US - Connecticut.

[toxic shard]

The Heltec T114 in the Muzi.works H2T case is a really nice tiny form factor for screen+gps, but it appears there may be some firmware (or worse, hardware) issues with the T114, so not recommending right now

For novice users the app really doesn't make the phone GPS stuff easy / clear.

At least on iOS

OH WAIT, WeHa is my friend

[void cape]

Heh

[toxic shard]

His should have been sending location. I tested that when I went over his place after visiting you @hoary oxide

It's one of these Garth specials https://www.etsy.com/listing/1519629483/mesh-terminal-meshtastic-node-in?ref=shop_review

[hoary oxide]

Interesting. I don’t see his node anymore.

[toxic shard]

No GPS and no battery, just USB powered

I wouldn't expect you to see it, we checked LOS and it's not good

[hoary oxide]

Right, so not mobile.

[toxic shard]

His is indoors, second floor

[hoary oxide]

Yeah. Wonder how I got a hit. I was closer to the southern end of town today with the T-Beam… but this is registered on my house node.

[toxic shard]

Maybe if he got it on a big antenna on his chimney you'd have better luck, but we told him he doesn't have enough life insurance for that

Did it show hops?

[hoary oxide]

It didn’t.

[toxic shard]

Sometimes RF is a cruel mistress, who knows

Literally a plane flying over can bounce a single packet

[fierce moss]

yup

[fierce moss]

updated meshbot with more commands and several games

[tardy steeple]

It has arrived

You can add an external antenna according to the website .

[fierce moss]

ooh nice!

im waiting for that new GUI to come out

it looks sharp

they are still working on it though

[calm dawn]

I have a T114, I wouldn't recommend it until they figure out why longer messages fail unless you greatly reduce transmit power

[toxic shard]

Precisely. I hope they figure that out, and get the text to display bigger. Otherwise I quite like it.

[fierce moss]

Ok so

I got permission to move the TFG node to an 80ft tower

[tardy steeple]

There is discussion about it over in the #general chat currently

[fierce moss]

But i need someone who is willing to climb an 80ft tower lol

The clubhouse is at the peak. But there’s surrounding trees.

The tower, even at 70ft would be amazing

[fierce moss]

Or pole next to it at 50ft

I’ll look. Dunno who would climb that

[toxic shard]

There's always a crazy ham around somewhere looking for an excuse to use their tower climbing gear. I'll ask around but nots sure off the top of my head

[void cape]

An arborist may also be interested.

[nimble vale]

Hi I am a crazy ham

[toxic shard]

got mine today too

[tardy steeple]

I hate this keypad

[toxic shard]

it is... a keypad

that's the best thing i can say about it

[nimble vale]

Those give me so much blackberry nostalgia

[toxic shard]

i'd say that's mostly why i got it

[tardy steeple]

Somebody said they’re all blackberry surplus

[toxic shard]

Having some issues connecting to it with BLE from the web client, serial seemed to work ok

[fierce moss]

With climbing gear? 😄

[toxic shard]

We'll crowdfund gear if needed 🙂

Safety first 🙂

[tardy steeple]

Rent a bucket truck thinger?

[fierce moss]

i looked at those. they are stupid expensive to rent. even if we were only going to 50ft

[fierce moss]

so... ive been thinking... the TFG node...
If i can get it up to 50ft, itll increase coverage significantly.

I dont want to put a wisblock that high up. if it dies, we are screwed until we can get another climber back up

60ft of LMR400-ish wire is like $70

a Station G2 is $110

could run that from the shack on the ground, up the pole, and be pushing 1watt at 50ft

could be plugged in to start, but can work on getting a car battery and a solar charger on there

1w TX at 50ft, plus the G2's MUCH better filtering would make a huge difference i think

im going to call my eversource buddy tomorrow to see if he has anyone willing to climb too

if he does, i may order the G2 and cable....

[toxic shard]

It's not a bad plan for sure!

[tardy steeple]

Run it POE

[fierce moss]

My base station here is POE

Pi4 with a custom hat and e22 board

Pxe boot. All remote storage

But i also have solar backup and propane here

For the club though, it doesn’t solve my problem of keeping the node easily updatable. As it needs to be solar.

I refuse to put up critical mesh infrastructure that isn’t independent from the grid.

So as it’s an esp32 device, i need a solid car battery and solar charger for it that will keep up i think

Push it from ground level. Adjust output for line loss.

The solar is the hardest part.

[tardy steeple]

About how much was that to assemble ?

[fierce moss]

~$180 for the box and stuff in it.

[tardy steeple]

Not bad

[nimble vale]

I need a new harness anyway so I would probably be interested if someone donated to the cause

[fierce moss]

What do they cost?

[nimble vale]

about 200

[toxic shard]

how is the solar exposure near the base? Is it just a matter of getting a big ass battery and some excessive panels?

[fierce moss]

It’s terrible at the moment. I’d have to clear a few trees.

[toxic shard]

@nimble vale I'll put in $50

What about nearby? Solar doesn't need to be right at the base of the tower

[fierce moss]

I’ll look at options. Has to be in a spot that won’t get shot at by the old men too lol

Maybe they have ones that can go on the tower/pole? It’ll be above the trees at 30ft.

Like a narrow 100w to avoid it being a sail.

Dunno

I’ll have to see how far a wire can run for DC off a 100w panel. And if that will keep it topped up.

Been researching and at 14.2v, the G2 uses 200-250ma on average

That’s what it’s looking like anyway

I think a standard lead acid car battery would power it for a week or so.

