US - Connecticut.

[fierce moss]

Corey's node firmed up communications back to the main router/repeater

hopefullt the Chipinee router i put up will catch almost all of bristol and part of plainville

math says it should

[toxic shard]

🙂

[surreal sable]

Im going to try and get it a few feet higher when I get back next weekend I’m thinking I can get it around 20 feet - it’s probably 15 right now

[fierce moss]

Nice.

Shoot me your precise gps. I’ll get it on the map at 17ft.

And the antenna specs.

I’ll show you your coverage

[surreal sable]

https://store.rokland.com/products/low-profile-6-dbi-n-female-omni-outdoor-915-mhz-antenna-for-helium-rak-miner-2-nebra-indoor-syncrob-it-bobcat

41.76382° N, 73.05501° W

[fierce moss]

you arent using a ton of coax or anything right?

tiny drip loop of lrm400 or direct?

[surreal sable]

No not at all 3 feet of 400

[fierce moss]

ok

i just add that in for the dbi loss.

[surreal sable]

I also dropped off a node in downtown bristol - I have not place it in a fixed location yet and it’s currently inside - just as a test

[fierce moss]

gotcha

there you go sir

that is coverage to basic nodes at 6ft

you JUST eek out a solid Green to the TF&G repeater 🙂

and with it at 20ft, should be a fully stable connection

you cover a significant amount of harwinton from there

that adds a lot honestly

i dont need to put a node at my buddy's house now

my chippens/bristol node should be the next one

with you filling in that gap, this is what it will now cover with just the 3 routers...

as long as i can truely hit chippens from TFG

yours doesnt. some hill in the way

but i SHOULD

we will see 🙂

im thinking of doing a Yagi from my barn roof down into the watertown/waterbury/naugatuck/prospect line

[surreal sable]

Nice!!!

Also got my admin channel working - so I can start seeing which family members I can talk into a node

[fierce moss]

Nice

They will be redoing channel passwords soon too lol

So depending how long that takes i may wait to put up chip pens.

We will see

[fierce moss]

made contacvt with bantam! he is putting up a router down over the lake

going to get him on discord

[steady solar]

Hey that's me!

[surreal sable]

Haha

[steady solar]

I've been sitting on this project for months and told myself I needed to finish up my outdoor node. Picking up mounting bits this week for a final install. Should be at least 40ft off the ground so over 1k altitude

[surreal sable]

Awesome!!

[steady solar]

Put a 10dbi antenna on it to reach far, hopefully get some coverage towards New Milford/Southbury

[fierce moss]

heya!

just shot an email

[steady solar]

Just finished reading it - I'll definitely take you up on that coverage map offer once I install later this coming weekend and do precise measurements

[fierce moss]

sounds good

we can add it to the coverage map

ill get a website up to aggregate all the info soon.

if you havnt gotten your coax yet, https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09TZPPVMW/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&th=1

close enough to lmr400, not too large, and lets you put in a proper drip loop while keeping the antenna port facing down

tested and showed very minimal loss

and for anything permanent, wrap all connector points with that self sealing silicon tape. like rokland's roktape. but there are plenty of generics

[steady solar]

Ah yep that's the exact coax I got, and I did get the Rokland tape

[fierce moss]

awesome!

[steady solar]

Anyone have recommendations for mounting hardware? The width of this is 4.5"

I believe I'll also need to mount it slightly below the peak at an angle

[fierce moss]

a standard jpole should work

just look on amazon for "j pole mount"

[steady solar]

I went with the Phillips one but then I realized it's 5.2" at base and doesn't rotate so that wouldn't work

[fierce moss]

this one?

oh, because of your siding?

home depot/lowes sells a few types of these

they are made to put over house siding to create a flat surface for mounting

then you can use that philips

[fierce moss]

so they are majorly revamping Meshinfo now, but i got it up and running in it's current config

https://wg4ry.com/meshinfo/

updates every 60 seconds or so

[toxic shard]

Cool! I need to set that up

[fierce moss]

Well once we get a solid link, yours will show up there too

[toxic shard]

But what about my super secret private mesh mwuahahahaha

[fierce moss]

Lol

Well this will eventually only show channel 0 and ConnNet

Any maybe whatever gps channel we are forced to use after the devs continue to nerf features “for your own good”

Hopefully they don’t destroy all decent positioning functionality.

[toxic shard]

Seen this afternoon in Bristol

[fierce moss]

Nice

[steady solar]

What are y'all's max hops set to on your radios?

[toxic shard]

Might not be exactly the right distance. The app shows the distance from where I am now to where the far node was. I’m about 5 miles away from where the node was when that was received

I had been leaving them at 3 but now I’m putting them all to 7 as I go, at least until we get a big mesh going here.

[fierce moss]

7

[steady solar]

I'm also set to 7 on all of mine, perfect

I galavanted over to Colebrook and Norfolk today, only one node seen the whole time unfortunately

[fierce moss]

They need a repeater at high altitude to get over that mountain on 63

[steady solar]

Wow, the potential coverage if a repeater was at Mt Tom, incredible

[fierce moss]

Yea…. I have a call into my buddy at the DEEP lol. Would need to find a specific spot

[steady solar]

Shoot if you get that approval I'll pay for that repeater lol

I like to hike Mt Tom here and there, not sure why I haven't thought about this before

[fierce moss]

That’s a longer process ask though.

The new Bristol one should link unwin in and a ton more through Harwinton/Bristol/Farmington.

But i did email him.

I need to see what music mountain would produce

That might get falls village/Salisbury/Norfolk

Haven’t mapped that out

[steady solar]

30ft above music mtn peak

Just using heywhatsthat for these, so rough visuals

The potential coverage from just over the border into mass from mt Everett is astonishing

[fierce moss]

Yea

[toxic shard]

Also saw at home in Plainville today

Err, I guess that's a different WG4RY one

[fierce moss]

I have a few lol

Tbeam and 6dbi antenna on roof of truck

Tbeam inside

Tdeck

The raspberry pi with e22 module

And a virtual node for the BBS.

[toxic shard]

I got two new cases today to take care of some naked nodes

[fierce moss]

Nice.

I can print them for you too if needed

[toxic shard]

I'm sitting on the couch and I can see 7 and touch 6. Most of them are off though

Actually I think all of them are right now.

Plus 3 unfilled cases.

I've got 5 active that I can't see from the couch. One outside on a good antenna, one outside on an average antenna (mute), one outside on a bad antenna (small unify enclosure with the PCB base), and the t-echo in my car.

2 t-beams off downstairs, as well as a pi pico I just started testing meshtastic with.

Fudge, just saw another one from the couch. Send help

[fierce moss]

Ha

[toxic shard]

As long as I don't question my wife's craft purchases, she doesn't question my radio ones. Happy wife, Happy life.

[steady solar]

Can you see Farmington nodes from where you're at @toxic shard ?

[toxic shard]

Not from where I am, though I'm trying to find a good spot to bridge there.

