment, but not for extended periods.

[hard heath]

This would be a good set of criteria to examine for anyone wanting to look into the role. I don't think I ever have connections that would meet this.

[quasi beacon]

I would add, if at any point another node has better placement for router role I'll happily move EBT off it. But from previous testing, the mesh was in much better shape with it in router role.

[narrow ledge]

I would agree. It appears that EBT is the best link from downtown Omaha, though I am always happy when I can route through others from time to time.

[quasi beacon]

I wonder if Merlin's Yagi aimed southwest might have a shot at Lincoln or at least Ashland? You're usually aimed southeast across the metro right?

[clear flare]

Yo

[distant kettle]

Welcome @clear flare, are you 0c0d?

[clear flare]

yep and AbZ0

[distant kettle]

I'm seeing some of your messages but you are 3-4 hops away so it's really marginal. Some of the people out west are probably able to reach you more reliably, but looks like most of them aren't watching the mesh chat right now

If you can get your antenna up higher and/or outdoors you might have a better time

You're just way out on the outskirts of our current footprint

[clear flare]

my tdeck is 3 ft away from my main node that is connected to MQTT

Wait are you connected to MQTT?

[distant kettle]

I'm not. The public MQTT relay generally causes more problems than it solves so most of us don't have much experience with it. My messages to you are probably being relayed by a different MQTT connected node

[clear flare]

Yep it is. my MQTT sniffer can see your messages

thats probably why we 3-4 hops away

So that would make my tdeck 4-5 hops away.

[distant kettle]

I'm testing via over the air traceroute so MQTT relay isn't counted in there

Is your home node using the little antenna that comes with the rak4631? A better antenna may help

Also, having that node set to router is definitely not going to help, it's going to be adding a hop without helping anything

[tawdry compass]

Yes, pointed generally at Bellevue. Sure, I could point to the southwest

[clear flare]

Well i changed it back to client and you still didnt see my tdeck message

[distant kettle]

I did see a message from AbZ0 and replied

[clear flare]

OH man I must of miss that.

[distant kettle]

My reply is probably getting lost on the way because it's just too many hops out. I think better antenna placement and maybe a better antenna are going to be what you need

If you can put it in an upstairs window, or outdoors, you might see better results

https://a.co/d/bNKOn5y

This is a good cheap upgrade option from the antenna that comes with the RAK.

[tawdry compass]

My original purpose for the Yagi was so Photon and I could have direct comms. That was before all the Bellevue nodes came online. I'll swing it towards Ashland.

[distant kettle]

A window that faces east or north will be your best bet if you stick it in a window.

AstroBob moving his antenna might help you as well. ;p

[clear flare]

not using the original attenna and its by the window on the 3rd floor of my house. I dont think we are connected only through attenna. Im watching the MQTT traffic and your messages are coming through that. I think your bouncing off of a public node that is connected through MQTT

[distant kettle]

We are intermittently connected through the radio. Your messages to me are coming over the air, I don't receive any MQTT.

It's just a very marginal connection

here is what I have received from you

Did you receive anything from Merlin? He is a lot closer to you so I would expect those to come through

[tawdry compass]

Merlin is now pointed ~190 degrees

[clear flare]

I got your message def through the MQTT here is the message.

[distant kettle]

Here is a traceroute showing that I can reach you without MQTT, it's just on the edge of running out of hops

I would also recommend putting one node in CLIENT_MUTE and leaving the other on CLIENT, if they are both in CLIENT it's going to be adding wasted hops

[clear flare]

HA it is bouncing off my tdeck

[distant kettle]

There aren't a lot of nodes around Millard so I think you are just really fighting with geography out there. Might need to get the antenna up on the roof or something. Even a window screen will eat some signal

If you take the tdeck on a drive out north or east you will probably be able to reach everyone no problem

[tawdry compass]

I could try ROUTER_LATE, if you like. (with Merlin)

[distant kettle]

you get this @clear flare? M is really close to you so you should be able to

[clear flare]

Yep I got that on my tdeck and my main node. I responded on both

[distant kettle]

OK cool. Your responses didn't make it back to me unfortunately but I am about as far out from you as I could be

[clear flare]

I saw your message

[distant kettle]

@clear flare Under Lora settings, what do you have set for "max hops"? You might want to set it to 4 if it's on the default 3

[distant kettle]

might not be a bad idea, M is really well placed anyway and a lot of my routes out west end up going through it

[tawdry compass]

Okies, setting Merlin to ROUTER_LATE until not needed

[distant kettle]

M said he didn't see your responses. You didn't happen to turn those nodes on without an antenna connected, or swap the antennas while they were powered on, did you?

[clear flare]

I think I figured it out. Def something wrong with my attenna as when I turned my tdeck into client mute yall stopped getting my messages.

[distant kettle]

Could be, it definitely seems like you aren't quite getting the performance I would expect. What are you using for antennas?

[clear flare]

something cheap on aliexpress 😛

[tawdry compass]

It might help to switch off MQTT for a while.

[clear flare]

The interesting part is that the guy from bellevue saw my message and replied back (def through mqtt) and I didnt get it on my tdeck.

[distant kettle]

That may be the problem lol. A lot of those are reaaaally bad

[clear flare]

Nah my end goal is to use a priate MQTT and have the public channel bridged but no thte private

and then use home assistant

through MQTT

[tawdry compass]

Turn off MQTT until you know what's going on. MQTT is just the internet. Not needed here.

[clear flare]

I will have to tackle that part later. Need to take the pup out for a bit before he decides to close my laptop cause im not listening to him.

thanks guys for your help tonight. I will def need you again

[distant kettle]

sure, no problem, we have a lot of experience between us in here so you will get some good advice

AstroBob is right about turning off anything and everything to do with MQTT at least until you get the other kinks worked out

and if/when you do enable it there are very specific settings you will need to use to avoid creating a bunch of congestion that makes everything work worse

[tawdry compass]

I second that. Good advice.

I'll leave Merlin pointed at ashland. Maybe We'll pick something up.

[hard heath]

Late to the party here. Picked up tx from 0c0d at 4:45, 6:02, 6:05, and 6:15.

Traceroutes to each

[dapper igloo]

Make sure you're running at least v2.5.19 on that node. ROUTER_LATE has a major bug in 2.5.18.

[quasi beacon]

Oh, I guess I was thinking future state. I don't think @twin fern has set up the node in Ashland yet.

[twin fern]

I haven't. It's heckin cold.

[quick sage]

A little snow came down on the solar node tonight.

[quick sage]

There used to be a node that would show up on meshmap around Ashland or Greenwood from time to time. Been a while since I have seen it.

[tawdry compass]

We'll, it's super easy to swing to different directions. It's on an extendable fiberglass mast. Should I swing it back east again?

[tawdry compass]

So, it's been a week since I switched to a 20ah AGM battery for my outdoor node test lab. It's never fallen below 75-80% SOC. Yesterday it was able to return to 100%, even with the meager solar from overcast skies. Might have a viable candidate for a practical winter power source. Maybe. Of course, the AGM motorcycle/ATV battery weighs 8lbs and I'm massively over paneling . Probably not practical for a tree node, but for a barn, tower, or other structure, doable. I wonder what NOAA or whatever agency uses to power those off grid weather stations you see with the ~100 watt solar panels?

[quasi beacon]

Did you pick up any new nodes in that direction? If you haven't tried already, might also be interesting to see if you pick up anything new West or North towards Fremont or Blair.

[tawdry compass]

Haven't seen anything new yet. I'll swing to the west.

[quasi beacon]

Lol, I'm down in St Jo MO for the day. Came out to the car where the T1000 was sitting to find a bunch of chatter and node updates from Omaha via the "sky router" (G2 on a plane.) 😂

How far out were you guys seeing it? Looks like helix and EBT might have had it direct from a couple hundred km out.

[hard heath]

Last contact was 2 hops out and at 300.1km

[lavish garden]

Hey! That was me on DL772. I had the Station G2 next to the window all flight. It was nice chatting this morning!

I was super surprised how long I could keep in contact!

I ended up meeting a lot of folks in the Chicagoland mesh as well

I could see "East Bellevue Treetop" for a long time on the flight

[quasi beacon]

Awesome! How far out did you see EBT? That's a router node that I run remotely.

[quasi beacon]

How many strange looks did you get with this? 😂

[lavish garden]

It was at least 225km.

haha. My neighbor didn't even ask about it. 🙂

I left a DM there (EBT). Not sure if it got to you or not as it has the slash/cloud icon "Crazy that I'm seeing you node 200km away DL772"

[hard heath]

I doubt I'd have gotten a message through on this, but it set a record for me.

[lavish garden]

Oh wow! That's definitely the furthest I've seen!

Wish I could have frozen the locations (distances) when I lost contact. My distance numbers just kept increasing as the flight went on. I'm pretty sure I saw near 225km to EBT with a latest heard of "now".

[quasi beacon]

Just got back and checked my home node. Picked up your last update at 330km! Not sure which nodes it hopped through but I assume they were local in the OMA area.

[tawdry compass]

How the heck did you power the G2? on a plane?

[tawdry compass]

Let us know when you deploy, I'll whip the yagi around to you.

[twin fern]

I need to even buy hardware first, so it probably wont be until like March.

If somebody has experience making the weather proof'd enclosures and/or has spare hardware that I can buy for cheap to do it, lmk. I'm currently waist deep in some other projects I have to finish too so even if it costs the same, saving time to just buy it off one of you, saving the time in research in what all to get would be nice for me right now.

[narrow ledge]

FA16 in downtown Omaha saw Sky Router last at 2025-01-23 11:06:51, -1.5dB, 40.0818° │ -92.3009° (205 miles), altitude 10,352 m.

[lavish garden]

On the G2 website it listed the VEEKTOMX Mini Power bank as compatible. That's what I got.

Only got down to 80% on the 4 hour flight

[lavish garden]

That's crazy! What's unique about your node? It was definitely the one I heard from furthest

[lavish garden]

I also had the Tx setting in the app at 9

It's not as fun if I can't hear back 🙂

[quasi beacon]

EBT is about 50 feet up in a tree with a 1 watt amp and high gain fiberglass antenna. The screen shot was from a node at a different location, but EBT might have been one of the earlier hops. Probably not the original receiver though or it likely would have been 1 hop to my home node.

[quasi beacon]

@narrow ledge some more downtown data points... I was briefly at the top of the airport parking garage this evening. Saw DT16 right away with a super strong signal. Trace route there was bonkers based on the strength of the 0 hop back. Signal to/from EBT was decent. I wonder if DT16 would benefit from a narrowly tuned antenna with very high swr outside of ~907mhz to help block out interference. It just seems like all the noise is completely overloading the receiver.

[dapper igloo]

Is the noise narrow, or all over the place? If the latter, is it largely above or below the frequency you're using, or is it on both sides?

Do you know how close the noise source is?

[quasi beacon]

There's commercial RF gear at the same location. I believe it might be cellular which means it's probably on both ends (~700mhz and ghz+ for LTE bands.)

[distant kettle]

Both my RAK and t1000e died yesterday/last night from nrf52 flash corruption bug yet again.

I see that some new "maybe really fixed this time" changes landed within like the last 12 hours, so I built the trunk firmware (2.5.20.3298df95) and will see how that works. I can share the builds here in a little bit if anyone else wants to try them

[dapper igloo]

From that, it sounds like you are guessing rather than sure. I recommend that you take a spectrum analyser up to the site and verify what the noise actually looks like before taking further steps.

If it's what you think, and you can't (or don't want to) move the node far enough away to mitigate, then you'll need a bandpass filter.

[narrow ledge]

I'm a few days away from replacing the DT16 (Heltec V3 with a DIY Mall antenna) with a Station G2 with a 5.8 db 2 foot fiberglass antenna. I'm hoping the new hardware and better antenna will solve the issue. Ideally it would do well enough that I could remove the T1000-E running nearby in ROUTER_LATE mode, which seems to be the better ears up there.

[narrow ledge]

I'd consider a bandpass filter if it's easy to install and not too expensive.

[narrow ledge]

Do you have any recommendations for a bandpass filter?

[young kernel]

Does MUD and/or OPPD use the 900MHz ISM band for meters/ERTs? They are low duty-cycle but could be adding to the background noise in a high-density area like DT. I've used rtlamr to monitor the Lincoln Water and LES meters on 900MHz (maybe gas, too...can't remember). I can easily pick up my whole neighborhood with the absolute rubbish antenna that come shipped with those cheap DVB-T dongles .

[distant kettle]

Here are builds of the pre-2.5.20 firmware revision that includes some fairly promising potential fixes for the various flash corruption issues on nrf52 boards that cause most, if not all, of the "my rak/t1000e suddenly bricked itself" issues

I have been running these without issue since this morning, fingers crossed

@narrow ledge Perhaps you want to try this on your t1000s that have been dying

Recommend running a full wipe before installing this to clear out any existing LFS corruption -- even if the node is currently working fine, because some of the LFS corruption issues can linger silently before becoming "symptomatic". So it's possible for it to already be corrupt and just not bad enough to brick the node yet

[dapper igloo]

Not specifically, but it's important to actually check what the noise you're trying to address is first. Last thing you want is to deploy a bandpass filter, then realise that the noise is within the frequency range it's passing.