[toxic shard]

You could put a couple smaller ones like this in series one above the next to get enough voltage to keep losses from distance down.

Those are 20W

$25

Those into a mppt solar charge controller on a self-heating LFP battery would probably endure long term even through cloudy winters

[void cape]

We should ask W1JJA if he wants to run a node, he has a tower

[fierce moss]

Where is he?

[toxic shard]

(on the very iffy assumption his FCC is accurate)

(red pin is me)

[fierce moss]

The Bristol node will almost definitely hit him too

[toxic shard]

I should have bought a ton of nodes and brought them to the Nutmeg HamFest to sell

[fierce moss]

And TFG will almost definitely hit the Bristol node if it gets on that pole

It MAY hit it now from where it is

I’m hoping it does

[toxic shard]

Lent two nodes to a guy who lives up in Litchfield, so don't. be surprised to see some "Unwin"s show up

(I don't know where exactly)

[fierce moss]

Ha

Cool.

My base station and TFG both cover a good chunk of LITCHFIELD

[toxic shard]

https://a.co/d/8axXtf0

[fierce moss]

I bought the Station G2 last night

[toxic shard]

I've got one on the way as well

[fierce moss]

Buy stuff in chunks and it doesn’t seem like a lot lol

[toxic shard]

i keep tellingmyself that

[fierce moss]

And i have a spare 8.5 antenna

It’ll be an expensive node upgrade… $230 for the radio, antenna and coax

Plus the whole solar/battery setup

But it’ll be a full watt at awesome elevation.

[toxic shard]

Infrastructure is worth it

[fierce moss]

Need 2.5 beta so i can toss that Bristol node up. It’s ready

[toxic shard]

🤞

[tardy steeple]

Are these still current numbers?

[toxic shard]

no

There is no place to see numbers like that in any meaningful way. Liam's map app is the closest, and even it is not even remotely covering all nodes

https://meshtastic.liamcottle.net/?lat=-0.0022546487597418646&lng=284.94140625000006&zoom=2

[void cape]

Wolcott somewhere. He’s got a tower with 2m on it and has really good SNR on NFM 2m to Harwinton. Was just chatting with him from my car 2m

Also, why don’t you put the solar panel and the battery on the pole near the Meshtastic device but run a wire down the pole and put a switch there so you can restart it if it breaks down. Or just solder a wire onto the reset pin and bring that down the pole.

[toxic shard]

Doesn't help with doing updates nor if the node is fried and needs replacing. If you can put the node in an accessible location and still push out legal limit at the antenna, that's the more reasonable approach.

If you're using a 0.1W RAK Wisblock, doesn't really work out. But if you're using a Station G2 you can drive the power at the base enough to keep the ERP where you desire it.

[tardy steeple]

Now what’s better to set up MQTT on this liamcottle or the one from meshtastuc directly ?

[fierce moss]

Exactly

Liam’s. Meshtastics is super nerfed now

[tardy steeple]

.so right now I have a
T-beam
Heltec v3
Wismesh pocket
T1000e

Just playing around with these more or less . Would the station g2 be a good investment ?

I have my gmrs license and I failed my ham test last week . Gonna study up and try again

[toxic shard]

Even Liam's is down by almost half from earlier in the summer

[toxic shard]

Good on you for testing! Keep at it!

[toxic shard]

Depends on your goals. It's not a bad way to spend some cash, but if two $50 nodes in the field are better than one $100 nodes in a box

If I fall in love with mine when it arrives, I might change my tune

@tardy steeple What ID does your WisMesh Pocket think it has? There was a batch with bad bootloading that all got the same ID and it borks stuff. If you haven't done a Full Erase and reinstall you might want to.

(the little trash can on the right side of the flasher page)

[tardy steeple]

Oooo I had one of those actually posted it and Facebook and somebody screen capped it and the Meshtastic discord and it was resolved actually ended up sending it back to Florida and they sent me a new one

[toxic shard]

I'm full erasing every node I get from now on, that was a huge headache

[tardy steeple]

Yeah, I kinda like the station, but I was looking at it, and it has basically is literally open at all sides that kind of turned me off and purchasing it

I saw on principles I believe it was that somebody made like an enclosure for it and I was thinking about going for it, but I’m still thinking on it

[vagrant summit]

I’m in eastern NY near I-84. I sometimes see a node or two from just over the border when I’m hiking. If you see DMKU, say 👋

[fierce moss]

Liam's still collects realistic data though

the official meshtastic one only uses impercise gps data now.

lots of political nonsense

Lliam's at least works

you can setup MeshInfo or MeshSense

and do it local too

[toxic shard]

yup yup, which is phenominal

[fierce moss]

i publish to Lliam's but also run both of those

[toxic shard]

I only pub to Liam's but i'll eventually run local too

[fierce moss]

if we get bristol linked, you wont have to

can just use mine

its all local and on backup power

i have a week of standby propane, and working on transitioning part of my solar to offgrid solar

[tardy steeple]

I had a node I configured set up to a portable battery bank and would turn on after a power loss .

It worked as intended however the portable battery shut itself off as the node draws too low power

[fierce moss]

There’s a $5 usb to usb adapter that fixes that without adding much more draw

[tardy steeple]

I was thinking about getting like a SwitchBot like the photo. I just included to power on the portable battery pack that has a always on feature

[fierce moss]

when i flew a tbeam with the drone lol

totally not just with sketchy fishing line

[void cape]

Hahaha

[toxic shard]

Can you elaborate?