I'm on the hill with mostly west and southwest LOS, so I'm better positioned to see Plainville, Bristol and Southington

But we'll find a spot for a solar or big battery node to get around the mountain. I've got a friend near Miss Porter's School so gotta make it happen

He's the only person I know if in Farmington with meshtastic

[fierce moss]

I’m redoing my pi and e22. I had the first working one configured.

Just printed a hat for it.

[fierce moss]

We all should be able to see a good chunk of farmington once i get chipanee up theoretically

[fierce moss]

Gotta get Bill to name his node lol

[steady solar]

Do you happen to have his coords? Buddy of mine is by the UConn health building and I'm curious if they could reach each other, seems like he gets mixed results.

[calm dawn]

Which Bill?

[fierce moss]

you i believe lol

Meshtastic 944c ?

i dont actually care. just the only generic one in the mesh

[nimble vale]

Im on the south end of talcott so if I can get a better antenna I should reach vernon without much issue

[fierce moss]

theres a chance the bristol one will each all the way across there

[nimble vale]

Tis me

[void cape]

I did a lot of driving around since Friday and to be honest, I did not find any nodes driving along the I-84 corridor after Route 4 all the way through to 90.

Interestingly, none of my passes along Rt 4 caught the node in Farmington.

When I was in Marlborogh, MA, I was able to hear only one node from the Boston net.

[fierce moss]

so, there are a few. the problem is you cant just drive and hope to hear a beacon

you have to transmit on primary and see if there are any Aks

[void cape]

Mmm..

[fierce moss]

lots of nodes dont beacon more than once every couple hours.

[void cape]

Yeah, darn.

[fierce moss]

but they will let you know if they received a packet

[void cape]

I have driven past the node in Simsbury in the past day as well so I guess that doesn't help me then.

[fierce moss]

i like to send out a howdy every 10 miles or so or if im in a higher spot

5-10

[void cape]

It's too bad that it's not as easy to find nodes as it is on APRS.

[fierce moss]

yea.

[void cape]

Granted, 25 watts on 2m is going to get a lot farther.

[fierce moss]

i bought a comet gp3 to toss up as an igate on my barn here in goshen at about 1500'

igate/repeater

gotta set it up soon

[void cape]

I was considering setting up an igate but after this 900MHz shebang, I'm thinking twice.

I'd have basically zero coverage area with a digipeater

[fierce moss]

well im going to setup my new shack in the barn once i get the office done in there

[void cape]

oooo nice

[fierce moss]

so putting up 3 dualbands on the roof and a 915 yagi for meshtastic

[void cape]

I have a dual band 17 foot antenna for 2m/70cm that I was considering putting on the shed.

But, it's in a valley and wouldn't hear much.

What would be cool though -

I'm getting a Discovery Dish at some point in the next few months once they deliver on the crowdfunding campaign

It would be neat to find a way to share some of those images over a mesh or other data path.

It'll be really exciting when the new GOES EAST system goes live.

[fierce moss]

ooh neat

just read about it

live sat weather images. neat

[void cape]

I'll have the weather band and I also bought the feed for hydrogen line if I get bored.

Might buy a second dish for the hydrogen line if I like the dish.

They are talking about selling a rotator for that.

[fierce moss]

ever use one?

[void cape]

An antenna rotator? No.

Not even a dish

[fierce moss]

i was looking at one for the yagi possibly. but i dont know how they handle CT winters

[void cape]

It depends on how robst you build it lol.

A servo with metal gears and some mechanical advantage would probably work fine.

[fierce moss]

yea exactly. is it worth it

theres really only 1 place to point it. and if i wanted to do a high gain omni later on down the line after more routers pop up, i can just swap it.

[void cape]

I have a 3D printer (the Bambu X1C) so if it requires parts that need to survive outside, I'd do them in nylon.

[fierce moss]

oh nice

ive got a CR6-SE. had plenty of PETG survive outside

nylon is cool

[void cape]

The Nylon 12 carbon fiber filament that the Bambu can use is absolutely bonkers.

It's the same sort of stuff that shopping cart wheels are made out of.

[fierce moss]

neat

[void cape]

I tried breaking the stuff with 50% infill and a large sledgehammer and it bounced.

The biggest issue tends to be the warping though, and the material is probably as bad for you as asbestos due to the carbon fiber strands

[toxic shard]

Near 41.722531, -72.828872

[steady solar]

Ahh that's less than 3 miles from @nimble vale but straight through Talcott mtn unfortunately

A Talcott repeater is also a dream...

[steady solar]

Do we need some Torrington coverage? I have access to 2 buildings, one by the Aldi and one up the hill that I could get permission to putting something up and access if needed.

Not great los but there are options

[toxic shard]

meshmap.net is back up, but it's not clear which mqtt it's on

[fierce moss]

I’m avoiding it

Liam’s is better

[toxic shard]

Liam's map is better, but meshmap is much faster

liam's site needs a better way to handle the data, not a 9MB json file

[fierce moss]

I can easily make a second bridge to push to both

[toxic shard]

I tried setting up a new TBeam Supreme with wifi to do mqtt but so far hasn't worked. Perhaps I'm using old docs

[fierce moss]

But I’ll direct people to Liam’s.

Meshmap.net is controlled by the mesh devs here and they are.. political

[toxic shard]

Do I need a different root topic on Liam's?

[fierce moss]

Nope. Just spit it into any unique topic

For the Tbeam, ESP32 Wi-Fi is horrendous

[toxic shard]

I thought the S3 core was better

[fierce moss]

Nope. I have 2 supremes

Put it literally RIGHT NEXT to your access point

And it will work

Can’t move it though

[toxic shard]

The default root topic is "msh/US", do I need to change that? (again, just talking about liam's mqtt.meshmap.app)

Does "Map Reporting Enabled" need to be turned on?

What do you think is a "good" option for a node on the network? Just do a Pi with native?

[toxic shard]

Got my new TBeam Supreme talking to the map by tethering it on wifi to my phone, for now. Seeing this unexpected node in Bristol. I don't think it's on the normal public channel

Bristol-ish, it's got a 12km precision

[surreal sable]

About 100 of us brought nodes to Vegas for our sales conference - we lit up the strip!!

[fierce moss]

Ha. Nice

So for your topic, there is no egress, so anything works.

Default is fine

Turn on neighbor info

On that node

Best option for a static mqtt node is meshtasticd on a pi OR a node that accepts a usb network adapter

Some Esp32 devices can

[void cape]

The ESP32’s WiFi stack is hilariously trashy.

It’s got an undocumented airtime limitation in it that prevents more than a certain amount of transmit time per day 5 minutes or something. So if there’s too much stuff, it turns the radio off and acts dumb.

I found this by writing my own code for it and then watching the output with an SDR.

[toxic shard]

Appreciate the info, thanks

Some of the plainville and bristol nodes are now on the map, though until i get a more solid network option (or Gary's mesh reaches mine), it might be on or off

[fierce moss]

From this

To this

Gotta design/print a case now

[void cape]

Is there really a node just hanging out in the middle of the highway on Rt. 8 north of Torrington?

[fierce moss]

it does say 9 min ago....