Once you know what you're dealing with, then you can spec an appropriate filter setup to deal with it.

[quasi beacon]

Yeah, mud uses 900ism on the gas and water, not sure about OPPD. Id be surprised if Scott's situation on the roof is 900ism interference though. Seems to be from the RF equipment up there because his nodes inside several floors lower typically receive much better.

[narrow ledge]

My Station G2 (FFG2) is up on the roof in CLIENT mode. I didn't have the right fasteners to put it where it will ultimately go, so its RF performance may be compromised. Please let me know what you all see. DT16 is now in CLIENT_MUTE so it shouldn't be in competition.

[distant kettle]

Release of 2.5.20 alpha is out, so use that instead of my builds from the 24th. Release notes mention being "cautiously optimistic" that the LFS issues on nrf52 are resolved, and give the same advice I gave about running a full erase first. Doing a configuration export, full erase, and configuration import is fine if you don't want to reconfigure everything.

My nodes running my build of 2.5.20 are still working fine, so things are looking good.

@quasi beacon you might want to go ahead and upgrade EBT next time you get the chance to. Might be the last time you have to climb the tree for a while!

My builds should be essentially identical to the official release, so no rush to update for anyone who is running those

[quasi beacon]

Thanks for the update! I'll give it a couple weeks for the general public to use 20 and see what other bugs are found. 😂 Then I'll see about updating EBT via BLE. Although I don't recall from my previous testing if full erase is possible with that method. Will test that on my second board first to avoid climbing the tree if possible.

[quasi beacon]

I've been out for the weekend but will be back tonight. Interested to see how this has been performing.

[distant kettle]

Unfortunately the full erase firmware has that step where you have to connect over USB/serial and send a keystroke to complete the wipe (the web flasher automatically sends the keystroke)

[quasi beacon]

Oh right, I forgot about that. I might test ota flashing the spare node without a wipe.

[distant kettle]

The wipe may not be necessary. It's just conjectured that the LFS corruption can occur in stages where if the process of corruption has already begun it can still get worse on the new firmware (or something like that)

My RAK and t1000 are still running on my 2.5.20 build. Good feeling about this one

[quasi beacon]

Seems similar to DT16. Hopping through FFX2 on the way there but direct back to EBT.

[quick sage]

I got one of my RTL-SDR dongles running... I can see my local nodes sending data in the waterfall. have a random antenna on it so not sure if I can pick anything up other than my local nodes.

[distant kettle]

If you have nodes nearby and the automatic gain control enabled on the rtl-sdr, it will likely attenuate its gain enough to not hear distant nodes

You will have better results disabling AGC and adjusting the gain by hand, and/or getting some distance from your local nodes

That said, LoRa transmissions from the devices most of us use are very low power and will be seen only faintly amidst the noise

LoRa has the odd property that, given a typical transmitter and a couple miles of distance, it will usually be below the noise floor but still decodable by LoRa receivers. The magic of chirp spread spectrum modulation

@narrow ledge Don't know if you got these replies. I can hear you 0 hops right now but can't stick a traceroute. Asymmetrical routing issues

Reasonable signal towards me

[narrow ledge]

FFG2 is currently deployed in the best spot I can get it (I think). It’s where DT16 (H V3) was. It’s got a high gain antenna. I’ve removed the T1000E that seemed to have the better ears and in RL mode.

I’ve put all my inside nodes in CM to see if FFG2 can perform.

[narrow ledge]

Hmm. Not even hearing it inside my condo. Headed back up to investigate.

So power setting on a G2 should be 9 or 10? Not 30?

[tawdry compass]

set it 16, the recommended setting for US meshtastic.

Speaking of G2's, I blew up mine today. Seems the PD power source of my cheap outdoor inverter overvolted it and blew the MCU. ☹️ Spoke with Neil Hao, and he confirmed this and is shipping me a new one. In the meanwhile, I have ordered a usb pd tester. Note to self: Test before using cheap stuff. 😅

[tawdry compass]

https://wiki.uniteng.com/en/meshtastic/station-g2

This is the power setting chart for the G2

[quasi beacon]

I believe setting it to 16 will output 3x the legal limit for 900ism in the US. I think @narrow ledge was correct with a setting of 9-10 if trying to keep TX at a watt.

[quasi beacon]

Maybe something with the power supply? Was getting trace routes on it yesterday but not now...

Anyone tested if a node in CM participates in trace routes? If not, maybe that's why traces aren't going through. Doesn't seem like anything can receive well in that spot.

[tawdry compass]

Yes, the factory setting is 10. I was thinking of ham limits. He would be quite legal with any of those power limits with a ham license. (and without encryption, of course). Also, I believe the power limits are measured at the antenna end of the feed, right? So, wouldn't you need to subtract any losses from the limit? From the manual: "the transmitting power of the transmitter can be increased to ensure exactly 30dBm power feeding into the antenna."

[tawdry compass]

Here's a handy line loss calculator: https://kv5r.com/ham-radio/coax-loss-calculator/

[tawdry compass]

Then you need to consider the losses for stuff like sma adapters, etc. Just sayin'

[narrow ledge]

Should a 20W power supply be good enough for the G2? I know when I first got it I tried regular USB 5VDC and it performed poorly. With the 20W USB-C PD I get the three lights: red, green, blue.

[quasi beacon]

Should be good... I'm seeing the updates hopping through (I assume) EBT. Even got some packets direct at my home node which is impressive. Just still unable to get a traceroute through.

[narrow ledge]

It's got a 36 inch SMA to Type N feedline going through a bulkhead connector. Perhaps that's a little lossy. I have a 12 inch cable on the way. After that, I could try mounting the antenna directly on the enclosure and have a 6 inch direct feedline with no extra connectors.

[quasi beacon]

Honestly 3 feet of something like rg58 coax will have negligible loss. I wouldn't worry too much about that or the connections. I think you've seen this RX problem on enough different setups now to know that there's a serious interference issue in that spot. Short of filtering, not sure what else you could try.

[quasi beacon]

I'm curious if it's receiving anything 0 hop besides your other nearby nodes?

[tawdry compass]

Yes, if you get all three lights lit, you should be good. The spec says 20w. BTW, B&Q(neil) have already shipped my free replacement. They respond quickly. Good to know.

[tawdry compass]

Here's what my setup for my Yagi calculates out to.

[tawdry compass]

You say type "N" feedline. Type N would be the connector type. Do you know what type the feedline is? It could be lmr240 or even lmr400. How thick is it? If it's almost pinkie finger size, it's probably lmr400. that would mean very low loss.

[twin fern]

Looking at getting stuff for the Ashland node,

I still need to figure out how to do power. I can run power up to it, probably just via an extension cord, but I'm not sure what to use for a socket on the box

That I think'll work. I'll just cut into the extension cord. Thoughts?

Do I need to add some sort of lightning arrester?

[quasi beacon]

Looks pretty good. Will you just mount the antenna directly to the N connector on the box? (You'd lose a lot with the included coax.) I wouldn't bother with lightning protection. You'll pay more for a quality unit than just buying another board if it gets zapped. 😂

Before you spend all this time and money, is it worth testing with a basic node at this location tied to an extension pole or something at the same height? If you can't reach anything in Omaha or Lincoln, would you still want to do the full installation?

[twin fern]

Yeah, antenna directly on the box was my plan to avoid line loss.

We already verified I can reach Omaha from this location

[quasi beacon]

Nice! Where will you be mounting the box?

[twin fern]

Not sure if you're asking where at the location, or where the location is

There's already a pole that's attached to the firelsplace (that also gets far enough out and high enough to not have things melt) that was put up for a WISP Internet connection before fiber got ran there.

The location is in Woodland Hills, just south of Ashland. The house is on top of a hill too, which I imagine is most of why I can even reach Omaha.

[twin fern]

I'll also see if I can get the mast up any higher than it already is, but when I tested I was just holding my lil guy at arms length high, standing ontop the roof and that hit Omaha. My bigger concern now is reaching Lincoln, but there's next to no nodes to hit there yet anyway. My hope is that this will be good enough that I can test it myself from my relatively crappy position near-ish the highlands in Lincoln, but I don't think that has great odds of success.

[twin fern]

If anyone else has thoughts, they'd be more than welcome before I pull the trigger on that setup

[narrow ledge]

Update on my downtown Omaha nodes: Something weird is happening. I am not sure, but it seems like ever since I replaced the Heltec V3 based node with the Station G2, downtown just seems disconnected from the rest of the mesh. A lot of things changed at once: mast, antenna, feedline, enclosure, etc. This weekend I will try to troubleshoot more. I might just put the Heltec back into the new box with what should be a good antenna. I'll see if that makes any difference.

It seemed that even from day one with the G2 in my condo with a basic antenna that it just wasn't performing well.

[twin fern]

https://www.amazon.com/Hexa-Boost-Antenna-Outdoor-Omni-Direction/dp/B0953Z1QF3 vs https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09N2H166D thoughts? I've been told these 3.6ft antennas perform better in a different discord server.

[narrow ledge]

The 5.8 dBi is the one I got, but I haven't been able to tell yet if it's going to work for me as well as or better than what I had before. Still need to swap our radios for some testing. It does seem well made, includes mouting hardware, and I got a good SWR reading on it.

[twin fern]

Hm. Alright.

TBH, reading up on it I'm actually kinda confused how I even managed to get/send anything to Omaha. Even to just the edge of Omaha is ~16 miles.

To where I'm hopeful I'll be able to pick it up in lincoln is 21.

[narrow ledge]

Are you seeing any 0 hop nodes from your location?

[twin fern]

I tested a WHILE back, but uh...

^

[narrow ledge]

What's your node name and !id?

[twin fern]

I'm not home to check right now. Both of my nodes have "vega" in the node name though.

ah, wait I can check from the app anyway, duh.

!8e1760f8 and !4338bb18

Those are "Vega KE0WVG" and "Vega3 KE0WGV" respectively.

[narrow ledge]

Update downtown: I have removed FFG2 from service and replaced it with DT16. That's a Heltec V3, like before, but now connected to the +5.8dBi antenna. FFX2 is still nearby in ROUTER_LATE mode. Please let me know if you all see any improvements.

[young kernel]

The grain silos on Cornhusker or Purina plant would be ideal spots for repeaters on the northeast edge of Lincoln, but that's never going to happen. Hardin Hall on East Campus or Oldfather on City might be more realistic in terms of finding cooperative participants. Not sure if either of those would reach you in the Highlands, but it would be worth a shot. I can try reaching out to some folks, and if a suitable location can be found I'd be willing to do a build.

[quasi beacon]

You were testing the other nodes on client-mute for awhile right? That could have been part of the issue since the RX in that spot has been pretty bad. I picked up the G2 0 hop again yesterday at my home node, which means the transmit performance from that spot was really solid at least. I see DT16 again now 1 hop... but have not been able to get a trace (it was tracing pretty reliably a week ago or so.) But i've also been struggling to get trace routes in general today, so it might not be the setup on your end.

[quasi beacon]

Looking at some RF mapping, I think it's going to be difficult to have a solid connection to Omaha and Lincoln from there. On the Omaha side, west Gretna or west elkhorn (like Skyline Dr/220th st) could be good, but it will be tough to get east of Hwy 6/Hwy 31. On the Lincoln side, you should be solid to the triangle between Cornhusker/i80/N 56th, but past that would be sparse spots with high elevation (eg. around Lincoln North Star highschool.) So on both ends, you'll be relying on well placed nodes to make the connection. Still worth doing though since you were picking up some Omaha nodes during your test. Did anyone receive your messages at that time?

[clear flare]

@distant kettle Did you get my tdeck message from ABZ0?

[quasi beacon]

I saw the LFHP test a couple mintes ago in Bellevue, but nothing from ABZ0.

[clear flare]

ugh

[quasi beacon]

It

It's not necessarily a problem on your end. The mesh seems to be really bogged down at the moment. I'm missing random messages today and not many trace routes are going through.

[quasi beacon]

looks like we both got you there

[clear flare]

awesome. Going to put this node on the roof this weekend. Building the battery pack for it now

[quasi beacon]

Nice, what's your approximate location?

[clear flare]

132nd and L

[quasi beacon]

Any idea what routes most of your incoming/outgoing messages are taking? Looks like you're two hops from me, but can't get a trace.

[clear flare]

I can never get traceroutes to work.

[quasi beacon]

I guess a better question would be, which nodes do you see 0 hop?