[fierce moss]

They make a tiny pass through adapter that forces powerbank ports to remain on even under low draw

It flickers a tiny larger draw every several seconds

[calm dawn]

@fierce moss Reading your discussion above about getting the router node higher. What if you built a box that included the antenna, panel, etc, and used a pulley to hoist it up the tower? Then you only need a climber once.

[fierce moss]

i dunno how secure a solar panel/box/etc will be if just on a rope

if its just an antenna permanently mounted up there, that should be a one time thing

it would make it simple if it could work though

nice normal wisblock node.

maybe it clicks into some sort of Y brace?

the antenna could always hang downwwards to not make it top heavy...

i need to see what kind of sun i can get if i knock a few trees down next to the pole

[toxic shard]

I just got some new prototype power boards from the guy who makes these: https://www.etsy.com/listing/1743333017/lithium-ion-and-polymer-battery?click_key=e3401a044b21680837dd033068be0e698a85a855%3A1743333017&click_sum=3295307f&ref=shop_home_feat_1&pro=1&frs=1&sts=1

(for funzies, those are the non-RAK polarity, but I can solder my own leads on using the through holes)

I'm actually making a listing for a DIY solar power kit for the RAK boards, it'll include the li-protect boards, the MPPT solar charge controller, the DC-DC buck converter for higher voltage solar panels, and both types/polarities of JST 2.0 cable. Just don't have it written up yet.

If you wire the solar panel to the mppt charger to the li-protect / rak board (with the battery then plugged into the li-protect other side, when it gets sunlight again it'll pop right back on and start charging and running.

I include the buck converters to keep it stable with either two panels in parallel, or whatever random voltage panels people might want to use.

I orderd two from him as a custom order

[tardy steeple]

I think I ordered a rak base from him

[fierce moss]

i had an mppt charge controller in the first TFG one

it failed

i figure theres no real reason for them honestly if you use 4x 18650s

nor the undervolt protection

if it dies with 4 batteries, then theres a larger problem

[fierce moss]

I tested the truck node from my brother's house in harwinton today and it was decently stable

not perfect, but ok

[tardy steeple]

I’m trying to get my rak node on WiFi and up and going

[fierce moss]

which rak node has wifi?

RAK2305 ?

the normal rak wisblock doesnt have wifi. just BLE and LORA

for any ESP32 node, you need to essentually put it RIGHT next to your Accesspoint/WifiRouter

as the wifi TX/RX is horrible on them

[tardy steeple]

https://gist.github.com/Elycin/0cc317cd4394641b0fea3f4f4004f386?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR07h2pa690wg0WMBl5HE96atrBNNQ8L8SORo8W5b8q_2tkQy1op3zPkGmU_aem_I6jwdvKlhuxzsTdGIT2ABg

[calm dawn]

Is it a tower, or a pole? If it's a tower with a flat side, you could have a PVC pipe or something across the back of the box to span the width of the tower. Assuming the pulley is "inside" the tower, tension and gravity would hold it in place.

[fierce moss]

theres both. can use either

[toxic shard]

@fierce moss looks like 2.5.4 is stable

[fierce moss]

Yea. It’s very close. 2.5.5 is out.

There’s a few issues still on git. They just worked out a pki key issue that fixed a lot

I’m guessing 2.5.5 is the last before beta.

[toxic shard]

no, 2.5.4 is beta

[void cape]

There will probably be another beta before they have the release.

[calm dawn]

Aren't you busy? 😆

[toxic shard]

There's always another beta, what release do you mean?

[fierce moss]

Oh!

They published 2.5.4 as beta? Nice

[void cape]

Something like that… lol

[fierce moss]

Are you there for the weekend?

I’ll probably be stopping by tomorrow

[void cape]

Oh cool. Yeah, all weekend.

[steady solar]

I dunno I have my tbeam 2 rooms over from the closest AP heh

I have a few esp32 devices all over the house - air quality monitoring, wled, the tbeam

Also a couple esp8266s for wled as well

[fierce moss]

yup. and the tbeams suck ass

put it RIGHT next to the AP if you want it stable

i have an excellently balanced unifi setup here. it wont work 15ft away

not stable

the tbeam supremes are stacked in such a way that it blocks the wifi RF

what little there is

[calm dawn]

I get around that issue by just not using the Wi-Fi interface lol

[fierce moss]

ha

sometimes you want/need it though 🙂

but i now have enough ip linked nodes that i dont need to use the tbeams

[calm dawn]

What do you use it for?

[fierce moss]

well now i have my base station that is the custom Pi4 with e22 hat

so that is my main IP based node

but you need TCP for MQTT (i have a local broker) and for running scripts against it

i have like 5 virtual nodes now. running different functions

all into the broker

those top left nodes are a few of the virtual ones. connected via mqtt and out the base station into the mesh

[steady solar]

@fierce moss 🤔

[fierce moss]

Probably my custom firmware freaking out.

[fierce moss]

yea i was doing crap to it that it didnt like lol

working on migrating everything to 2.5.4

[fierce moss]

gonna get everything updated and then see if i can get my buddy to go with me and put up the node this week

[fierce moss]

It was good meeting you Jared. Sorry it was rushed. Outings with a 2 year during his nap time are rough lol

[void cape]

Pleasure to meet you! No big deal about the rush. Had a great time this weekend overall. Also saw Bill in person as well while I was there.

(Granted, they’re my neighbor so we see each other anyway)

[fierce moss]

ill deploy the latest build to the router tonight and configure. test for a day or so and then get it live 🙂

[fierce moss]

well that was a hell of a night lol

banging my head against a wall for hours after upgrading my virtual nodes to 2.5.x

[toxic shard]

Did your head win, or the wall?