[steady solar]

@fierce moss That's my mobile node, I turned on share location from phone for a hot minute and now the map shows that the node is staying there lol

[fierce moss]

Ahh ok lol

[steady solar]

Idk why it still shows that as the location though, very annoying

[fierce moss]

It’s just the last location.

[steady solar]

Ah, wish when intentionally unsharing it would go away. Just re-enabled it at the same location as the BL node to avoid future confusion

[fierce moss]

It drops off eventually

But some nodes only beacon daily

[steady solar]

Any particular types of nodes I should turn Neighbor Info on? Or all of them

[fierce moss]

just the router

you want the one that will read/relay the most.

generates too much unneeded traffic on end-user ones

not that we have that problem yet

[steady solar]

Ah I gotcha, so definitely off for a mobile node?

[fierce moss]

yea

[steady solar]

Ok cool thank you

So dumb question, I've been seeing nodes every few days from NY and as far as Danbury. I'm on MQTT with a client node at home but the topic is only for CT, would that be related?

[fierce moss]

no. it's planes

people flying over and running a node from a plane

[steady solar]

Ahh a friend went over? Hah

[fierce moss]

happens a lot and then you get garbage nodes in the stats lol

[steady solar]

Yeah stuck there for days until I remove them lol. Have 73 on my list rn because of it

[fierce moss]

yup. wish there was a tool to auto-prune nodes with GPS outside a certain range

then again

if we get half the state covered by next spring 🙂

[steady solar]

At some point I picked up these guys, really cool setup they have https://pvmesh.org/

They have pretty big coverage reaching into Hartford

https://pvmesh.org/nodes/#node-map

Imagine connecting us up with them

[calm dawn]

I've seen some of their nodes

I was thinking about asking if I could put a node up on johnnycake mountain. I think that might connect us eastwards and north

[toxic shard]

A bunch of my nodes just went back in time. Always something going wrong with this stuff.

[fierce moss]

is that the nodedb on your own node?

[toxic shard]

Yeah, i'm connected to 2fd8, as I usually am from this computer. But for some reason it got all wonky

Like what?

Bit old firmware, but it's been up and chugging just fine for months

Frustrating to even tell what time the node thinks it is, let alone set it

time in meshtastic between the various nodes and apps is a freakin' mess.

[fierce moss]

honestly, i find the python cli is the most powerful of the UIs

it works a lot of the times that others done for setting things

i have a tbeam that just wont take some setting saves through the webui

[toxic shard]

I use it pretty often

[fierce moss]

even with a zero-out reflash

it's strange

cli works though

[toxic shard]

Because the iOS / macOS apps don't let you change nodes gracefully, I usually keep my mac on 2df8 and my phone on JW in my car. The rest I usually check on and tweak configs with the web gui via BLE or serial.

When I started with Meshtastic in early 2022 it was all CLI

[fierce moss]

ios app now needs to be ios 17 or better, so i cant use it without loosing my jailbreak

i have it on the mac though

but ios app has pretty decent remote node management

[steady solar]

One of my main complaints is the mobile app, Android isn't much better. Every time I get in my car I have to select my mobile node, get back home, manually select home node of choice. Very clunky, amongst random bugs

[toxic shard]

Back in my day there wasn't even an iOS app and we had to walk up hill both ways and install QT to use a gui flasher

[fierce moss]

Lol

[toxic shard]

Sent an email to Eric W1ERB from Berlin about this channel. Saw a new "Rover" node of his today.

[fierce moss]

Nice

[steady solar]

Think the Philips j mount I received today will actually just barely work, if it does I'll have my repeater nice and high up by the end of the weekend 🙂

[fierce moss]

nice!

ill add it to the map. measure the height 🙂

[steady solar]

I.... what? This node of mine hasn't moved an inch in weeks and is suddenly in the Atlantic lmao

[fierce moss]

Lol.

Which is it?

[steady solar]

My static client tbeam heh. Looks like it corrected itself, just the first time I've seen that.

[toxic shard]

Just consider yourself lucky you weren't standing between where you left it and where it was going. Could have been hurt.

[toxic shard]

Anyone seen this node before?

[fierce moss]

Yes. A bunch

Only after plane bounces

[toxic shard]

Gotcha, thanks

[void cape]

There was one flight earlier this week that got me like 50 nodes from the nyc area

[fierce moss]

yea. i wish i could block those from entering the nodedb

once we get a good scraper like Meshinfo, it should be able to filter/parse by distance or geofence.

i know they are working on that

im working on my pi now. printing a case for it.

[fierce moss]

excellent. new hat is working

anyone care to toss a test message out on channel0 ?

nice! working

[toxic shard]

NICE!

Are you planning on making more?

[fierce moss]

i could. dont plan on it atm. just wanted it for my base station.

i have it running POE and over PXE boot with all remote storage. no sd card/ssd etc.
And the e22 is 1watt

so ill have it up on the barn on a pole with just 1 cat6 wire to it. and i can backup/edit/change the OS remotely

i do have a few more hat boards, female pins, and like 1-2 more E22s though

def could make more

[fierce moss]

https://wg4ry.com/meshinfo/chat.html

ill be fine tuning what it sees/gets saved, but a longfast chatlog is nice

new UI should be soon for MeshInfo

[toxic shard]

Got messages from my friend when his family was at Lake Compounce to my node on the hill in Plainville, 5.6 miles. I wasn't home so couldn't chat.

Surprised that made it, but I got 4 messages so not a total fluke

[fierce moss]

Nice

Im hoping the Bristol relay will pull you into our mesh

I kinda wanna wait till 2.5 is out

So i can change all nodes over to it

For the new admin channel encryption

[toxic shard]

Yeah, I'm kind of paused thinking about remote deployments until that's stable

Tomorrow I think I'll set up the Yagi again pointed your way and see if it works better this time.

[calm dawn]

@fierce moss Is your BBS node functional? If so, how do we interact with it ( or can we)?

[fierce moss]

I can bring it back up, but it’s up/down at the moment as i work on it.

[calm dawn]

👍

[fierce moss]

I’ll have it back up by tomorrow. I’ll take a pic of the new case/box

[calm dawn]

Was just curious, I tried to direct message to it and got no response

[fierce moss]

Yea service isn’t running. I’ll let you know

I’m designing a clip for the Poe adapter in tinkercad now.

I’ll release it all as a single package file

[calm dawn]

Also, I just got the first batch of parts for my solar router project. I haven't asked anyone for permission to install on their site yet. Still hoping I can get it on johnnycake mountain.

I'll see how it runs at the house for a bit first

[fierce moss]

Nice.

I’ll get the latest coverage map and include chipsanee. Then you can look at spots it may work best.

[fierce moss]

its awesome you can relay out of your house right now though. your location looks like it's in a big radio sinkhole lol

should clip the poe adapter securely inside the box with two m2 screws

[void cape]

Those are some pretty square screw holes there.