[clear flare]

only direct works

wait let me disable my mqtt node

ok try now

[quasi beacon]

yeah, still nothing to LFHP but the last update shows 2 hops away. Just curious was all. So many new nodes coming online and trying to gauge who's covering where

[clear flare]

where are you coming from? I will move it to a mindow in that direction

[quasi beacon]

90% of my messages sent/received hop through EBT in Bellevue. do you ever see that one 0 hop?

[clear flare]

that is 1 hop away

[quasi beacon]

could you try a traceroute to ebt?

[clear flare]

Yep

nada from my tdeck tho

increased my max hops to 5 and I got a trace from my tdeck.

[quasi beacon]

Saw your abz0 test at 950, responded from my t1000 but not sure if it made it through.

[clear flare]

didnt get the response. :/

[twin fern]

I don't know if anyone heard me back, but I did see other nodes.

[distant kettle]

something is really wrong if this is what it's taking

[distant kettle]

earlier I noticed someone was uplinking public mqtt to the mesh and it was really bogging stuff down

[distant kettle]

not that crazy. there are a few nodes about that distance away that I can reach direct

this is about 16mi

PHHM is I believe running 1watt tx power from a rooftop. my node is sitting in my front yard.

[distant kettle]

I would recommend looking into the EBYTE lora transceiver modules that do higher tx power

I am pretty comfortable saying at this point that 2.5.20 fixes the issues that were plaguing nrf52 devices such as the RAK and T1000E. Everything has been running perfectly for a week. @quasi beacon @narrow ledge and anyone else deploying infrastructure on these devices take note

No more crashes, no more comas, no more factory resets. The nightmare is over :p

[clear flare]

What changed in the 2.5.20?

[distant kettle]

They fixed a couple bugs that caused the storage to randomly become corrupted on nrf52 based devices, which usually caused the devices to crash and need a full wipe and reflash to work again

Some of us were running into that every few days

[twin fern]

You have a link to one to confirm I'm looking at the right thing?

[young kernel]

E32-900M30S is the version you want (not E32-900T30D, which is UART and won't work with meshtastic)

Amazon link always sends me to the 900T30D version, maybe this will work: https://www.amazon.com/Modulation-Wireless-Transmitter-E32-900T30D-Antenna/dp/B09KZWP4PF/

[distant kettle]

Rusty linked you, but also talk to @hard heath who has built a bunch of nodes with these

[young kernel]

Here's the pinout I've been working with https://github.com/NanoVHF/Meshtastic-DIY/blob/main/Schematics/E-Byte_E22/Mesh_Ebyte_E22-XXXM22S.pdf

[hard heath]

I can send some info on what I followed for the Ebyte boards. They're pretty simple to put together but not exactly light on power usage with the higher powered radio and ESP32. I've built seven of them so far and they've all got Photon in the name except for my brother (Reemergence) and friend (Helix)

One uses the 900M30S board which is capped at 1W. All the others run 900M33S boards which can go up to 2W (with the right settings and credentials)

https://github.com/meshtastic/firmware/blob/master/variants/EBYTE_ESP32-S3/variant.h

Really good documentation in here about this variant. You can do the custom build as 'private-hw' if you like, but an Ebyte and ESP32 work fine with a few tweaks on this variant (depending on which ESP32 you use).

I also made one using a Xiao BLE (NRF chipset), but it crapped out with that NRF bug and I haven't sorted it out yet.

[distant kettle]

https://kernelcon.org/

Not sure if anyone here knows about Kernelcon but it's worth checking out. I think Matt Virus (the two "mvirus" nodes that just showed up) is planning to run a workshop on Meshtastic there this year and hand out a bunch of nodes to people. I am going to reach out to him and see if we can coordinate

[twin fern]

I've heard very very bad things about Kernel con. Like, multiple disconnected individuals saying it's basically a scam. I don't know personally, it might be fine, but express caution

I was bummed, because I was interested in going, but multiple bad things said convinced me not to

[distant kettle]

weird. a scam?? not sure what that could be referring to. I have gone several times and enjoyed it

[clear flare]

New node almost ready to go up 🙂

[digital dirge]

I'm not surprised. AFAIK, the G2 just doesn't perform as well on the recieve. This is from Austin, NYC, me, and now The Lancaster, PA guys. I took mine out of my main repeater spot, and dropped my TBeam Supreme back in.

[narrow ledge]

This seems like a good spot for a Meshtastic node. I didn’t have much time to play with it, but it seemed like I had a direct link with EBT from this vantage point in CB.

[quasi beacon]

Nice! Yeah that would be a great spot. Do you know anything about the "Phelps roof" node? I drove by that area today and it had a solid signal just north of the zoo. Could be a good link.

[quasi beacon]

I assume the connection to the downtown nodes was good as well?

[clear flare]

Anyone have a use for a automatic ping/pong? Ive set one up on my private channel which has been useful. No reason why I couldnt set it up on the public. I think a traceroute serves the same purpose though :). Just peace of mind I guess.

[mild relic]

hey everyone - new to this discord channel, long time hardware + RF nerd. I live in far north omaha / ponca hills area. Not many mesh neighbors up here, but i'm working on getting better range and reaching to the downtown area. I have several nodes deployed across my farm and i cover 50+ acres with wifi here as well.

@distant kettle pinged me, i look forward to coordinating.

I run the hardware hacking village at kernelcon and have been involved with it since the beginning. Not sure why anyone would think it's a scam or make such a claim. The hardware hacking village at kernelcon this year will include mesh node building (I have T114v2 node kits) and i've organized several large workshop builds in the past.

www.kernelcon.com/agenda

https://www.hackspace.io/kernelcon-2025-hardware-hacking-village/

[distant kettle]

Nah. We have enough issues with excess background chatter and high congestion. Note that stuff on a private channel also uses up airtime on the public mesh unless it's happening on separate nodes configured for separate frequency slots.

I would strongly discourage any automated pinging or automated tracerouting unless it's on a separate frequency slot.

[distant kettle]

Hi Matt, glad you could make it! @narrow ledge is the guy I mentioned who has rolled out a lot of the downtown infrastructure.

@narrow ledge, Matt will be basically handing out nodes during the Kernelcon event which takes place April 1-4 at the Embassy Suites downtown. We had a brief discussion about maybe configuring these nodes for a different frequency slot and/or modem preset so they are on a separate mesh for the conference. That way the new owners of these nodes would have to educate themselves a little before figuring out how to get on the main mesh, so as to avoid potential issues that might be caused by a bunch of new node owners experimenting, possibly using bad configurations, etc. I had suggested that you might be willing to temporarily set one of your downtown nodes to operate on this separate conference mesh temporarily, or deploy another rooftop node, to provide some downtown-wide coverage for this separate conference mesh.

I wanted to present something about Meshtastic this year, but was not able to get my ducks in a row to do that, so I'm glad @mild relic had the same idea and actually did something about it!

Anyone else in here who operates some "key infrastructure", builds specialized nodes, etc. please introduce yourself to @mild relic when you get the chance. He is what I would call a Distinguished Tinkerer around these parts and can be a real asset to our local mesh community.

Sorry for the wall of text lmao

[mild relic]

Thx for the kind words ^

In addition to meshtastic stuff I have a couple Cisco IXM lorawan gateways and some other gateways deployed. One GW on TTN and other gateways on actility/chirp stack. I do a lot with RF/wlan/back haul for work.

[unreal scaffold]

And when he says a lot he means a lot. I swear this guy can see RF with the naked eye

[quasi beacon]

Welcome! Always great to have experts in the community! I run a few nodes down in Bellevue including the "EBT" router node which has decent coverage in the area.

[mild relic]

Nice! I've seen EBT driving around but can't see it from my house. Working on fixing that 😎

[unreal scaffold]

Pretty sure I saw you guys as I flew over yesterday

[shy mortar]

Hello, Nebraska. Is everyone here from eastern Nebraska or are there any more western and/or central folks? I'm new to all of this and I'm in McCook so things are a bit lonely on the network right now...

[grizzled saffron]

I'm new to Meshtastic. Holed in Benson (Omaha) with:
b9f8: personal node
a804: Wife's old node
c99c: attic window node facing East

• 4 other nodes (3 to be delivered)

[narrow ledge]

I didn't get a chance to try any other nodes. I will get up there again sometime and take a better look.

[narrow ledge]

Welcome! I am downtown and will look for you. I sometimes bike up in that area and usually take a T1000-E with me.

[mild relic]

Farnham 16 - 1 hop away

That you? 😎

[narrow ledge]

Yeah, I could do that. It would help me learn more, as well. Just let me know!

[distant kettle]

that's one of Scott's, yeah

[narrow ledge]

PDD is my buddy in Gifford Park. He's not too active, but has a couple of potentially-infrastructure nodes on a top level of his house. I am working with him to get better placement that might help bridge downtown to points west.

[narrow ledge]

Yep! FA16 is one of mine. It's inside my condo in a window 7 floors up. I'd expect you to have a better path to DT16, which is up on the roof about 14 floors up, but RF is weird.

Traceroutes are looking good for me today from downtown. My favorite is this one to Benson, via the roundabout way. But, hey, it works!

[narrow ledge]

What are your node names that I could look for?

[narrow ledge]

Not seeing them now, but I do recall seeing a hackspace.io node out there recently.

[mild relic]

Things are not optimal at all right now hah. I have a bunch of rooftop outbuilding work to do as it warms and I'm working on finding a 40 foot climbable tower to make things easier

[quasi beacon]

Welcome! Most are in the Omaha area with several in Lincoln as well. I went out to Grand island a couple weeks ago and didn't see anything west of Lincoln. Maybe try to get some of your friends and family interested in it?

[quasi beacon]

I'm curious which nodes you're zero hopping? There's some good elevation up in Ponca hills, could be a good vantage point for different areas of the metro.

[distant kettle]

can't recall when, but I remember seeing hack briefly once down here in Bellevue. Might have been one of the times an airborne node was bridging in distant nodes

[distant kettle]

lol, I see weird bounces off of ROCI like that sometimes. it has good reach

[mild relic]

For the discord join msg....might include an invite link to the meshtastic discord. The sub forum link doesn't work if you haven't clicked thru the invite link 👍

[grizzled saffron]

That's what I had to figure out on my own. Only figured it out by accident while troubleshooting a device last week.

[distant kettle]

The way they do local groups as discussion threads like this is kind of broken for a number of reasons, I wonder if anyone has proposed to the admins to let local groups upgrade to actual channels

not being able to search for instance is super annoying

...wait, they might have fixed that in Discord since I last checked lol

[quasi beacon]

Thanks for the heads up. I just sent the invite link on the mesh, will see if anyone new shows up.

[grizzled saffron]

Anyone know if my c99c placement is helping or hurting the mesh in any way?

[sterile hemlock]

Hello! KF0SLJ.

[tawdry compass]

c99c appears to be in client mode. Shouldn't be hurting anything. You are one hop from ROCI, here in Elkhorn. What antenna are you using? tell us how it is placed. Welcome to what I call the MOB mesh!

[narrow ledge]

What's MOB? Metro Omaha-Something?

Downtown Omaha FFX2 (T1000-E, ROUTER_LATE) is charged and connected to a fresh battery in advance of the crazy cold and snow coming up. Fingers crossed it can withstand the conditions! DT16 is connected to AC power. Best of luck to those of you with outdoor nodes.

[grizzled saffron]

Thanks, @tawdry compass, I thought I might have been wrongly pulling traffic away from a better-placed node like Hamtastic Benson.

Hey, @sterile hemlock . Nice to see fellow bacons.

EDIT: Didn't see the questions in my busy moment.

• I'm using a cheap 5dBi antenna from Amazon (MakerHawk)
• It's in the attic (2nd floor), taped to the window facing East
• Hills in every direction
• It's a Heltec V3 plugged into the outlet
• Somehow the Heltec T114 (b9f8) in the kitchen sometimes grabs messages the V3 does not...

[tawdry compass]

MetroOmahaBellevue == M.O.B.

[tawdry compass]

Sounds like you are doing the best you can, given the the terrain limitations. Are you in a HOA? I am, so I can't put anything permanent on the roof or anywhere else. I have an tripod mast with a yagi for Merlin, and a magnetic car mount with an alfa 915 on the gutter for ROCI. Merlin is totally off-grid powered by 20aH AGM, 100w solar and mppt controller.

How are everyone's solar nodes faring with the cold, clouds, and snow? Merlin is pulling 16w at the moment. Brushed the snow off the panel. Man, it's cold.

[narrow ledge]

Oops. I spoke too soon. I haven’t seen FFX2 for hours. It’s in a place where my footprints in the snow would give it away its discreet location.

[tawdry compass]

Is it still up?

[quasi beacon]

EBT isn't pulling in much. I'm guessing there's some snow on the panel even though I placed it at a fairly steep angle. But plenty of battery reserve for now.

[quasi beacon]

If there are parts of your coverage area that aren't in range of other clients (or routers) then keep it on client. Otherwise, if the coverage your node provides is fully redundant, you would be better off in client mute mode. That will cut down on unnecessary rebroadcasting which is good for the mesh and good for your node as well. Less battery consumption and less likely to miss incoming messages (which happens when transmitting.)