[toxic shard]

Is the Bantam Lake node online? My litchfield colleague couldn't hit it when I thought he'd be able to

him to where Bantam is on the map

[fierce moss]

I helped find a bug in the current firmware

It wasn’t me. I wasn’t crazy lol

[toxic shard]

You still might be, for other reasons 😛

What was the bug?

[fierce moss]

Ingress traffic was being dropped from mesh to mqtt for pki to pki DMs

Hours of troubleshooting lol

[toxic shard]

Do you recall who's running the Bantam Lake node?

[toxic shard]

🤓

[fierce moss]

Testing OTA flash to chipanee router now

Going to put it up
Tomorrow

[toxic shard]

Nice, i need to practice that

[fierce moss]

Let me see

Once it’s back up I’ll look

Ian is bantam

[toxic shard]

@steady solar did you see any Unwin nodes over the weekend?

[fierce moss]

i didnt see any in the scrapes

but then again my stuff was mostly broken while i was working on the firmware

[toxic shard]

🙂 Appreciate you checking

[steady solar]

I didn't see any recently sadly

[toxic shard]

Thanks. I'll do some troubleshooting. He's to the north on Maple St in Litchfield.

[fierce moss]

is he ok with you dropping a pin of his location for us?

[fierce moss]

You may see chipanee on the map

its not actually there yet

but im setting the position now

[steady solar]

Is anyone able to see if IR7M is still transmitting location packets? It shouldn't be but I'm not sure

[fierce moss]

You can check the site

http://meshsense.wg4ry.com

[toxic shard]

Thanks for making that available Gary, very useful

[fierce moss]

Tomorrow we see if TFG can link with chipanee

Or if we need to raise it to the other pole

Either way, it’ll help you guys

[toxic shard]

🎉

[toxic shard]

He hasn't told me his address yet, dont' know him well enough to ask yet. I think the node he was trying was locked up or otherwise borked. He reflashed it today. It's a T-Beam that was named "Unwin Spec5" but I'm not sure if it still has that name. Has GPS, so it'll probably show his location if it is picked up.

Seeing Chippanee on the map, even though it's not there yet, is so exciting.

[fierce moss]

make sure he enables Position Enabled and Percise Position under LongFast (channel 0) if he wants on the map

oh and turn off Ignore MQTT and turn ON "ok to mqtt"

those are the 4 big settings after setting region and names

after moving to 2.5.x, you have to specifically set all 4. they are off by default now

i was thinking of adding like a once a day broadcast to let people know to enable those if they want to use the mesh services

[fierce moss]

all strapped down in the truck ready to install.

nite all

[fierce moss]

@toxic shard happen to be there?

[toxic shard]

I’m here

[fierce moss]

You should see it

I don’t think it can quite hit tfg

But it’s getting tons of nodes

[toxic shard]

Nice!!

Almost wish nodes had an “finger” type function where they’d return a short blurb if you poked them. So you could put your contact info in.

[fierce moss]

Yea. That’s why i label with my call sign a

[toxic shard]

I’m seeing Bristol nodes I usually can’t from here. Excellent. Still not seeing 12da in Farmington

[toxic shard]

@fierce moss getting a 502 on your meshsense FYI

[fierce moss]

There were updates last night

I’ll start it again

There you go

[toxic shard]

I'm able to hit chip from my desk node inside my building, that's impressive

(desk node is currently Silver 8538)

80%+ of the nodes chip can see are mine 😬

Do you think I should drop SOL down to Client?

Now that a better Router is in range?

[void cape]

Okay, I think that the drone is bridging the gap to Chip for me

[fierce moss]

I would drop to client and see how the routes go

I’m going to grab my drone later and see at what height i can hit it

With like a tbeam

I was really hoping it would reach Torrington

So either we need to put TFG up on the taller pole/tower, or find a mid-spot

[void cape]

I actually haven’t seen any packets from it despite pinging it.

Chip, that is

[fierce moss]

I was hitting chipanee in spots in Terryville

[void cape]

Hmm

Well, I’ve got about 10 minutes of flight time left before I have to bring it down.

[fierce moss]

What node and version are on the drone?

[void cape]

It’s a small RAK and… not sure. Probably 2.4

[fierce moss]

Gotcha.

2.5.x is nice with the PKI DMs

[void cape]

Yeah I will update when it’s stable

[fierce moss]

2.5.4 is.
Only big bug is mqtt stuff

[void cape]

Yeah I’m not in that much of a rush

I’m still not seeing chip

[fierce moss]

What height?

[void cape]

400 feet AGL

At my house

(Well, 392 feet but close enough

[fierce moss]

Chip is pretty high…. The 10dbi antenna is kinda narrow, but it spreads

[void cape]

Considering I can see stuff in the Bristol valley, it’s got to be getting to Chip at minimum. But none of my traceroutes worked

[fierce moss]

I wonder if you upgraded to 2.5

[calm dawn]

How quiet are those motors on RF?

[fierce moss]

From what I’ve seen they do just work better when it’s all on 2.5

[void cape]

I’m not sure. But I’m able to hear most of the nodes in Bristol so I’m guessing not enough to impede signal. My SNR is 12.5db which is the same as when the drone is off

I have to bring it down very soon. Just about out of battery

[fierce moss]

Hell, you should at least be seeing it through unwin’s

We know he’s solid to it

On 7 hops?

[void cape]

Drone’s down

Yeah, not sure why I’m not seeing it.

[fierce moss]

Toss on 2.5.4 next time. Fast to go between them.