[steady solar]

Ready to go on the roof tomorrow... or should I wait for 2.5 because that's going to be a real pain to access 😂

[toxic shard]

Could you flip that so the feed point is on the bottom? Less chance of water ingress

I mean, it looks well sealed, but can't hurt to have gravity on your side

[fierce moss]

looks good! i second flipping it over though if possible

less about rain and more about sitting water freezing on the grommet points

itll help the lmr400 too. a nice single 180 degree U shape with the coax is way better than all those right angles in it

[steady solar]

unfortunately everything's drilled and set to go so no dice... i'll do some improvements on the next iteration for sure

i do have a hydrophobic vent on the bottom which will help

[fierce moss]

nice

oh itll def work

[steady solar]

Gary, do you want accurate height measurement from the ground to the very top of the antenna?

[fierce moss]

im printing my POE adapter clip. just drilled the BIG project box for the poe pi. if i didn't do something stupid with the measurements/math in tinkercad, ill have it done by tomorrow

then again, the chances that something comes out exactly as you hoped on print #1 is like MAYBE 20%... but this one is pretty simple. as long as the petg doesnt shrink too much

i added 2 bottom pressure/vent pieces on this one. it's a pi4. and i dont want to use a fan as i dont want any moving/likely to die sooner-than-others parts. itll let it breathe a bit more

Is your node a wisblock?

i assume?

grab an android tablet and practice the exact steps to remote upgrade

if you/it screws up, you're climbing... but it gives you a decent shot at upgrading all over BLE

[steady solar]

Yep, wisblock. That's interesting, I didn't realize you could do remote upgrade. What's the benefit here, should I be using router or repeater? Only differences I'm seeing are that repeater is invisible on node list, yet has bluetooth enabled which makes it easy to manage without an admin channel

[fierce moss]

it's for your house?

i'd be doing client

[steady solar]

It's not ever meant to be connected to directly - I have a client inside the house for that

[fierce moss]

yea it's a base station

[steady solar]

This one is just for high up routing purposes

[fierce moss]

the proper roll is still client

[steady solar]

Interesting, ok. Why not router/repeater?

To my understanding routers/repeaters should be high up, great LOS devices

[fierce moss]

router= only if an IDEAL spot like a tower or peak of a mountain. They actually change packet priority. Clients still route/repeat/receive, but they dont jump the priority list.

Routers not in the perfect ideal locations harm mesh propagration

[steady solar]

Ah, so THAT serious of good LOS. Got it, will change to client

[fierce moss]

yea

[steady solar]

I'll prob change to client_hidden so I dont get people messaging it, will probably rarely/never check it

[fierce moss]

its why they removed Router_Client roles

people were choosing it not understanding and it screwed up meshes

i'd leave it client. People will want to traceroute your router to check coverage

[steady solar]

hmm alright, fair

[fierce moss]

unless you absolutely dont want it listed

YOU will probably want to traceroute it

[steady solar]

At this rate I'm already checking my base station at home and mobile, so eh 😆

why not hah

[fierce moss]

yea but it doesnt properly show in the traceroute of even those clients if hidden

[steady solar]

i find traceroute soooo finnicky, i have gotten it to work maybe a small handful of times

[fierce moss]

i think it shows "Unknown"

theoretically both tracerouting AND remote admin will be more stable in 2.5

due to the new packet encryption

[steady solar]

i'm wondering if i should just throw 2.5 preview on and send it onto the roof in the morning

[fierce moss]

as long as you dont mind running up there 🙂

i would 100% learn and testrun the remote upgrade process first

you may never need to go back up there

if it all works

[steady solar]

Yeah sounds like I should be doing that, I'm just itchy because I finally got the node all set up after months hah

[fierce moss]

oh i get it lol

[steady solar]

Fingers crossed for sure. Is there a recommended video or guide for remote upgrade?

[fierce moss]

i dont have any specific one to point to. there are like 2-3 on YT

[steady solar]

ok cool i'll peek

[fierce moss]

i want 2.5 as well. its why im waiting on the golf course

[steady solar]

Probably for the best with all of the changes

[fierce moss]

i really think that router is going to get like all of harwinton, bristol, parts of farmington, burlington, etc

should bring in Uwin

im thinking of doing a yagi for the house base station. It'll reach TF&G even without it pointing at it.

[steady solar]

Every other night or so I keep connecting to Danbury which I think is connecting me to NYC. I'd be really surprised if this was due to planes, like that many people running meshtastic flying over

[fierce moss]

it's exactly 1mi line of sight. from the barn to the club

[steady solar]

But even the range of the messages we got tonight was pretty nuts so I could be very wrong

[fierce moss]

i get 3-5 flyovers a week sometimes

lots of people into boston, ny, and bradly

[steady solar]

I run an ads-b feeder here as well so I'm tracking planes

[fierce moss]

neat

[steady solar]

Pretty quiet night

Blue lines are my realistic range. ADS-B is also very LOS and I have this antenna indoors so I'm getting pretty impressive range all things considered

[fierce moss]

very cool

[steady solar]

Oh wow, OTA firmware upgrade steps are stupid easy. Wisblock gang ✊

[fierce moss]

so YES

when they work they are lol

did you do it? or just watch?

[steady solar]

Saw the instructions, going to do a full test tomorrow while I still have it on the ground

[fierce moss]

cool

[steady solar]

You've had problems with it not working?

[fierce moss]

yea. lots of people have

[steady solar]

😒

[fierce moss]

and of course it can fail at the DFU stage

meaning it's stuck there will you climb

[fierce moss]

BBS is responding now but kinda broken. working on it

[fierce moss]

yea print was not perfect... but i was able to re-measure 🙂

[fierce moss]

ok BBS fixed! up and running

just private message it

adding a local chatgpt-like llm to it shortly

[fierce moss]

New POE PXE boot e22 base station complete

[surreal sable]

Looks great!

[fierce moss]

ty

ill be uploading the STLs to thingiverse as a kit

[toxic shard]

Yagi is up, let’s see if it does any better this time

[void cape]

Is that a curious neighbor in the background?

[fierce moss]

if you reach out, tie that to the corner of the house or sink it in concrete lol

which direction are you facing?

and is that the Rak 12dbi yagi? i was eyeing it.

[toxic shard]

Yeah I’ve been chatting up the neighbor about it. He’s chopping a stump. I’m having the better day.

https://store.rokland.com/products/12-dbi-aya-9012-alfa-network-n-female-directional-yagi-outdoor-iot-915-mhz-antenna

Not helping it seems, in this case. Some houses in the way. Pointed at Torrington

General direction.

House in the way so not ideal

[fierce moss]

Well tell them to get 2.5 out so i can place my Bristol repeater lol

But yea I’ve been looking at getting that exact yagi

[toxic shard]

RF is a cruel mistress

[steady solar]

@fierce moss Sent a friend request so I can msg you exact specs of my roof node

[void cape]

Has anyone driven up to Chippin’s hill with a node on their car to at least try it?

I mean, if the yagi is still set up you’ll know if Chippins hill is the end of the story or if you need additional coverage

[toxic shard]

I haven’t been up there to test.

Leaving the yagi up for a few days if the weather holds.

[fierce moss]

Haven’t yet. I have a 6dbi on my truck. I’ll try it this week when looking there

[fierce moss]

BBS wasnt stable today

SHOULD be now...

im hoping to get up there wednesday

might not get it UP on wednesday, but i need to see what mounting options i have on the roof there first

@void cape can you try the BBS from your location whenever able?