[quasi beacon]

@distant kettle I OTA'd 2.5.20 on top of 2.5.15 without an erase on my spare rak. so far so good. Just need to work up the nerve to do it on EBT. Will wait till it's warmer than 8 degrees in case it crashes. Don't want to be climbing in this weather. 😂

[narrow ledge]

I think the cold disabled it. I’ve had mixed results with these in the cold. Sometimes they survive just fine. Other times they shut down.

[tawdry compass]

Supposed to be like 10+ below tonight. Hope my outdoor nodes survive. I'm not optimistic.

[tawdry compass]

Bummer. sorry to hear.

[grizzled saffron]

I am not in an HOA. I frequently hit EBT based on what MeshSense tells me.

It's awesome Omaha is blowing up right now, but I'll be leaving here in 2 weeks. I'm hoping to take what I've learned here to the next place, and finally construct a 100ft tall repeater tower.

EDIT: Trying to convince a coworker in Bellevue to join in (SSW of Capehart/25th).

[quick sage]

Anyone see me Chicago right now?

[grizzled saffron]

Yep

[grizzled saffron]

For you guys running the Seeed Studio SenseCAP Card Tracker T1000-E, what's your review of it? I've heard there's been issues with them.

[mild relic]

5 delivered tomorrow....will let you know.

Got these delivered today

125 Heltec t114v2 nodes for kernelcon hardware hacking village

[quasi beacon]

Great device! Probably the best form factor out there for a portable node.

And for the money, really a good price for something with built in battery, GPS, already in a case, etc.

[quasi beacon]

A 100' tower would be awesome! Where are you heading?

[grizzled saffron]

First, the 125 T114s... holy freaking god!

Second, I'm glad the card node is working well. I'm interested, but honestly, what node am I not interested in...

Third, I'm heading to Alabama for 2 weeks. Hoping I get a job there when I get back from our 5-month hike starting March 16th. My wife and I are bringing mesh nodes to communicate when we don't have cell service. One of us hikes ahead, or falls back to use the bathroom sometimes.

[mild relic]

Yep yep, should be a good time.

Nodes, cases, batteries, pigtails, antennas etc have everything.

[grizzled saffron]

Are those for all the competitors or just you and/or your team? Without screens, GPS, and cases... that's over $3,700 including tax!

[mild relic]

I have 75 sold already

50 going to kernelcon to sell there

Every kit is including case, battery, gps

[grizzled saffron]

Finally got my case to build 28d0. You should see it popping up tonight.

[hushed knot]

Hey fellow Nebraskans. Very cool to see others relatively nearby building out Meshtastic. Just dipping my toe in to get myself familiar with the goal of setting up some solar nodes later this year to connect family and friends in and around Syracuse. I’m a little far off from the group of you in Omaha 😆

[quasi beacon]

Hey Omaha mesh. In a month or two I'll be losing access to the location that EBT is currently installed at. If anyone has a prime spot for a solar/LTO/1w node please DM me the details.

[twin fern]

So close... I'll try to get every inch of height I can when I get the stuff for this.

I know this isn't totally correct, because I was able to pickup some nodes fromo Omaha that I logically shouldn't have been able to if this was perfect.

[mild relic]

Toys arrived today here too....

[hushed knot]

I know many others have said similar, but I had very tempered expectations that have been exceeded testing just between my two units.

[quasi beacon]

This looks very similar to the model I was working on. Does this map show the signal strength received on a handheld unit at ground level? Figure your range will be significantly better than the map indicates if the receiving node is on a rooftop or tower.

[quasi beacon]

Great little units!

[narrow ledge]

After the recent warmup I went to retrieve two outdoor T1000-E nodes: Lake Manawa and downtown rooftop. Both were frozen and required a flash erase and firmware reinstall. Both have been restored to service along with auxiliary batteries that should provide 7 or more days of runtime.

FFX1 is back up on the roof near 16th and Farnam. I’ve turned off its GPS to see if that provides more runtime.

FFM1 is on the north shore of Manawa and hoisted aloft a flagpole for better height.

I’m still not seeing FFM1 on my edge of the mesh.

[quasi beacon]

Yeah the last update from ffm1 in Bellevue was 20 hours ago, which makes me think it's signal isn't getting out reliably. Maybe it's too close to the metal pole?

[narrow ledge]

I bet you’re right.

[hushed knot]

I have to assume this is one of those "RF is wierd" situations? 45D0 popped up for me 10 minutes ago and I'm no where near, shows it happened with 2 hops

[quasi beacon]

Interesting. Is this the first connection you've seen from the Omaha area? Did you change anything on your node setup? It's possible someone was flying over and hopped it. But that's also not an impossible distance for Lora. I was picking up EBT several miles south of Beaver Lake a couple weeks ago. Are you in a high elevation location?

[hushed knot]

Yeah first Omaha connection, I am on the default setup except ignoring MQTT. Syracuse is in a little mini valley and house is kind of average elevation of the town with my node just hanging in the window. I did consider it could have been a flight overhead.

[limber shard]

Every once in awhile I'll get a node from Omaha and Kansas to pop up in my node list; I'm out in the York area. It's cool to get a node to pop up that far away, but never can ping it back.

[narrow ledge]

https://meshtastic.org/blog/meshtastic-2-6-preview/

Interesting updates with the 2.6 preview release. I wonder if the next-hop feature will help with my asynchronous link in downtown Omaha.

[clear flare]

New node went up in old Millard. Couldn’t access the peak where I wanted it because solar panels got in the way. Would have to remove a panel to two to fit the ladder. Put it there for now. Let’s see how well it fairs. Worst part, put the ladder away and sat down to test just to find out I can’t connect to it. Ugh. That’s a problem for tomorrow.

Note to self. Test things then put the ladder away.

[clear flare]

Alright it’s fixed and operational.

[narrow ledge]

What's it called?

[clear flare]

LFH Public Node

[quasi beacon]

Good looking setup! I've got you 2 hops to my home node in Bellevue. Being in router mode within range of delta isn't optimal. You'll be hearing a lot of the same traffic and rebroadcasting on top of each other. Client mode would be preferable in this situation.

[grizzled saffron]

Heading out. Stay Meshy, Omaha. You can now remove b9f8, c99c, 5230, 57d4, a804, e0c7, 28d0, 5c05, c3a3

[quasi beacon]

Good luck to you, and safe travels!

@narrow ledge @distant kettle EBT will be down sooner than expected. Losing access to that location next week, might even be taking it down tomorrow. The Bellevue and downtown nodes will lose a lot of connections. 🥺

[narrow ledge]

That’s a bummer.

[quasi beacon]

Yeah, if I can't find another spot, I'll probably put it up in Papillon this spring. Would cover west Sarpy county pretty well, but not as well east/northeast.

I think it would still reach high ground in council bluffs though if we could get something going over there.

[narrow ledge]

I’ve been thinking about putting a T1000-E plus battery combo up near the L&C monument in north CB, but I’d need to scope out a spot where it won’t be disturbed but can be serviced. Might do a POC this weekend.

[quasi beacon]

I was just looking at that location the other day on Google Earth. Close to 1300 ft elevation in some spots. A discreet solar node in a tree would be interesting there

[quasi beacon]

there's also that little radio tower up there that someone posted of a photo of on here awhile back. I wonder if anyone is actively using that site.

[young kernel]

Replying to post with Google Street View picture of the little shack at L&C on the southeast side of the entrance road as you come off of Monument Rd. I don't recall seeing agency/organization signs but I don't recall looking to hard at the time.

[quasi beacon]

Thanks! Yeah, that tower would be a great spot.

[narrow ledge]

Goodbye, EBT! It’s been fun.

[quasi beacon]

Crazy thing is, I took it home and propped it against the side of my house to do some solar/run time testing, and the thing is picking up twice as much acticity as my heltec home node 10+ft higher on the roof. Not sure if my heltec sucks that bad or if the EBT setup is that good. 😂

[tame pendant]

@narrow ledge let me make some phone calls and see who has that tower and see if maybe we can get something up

[quasi beacon]

Welcome Dan! From your photo it looks like you've spent some time on radio towers. Is that for a living or for the ham hobby?

[tame pendant]

Little of both

[unreal scaffold]

Your heltec sucks that bad...

[narrow ledge]

That’s cool, @tame pendant ! Welcome to Meshtastic and welcome to the discord.

[tame pendant]

@narrow ledge Thats from the monument look out at 16 feet off the ground into a 3db stick antenna

[narrow ledge]

Interesting. Even from there it looks like it would be a challenge to get out over the midtown hills.

[quasi beacon]

I love this tool! Been using it for a couple years. Yeah, to @narrow ledge 's point, a node here wouldn't provide significant coverage to mobile nodes. However, it could make a good regional router with excellent coverage of downtown and the airport. Then it would just need to be able to link up to other regional nodes for access to the rest of the mesh. Eg. the spot in Papillion I'm considering relocating the gear from EBT to should be able to reach that location in CB.

We just need access to a tower somewhere centrally located in the metro. @tame pendant do you have any good tower spots?

[quasi beacon]

Anyone know the guy who changes light bulbs on the 1,200' TV towers at 72nd & Crown point? And how much would we have to pay him to sneak a node onto the top of one of those? 😂

[narrow ledge]

It's lonely here in downtown and CB. It's just me and @tame pendant , and @hard heath 's brother. I didn't fully grasp how important the EBT link was for the area here. Is this a case where MQTT could be useful; to bridge into a cut-off area? Ideally an RF link is preferred, and more fun. Admittedly, I don't know much about MQTT. I wouldn't want to get traffic from the whole world, but wonder if it could be used to connect east to west.

[narrow ledge]

Heathen is out there in CB, too.

[quasi beacon]

Jeez, my home node isn't seeing much either. Yesterday when I had EBT resting on the side of my house, it was seeing 50-60 online and hopping those to my home node. I put the pole/antenna on the ground this morning so the wind wouldn't blow it away, and now my home node only sees 13 online. This Heltec must just be garbage for RX.

[quasi beacon]

It's too bad the RX performance is so sporadic at your location, I actually saw one of your nodes 0 hop (DT16 maybe?) regularly yesterday with EBT on the side of my house. I also saw your test message from FFX2 yesterday evening, but I assume you didn't get my response?

[narrow ledge]

I'm getting a handful of 3, 4, 5 or more hop packets coming out here. No clue what the route is, but interesting, nonetheless.

[hushed knot]

I think I randomly picked up one or two of your nodes on Sunday Scott (AD90 and B178). Idk what it is, but I keep getting random 2 hop Omaha nodes every few days.

[narrow ledge]

AD90 is DT16, an outside rooftop node with 3DBI antenna. B178 is @hard heath 's brother's node not too far from me.

I sometimes see these weird stations and ones like them, sometimes directly with a decent signal. They don't seem to send a device role, no usernames, etc. They don't show up in the iPhone app or in the CLI, but I can see then in the noproto stream and in Meshsense. I wonder if these are other LORA devices that aren't participating in Meshtastic. Is that a thing?

[tawdry compass]

still seeing some of your nodes out in Elkhorn, Redd.

[tame pendant]

@narrow ledge kinda like when dmr repeater looses it connection back to the host. Then it becomes and island........lol

[hard heath]

Still seeing downtown nodes here too, but I'm sure the weather isn't helping my attempts at a traceroute.

I dusted off PhotonYagi again too. It's still pointed roughly downtown.

[distant kettle]

I couldn't tell you for sure why these devices behave like this, but they are definitely Meshtastic devices. Non-Meshtastic LoRa devices will never appear in that list. Meshtastic packets have a specific preamble marking them as Meshtastic packets, and the other data you see there such as the device ID are all Meshtastic application protocol level stuff

They may be CLIENT_HIDDEN devices, the existence of which can be observed if they exchange traffic with other nodes, but which will not normally send out the nodeinfo packet that fills in the other fields

or something like that

[narrow ledge]

Is there a way, maybe with the CLI, to ask a node to respond with nodeinfo?

[narrow ledge]

Which node is running the yagi?

[hard heath]

PhotonYagi. But I think I've actually got it pointed where EBT used to be and it's highly directional. I'm not surprised if you can't see it

I'll turn on PHEX in a bit. Smaller Yagi oriented more towards downtown (I think), but a lower power node

[quasi beacon]

The android app has this as a standard option to request user info or position. @narrow ledge , meant to reply to your question.

I just scrolled back to your original question... I think this is normal behavior when you receive a packet from a node that wasn't previously in your list, but you haven't yet received one of its periodic nodeinfo updates. Just the node ID will pop up.

[distant kettle]

Anyone going to Kernelcon on the 3rd-4th? I'll be there, and as previously discussed @mild relic will be hosting a workshop that will be distributing nodes to attendees. Perhaps an informal meetup in the vicinity of the conference for those not able to attend the actual conference?