[fierce moss]

Don’t need a full flash. Just main partition

[void cape]

Is this the right one?

[fierce moss]

Yes. But i would delete it from the DB

Especially if you upgraded

The public key is stored locally

For pki

[void cape]

Mmm

[fierce moss]

It didn’t have one when yours saw that

I can compile you a 2.5.4 that removes the trace route limiting if you need it. Just let me know what node model

Though it’s not normally an issue anyway

[void cape]

Yeah I think something is still bugged with that firmware.

[fierce moss]

It’s pretty stable.

[void cape]

I got all sorts of other data but no traceroutes at all. Position data, battery data, not a single traceroute.

Wondering if that node was forwarding what I was seeing but not reporting itself due to a bug

[fierce moss]

It’s not that it’s buggy. More that it’s less backwards compatible than we were hoping

[void cape]

I’d say that is a bug lol

[fierce moss]

Not if everyone upgrades lol

[toxic shard]

Seeing Eric W1ERB's router node in berlin but not positioned

[fierce moss]

Are yours on 2.5 unwin?

[toxic shard]

2.5.4.8d288d5

For "Silver"

[void cape]

For several of the nodes heard, that would not be possible because many of them have been up for a while. So I don’t think the issue is with the nodes heard necessarily

[fierce moss]

Let me know if you’re running a local meshsense.

[toxic shard]

Seeing that 12da in Farmington is awesome

[void cape]

Eg.

[fierce moss]

I can get you a firmware that removes the TR limits. By default, 2.5.x limits to one every… 60 seconds i think

[void cape]

2.3 also does that it appears

It’s not really a problem imo

[toxic shard]

I don't have meshsense set up at home yet because I don't have a great device to run it on yet. My home mac is Intel and my Ham PC is far from a node and I'm not sure it even has bluetooth. I'll work on it

[void cape]

I was able to send several traceroute requests and none of them worked

[fierce moss]

Meshsense sends TRs automatically, but does a bunch. So only 1 will get through without modifying

Back in a bit

[void cape]

Hmm

[toxic shard]

Meshsense does a TR when it sees a new node, or when the number of hops on a node it's already seen changes.

Usually during a workday I leave a node on top of my car to relay over the hill a bit and hit home. With Chip in place I left the node off today and i'm still able to get home. 8538 -> GFR2 -> SOL -> JW+

Noice

Eventually, by EOY I hope, we'll have a nice base node here at work and it'll help round out the bristol net, maybe reach further into southington.

(big maybe on that last bit)

[toxic shard]

@steady solar bantam lake is showing up as client mute. Any reason for the mute?

[steady solar]

Yep, I don't want it participating in routing as it's inside the house and does not have good connectivity. The router is on the roof and is standard client role.

[toxic shard]

Ahh, didn’t see the router when I glanced

[fierce moss]

OOOH

i might be seeing intermittent packets

thats a good sign

lets see....

oh wait maybe thats stale data

in the client

but then again i dont think so? hrmmm

im resetting the nodedb on my base station here

lets see what it collects

[fierce moss]

BLR1 is your roof?

[void cape]

Huh…

I can’t seem to send packets from a 2.3 to a 2.5

The 2.5 can’t reply, it seems

[fierce moss]

there are strange issues.... yea

im going to upgrade TFG's router to 2.5.4 shortly

pray that the OTA update works

or have to come back and get a ladder lol

[void cape]

I’m updating the drone node and 9f04 to see how that behaves

[fierce moss]

ok

ill try to upgrade the router today...

especially if theres any chance itll help to bristol. but i doubt it.

ill have to get a drone up to see what height gets to bristol

[void cape]

400 feet from Harwinton totally works but it probably would work even with 200 feet from my location

[fierce moss]

TFG is at about 1500ft

its right at the crest

if i can get it another 30-50

should be ok i think

rebooting base station

[steady solar]

Yessir

[void cape]

The tbeam refuses to update via the flasher website so I had to use the cli one

It works I guess

[fierce moss]

wierd

how did you put it into dfu? follow the site instructions?

i just flashed 2 tbeams from the site in the last 2 days

oooh yea

a packet or two are leaking through

theres a JW node packet that made it through

unless thats off your drone

JW is Unwin

yea. im seeing all sorts of nodes now

bouncing through you

[void cape]

Drone it is yep

[fierce moss]

i like it

[void cape]

The antenna is heavy enough that it pokes straight down and polarizes vertically like I want

[toxic shard]

i set up my "at work on top of car" node 20min ago or so, if that changed anything

ATLA

[fierce moss]

TFG router upgraded to 2.5.4

[fierce moss]

It’s recommended that you reset your nodedb if you use it

[steady solar]

Is there any downside to fully formatting when reflashing? Besides the obvious change in settings

Yes my goal is to make sure people don't see duplicate nodes

[fierce moss]

No. You’ll just need to fully reconfigure

[steady solar]

Ok cool, I usually like to do that

[fierce moss]

Not an option for OTA updates

Other than that, yea

[steady solar]

Right. Did you update via the NRF connect app for this version?

My tbeam indoors I usually nuke heh

[fierce moss]

I did. For both routers.

I have a process list i made

This one was slightly more complicated as i migrated off the old admin channel to the new pki admin setup

[tardy steeple]

I never get the OTA TK work anyway

Gonna be working on my rak wirekess solar WiFi node soon

[fierce moss]

nice

OTA works well as long as you use the right tools and follow the process exactly

but it's def still far less stable

but if it's way up on a pole or roof....