[void cape]

Yeah

[fierce moss]

looking to see the latency with multiple hops before i start adding 3-4 packet responses to it

ty

[void cape]

I’m not getting a trace route or response

Okay just got something

It’s not a very good connection it seems

I can’t get any trace routes

I can’t hit the TFG router

I can reach dd_r_r1 though

Hmm

I’m getting inconsistent results right now from Corey maybe? The HAS router has to be reached through him and seems to not make it every time

The wind picked up around here and I’m wondering if that’s having any effect

[surreal sable]

My antenna height for dd_r_r1 was reduced by a couple feet on Friday it will be taller by this Friday hopefully - waiting for a new antenna section - could be the problem

[void cape]

Can you reach the TFG reliably from you?

[surreal sable]

Not around to test right now - will try later

[void cape]

Alrighty

@fierce moss Is TFG stable for you?

[surreal sable]

I’ll let you know as soon as I can test

[fierce moss]

it is yes

[void cape]

Okay. My theory right now is that my connection to Corey’s router is unstable

[fierce moss]

ahh

[void cape]

Only one traceroute mentions TFG

Several heading that direction have failed

[fierce moss]

hrmm yea im failing to you

[void cape]

Can you reach AE1B’s nodes either?

His work direct to me

[fierce moss]

kinda

[void cape]

Hmm

[fierce moss]

2 out of 3 worked

[void cape]

Corey’s node seems responsive on direct to me

[fierce moss]

Corey is AE1B?

i need to write these down lol

[void cape]

No, Bill is

[fierce moss]

ooh

[void cape]

Corey is dd_r_r1

[fierce moss]

that TR worked to you

[void cape]

AE1B is across the street from me in case my particular node position is garbage

[fierce moss]

try just direct messaging the bot

rather than TR

[void cape]

Yeah I got only one out of it

[fierce moss]

ahh

[fierce moss]

wierd

[void cape]

Yeah, I’m getting no luck

Honestly, the optics into how well a mesh like this works is garbage in the app

Nodes can’t even share how well they hear other nodes

That’s the fault of the firmware too though

I really hope someone forks this firmware and makes it so that you can actually triage connections against other devices

[fierce moss]

agreed.

the devs now would never add a feature that adds to mesh load

yea a few came through.

def not all

2024-09-02 21:14:35 -0400 GAFB 9f04 None Welcome to GAF-MeshBBS - Type CMD to get started!
2024-09-02 21:14:34 -0400 9f04 GAFB None B
2024-09-02 21:10:21 -0400 9f04 ALL None Checking Chan 0 first

current version of NRF Connect app fixed their issues with OTA updates it seems

at least on android

i just upgraded a wisblock without issue OTA

[fierce moss]

wiki lookup on the bot is like 50% working now

LLM soon

[fierce moss]

yea, TFG -> Corey's node is 50/50

atm

[toxic shard]

Nothing overnight on the plainville yagi 😦

[fierce moss]

dang

still about 50/50 to corey

[surreal sable]

Wow crazy - You were solid before right?

I had a 7 foot mast I was using and am changin it to a 10 foot - to get a bit more height - I had to move to a 5-foot section until another 5-foot section arrives in to give me the extra couple of feet i wanted.

Supposed to be getting it friday and should have it installed on friday as well

[fierce moss]

gotcha. Yea it was far more stable before i believe

it could be something as simple as a few extra trees in the way in a different position

it's a borderline signal

is the harwinton fairgrounds repeater still up there?

[surreal sable]

Which node is the fair ground

[fierce moss]

KO4TSM/e464 Router at HAS

[fierce moss]

ill go up to the golf course tomorrow. probably cant mount it yet, but i can test

i need to see what is up there to mount on and then buy the right hardware

also, hoping to mount it where i can hit it with BLE from the ground so i can update without bugging them for roof access

[toxic shard]

Got my first Heltec T114, pretty nice

[fierce moss]

nice

I'm going to try to get my new base station up and on the roof in the next 2 weeks

that, plus Corey getting his another few feet up should stabilize it i think

[fierce moss]

hahaha

yea i have my clients here all over the place

and right now the client that feeds mqtt is in a concrete bunker

so that makes sense

[void cape]

The HAS node at the fairgrounds will probably have to be moved at some point; it will increase in elevation most likely as a result.

[fierce moss]

itll be way up on the barn soon though

cool. yea i dont know how solid the HAS line of sight is to TFG

[void cape]

It probably is borderline BUT it will probably have a better LOS than Corey to the golf course since there’s a small hill in his way there I think.

Or, it might be in the fresnel zone

[fierce moss]

all my TR to the HAS router go through corey

[void cape]

Yeah. It’s currently strapped to the side of a building and not on a pole; it will soon be on a pole in their upper field.

[fierce moss]

nice

once it is, let me know stats and ill add it to the coverage map

i should be going to bristol tomorrow

ill be checking chipanee

[void cape]

It’s going to go on the hill in the right of frame

[fierce moss]

get it up that light post

[void cape]

Currently it’s at ground level on a building out of frame to the right

Heh, I could just do that. The fairgrounds does have a cherry picker truck.

[fierce moss]

dude

that would be perfect if they let you

[void cape]

I’m sure they would not mind. I just need to set it up for that.

[fierce moss]

j-pole right into the left side of it away from the side of the lights

facing the sun

[void cape]

This video is a bit old, those poles are taller now IIRC

[fierce moss]

cool

[void cape]

Oh, actually no you can see the old short poles too

[fierce moss]

get it up there, it would be solid

lemme do a test on that...

[void cape]

There’s poles near the middle of the grounds that are taller. We actually have a Ubiquiti network on the poles too for the vendor’s credit card machines that need WiFi

[fierce moss]

nice

i love unifi. i have easily 3 grand of unifi here at the house lol

[void cape]

The whole system is a 5GHz mesh but we are moving to running overhead lines to some of them.

[fierce moss]

cool

[fierce moss]

what height do you think those are?

[void cape]

You can see the AP on this pole here

Errr.

Probably 20 feet at least

[fierce moss]

thats more than 20...

probably 40ft poles

so ill put 30

[void cape]

Here’s some doorways for height context

Yeah, maybe 30 footers

The white pole to the right is a flagpole and we can’t use that

We also can’t use the handful of utility poles; they have transformers on them so they are easier to notice.

[fierce moss]

yea

any 30ft-er will work

they all clear the roofs

its calculating now

[void cape]

Cool

[fierce moss]

would help if i put the right location...

[void cape]

It would probably go on the intersection of the two red dashed lines at 30 ft.

[fierce moss]

it isnt perfect, but at 30ft, an 8.5dbi antenna should be solid from there

to TFG

[void cape]

I’d be using that 3 foot antenna I bought on Amazon with some feed line

Do you have the link for the lmr400?

I can also just use the short 6 inch coax wire that I bought for it I guess

[fierce moss]

use KMR400

https://amzn.to/47b3W8c

[void cape]

It’ll work with these ends?

[fierce moss]

is that an SMA connector?

[void cape]

Yeah.