Been busy lately so I haven't been around as much. Hope everyone is doing well

[distant kettle]

I might be able to explain this. A friend of mine had one of my nodes in their car and was driving back to Bellevue from Nebraska City around this time.

[hushed knot]

That would probably be it

[quasi beacon]

How good is your connection to mid town? The spot I'm looking at in Papillion should cover that area (roughly 40th between Leavenworth and Hamilton) better than EBT did.

[narrow ledge]

I don’t normally see nodes in that area in general (because maybe there aren’t any), but my buddy has a couple of indoor nodes running full time near 38th and California, which is not far from the area you mentioned. 40th is along the top of a ridge, but maybe it’ll still be a good path.

I’m working with him on ideas for getting an outdoor node, perhaps with some added elevation and a high gain antenna.

[narrow ledge]

His nodes are GPM1, GPM2, and sometimes a T1000-E named PDC1. Can anyone hear those?

[quasi beacon]

Yeah, I'm seeing those 2-3 hops out.

But I also have DT16 0 hop. So the downtown nodes are getting out, but not receiving much from the rest of the mesh. That's where if you have a strong connection from midtown, maybe those nodes can feed you the incoming stuff if we can reach them.

[quasi beacon]

Random thought, is DT16 the roof node in the outdoor box? Do you have a rak with antenna port you could test there (or would you want to borrow one of mine)? My home node is a heltec hooked up to what should be a really great antenna setup. But now that EBT is down, I'm realizing the RX performance is terrible. Everything was just hopping from EBT. I have the EBT hardware at my place now in a really poor spot, and from what I'm seeing today, it's hopping about 2/3 of the packets that the heltec is seeing.

This is being picked up by "debt" (decommissioned EBT 😂)

But it won't traceroute, so not receiving me apparently, even though I'm pushing 1w on this end.

[narrow ledge]

Yes.

[narrow ledge]

It’s a Heltec 3 with this 5.8 dbi antenna.

There’s also a Station G2 in the box, but it’s not in service. It didn’t seem to receive very well. I’m game to power it back up for testing.

[quasi beacon]

I've heard others say the G2 RX performance isn't great. Do you want to try a rak? I've got 2 spares... USB c in and SMA out for Lora.

[narrow ledge]

I suppose it couldn’t hurt. I’d been thinking about buying one to see if it’s any better.

[quasi beacon]

I'm just baffled at how well the rak is performing and how poorly the heltec is performing at my home location, wondering if it might be similar at your place

[narrow ledge]

My understanding is the Heltec are great for the bench, experimenting, low cost, etc, but not for serious service. I do love ‘em, though.

[quasi beacon]

Yeah I like it for the home node since it can connect over wifi. Great for an outdoor installation where Bluetooth wouldn't have a reliable connection.

[narrow ledge]

Which Rak would you recommend. I’m willing to throw even more money at this. That’s the joke with Meshtastic. The gear is “just cheap enough” that it seems like “just one more” will do the trick. 😹

[narrow ledge]

Just needs to fit in the box.

[quasi beacon]

I've had good luck with the 19003, the small one

If you don't intend to add a bunch of modules, no sense in using the full size version

[narrow ledge]

https://amzn.to/3FhPmCg

[quasi beacon]

This one has a GPS module in the case, still pretty small

[narrow ledge]

https://amzn.to/4iBhFtu

Is this all I need? Looks like it has that little surface mount antenna connector. I have several of this little pigtail with SMA on the other end.

A case would be nice but if it’s in the box probably not needed. It’s cheaper than I thought.

[quasi beacon]

Nice, looks like the price has come down. I'm also going to test later today without the amp hooked up and see how the rak receives by itself. The amp has a built in filter... Wondering how much that is contributing.

[quasi beacon]

Yep, that's all you need if you already have ipex to sma. For the most compact installation just wrap some electrical tape around it to prevent any shorts.

[narrow ledge]

Do those boards snap together? And wiring or soldering required?

[quasi beacon]

Yep, plug and play with 4 little screws. No soldering/wiring needed for the basic setup.

The radio module just pops in. I did some soldering on this one for remote battery monitoring on EBT, but otherwise a really simple setup. Flashing is easy with the same "drag and drop" method that you probably used for the t1000's

Heading out to bypass the amp and see if DT16 is still 0 hop.

[narrow ledge]

Ok. Just ordered one. Hope to have it tested and installed in a couple of days.

[quasi beacon]

I hope it works better. Id feel bad if I convinced you to throw more money at this for nothing. 😂

[narrow ledge]

I’m in too deep already. 😹

[quasi beacon]

Yeah me too. 😂 I still have DT16 0 hop without the amp, but it's a VERY weak signal. Lost about 3db SNR without it. Still promising though.

I would swap my main home node for one of the raks, but the connection to the roof would be spotty.

[narrow ledge]

Is that an amp on the RX? I wonder if that would work for me, but maybe it just makes the noise louder, too.

Is there such a thing as a notch filter for the main Meshtastic frequency?

[quasi beacon]

Yeah it applifies about 10db on the RX side. But also has a filter. So the SNR ends up being a bit better too.

[narrow ledge]

Do you have a link for the filter/amp?

[quasi beacon]

I'm not too familiar with all the options out there, but the amp I used for EBT is specifically for 902-928mhz with built in filtering. I also tried some other ones with a wider range (can also be used for 868) and they don't seem to perform as well.

[quasi beacon]

Let me see if I can find it. Not sold anymore at most places. The common on on eBay is the 868/915 which I'm not sure if I would trust

[quasi beacon]

I can't vouch for this being on Ali... But this looks like the one.

https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256804035063288.html?gatewayAdapt=glo2usa4itemAdapt

Yeah this one looks identical and has the same "ab-915" marking. 5v in and SMA in/out.

[quasi beacon]

It's a bit bulky though. You're welcome to test mine to see if it fits/functions before pulling the trigger. I probably won't be setting mine back up in the new spot for a month or two.

[quasi beacon]

Woops, the one I linked isn't available anymore. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256808279935890.html?spm=a2g0o.detail.similar_items.1.6893goRIgoRIBZ&utparam-url=scene%3Aimage_search|query_from%3Adetail_bigimg&algo_pvid=e05ca40a-dfcb-4ca5-a76a-0c4cfb454cdd&algo_exp_id=e05ca40a-dfcb-4ca5-a76a-0c4cfb454cdd&pdp_ext_f={"order"%3A"-1"}&pdp_npi=4%40dis!USD!74.88!74.88!!!74.88!74.88!%402103246617415366688067691ef777!12000045257305708!sea!US!0!ABX&gatewayAdapt=4itemAdapt#nav-specification

This one looks to be the same.

[narrow ledge]

I might ask to borrow yours once I get out the Rak. I’m currently writing some scripts to help me gather SSI data so I can analyze before and after.

[tame pendant]

@narrow ledge Afternoon

[narrow ledge]

Hey Dan! I was able to get a DM ACK this afternoon. If things are working well, I would expect that most of the time.

[tame pendant]

cool

i have been on 20 meters Vara Ac all morning

which one do you use regular

[tough timber]

Anyone recieve anything from BWest today? With EBT down i'm not sure if I getting out of Bellevue

[quasi beacon]

I didn't see anything in quail Creek. I would think you could reach agv though. Are you receiving anything? I'll the amp back up and send a message in a bit.

[quasi beacon]

@narrow ledge The amp definitely helps. I couldn't 0 hop agv since the amp was bypassed. Just hooked it back up and the first packet from agv was 0.

Still a weak connection, but definitely an improvement

[quasi beacon]

Did you get my test message about 10 minutes ago?

[narrow ledge]

G2 back in service. Look for FFG2. I’ll put the Rak here when it comes.

[narrow ledge]

DT16 is out of service at this time.

[quasi beacon]

I picked up your test messages 0 hop on both nodes. Solid signal on DEBT. I assume you didn't get the response?

[narrow ledge]

No response heard. Heck, it doesn’t even seem to be able to hear me from inside my condo 7 floors away. Gathering data now. I’m wondering if I have a defective unit. I did email support and they said they’d replace it if necessary. They acknowledged it’s a bit deaf in loud environments, but it seems to me it should be performing a bit better.

[tough timber]

The only test message I received was from Red G2

[quasi beacon]

Are you getting red g2 direct?

[quasi beacon]

It's transmitting well. Would be a great location if you can figure out the RX issues.

[tough timber]

looks like 1 hop away

[narrow ledge]

I kinda wish I could crack a T1000-E open and connect an antenna to it.

[quasi beacon]

The rak you've got coming is basically that. I'm anxious to hear how it works.

[narrow ledge]

Here's an analysis of RX SSI between the Heltec V3 and the Station G2 generated from traceroutes from another node seven floors down from the roof. Both stations used the same antenna and power supply, same firmware. The difference is obvious. TX SSI was about the same between both radios.

[signal gulch]

This statistical chart is very clear, which is the obvious impact of environmental noise on the external LNA. The 4dB more receiving sensitivity means that the G2 can theoretically receive signals from twice the coverage range. These signals include noise, which will affect the SNR. The filter performance inside the LNA is limited by the process and cannot be compared with the cavity filter. This is also why users in a noisy environment can greatly improve the SNR and play a 4dB more RX receiving sensitivity and receiving far more range once they use the cavity filter.
https://wiki.uniteng.com/en/meshtastic/station-g2#impact-of-lora-node-dense-areashigh-noise-environments-on-rf-performance

[signal gulch]

RSSI and SNR must have some margin with RSSI>=-120dBm and SNR>=-20 to ensure stable communication for SX1262. So I think the data in your chart is actually SNR instead of RSSI. If this data is RSSI, the received signal is terribly strong:)

External LNA can improve RSSI, but due to the improvement of receiving sensitivity, SNR will usually deteriorate. The degree of deterioration is related to the environmental noise. Therefore, in a noisy environment, when RSSI still has a margin of -120dBm, using a cavity filter can greatly increase the RX coverage.

Whether to use a cavity filter depends on the margin between the SNR of most receiving nodes and -20. If the margin is sufficient, there is no need to use a cavity filter. If there is no margin between the RSSI and -120dBm, there is also no need to use a cavity filter. Because the received signal power is too low, it is meaningless to improve the SNR here.

Due to the above characteristics,

Users in low-noise environments generally report that external LNA greatly improves RX coverage.

A few users in high-noise environments report that after using cavity filters, RX can be greatly improved compared to other devices (because their RSSI has margin, but SNR margin is insufficient).

From a theoretical perspective, due to the large-scale deployment of Lora devices, we believe the Intermodulation Distortion (IM3) problems may cause noise problems in same areas in the future. I have noticed that in some areas, even devices without external LNA (Not a g2) must use cavity filters to ensure stable communication. This is definitely not a good trend.

[quasi beacon]

Hi Neil, thanks for all this information. What are your thoughts on using a SAW filter instead of cavity in a high noise environment? They're significantly less expensive and very compact. I'm using an amp with a built in SAW filter that seems to work well enough, but have not tested it in a noisy environment like Scott's.

[signal gulch]

The main problem of SAW is that it can withstand low power. For devices with lower RF transmission power, SAW filters may be a good choice.

In addition, filters produced on a large scale may have some common problems. Whether it is a cavity filter or a SAW filter, in order to ensure sales, manufacturers usually make the bandpass cover the entire ISM band. This may not be a problem in most areas, but if the noise source in some areas happens to be in the 915MHz ISM band, then this will become a problem.

[tawdry compass]

How do you like VaraAC, Dan? I mostly use JS8Call on 40M. Never really used VaraAC much. Curious.

[tawdry compass]

Pretty sure Neil is the inventor of the G2. I have a couple. Great support!

[quasi beacon]

Have you tested other boards such as heltec/rak attached to the same antenna setup? Any differences in RX performance that you've seen? Probably a lot less RF noise out your way.

[tame pendant]

I like it works real good

[narrow ledge]

My new RAK Mini node is up and running in downtown Omaha. The nodename is FFR1. Please let me know if you can see it, trace to it, or send a message.

[clear flare]

I doubt I would be able to see it but currently cant see it out in old millard.

[quasi beacon]

I see it direct... But haven't been able to get a trace through yet. Are you receiving anything? Or seeing any more/less node updates from outside of downtown vs the heltec or G2?

[tawdry compass]

Yes, I have tested various other boards with same antenna's. Not a big difference as far rx that I can see. But my data is not deep.

[narrow ledge]

I’m not receiving zero hop traffic differently from the other units. I might have even noticed more with the Heltec. It might be time to consider the filter and amp components.

[narrow ledge]

Mine came assembled. I just connected the LoRa antenna and the BLE antenna. I had a spare battery and it plugged right in, too. I think I kinked the BLE cable. I can’t use BLE unless I’m inches away from the device. In all, it seems like a great unit. I don’t really miss the screen.