[fierce moss]

so! i definitely saw two of Unwin's nodes 14min ago

very very speradic

but that means it's doable

the station g2 is supposed to have very good selectivity

so good hearing, 1 watt, and +30=40ft will get us there

[toxic shard]

nice

the G2 is on a "5dBi" antenna, indoors, second floor with just one exterior wall between it and the outside facing west. Temporary until I figure out how I want to do an exterior mount.

I think SOL (rak with a "8dBi" antenna, outdoors, maybe 15' up) probably has better reach right now, but who knows.

I put G2 there mostly to fill in for local stuff if SOL is overshooting

[void cape]

I highly doubt that node heard 9f04 when it was in Winsted; probably the location didn’t update on return

[fierce moss]

Yea, meshtastic’s gps beaconing is kinda crap.

[void cape]

I find it very surprising that we don’t see chip at all

[fierce moss]

I bet you we will if i get it on the pole.

Next week I’ll try some drone testing at hat height

Next to the pole

My barn covers a lot of what TFG does. I wonder if we could find a like a wide beamed 180ish degree shaped antenna

[steady solar]

Just a heads up I have IR7M at a friend's house in West Bristol from about 7:00 p.m. last night until about 9;00 p.m. tonight

Might explain some connections

I don't know why on some maps it still shows the old old old location, I turned it off ages ago

@fierce moss Is your process any different than what the meshtastic documentation says for OTA updates?

[fierce moss]

just slightly.

Remote admin to it or connect to it over ble

Set to client mode

Make sure power saving is off

DISCONNECT CLIENT-
Set node to NONE on android client!

Download new firmware from git

Open in "My Files" client

Extract Firmware-rak4631-xxx-ota.zip - from main zip.
leave this zip compressed.

use app "NRF CONNECT"

Redresh

Connect

Dfu- tiny curcle top right

select Zip file

Click OK

There will be ONE scarry/red line. Normal.

Another red at end. Normal.

Great success!

Check all settings.

Set back to router mode (will disable BLE)

with this new one, i also set my admin public keys before setting it back into router mode

i do that from the CLI.

[steady solar]

Niiiice thank you! Don't want to have to go on my roof again hah

[fierce moss]

Leave it in client mode until you add the admin keys. I can help you do that after

It’ll let you easily manage it via another node

Even if you plan on leaving it in client mode, it’s good to have the keys in there just in case you ever accidentally put it in router mode. The Bluetooth will shut off.

[tardy steeple]

@fierce moss

[toxic shard]

@steady solar still seeing positions from I7RM

Probably need to turn it off on the public channel settings perhaps?

[steady solar]

That's so weird, it's entirely off there and everywhere position is a thing. I guess when I update that node I'll do a fresh wipe and start anew. Thanks for letting me know

[tardy steeple]

T114 replacements

https://www.reddit.com/r/meshtastic/s/4kU14rKrQG

[toxic shard]

Thanks for the heads up. Emailed in for my replacement.

[fierce moss]

what were the issues?

[fierce moss]

do you not want it broadcasting your location? is that the mobile one or base station?

[calm dawn]

You asking about the T114?

[steady solar]

Correct, I don't want my mobile node broadcasting location. I enabled it by hitting share phone location to mesh, but I turned that off weeks ago. I also reset my channels to make sure it wasn't set to broadcast position.

Dunno why it's still sending location telemetry tho...

[fierce moss]

Yea

[fierce moss]

Ahh

[calm dawn]

It fails to send longer messages unless you reduce power, seems to be a hardware limitation they had to redesign the board to rectify

[void cape]

I also had the drone up for a little bit so some messages may have gone through

[fierce moss]

I’m driving in Terryville so I’m on the chipanee side lol

Just amped up another guy to get one

[toxic shard]

Got your “East mesh” message

[steady solar]

Yee haw pardners

[fierce moss]

I think ian wins

[toxic shard]

For the first time I was able to get a message out from Target in Southington. It's in a bit of a gully so it's never worked in the past, but I sent a message last night on the public channel and got it at home 🎉

[fierce moss]

Nice!

I really want to link the routers now lol

It opened up so much

[toxic shard]

Did you get any pics of the Chippanee install?

[toxic shard]

noice

[fierce moss]

Finding someone to climb the pole/tower before winter i think is the goal

[toxic shard]

Any of the mount in place on the roof?

[fierce moss]

I’ll have the g2 soon

[fierce moss]

What do you mean

[toxic shard]

Like, a picture from up on the roof

[fierce moss]

Oh. No. I should have

[toxic shard]

No worries, you shared what the assembled mount looked like before, so I'll use my imagination 🙂

Drone time 🙂

[toxic shard]

Gary, looks like your meshsense web lost it's node icons. Seeing it trying to hit these URLs: https://icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev/api/genHexer?name=4146374292

[fierce moss]

The node has crashed a few times

Not sure why. I’m heading to ny to go du k hunting. I’ll get it up when my buddy is driving

[fierce moss]

Weird. It looks ok to me

[toxic shard]

I'm getting connection refused from icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev

[fierce moss]

Where are you? Work/home?

[toxic shard]

I'm at home

[tardy steeple]

Quack

[fierce moss]

Maybe I’ll reset it

Give me a few

Does it work on your phone?

[steady solar]

works for me

[fierce moss]

Or another browser?