The router is a Tbeam 1.1

[fierce moss]

oooh

not a wisblock?

if youre putting something at 30ft, id use a wisblock

[void cape]

I could change it out I guess but I don’t have that hardware right yet

If you let me know what to get I can buy it

It probably should have a case too

[toxic shard]

The WisBlock or other RAK 4631 nodes are much more power efficient for solar use

[fierce moss]

it uses like 50x less power than a tbeam

i can walk you through the whole process lol

[void cape]

I can make stuff I just need to know what to get so I avoid the research phase lol

[toxic shard]

The regular "RAK Meshtastic Starter Kit" if you're building something.

[fierce moss]

yea

https://store.rokland.com/products/rak-wireless-wisblock-meshtastic-starter-kit

[toxic shard]

They also sell a good 3000ah matching battery

[fierce moss]

do you have a 3d printer? i can print you the mounting plates i made for it

[toxic shard]

I just got some printed too.

[void cape]

Yeah I’ve got a bambu

[fierce moss]

cool

ill give you the stl

[toxic shard]

https://www.printables.com/model/623519-rak-plate-adapter/files

[fierce moss]

this is a really good guide....

[toxic shard]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_h3UluaqfTw&feature=youtu.be

[fierce moss]

yup

[toxic shard]

https://www.thecommschannel.com/meshtastic/parts/index.html

[fierce moss]

thats it

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:6649586

that is my mounting plate

either will work

[toxic shard]

For anyone who doesn't want to build a damn thing, keep an eye for this being back in stock https://atlavox.com/products/atlavox-s4-solar-meshtastic™-node

[fierce moss]

wheres the fun in that? lol

but yea it's a solid option

i really like N connectors for permanent placement though

SMA connectors just get loose

gotta silicon tape it all down either way

[void cape]

It's just what's on the tbeam tbh

I'd externalize a BNC personally lol

[fierce moss]

N connector 🙂 BNC is for quick disconnect. N connectors are perm

[void cape]

idk all my ham gear is bnc or PL259

[fierce moss]

i have BNC adapters on all my HTs

[void cape]

oh, except for the handsets; those are typically sma

my nanovna is also sma

[fierce moss]

watch that THE COMMS CHANNEL build

[toxic shard]

If you really hate money and also don't want to build, https://www.etsy.com/listing/1312727008/3w-meshtastic-solar-base-station-with?show_sold_out_detail=1

[fierce moss]

it's what mine are based off of

[void cape]

yeah.

I'm really curious what the diameter of the telephone poles are

[fierce moss]

https://store.rokland.com/products/tape-helium-antenna-and-coaxial-cable-self-fusing-silicone-heat-water-resistant

also make sure to get that

[void cape]

I can measure the bottom and consider that worst case I guess

but I've never measured the top.

[fierce moss]

you activate the tape by stretching it

then wrap it.

super water tight

wrap EVERY outdoor coax connection in that

[void cape]

apparently 10-14 inches is common

[toxic shard]

That's what she said

[void cape]

pffft lol

Michael Scott arrived in my head making a face

[fierce moss]

ha

both of mine look like this

i used to use a third party MPPT charge controller but it failed

no reason to do that honestly

[toxic shard]

RokTape and Type N connectors for serious biz. PL259/SO239 isn't good for UHF (ironically).

[fierce moss]

they use such little power

[void cape]

It has great solar there so I really don't think that it'll be an issue if it's just the 6W panel and the 18650 that it has now.

[toxic shard]

@fierce moss what's that below the antenna connector?

[void cape]

Particularly if y'all are saying that the system draws less power overall.

[fierce moss]

i add breathers to the cases

[void cape]

I've never seen that system die that's up there now and it's a tbeam in a box

[fierce moss]

not 100% needed

it will avoid any heat based condensation problems

[toxic shard]

T-Beam can chew through an 18650 in one day in my experience

[void cape]

It doesn't have any issues in router mode apparently.

[fierce moss]

those 4 18650s will power the wisblock for 30-40 days

[void cape]

That thing only gets to 75% by morning and the solar immediately charges it as soon as the sun comes up.

[fierce moss]

a few days of no sun and it's toast though

[toxic shard]

I'm working on a node in a similar case that'll have an external 20Ah 12v LiFePO4 battery, hoping for 6 months

[fierce moss]

which is possible in winter

[toxic shard]

RAK can have some issues coming back from a dead battery with solar, better to have battery margin

[fierce moss]

yea

[void cape]

My lifepo4 battery's charge controller shuts off below freezing fyi

[fierce moss]

30 days is a solid margin

brb

[toxic shard]

Good, LFP will be damaged charging below 0c

[void cape]

It doesn't let me discharge below 0c.

[toxic shard]

My plan isn't to charge my LFP in the field

That wouldn't be the charge controller unless it had a load port, I don't tend to use load ports

the BMS would be the only thing that would cut off discharging usually

[void cape]

well, it's one of the batteries on Amazon that just gives 2 terminals.

the bms is what does it

inside the battery

[toxic shard]

Most amazon BMS don't even have low temp protection

[void cape]

below freezing, it turns off

[toxic shard]

so that's surprizing

[void cape]

idk, the one I bought does.

[toxic shard]

Got the model?

[void cape]

Nermak

12V 20AH

Great battery by the way. It kicks arse.

Two of them allows me to run my train without issue.

[toxic shard]

This is the one I'm using, discharges to -20c

Let me rephrase, spec says it won't be damaged down to -20c. I don't believe it has a low temp sensor

I like the form factor on yours too, I've got a similar one but no handle

Your battery's amazon listing says:

Operating Temperature Discharging: -4°F to 140°F; Charging: 32°F to 113°F

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESEJH4JaBlw

😬

Hopefully their stuff is better now, vid is from 2 years ago

[void cape]

If what I do to it doesn't punish it, I have no idea what does.

[toxic shard]

NICE!

[void cape]

Here's another video of me in a gondola with the locomotive.

It has two of those batteries in series with a 24V 500W electric motor. I can pull the gondola, the flatcar, and the locomotive with 4 people riding it for about 3 hours straight on one charge of the two batteries.

It uses regen brakes which does help the eff. a little bit when going down hills with a load.

(in fact, it only has regen brakes, lol)

Top speed is about 7.2 miles per hour, which is pretty scary on a train of that size.

So yeah, I defintely punish those batteries a bit. The starting current of that motor is pretty fierce.

Two years of this and the batteries haven't given me any trouble. I also use them with my SOTA/POTA rig since that works great. Also use it to charge my laptop.

I usually use a cigarette adapter I just wire with a 20A fuse for that.

[toxic shard]

Sounds like they're working great for you.

Gripe: The case that I got with the Heltec T114 has the USB port on the antenna side, wtf

on top... smh

[void cape]

ah, I have a relevant quote:

"All of these battery packs are really just tricking a bomb into exploding really slowly" - a coworker's wife.

[toxic shard]

I'm sure there will be great 3D printed cases soon. This is brand new. First Heltec board with the efficient nRF52 chip like on RAK, but with a screen included

Well, I think it's the first, anyhow

[void cape]

Actually, that would be a benefit; if you mount it in a box somewhere, the ports are both pointing down.