[quasi beacon]

Well that sucks... I guess if nothing else the battery backup on the rak will last 10x as long vs the Heltec. Shoot me a message if you want to look at the filtered amp.

[quasi beacon]

I think I have a spare BLE antenna. The range is these is usually very good.

[narrow ledge]

RAK Mini and 3000mAh LiPo here with maybe a better view of the west. Fingers crossed!

Is there something special I need to do to enable charging on the RAK Mini? It powers from 3.7V LiPo just fine, but I don’t measure any current from USB when trying to charge. For comparison I see about 0.4 mA when doing the same thing with a Heltec V3.

[quasi beacon]

Should automatically charge at 350ma whenever USB and battery are connected.

If the battery is close to full it might not do much though. I've heard of some boards only charging to 4.1v

[narrow ledge]

I have two RAK 19003 now. I’ll pull them both to the bench this weekend for power and charging testing. They each came with a bag of screws, but I didn’t put anything together. I’ll look through the docs too to see if I am missing something. So far it seems to be a great little device.

I got this spam in the primary channel yesterday. I hope this isn’t a trend.

[velvet girder]

The screws in the RAK packaging are for attaching additional modules to the base board.

[narrow ledge]

Thanks. Sometimes I wonder if I have screw loose. 😹

[quasi beacon]

Yeah, he was going like that for 30 minutes. Obnoxious.

[narrow ledge]

My first thought was airborne, but 30 seems long for a flyby. I just get very little primary channel traffic down here now.

[quasi beacon]

It definitely was airborne, he mentioned the flight # at one point. Was also hopping a bunch of other nodes from hundreds of km away at the same time. He definitely got his message out. 😂

[unreal scaffold]

We got versions of this in Iowa too, on the same day. Also annoying.

[narrow ledge]

I see mistake. My LiPo batteries have the JST 1.5 connectors, which is what’s on the Heltec V3. On the RAK 19003, the JST 1.5 is used for solar and the JST 2 is for the battery. Plugging the battery into the solar port does power the board.

I’ve just ordered some more batteries and JST connectors.

[quasi beacon]

Thatll do it! Double check the polarity before plugging in. Some of those connectors are reversed and these boards aren't protected for that.

[tawdry compass]

Yep the main power on the rak's is reversed. Made a special cable for a guy and he promptly removed it and plugged in a standard battery and let the smoke out. lol

[tawdry compass]

Yep, saw that. Kinda nuts

[desert vine]

Hey Nebraska peeps! I’m just getting into meshtastic and I’m in Omaha. Just bought two nodes and excited to try this out.

[quasi beacon]

Welcome! You'll find there are a lot of nodes in the area. There's probably somewhere around 100 online at any given time, but not everywhere is that well connected to the rest of the mesh. What part of town are you in?

[desert vine]

Im around 156th and center! And work around 132nd and fort

I bought my coworker a node so he could play around too

[tough timber]

Trying to find out how far my test messages are making in out of Bellevue, did anyone receive my test messages today?

[narrow ledge]

Welcome!

[quasi beacon]

Yes, I received both messages. Responded once on my home node, which you might not have received since DEBT is laying on the ground at the moment.

[quasi beacon]

And now apparently my home node is down. Hope it didn't blow off the roof. 😂

[desert vine]

Anyone here use meshtastic when cell phones went down? If so what were the outcomes and what did you learn?

[quasi beacon]

Did you lose cell service in the storm? I haven't used meshtastic in that scenario, but for point to point communication in close proximity or with good LOS, it's been pretty reliable in my experience. If you're relying on the mesh to get messages across town, not so much. For us down in the Bellevue area, I had a solar powered router node at the top of a 50ft tree that was pretty reliable. Especially for single hop connections when the traffic wasn't high. Family member sold the house though so I had to take it down. 😢 But even with a well placed router node, reliability goes down with heavy traffic (it cant transmit and receive at the same time so some messages get missed.)

[narrow ledge]

I’ve made a temporary, experimental change that may have brought traffic to downtown. Are you all seeing any new nodes or traffic from here?

[tough timber]

Yup no response received on my end.

[quasi beacon]

I actually haven't seen any of your downtown nodes in a few days. But that could be on my end. I don't have a reliable setup at home currently.

Are you receiving more downtown with the new setup?

[desert vine]

No I didn’t just wondering if people had used it in a situation like that or out camping where you don’t have cell reception

[narrow ledge]

I plan to do this (mostly for fun) when camping and cycling, especially on RAGBRAI this summer.

[hushed knot]

RAGBRAI I think is an excellent use case

[desert vine]

Oh nice! That should be interesting to hear the results of!

[tawdry compass]

Not Meshtastic, but for fun, here is what you can do with HF 40 meters and a weak-signal digital mode, in this case, JS8Call. This is a page from PSKReporter showing the the stations that heard me this morning. I have been heard in Hawaii, and all across the continental US.

[tawdry compass]

It's a text only mode, a little like Meshtastic, and 100% radio as far as messaging. The interface will relay data to the internet, if you allow it. You can go all off grid, if you wish.

[desert vine]

Any legal requirements to run it? Sounds interesting!

[tawdry compass]

Yes, a Amateur radio license is required.

[quasi beacon]

Pretty cool... are most of these pretty reliable connections or does it only work at certain times of day?

[tawdry compass]

Propagation varies with many factors, sunspot number, A index, K index, Solar flux, season, geomagnetic storms, etc. HF propagation is a science in itself. BUT, generally speaking, 40 meters and 20 meters are fairly reliable for distance communications. The bonus with 40 meters is that you can use NVIS (Near vertical incidence skywave) for very reliable comms out to say 3-400 miles. It's a technique perfected by the military, going back to WWII. My main HF antenna is set up in that fashion.

But long distance comms with 40 meters are best attempted at night, because of the ionosphere.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ionosphere

Sorry if I am being to simplistic here. Not sure of the audience.

[inland bobcat]

Very cool, makes sense when you’re talking about 7mhz too! How much power was behind that transmit?

[tawdry compass]

With JS8Call, I use about 50-80 watts.

[inland bobcat]

Nice! Little more uumph than .25/1w Meshtastic node

[tawdry compass]

😅

[desert vine]

I think I need to upgrade the Antenna on my WisMesh Pocket V2. I live at the bottom of the hill in my neighnborhood and it's hard to get messages out. Anyone know what a good upgrade would be?

[lucid pasture]

Hi, for wireless communications, the line of sight is always an important factor. If your line of sight is bad, you can always increase the power of the antennas. As far as I know, Rak provides more types of antennas, but they aren't quite as portable as the one included on the Pocket V2. You can choose between the
3dBi fiberglass antenna
5.8dBi fiberglass antenna
8dBi fiberglass antenna
In any case, you need to buy it with an N-Type to RP-SMA adapter. Hope this helps!

[desert vine]

Thanks for the info! I still want to keep it portable! Maybe if I setup a solar mode I’ll look into it!

[lucid pasture]

Your Welcome , Maybe the 3dBi is still and option, since the included antenna is a 2dBi

[inland bobcat]

We like the 8db Rokland antennas in our mesh

[quasi beacon]

In my experience, the foldable Rak "blade" antenna is pretty hard to beat for portable TX performance. It's not great on the RX side, but if you're struggling to get your signal out while receiving fine from a higher power node, this would probably be a good fit. I believe these only come as RP-SMA though, so you'll probably need the adapter ... looks like it comes with that from the rak store: https://store.rakwireless.com/products/blade-antenna?index=101

[distant kettle]

at Kernelcon. @mild relic I will drop in on you later

[mild relic]

I'm in the HHV

[unreal scaffold]

@mild relic just posting the menu of goodies for all of the nerds

[tough timber]

Longest connection I've gotten so far with WQB2s fly over

[abstract goblet]

Thanks kernelcon.org and @mild relic for introducing me to MT, I’ll be bringing them back to CO with me to extend the mesh there. And will be bringing them into the traillife.org community there.

[distant kettle]

@mild relic distributed 92 Meshtastic nodes at Kernelcon!

[mild relic]

[email protected]

@themattvirus on twitter

[distant kettle]

They are all configured for a private MediumFast channel, but I expect some of those will find their way to the public mesh

[mild relic]

The guide at hackspace.io/projects discusses factory reset and public mesh joining

[distant kettle]

thanks Matt! I was thinking last year "someone should do Meshtastic stuff at Kernelcon" so this was perfect

[hearty fiber]

I've done the factory reset. Are there other public channels to join besides default? I've seen people sharing QR codes but the (ios) app says it will replace all channels anytime a code is scanned.

[quasi beacon]

most everyone in the Omaha area is just using the default public channel.

[distant kettle]

@narrow ledge not sure if you're getting my replies but I copied you here in Bellevue. 1 hop

[narrow ledge]

Hey folks. I have a semi permanent install in the Loess Hills slightly north of CB. So far it seems to be helping to bridge downtown and CB to some western Omaha nodes. I’ve seen some successful trace routes that are giving me some hope.

The name for now is FFR1.

[quasi beacon]

I've picked up a 0 hop on my terrible home setup, which is promising. Especially if you can reliably receive FFR1 from your home/roof nodes that previously had a hard time receiving. I need to get my home setup straightened out and get the EBT gear relocated to Papillion. Mapping indicates it should have a good connection to the Loess Hills location and most of the rest of the metro mesh.

[twin fern]

Just the notif on my phone after I'm out of range of my node. !797fb83e "Rak Mini b83e", I got your ping in the Highlands in Lincoln.

[quasi beacon]

Wow, that's awesome! Can you tell if it was a zero hop connection?

Oh wait, different rack mini. I assumed it was the one over in the bluffs. I'll have to check and see if I got anything when I get home

[small cliff]

Hello hello! Just got invited here

RayneCloud here

I am super new to radio stuff in general. Waiting to get my license and also have both a portable and a roof-mounted Meshtastic node. Just got the roof one up and running this last weekend :)

I've got my portable which is just RayneCloud and my roof top node which is RayneCloudRoof

[quasi beacon]

Welcome! The Omaha area has a pretty decent mesh. I'm down in Bellevue. We don't have a great link to the rest of the mesh at the moment but I'm hoping to set something up in Papillon in the near future.

[small cliff]

oh nice! I am down to learn and help where I can! It's really fascinating stuff to me!

[narrow ledge]

Welcome! You e come to the right place to learn about how Meshtastic really works.

I’m glad to see more nodes close to downtown. I think I’m usually direct or just a hop or two to your nodes.

[small cliff]

oh nice! The RayneCloud node travels with me to work most days. Right now that's to Papillion but soon to be Lincoln every day

[small cliff]

The ghetto setup in my attic lol

The antenna was there from a company that came through town a few years ago and had Helium miners on people's roofs and I signed up but after they went under, I got to keep the antenna so figured I'd hook it up to this once I learned about it

[narrow ledge]

A few days ago FFR1 became harder to hear, and when it sent telemetry I could see it wasn’t taking much charge. As I suspected, it had fallen to the ground. It’s back up on its perch and doing well. I have plans to install a better antenna and maybe a bigger solar panel.

[small cliff]

that's really cool! Where do you install those? just around town?

I don't know like.. what all we can actually do with this. I'd presume getting permission from land owners is important if we wanna put it somewhere lol

[inland bobcat]

What was the range on this?

[inland bobcat]

The taller height wise the better, think hills, tall buildings, light poles etc. Height is might/line of sight is king. You’ll never be able to drive around and not notice all the tall places from now on. In my local mesh we use https://www.heywhatsthat.com to map out a “splash” of potential signal from a location. We typically see better coverage than the map says but still helpful.

Otherwise the mesh is a local (long fast) community or create your own local group for friends/family whatever.

[twin fern]

I didn't get GPS on it, so I'm not sure.

[inland bobcat]

I didn’t see anyone from Omaha to Lincoln on a recent visit, if somebody is spanning that with no airplane involved that’s awesome.

[quasi beacon]

Sorry I sparked some confusion there. There's a "rak mini" node in council bluffs that I wrongly assumed he was referring to.

[inland bobcat]

Ahhh no worries

[narrow ledge]

FFR1. But it will be renamed (maybe with a different board and address) when it gets a little less POC and more stable. POC seems to be going well.

[narrow ledge]

And FFR2 in midtown near Gifford Park will be renamed, as well, once it is done with some POC testing.

[peak cliff]

Hi all, I'm clevernyyyy in the Elkhorn area

[small cliff]

Hey there! Glad to have you here!

[inner tapir]

Hey, Y'all. I'm all the JomurrXYZ nodes over by Prairie Queen Rec. Just found this corner of the discord server.

[quasi beacon]

Welcome! I've seen your nodes on the mesh. I'm not too far east from you in Bellevue.

[inner tapir]

Yeah, sorry about that haha. I am working on slimming down my numbers. Just finding what hardware I like the most.

[quasi beacon]

No need to apologize, I think I'm up to 12ish nodes, have had 5-6 running at times. 😂

[narrow ledge]

Welcome!