Yea worked on my phone too

[toxic shard]

Does work from my phone, interesting

[steady solar]

issue from your home internet?

try changing dns servers

[toxic shard]

I checked 4 different DNS servers, they all give me the same results (google, cloudflare, etc)

[fierce moss]

Or try incognito mode

To stop Adon’s

[toxic shard]

joshua@Benatar:meshtastic % host icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev
icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has address 104.21.59.8
icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has address 172.67.167.99
icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has IPv6 address 2606:4700:3035::ac43:a763
icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has IPv6 address 2606:4700:3033::6815:3b08
joshua@Benatar:meshtastic % host icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev 8.8.8.8
Using domain server:
Name: 8.8.8.8
Address: 8.8.8.8#53
Aliases: 

icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has address 104.21.59.8
icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has address 172.67.167.99
icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has IPv6 address 2606:4700:3033::6815:3b08
icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has IPv6 address 2606:4700:3035::ac43:a763
joshua@Benatar:meshtastic % host icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev 1.1.1.1
Using domain server:
Name: 1.1.1.1
Address: 1.1.1.1#53
Aliases: 

icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has address 104.21.59.8
icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has address 172.67.167.99
icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has IPv6 address 2606:4700:3035::ac43:a763
icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev has IPv6 address 2606:4700:3033::6815:3b08
joshua@Benatar:meshtastic % 

maybe it's an IPv6 thing

(incog doesn't help)

[fierce moss]

Weird

I’m using a cloudflare tunnel. But that’s an external image anyway

Hit shift and refresh

[tardy steeple]

Stuff like that happens when I have this enabled at times

[toxic shard]

it's something with my mac for sure, I probably screwed with .dev years ago and have forgotten where

because even though DNS is showing IPs, ping is going to localhost

joshua@Benatar:meshtastic % ping icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev
PING icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev (127.0.0.1): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=64 time=0.038 ms
64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=0.047 ms
^C
--- icongaga-api.bytedancer.workers.dev ping statistics ---
2 packets transmitted, 2 packets received, 0.0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 0.038/0.042/0.047/0.005 ms

I must have installed Pow on here at some point https://github.com/basecamp/pow

Or if not Pow (which I used to use for Rails dev, but I don't think I ever did on this 2019 macbook pro, something else put or prompted me to put a /etc/resolver/dev file in pointed at localhost. I moved that to another name and now the images for the node hexes are working.

Thus concludes Friday IT Woes with Unwin

[steady solar]

Side note, glad I tested OTA update on my mobile node first. Apparently the newest version of nrf connect android app still doesn't work well with meshtastic. Had to revert to the old version via documentation

Going to update my roof node, wish me luck hah

[toxic shard]

good luck!

[steady solar]

Went swimmingly! 😄

Side note, any recommendations on an ESP32 based static home node that will always be powered? I gotta say I'm less than impressed with the tbeam, constantly seem to have issues with it. Not sure if it's a tbeam or firmware for tbeam issue but just seems unstable in most ways

[fierce moss]

Always powered? For a mute client or for the base station?

[steady solar]

mute client in the house i'll stay connected to

i'll always have it plugged into power so battery optional

[fierce moss]

Get the new tdeck

[steady solar]

would be nice for a power outage incident but not required because i have other nodes

[fierce moss]

The new ui will be nice

[steady solar]

is that the tdeck plus?

[fierce moss]

Tdeck plus or whatever. Yea

[steady solar]

niiice does look slick and has the added ability to use it as a standalone device. i like!

[fierce moss]

Yea

And the new ui is in beta but it looks really nice

[steady solar]

Super weird that the ESP32 chip they claim to ship with it is the "ESP32-S3FN16R8"... yet that chip doesn't exist from Espressif?

Closest I could find is the ESP32-S3FN8

According to their naming convention this one should provide 16mb of flash memory

wonder if this is some kind of wonky homebrew though hah

[toxic shard]

This node is an experiment in having a solar-only, no-battery node

Not something I intend to deploy, more for lols

I think it's over-paneled enough that it'd run on an entirely cloudy day. Just messing around. It's using the solar panel gary suggested in the comms channel recommended narrow box. Not even mounted, just in there. Rather than cutting a square hole in the lid, I used a hole saw that was big enough to let the panel's junction box fit. Quick and dirty.

antenna is the rak pcb antenna. Like I said, quick and dirty

[fierce moss]

Why?

[toxic shard]

why not?

[fierce moss]

The problem with raks is they brownout

[toxic shard]

not if you don't have a battery

[fierce moss]

Oh

[steady solar]

can't keep dirty power if you dont have any 😉

[fierce moss]

Ehh sure. Cant hurt i guess

I mean nothings dirtier than constant variable solar lol

But it’s an experiment

[toxic shard]

i'm not advocating for it, i'm just seeing how bad an idea it is. This is using the regulated 5v USB output of the panel

[fierce moss]

Sure 🙂

[steady solar]

hahahah i can't imagine it will go well but sure will be an interesting experiment

Side note, I think I got my mobile node to stop broadcasting location. Update seems to have fixed it, nothing in 2 hours according to meshsense

[toxic shard]

i've got more boxes and more panels for more legit builds. What i'm lacking is time, or focused time.

nice, what did you do to fix it Ian?

[steady solar]

simply updated to 2.5.5

go figure.

[toxic shard]

heh

[steady solar]

wonder if a bug in it was fixed or just needed a nice ol reboot

didn't really sift through changelogs to find out

[tardy steeple]

You see this ?

RTHIEAI Waterproof Outdoor IP67 Junction Box (8.7"x6.7"x4.3") with Mounting Plate, Hinged Clear Cover and Wall Brackets - Weatherproof ABS Plastic Electrical Enclosure for DIY Projects (220x170x110mm) https://a.co/d/aMqsWDt

[toxic shard]

haven't seen that one specifically, but there's a lot like that, very handy

this is the one i'm using for these smaller nodes https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B2RH6Y9G?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title

[fierce moss]

I don’t like clear

[tardy steeple]

I just picked that one up has some hardware and a mounting bracket included .