[toxic shard]

But then you'd probably not use this case, so it wouldn't matter

[void cape]

I guess.

[toxic shard]

It's just weird, like Apple putting the mouse charging port on the bottom

[void cape]

They prioritized the looks of a single plane of aluminum over having a USB port in the front that ruins the Apple asthetic

But, yeah, it's still silly they put it on the bottom lol

[calm dawn]

I like this heltec t114... Tiny, low power. I think I'll get another and relegate my t-beams to stationary home use

[toxic shard]

stationary, or in a car where they can get constant power when in use.

[calm dawn]

Maybe, since I work from home I don't drive a lot

[toxic shard]

Haven't convinced him to join us in Discord yet, but one of the other Plainville guys:

(I'm the test at the top too)

The "Lake" I referred to is a node he's putting at his place near here: https://maps.app.goo.gl/sKt5otbGXWgNwk3S6

[fierce moss]

oh nice!

[toxic shard]

Which isn't too far from Bantam lake, where I think you saw someone too

[fierce moss]

that's a great spot

[toxic shard]

He's not on the hill, so it'll be pretty limited actually

[fierce moss]

ahh

Ian is bantam lake

[toxic shard]

(I told him to sneak one up there, I'll continue trying to be a bad influence)

[fierce moss]

i havent gone for pike on bantam in forever

[toxic shard]

With all these lake people, I know where I want the mesh meetup to be

[fierce moss]

ha

[steady solar]

Sheesh we're going to need to add more maximum hops to our clients 😂

[steady solar]

Big unifi gang in this channel ✊

[fierce moss]

That cluster will go away once my base station is up lol

[steady solar]

I got his m1 for mobile and loooove it. At this price point it's basically the same as building it yourself, waiting for these to come back in stock hah

[fierce moss]

Missing a new AP i just installed and doesnrt show the gigabeam devices/bridge

covering more of the main fields now. Also need to start running wire to get some access into the back woods so i have solid wifi from my deer stands lol

need another 10gb aggregation switch eventually too

[fierce moss]

Anyone on to do testing?

[toxic shard]

We're seeing a bunch of stuff down here in Bristol @fierce moss

I'm "Silver" "8538"

[fierce moss]

Send on longfast

[toxic shard]

ok sent

[fierce moss]

Someone is picking me up. Dunno who

[toxic shard]

I think there's a plane too, seeing some NYC

[fierce moss]

Guhhh

Fucking hate plane people

Screw up all testing and add in garbage nodes

I was hoping the truck would hit tfg

Hrmm

[toxic shard]

Seeing any Unwin?

[fierce moss]

No. Not with the vehicle

I have the router and full antenna with me though. Just no mounting hardware

I’ll go up and test in a few

[toxic shard]

what is your node called?

[fierce moss]

Great Acres Farm - Truck - WG4RY

GAF2

[toxic shard]

I sent a position and a trace from Silver but I don't think it made it

[fierce moss]

GFR2 will be the new one

Great Acres Farm - Chipanee Router

[toxic shard]

Seeing it here in bristol

[fierce moss]

It just popped up?

[toxic shard]

Yup

[fierce moss]

Antenna is on its side lol

[toxic shard]

lol

SOL back home is on its side too

[fierce moss]

Maybe my truck node antenna it’s screwed up

[toxic shard]

Showed up on the map

[fierce moss]

Oooh

Testing now

[toxic shard]

(my work nodes are the ones north of the S in Southington)

Mine and my friend, he's P1 and f480

[fierce moss]

Send on LF again

On Longfast. Not direct

[toxic shard]

Just sent on LF after the DM

[fierce moss]

See my replies?

[toxic shard]

I received... "received"

Also seeing your T-Deck

[fierce moss]

Good

[toxic shard]

Can't tell yet if I heard you at home, no remote access

[fierce moss]

No trace route to TFG yet

I’ll try the roof

[toxic shard]

I'm seeing a node that my work stuff hasn't gotten info on yet, but comparing the IDs from my phone is TFG

[fierce moss]

Shutting it down to go to roof

[toxic shard]

Safety First

[toxic shard]

Didn't notice your LF messages but did receive them

[fierce moss]

Hrmm. Not all made it

Got someone in Plainville though

[toxic shard]

Yeah, that's a plainville regular

I did not receive his message

[fierce moss]

I bet you that extra 15’ WILL make a difference

Get over the trees and buildings a

[toxic shard]

There are three active clusters of nodes in Plainville. My herd, an unknown person with ["U.N.I.T." and "n1"], and that guy with "cwm" and another node I don't recall. CWM is also the guy setting up at Mt Tom Pond.

We're going to get a much better base here at work, just need to coordinate a bit. Right now my car has an Atlavox node on top of it while I'm working, and we have a couple of nodes inside the building.

But we'll have a proper antenna on top of a building in the next month or two, hopefully.

[fierce moss]

Nice

[toxic shard]

"CWM"'s other node is "fs" farm hill solar, but i haven't seen it in a while

[fierce moss]

I could always push a yagi in this direction

[toxic shard]

Looking forward to getting home and seeing which nodes there heard you

[fierce moss]

My base station will hit the tfg repEater no matter what. And i have the height for the yagi

[toxic shard]

nice

I'm even further off axis from the yagi and I'm still hearing it here.

Yagi is on "VOX" Unwin AtlaVOX S4

"ATLA" Unwin ATLAvox S4 is on my car in the parking lot in Bristol

[fierce moss]

Gotcha

A yagi on my roof should hit here better than the tfg

And probably hit Harwinton folk better too

Screw the south lol.

I’ll get my base station up first. The. Retest.

[toxic shard]

Thanks for doing the test. This is exciting

[fierce moss]

That or, if i get it on the chipanee roof , as long as you can help patch me in temporarily with mqtt and i can admin it, we can work on the best way to bridge to it

Let me think about it lol

Maybe i get really fancy and put a rotator on the roof with the yagi to fine tune it and adapt as the mesh fills in

[void cape]

The HAS node is currently in a bad spot to hear from the south but soon it may be able to hear the golf course better

[fierce moss]

True

If we can get that raised and the golf course one up, that could be the bridge

I’ll run some LoS testing tonight

[toxic shard]

Here's what I got at home during your testing:

[void cape]

I’ll try to move it next Tuesday

[fierce moss]

That’s everything i think

So it’ll be good up there. Need to figure out how to get on the roof. I thought there was a door. There’s not. I hate ladders

I’ll test LoS when home.

See if the fairgrounds “should” hit

[toxic shard]

Seeing TFG from home right now, probably not stable though

Haven't gotten a trace yet, but I'd expect the 1 hop to be my yagi

(this is from the perspective of the "2fd8" Wstone node)

@fierce moss can you see my side by chance?

Weird, I'm seeing your truck back at Chipannee

Just saw dd_r_r1

Not showing hops on it, curious

[fierce moss]

Chipanee is in my truck in my driveway

I’m sure the gps was last updated up there

It was temporary

[toxic shard]

I thought so, which is why I was surprised.