[narrow ledge]

Welcome!

[narrow ledge]

I think the node in the hills of north CB is helping bridge the downtown/CB area to more nodes out west. While not consistent, I am getting some traceroutes through to Photon. I might try to improve that CB node with a better antenna.

[quasi beacon]

Progress! I'm surprised @distant kettle isn't linking up with FFR1. Figured he'd be close to line of sight to that location. The papio location that I'm eventually going to set up should have a solid connection there.

[distant kettle]

let me see if I can trace that. maybe not in the rain

I still need to get off my ass and on my roof

agv3 remains basically sitting about 6 feet off the ground in the yard

Looks like I've received FFR1 direct a couple of times within the past hour but barely

rssi -128

[quasi beacon]

Similar at my place. I occasionally receive 0 hop, but mostly 1 hop, and I can't get a trace route through.

[inner tapir]

Sadly looks like we're still not getting down into the valley I'm in. I might have to try moving my solar node to another position.

[narrow ledge]

FFR1 has been replaced with LH01. Upgrades include higher gain antenna and larger solar panel. Hopefully this will help fill in Council Bluffs and Downtown Omaha.

[small cliff]

Looking good!

[quasi beacon]

Nice build!! I see it 1 hop away but haven't been able to get a traceroute. I'm interested to see if I get any 0 hop packets from this setup (this happened sometimes with FFR1.)

[loud plank]

Hey all, I am starting up a discord server to try to connect radio operators across the state of Nebraska. We have a meshtastic channel. My hope is the server becomes an easy place for people to cooperate and coordinate radio activities meshtastic, gmrs, ham radio et. al. If you know anyone in those communities please invite them.

https://discord.gg/cEzaPqNE

[quasi beacon]

Not sure if you got my messages from inside the airport on Monday. LH01 transmits great throughout the airport even inside the terminal. But it doesn't seem to be receiving as well. Traceroutes were quite lopsided with a difference of 10 to 15 db. A few db of this could probably be attributed to my node (T1000) which RXs better than TX. Wondering if it's just noise at that location or something with the setup. I saw @distant kettle mentioned something similar on the mesh.

[inland bobcat]

What’s the node and antenna?

[inner tapir]

JSOL has sadly either been stolen or otherwise taken after a year of deployment and faithful service

[quasi beacon]

That sucks... Where was it located?

[inner tapir]

Around Prairie Queen Rec area. Though its position updates were published to a private channel, so sadly I don't think anyone else would have seen it.

[distant kettle]

I did see those messages but I was too late to reply.

It has definitely consistently been the case that I can hear LH01 direct, but it cannot hear me whatsoever. I am set for max 4 hops but nothing seems to reach it.

I might try cranking my max hops just to test and see if that does it. But it sort of seems like something isn't right with it on the receive side

AFAICT there is quite a low volume of traffic being relayed by it which sort of confirms to me that it doesn't receive much

Doesn't appear that I can hit it even at 7 hops

Downtown has been pretty asymmetrical for me too. Can't get in

Well that can't be right.

okay, that's right by Dulles Airport so I'm guessing it was an airborne node that failed to get a fresh GPS fix after takeoff. some GPS units are really bad about locking at high speeds.

oh, or I guess was phone paired and the phone was in airplane mode with no Bluetooth, lol

[quasi beacon]

So I don't think it's a node issue necessarily. I was in the area yesterday and tested with the T1000 close to LH01. The outbound/inbound SNR was only about 3db off (which is reasonable based on what I've seen with the T1000 before.) The location must just have a lot of RF pollution. Would be interesting to take an SDR up there and see what the noise floor looks like compared to other areas in the city.

[tacit schooner]

something i always wanted to setup was the web client from an external address and still retain device access. Well if anyone is running Home Assistant, someones integration made that come true. I can now access Doopy_G2 (DG2) from my home assistant external URL and still interact with my G2

[inland bobcat]

That repeater (ffff) needs to be changed

[tawdry compass]

Pretty good distance. Roci is in elkhorn, FA16 is downtown.

[rotund bluff]

I saw a guy on youtube with a yagi in his attic getting 70 miles

I bought the same stuff he did because of his video lol

[inland bobcat]

I’ve done it with airplanes before but not land to land

[rotund bluff]

THat screenshot he was shooting through his roof

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/kEfMwQ30yqQ

the omni is for local and the yagi is for long distance link

[inland bobcat]

That’s sweet

[rotund bluff]

Mine is going to go outside in an enclosure

but same stuff

it has epaper display

I will prob run 2 nodes each with a yagi to be a relay down the valley.

opposite directions

[tawdry compass]

I have a couple of Yagi's. Merlin used to on one of them. They work.

[rotund bluff]

nice

[narrow ledge]

The short name is "LH01" and the long name is "Loess Hills 01 CB". I have this antenna.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09N2H166D?ref_=ppx_hzod_title_dt_b_fed_asin_title_0_3

[narrow ledge]

It wasn't performing as well as I think it should. The six inch whip I had before worked better than the 2 foot fiberglass antenna. I have all the parts to build a complete replacement and plan on swapping out the entire system soon. That's easier than trying to service the parts in the field.

Here's something weird. Just a day or so after I installed LH01, I noticed that it was no longer being powered or charged by the solar panel. Over about 10 days or so the battery died. I had plans to replace the entire system, anyway, since it wasn't performing as well I had expected.

Today (after being out of town all weekend), I noticed that it is alive and powered, even with the cloud cover.

Telemetry received:
Battery level: 101.00%
Voltage: 4.11 V
Total channel utilization: 1.13%
Transmit air utilization: 0.63%
Uptime: 337896 s

Maybe the windstorms shook it back into service, or maybe someone stole it and it's running from their bench. 🙂

[quasi beacon]

Lol, I was wondering about that. Noticed the battery was nearly dead last week and looks good now. Maybe a loose connector on the solar?

[narrow ledge]

That's my guess. The panel cable is terminated with a USB-C connector, so I took the easy way out and just plugged it into the RAK Mini USB-C connector instead of putting a JST on it for direct connect to the board.

I'm eager to see overnight if it begins showing battery discharge, and what the level is.

[quasi beacon]

I would have done the same. It's the same circuit as the solar input

And yeah, antenna performance with this stuff is really hit/miss. I would say for that setup, you're better off prioritizing RX performance. It seems a little hard of hearing at that location (similar to your rooftop.)

[narrow ledge]

On a different note, after being car-free for six years, I recently acquired a new-to-me vehicle. Do you all have any creative suggestions for a mobile node that won't require any drilling or cable routing? One thought is to just find an aesthetically pleasing enclosure and just put a T1000E plus battery on the roof on or near the broadcast antenna shark fin.

[narrow ledge]

Or maybe Command-Strip it to the inside of the hatchback. It'd be nice to be on persistently, with GPS, and have an outdoor antenna, but it's a pretty car and I don't want to make any holes or make it look weird. 🙂

[quasi beacon]

I had a similar thought about an enclosure made to look like one of those shark fins that stands the t1000 upright inside of it. Mag mount for easy on/off. Otherwise I usually just hang the t1000 from the rear view with a lanyard. Rooftop would be better, but it's still functional.

[narrow ledge]

DT16 is back online up on the roof in downtown Omaha. I powered off the Station G2 a few weeks ago to see what that would look like. Now the original Heltec V3 is back in its spot running in CLIENT mode on firmware v2.6.4.

[quick sage]

I will be testing a node downtown. It won't be very high in the air, curious to see if I pick any of those nodes up in the area.

[hard heath]

All Photon nodes were decommissioned over the last few weeks, and X4RE will be coming down sometime next week. It's been fun guys!

Very, very few nodes out where I am in Colorado now but hoping to see more as time goes on.

[quasi beacon]

Take care, and good luck at your new location!

[narrow ledge]

It was fun! Best of luck in the new area.

Well, this would explain why LH01 was off the air. Someone ripped out the antenna cable. Nothing else was missing or broken. I’m thinking they wanted the copper. Unfortunately for them, there’s very little copper in a sub-gigahertz antenna cable, and what is there is probably hard to strip.

I’ve replaced it with a whole new build (and shorter antenna cable) called LH02. I was planning to swap it all out, anyway, since I had concerns about how well LH01 was performing. I’ll get it repaired and try to find a new place to deploy it.

[narrow ledge]

My mesh downtown is filling in nicely since I replaced the Loess Hills node. Are you getting any traces or messages into downtown, CB, or midtown?

[obsidian hazel]

Hello from Lincoln! I just setup my first couple nodes this morning. I'm in Omaha often and will have to watch for the downtown node

[inland bobcat]

There should be some nodes in Lincoln! Get a node outside and on top of your roof if possible! https://mesh-lab.com has a great base station, N bulkhead on it lets you easily swap antennas, I’ve got an 8db Rokland on mine.

[twin fern]

I now have a RAKwireless Wismesh Repeater Mini coming for the Ashland repeater. Hopefully 🤞 testing it on Saturday. For now it'll just have a wee-baby antenna, but even on the cheap Heltek bare board I tested out there before I made it to Omaha, so it shouldn't be any worse. I'll be more interested to see if it can, by some miracle, get to Lincoln.

To my knowledge, there's no nodes other than mine in the window of my apartment on the edge of lincoln that would have a good chance of getting it.

[eager raven]

I can usually get CB from way out on 192nd and dodge

[narrow ledge]

Awesome! I saw a message today on the air from VCL0 near Platsmouth today about a 20 mile report.

Something is up today, though. I've notice the LH02 no longer seems to be charging from the solar. The battery should last a few days. I need to go out and see what's up.

[obsidian hazel]

Already working on the roof node. It’s about 20’ high with a 5.8dbi antenna. Did a quick range test today with the 20’ coax it came with and boy does it wreck the signal. I was only getting a bit more than 1/2 mile of range. Shorter cable comes in tomorrow though.

Other than that I’m just one Menards trip away from finishing up the solar enclosure

[twin fern]

Update: It should be going up tonight if all goes well. I also last minute decided to get a better antenna for it too, so I really hope we do successfully get to bridge the two cities.

Anyone gonna be in Lincoln able to test tonight?

[twin fern]

Ughhhhh, fucking amazon. The antenna won't be here today "We're sorry it's running late" - you couldn't have told me that hours ago before I made plans to install it tonight???? AHHH

Anywayyyyyy, I'll still probably install it, it'll just be on a worse antenna for now. I was also planning to use the antenna's mount that was coming with it as part of the structure to hold it all up though, so that itself might not even happen. I'll ping in here when I go to do it.

[obsidian hazel]

I’ll be working on my rooftop node tonight too. If I start spotting new nodes I’ll check in here. I’m in the Havelock area, so the viaduct and Purina factory at 70th and Cornhusker might be blocking line of sight

[twin fern]

Yeah, I think without the better antenna odds are low too. I really don't expect to reach lincoln on the stock one.

But, worth a shot.

But, my Heltek V3 did make it to Omaha from Ashland which I though no way in hell to originally too, so I'll hold out a tiny, tiny bit of hope.

[narrow ledge]

There was a North Omaha node that I think was misconfigured to report that it was in Ashland. I think it was Rayne Cloud or something like that. I was trying to reach the owner, to ask, but I think he's been offline for a bit.

I visited LH02 today and didn't see any reason why it wasn't charging from the panel. I pushed the on-board reset button and it seemed to work. Next time I will just try a remote reboot.

[hazy frost]

I plan on going to Mahoney tonight, I'll bring a node with me and have a look.

[twin fern]

Oh @small cliff

Hopefully getting my node up soon

[small cliff]

Hiya… it shouldn’t have been set to Ashland? I know I need to do a firmware update on it. I’ve been a bit busy but I’ll work to take a peek at it in the next week or so. Potentially Sunday if I have time :)

[twin fern]

You were also probably here when we hung out IRL with it. That may be when they saw it

[twin fern]

Solar node is (temporarily at least) in place in Ashland. It's still on the meh antenna for now

[narrow ledge]

Maybe the node thought it was still in Ashland for a bit when you brought it back home.

[obsidian hazel]

Havelock node is up now with the new shorter length of coax. Not technically solar yet. Didn’t realize that the battery connector on a wisblock is slightly larger than the ones I got with my Heltecs :/

Got it running on an old USB battery though to do some sanity checks

[hazy frost]

I saw Vega Ashland and Vega Pocket2 while driving to Mahoney on the interstate.

[narrow ledge]

And watch out for the polarity of the connectors! It may be different from the way the solar and battery cable you might have are wired.

[twin fern]

Eyy! Glad it's getting that far right now. Still on a crappy antenna, hopefully upgrading that very soon.

[twin fern]

Forgot to nudge in here: The antenna has been upgraded and it was hoisted quite a bit higher. I was getting all the way to north O, at least via a few hops. I have yet to get to Lincoln with it, unfortunately.

Honestly, I'm amazed it's making it to Omaha at all. That really shouldn't work.

[obsidian hazel]

Nice!
I’m reworking my rooftop antenna in Havelock still. I wasn’t getting the best range, so I bought an NanoVNA to confirm that my outdoor antenna was actually tuned. It is, so I’m at the mercy of the terrain for better coverage.

Lincoln is a lot hillier than my Grand Island raised flat brain can comprehend.

Playing around with the online site planners made me realize how low in the valleys I am. I’ll either need to find a high spot for a solar node, or convince my friends in Waverly to throw up an antenna before we can link the two metros.

In the mean time my rooftop node has been down for a few days. I overloaded my J bracket with 10’ of steel pole and bent it. I’ve got a tripod mount now though so hoping to get it up again in the next couple days.

[young kernel]

Jeff Geerling sighting in the wild! Presumably flying back from opensauce.

[peak cliff]

Whoa

[twin fern]

Out of curiosity, has anyone in lincoln been able to see the Ashland node?

[clear flare]

Taking down LFHP this weekend for updates, bigger battery, adding chirpstack equipment, and a wind turbine :D. Should be down around around a week (hopefully). LFHM was taking down permanently.

[clear flare]

Whats the name?

[twin fern]

Vash (Vega Ashland)

[young kernel]

Green triangles- Traceroute to Vash successful; Yellow circles- Traceroute to Vash failed but message acknowledged by a node (unknown if Vash or different node ACKed); Red circles- Traceroute failed & messages not acknowledged.

[glacial merlin]

Hello! I'm new to Meshtastic and I'm running my first node in Omaha

[quasi beacon]

Welcome! Lots of nodes in the area, but it has been pretty quiet lately. I don't see much of the mesh anymore though since taking down a well placed router in Bellevue. What part of town are you in?

[glacial merlin]

Midtown!

[glacial merlin]

I don't know if my device has enough range to really get a picture, what does the mesh coverage look like here?

[hazy frost]

Up your hops to 5 over the next week to see if that makes a difference. If it's inside, place it in a window, on an upper floor if possible.

[glacial merlin]

I read somewhere that I can only send messages up to 3 hops, is that correct?

[hazy frost]

Recommended is 3 hops, but it can be tweaked. With more hops the messages will 'hop' farther.

Too many hops and you can saturate a channel.

[quasi beacon]

There are pockets of solid coverage, West O in particular. Then there are areas with decent local coverage (Bellevue, downtown) but these rarely link up reliably with the rest of the mesh. From my location in Bellevue I'm only seeing about 20 online at any given time, but when we had a well placed router in Bellevue it was around 100. I would guess there are around 150 in the metro area.

[glacial merlin]

what happened to the router?

[quasi beacon]

It was at a family member's house... They moved. 😢. It was at a location with great base elevation, and then I mounted it at the top of a 50ft tall tree running on solar.

[obsidian hazel]

Checking my rooftop node for the first time since getting back from Open Sauce. I thought we managed to link LNK-OMA, but then I checked the LongFast chat. Looks like it was just a plane flying over 🙁

[quasi beacon]

Yeah, been seeing a lot of that lately. Saw a message from Chicago this morning

[glacial merlin]

I'm not seeing anything in the longfast chat, do I need to configure something differently?

[quasi beacon]

There's not much message activity usually. Do you see any other nodes in your list? If you send a test message do you get the check mark? (Acknowledgement from another node receiving the message.)

[glacial merlin]

yes to both questions

[quasi beacon]

I think you're good then. Just quiet on the mesh.

I'm curious, how many nodes show online for you currently?

[glacial merlin]

12

[glacial merlin]

would anyone here be willing to start a test correspondance with me

*?

[quasi beacon]

I just sent a message from "AMC home", would be kind of surprised if it makes it to you in midtown

[glacial merlin]

In LongFast?

I've set my thing to 5 hops

[quasi beacon]

Yeah, we probably dont have a good route between us

[glacial merlin]

where are you at?

[quasi beacon]

Bellevue, not far from twin creek area

[glacial merlin]

oh yeah

i see a line of nodes spanning east-west but nothing further south than Center

[twin fern]

ahhh! So close to Lincoln.

[glacial merlin]

I was able to see one node in lincoln from Omaha, but nothing in between even though I assume there are nodes in between?

[quasi beacon]

That could have been a fly over. I saw nodes the other day from the KC and des Moines areas

[glacial merlin]

ah gotcha

[young vortex]

Yes

[twin fern]

Oh! Awesome

[young vortex]

It's sporadic, and I've reset met nodeDB a few times, but it does come through once in awhile. My roof node is "Far West South Street".

[twin fern]

I'm in Grand Island for the state fair and I have picked up a single node. Saddage

[young vortex]

On a flyover, I picked one up between Beaver Crossing and McCool Junc. I wonder if you can pick that on your way back. I don't remember exactly where.

[midnight gull]

I hear lots of nodes, my router is at 35 ft in Washington County. But..too far to Oma so far. I heard Ashland a few times

Ctwh (Catwhisker) is my main router. You may hear TC1 (TomCat, mobile node) when I am out and about

[obsidian hazel]

I was there this weekend too and even remembered to pack a node...and then forget to actually bring it into the fair

[quasi beacon]

Anyone ever figure out a link that works reliably to the outside for this channel?

[gilded tide]

I've tried several methods with no success.

Randomly checking various meshmaps... where did everyone go? Only seeing a couple of nodes (reported online)

[quasi beacon]

Not sure how it's looking in other areas of town. But since I had to take down "EBT" about 6 months ago, my connectivity to the rest of the mesh has been terrible. At the moment I'm only seeing 2 active nodes in the last hour from the same setup that used to see 80+ when EBT was running.

[midnight gull]

I see 37 online this morning. Mostly in Omaha.

[gilded tide]

I put a node up in Mead today, had an immediate connection to VASH and saw a nice map. After that initial exchange, I had no further updates. If anyone sees MEAD, drop me a note here. I can't get to it from home and only have occasional access.

[young vortex]

I see mead now on my roof node in Lincoln.

[gilded tide]

Cool

[quasi beacon]

Nice! Mead to Lincoln is a good stretch. Is this on a tower?

[gilded tide]

Grain leg

[young vortex]

It said two hops away, so who knows if it was from a fly-over.

[gilded tide]

I'm beginning to think it was something like a flyover since it isn't showing up otherwise.

[gilded tide]

Let's try this one... NOMA located at Crown Point. Interestingly, "I" only see LH01 direct.

NOMA is at 135' and should provide long haul coverage.

[hazy frost]

I can receive it near 142nd and Ida. dm1c

[gilded tide]

I expected to see a lot more direct.

[quasi beacon]

I see noma in Bellevue. But it's 1 hop away.

I'm surprised a G2 at that height isn't transmitting to me direct

[cyan pendant]

I can see NOMA at the North Omaha Airport, also surprised it’s not direct and 1 hop away

[quasi beacon]

For what it's worth, one if the active members here was running a G2 downtown at the top of a tall building, and it was essentially deaf. Transmitted well, but didn't receive well.

[gilded tide]

I'm beginning to wonder

[quasi beacon]

Others chimed in that those things really need a filter to perform well in high noise environments

[gilded tide]

I have a tight bandpass on it already.

[quasi beacon]

Strange, that should be a fantastic location

[gilded tide]

Oddly, when I trace to various nodes reporting 1-2 hops out, they are showing as direct on the trace.

[tame pendant]

I have it 1 hop away @gilded tide ........de KBØTDW

[quasi beacon]

My home setup has marginal RX performance, but I've received NOMA direct a few times in Bellevue with a pretty weak signal.

Can't get a traceroute through though. @narrow ledge are you getting a reliable trace on NOMA via the Loess Hills node?

[narrow ledge]

I’ve seen NOMA on my map, but not sure if I’ve tried a trace route. I’ll check later tonight.

In other news, LH02 (solar node hidden in the North CB hills) seems to be working well, otherwise. No vandalism since some tweaker ripped off the antenna cable a few months ago.

[quasi beacon]

Did you ever get your G2 receiving normally? Or just switch back to a heltec?

[scarlet iron]

Hi! Im brand new. I saw a news article a few months ago about modifying Baofengs to join the meshtastic network and didn't get much past the idea that it was a cool off grid internet. But another article popped up today and drug me down the rabbit hole. I'm in Bellevue and want to set up a node at the house so I can see what kinda random stuff is bouncing around on the radio waves. I found a mesh map that shows some nodes in Lincoln but you guys have maps that show way more nodes. I figured the mesh would be up over all of America by now but is everything still just small local stuff? How can I help?

[quasi beacon]

Welcome! Meshtastic is really only meant for local communication. The 900ism frequency is usually good for a few miles with most setups depending on terrain. Two good outdoor setups with favorable terrain might be reliable out to 20-30 miles. So even with 7 hops (a message being relayed) it won't be going across the country unless the repeaters are on planes 5 miles up. 😂

Locally in the Omaha area I would guess there are 100 or 150 active nodes, but we're not very connected across the city at this time. I'm in Bellevue with a mediocre external setup and rarely see more than 20 at a time (sometimes only a few.) we really need an optimally placed router node to connect different parts of the city.

[tawdry compass]

I see NOMA lots, but cant get a trace through.

[gilded tide]

FWIW, for those that know, I have access to high sites. I'm just busy. However, last week I finally placed two, NOMA and MEAD. Both are G2s and both appear to be relatively deaf unfortunately. The next time I get around to either, I'll swap them for a rak4631 and see if things change. Assuming they behave as expected, I will switch them to repeater.

MEAD was spotted in Lincoln (28 miles) right after I placed it, but seems to have gone awol since then.

[tawdry compass]

My only node that I keep alive is Merlin. It's a G2. never had a problem with mine, I show 40 online right now. Perhaps a configuration issue? Firmware? I don't know.

[gilded tide]

I did hear merlin at MEAD right after I installed.

[quasi beacon]

I'm seeing a lot more nodes in Bellevue than I have previously. Could be NOMA. I'm curious if anyone else is seeing an uptick in connectivity?

[tawdry compass]

Only thing I have noticed is congestion from too many nodes, I suspect. I dunno.

[quasi beacon]

I suspect it's from being on a tower with more noise exposure. @narrow ledge had a similar issue on a downtown rooftop.

[gilded tide]

I do have AMCH as direct.

It's near 36th and 370

[tawdry compass]

Cool that you saw me from mead. That's a fair distance from elkhorn.

[quasi beacon]

Yep that's my home node. Just a heltec mounted on the roof. Im surprised your receiving that direct. Not running an amp or anything.

[gilded tide]

That's what a high site will get you 🙂 Now if I could just hear people lol.

[tawdry compass]

My last ping from ACMH was 8 hours ago.

AMCH lol

[quasi beacon]

Yeah AMCH still can't trace it, but I'm up to 40 active nodes on my list now. And NOMA is the only new node that is 0 hop to me, so I suspect most of this is NOMA's rebroadcasts.

[gilded tide]

I assume you just tried, I just had a hit from you

[quasi beacon]

Yep, weird.... If you're seeing that, it doesn't make sense that the traceroute isn't going through

How are you seeing that by the way? I assume you're not there at the installation?

[gilded tide]

I have remote access to this particular site and it's serial connected to the node.

[tawdry compass]

Just hit north omaha node, 1 hop.

[quasi beacon]

For what it's worth, I had good luck with Rak for a remote router node. They seem to have much better RX sensitivity than most of the others

[gilded tide]

I like the G2 because it's a single unit. I don't have to put crap together.

[tawdry compass]

Yup

[gilded tide]

However, if they are deaf, it serves no purpose.

[tawdry compass]

I can only say mine seem not to be deaf.

[quasi beacon]

How many active nodes are on NOMAs list at the moment?

[gilded tide]

It was 102, but I just rebooted it and it dropped to 84

[quasi beacon]

84 online? That's pretty good... Maybe it just took some time to wake up. That's about what my old router node in Bellevue would see.

AMCH is currently 41 online out of 117 total. I believe "online" just means heard within the last 2 hours.

[gilded tide]

ANd it's climbing, 86 now

[quasi beacon]

Well I'm impressed it's seeing me from Bellevue at only 21dbm. The signal from NOMA to me is direct, but pretty weak. And I assume you're pushing 1 watt?

[gilded tide]

it's 1w out, but there is only about 1 db net gain

[gilded tide]

almost 200' of 1/2" between the node and the antenna

[tawdry compass]

What type of line is that, Matt?

[quasi beacon]

Oh wow! Is it feasible to mount a node up near the antenna? A rak can get by with a fairly small battery/solar setup

[gilded tide]

I could, but then I have zero access to it

[gilded tide]

ldf4-50

And this site is fairly heavy with 900 already. If I direct conenct the node, I have to give up the cavity filter to subdue the neighbors.

[quasi beacon]

Yeah that's the tough part. I had mine running on solar. Climbed that tree more times than I would have liked! 😂