Seeing a bunch of nodes from up your way popping up just now

[fierce moss]

It doesn’t have gps built in

It grabbed from my tablet

[toxic shard]

GAF1, GAF0, BS1

[fierce moss]

That’s why

I’ll make it static when it goes in

[toxic shard]

Very weird it isn't showing any hops for GAF1 and BS1

[fierce moss]

Not home to test yet. Next door at my parents

[toxic shard]

👍

[toxic shard]

@fierce moss your Chipannee test also reached my friend in Farmington by Miss Porter's

(He's also P1 or P2 when he's mobile, but this screenshot was "12da" 12dattic Left@Fork, his base)

Just saw Bantam Lake for the first time

[fierce moss]

i had the node active in the truck lol

must have been some magical point

[steady solar]

Heyyy 🎉

[toxic shard]

🙂

[steady solar]

Just saw this guy for the first time

[toxic shard]

That's another guy in Plainville, it's gotta be hopping through me, he's down in the valley

[steady solar]

I only caught a glimpse of your atlavox s4 once before, I see it now though

[toxic shard]

Which one? One is shortname ALTA and one is VOX

[steady solar]

VOX

[toxic shard]

Cool. VOX is up on the yagi so makes sense

Usually VOX is with my car, but I tossed it up on the pole over the weekend and now ALTA is with my car. I put it on my roof when I'm parked to see what it gets

[fierce moss]

so... for clear LoS to TFG, the fairgrounds would need to be at 57ft

but that means it's very close

and every foot counts

[toxic shard]

Unclear if something changed with our equipment, if it's weird atmospherics, or maybe conflicting signals abated. I really need to get an SDR set up to look closer at what's happening in the band

I'm also not toooo far from the large towers on Rattlesnake Mountain, I sometimes wonder how much desense they cause.

[toxic shard]

Seems like the RF joyride is over, not hearing anyone over there anymore

[fierce moss]

what time was it?

might have been while i was driving around with a giant antenna in the truck lol

[fierce moss]

yea i saw you here too

i wonder if some packets snuck through when i was at chipanee

[toxic shard]

Except for the first image with messages from your earlier test, all my posts last night were about traffic I was seeing right then in the evening.

[fierce moss]

hrmm

[void cape]

I’m going to take the HAS node down in about an hour and prepare it for putting on the pole

[fierce moss]

Get it up there as high as you can 🙂

[void cape]

I took the node to the top of the hill for a moment to see if it did anything. Probably not

[fierce moss]

im here to test

you can also always use the BBS to test responses to the TFG router

[void cape]

Ah yeah, sorry, back at home at this point.

[fierce moss]

it seems to have been stable for several days

did you send anything to longfast from the hill?

[void cape]

Here's the list of nodes it's seen since I put it up. 98

[fierce moss]

oooh

so you raised the height?

[void cape]

It's currently at my desk; it's at home.

[fierce moss]

oooh

[void cape]

I temporarily took it to the top of the hill about half an hour ago

[fierce moss]

ok

[void cape]

Let me check APRS..

About 1:07 to 1:10 I was up on the hill.

[fierce moss]

did you send anything out?

[void cape]

Unfortunately, no.

[fierce moss]

ahh

[void cape]

Was busy doing something else while I was up there.

[fierce moss]

gotcha

[void cape]

we were inspecting the field

new drainage system

[fierce moss]

cool

im working on a new big drainage plan for my fields now

so if you wanted, I have a wisblock you could buy off me for the normal $35

[void cape]

We had a bunch of drainage stuff installed.

[fierce moss]

if you wanted to replace the HAS with it

just offering

as i have one in hand

[void cape]

I may take you up on that but I haven't ordered the other parts yet.

I should have time tonight to figure that out.

[fierce moss]

gotcha

ill build out a third router soon enough. just figured if you needed it in a tight time frame

i bet tossing it at the top of one of those 30' poles will have it hit TFG

[void cape]

I still need to get the box and stuff unless I'm just throwing the less power hungry node up there. But, I don't have a 18650 battery holder or anything on hand so I'd have to figure that out if it doesn't hold a battery.

[fierce moss]

i have some somewhere too.

[void cape]

The tupperware bin did work perfectly fine on the building I had fastened it to, and I don't think I need to change the solar panel.

[fierce moss]

just need to solder them together

[void cape]

That I can manage.

[fierce moss]

i just order them off aliexpress

they are cheap

then glue together, wrap some wire around each prong, and solder

they work well

and they perfectly fit snugly in those project boxes

you dont HAVE to put in those switches, but i like them as you can keep it off (if removing the antenna) without disconnecting the tiny battery and solar connector wires

[calm dawn]

I have some across the street here 🙂

[calm dawn]

What do you guys recommend for a solar panel? I just realized my Amazon purchase is DOA, so I'm looking for another.

[fierce moss]

https://amzn.to/3TjnvWm

[calm dawn]

Don't know if I'm overthinking it, but I think 6w might be overkill?

[fierce moss]

You want overkill. As it will produce enough charge to function on a semi cloudy day

And 6w is still only 5v 1.2a max/theoretical.

Likely sits at 5v 800ma on a sunny day

[toxic shard]

Does it have blocking diode?

I'm seeing your truck @fierce moss

[fierce moss]

I didn’t bother as there’s a 30-45 day buffer

If it goes past that, something else is wrong

[steady solar]

Honestly that 5w panel and 2 18650s will keep a node going for a stupid long time even with mediocre sun coverage

That's what I'm using for my node and I don't think I've seen below 80% so far

[fierce moss]

The wisblock mppt charge controller doesn’t even kick on till they drop below 90

[toxic shard]

I'd imagine it's a pwm charge controller, have you seen reference to it being mppt?

[steady solar]

Yep I think I saw 91% once and that was it hah, extends the life of your batteries big time

[steady solar]

Oh yeah there it is

[steady solar]

Do we keep getting plane flyovers practically every night or something hah

Getting so many online nodes on my list, a bunch in mass and actually hit a new record of a few in Virginia earlier today

[void cape]

Virginia is an exceedingly far distance for a plane. It's more likely that someone put it on a weather balloon.

[void cape]

Apparently the LOS for a weather baloon is up to around 400 miles, which is pretty close to how far away that was.

Interestingly though, doesn't seem to be any buzz about it on Reddit?

[tardy steeple]

18650batterystore.com

[fierce moss]

yes

it was a plane or balloon

https://wg4ry.com/meshinfo/nodes.html

i was also flooded

actively seeing that virginia one at 4 hops

up to 6 hops away in virgina/washington

i doubt the devs will put node pruning into the firmware

but the data scrapers should be able to do that

[steady solar]

I pruned nodes at 11pm and here we are... Wow

[toxic shard]

Weird I didn't see any of that.

I saw one in VA yesterday morning, but nothing unusual last night

(that wasd 4 hops, the macOS UI doesn't show that in the node info pane, so ignore the signal strength)

[steady solar]

The ID is of RK02, I got 5 hops somehow

I saw it same time as you did yesterday, but my node list blew up again a few hours again it seems

[toxic shard]

Mine shows it at 8;11am on 9/5