Only thing I would add is a breather .

[fierce moss]

Adds UV radiation to the internals

I have breathers

If you need one

[toxic shard]

Noticing I'm not seeing device metrics from the Chippanee router.

[fierce moss]

Which metrics?

[fierce moss]

I feel like all these issues are Unwin problems lol

[toxic shard]

hehe

[tardy steeple]

What’s better in a solar node ?

18650/21700 or flat lipo battery cells

[fierce moss]

It comes down to what is better in freezing temps. There’s a whole channel in this discord for that.

My gamble this winter is 4x 18650s will survive

[toxic shard]

I've got a LTO kit to put together for a node, haven't gotten around to it yet.

[void cape]

Yeah, same… something is wrong with it

Probably a firmware issue

[fierce moss]

Ne t time I’m in the area i can hit it’s settings

[surreal sable]

Wow - I’m going to have to add a couple to my solar node…

[steady solar]

I have 2 in mine, guess we'll find out hah

[void cape]

@fierce moss Did you set up your APRS digipeater yet? I had surprisingly good APRS reception in downtown Torrington today.

[fierce moss]

Nope. I have a plan, but not yet.

Probably spring honestly. Too many other projects and zero money.

[steady solar]

Up in VT for the weekend, basically no nodes past Bennington up through Stratton and Killington 😢

Was hoping there would be more traction up here but no dice

[void cape]

Yeah, not a lot up there when I went. North of Mass it basically drops off

I have a friend in Albany area in NY that’s trying to get their ham club to get into it

[fierce moss]

Yea I’m up on the NY side of Champlain

I think i only caught 2 nodes on the way up

[steady solar]

Oh that's funny, we're just on the opposite side. I'll wave from the east side of the lake! Heading up to Stowe tomorrow for a bit

[toxic shard]

Tempted at the Nutmeg Hamfest. Not one actual bit of Meshtastic stuff among all the vendors. Feels like a market opportunity.

Should have gotten a better shot of the asking price

[surreal sable]

Need to educate the masses

[toxic shard]

Only bought a power meter and some ferrites and some n-female bulkhead to sma male, should be useful for the Station G2s

[tardy steeple]

Ham fest down south had a few Meshtastic devices , not one person was interested in them at all .

Even had sad hams shutting off repeaters during SandR operations because “ unlicensed people “ needed help

[fierce moss]

95% of hamfests are guys over 75

No one cares about digital anything

They are all trying to hawk their boat anchors

At least at the smaller ones

[tardy steeple]

You see this ?

https://discord.com/channels/867578229534359593/1243316017480994826

[toxic shard]

I had not seen it, looks handy.

[void cape]

I have the 2m/70cm version of that base antenna that is like 17 feet tall. Worth it… but wow my area has poor coverage at 50 watts on that

[void cape]

There were a dozen folks chatting with them at Hamexposition in Mass recently. I think it depends on where you go.

I think that for hams, there’s more interest in low cost QRP gear than there is in Meshtastic because there’s the potential to transmit beyond the horizon; Meshtastic allows data to the horizon on a mesh which is about the same usable range as using 2m on repeaters.

Since they perceive 2m handhelds to be easier to use to communicate with people on local repeaters, they are more inclined to use it than a complex digital mode that honestly has a relatively lame mesh connectivity.

I’m still convinced that there’s a long standing issue with the firmware in a situation where packets are simply not being forwarded properly.. particularly noticeable at one hop behind the horizon.

Maybe my understanding of how their system is designed is flawed but it seems like the mesh capability is far underperforming compared to how I would expect it to behave.

[fierce moss]

I mean I get it, but i can hand a tdeck to my wife

Or kid

That’s the advantage

Then again I’ll make sure he gets his tech by like 6 years old lol

[tardy steeple]

I got my wife a t1000e

[toxic shard]

Getting my wife a t1000e would be easy. Keeping it charged not so much

[fierce moss]

Ha

[toxic shard]

Very low tolerance limits on tech. My best bet is putting one in her car that is charged as she drives and maybe she'd be able to grab it if she had to go

[tardy steeple]

Just got my tbeam up and going

[steady solar]

Ooooh hey @toxic shard

Anything change over the long weekend? Seeing quite a few more folks more consistently now towards Farmington. Still no 7R1 @nimble vale

[toxic shard]

Itsa me

Nothing changed over the weekend I can think of

My stuff is largely the same. Moved a11e slightly due to mowing, but it’s literally on the ground so I doubt it was doing much

Saw one new station TanK203 yesterday, otherwise nothing new

@steady solar send a message to CARD let’s see if it works

[steady solar]

Sent from my roof node, having issues with my in house node

Got some reason I only have SOL and G2 seen recently, CARD is showing last seen 10h ago

[toxic shard]

Hmm

Card has a very small antenna and I was in a building most of the day. Should be in range now.

[steady solar]

@toxic shard I see SOL is in router mode, is this intentional?

I thought router was only for like top of mountains n whatnot

[toxic shard]

Yes. I’m on top of a mountain.

SOL has the best reach of anything in plainville and Southington. Only the new chippanne node matches it in this area.

I might set it back to client once a pinnacle rock node is up that can reach over both sides of the rattlesnake mountain.

[fierce moss]

G2 came in while i was in NY

Will need to see what we need to do to keep a battery charged with its usage…

1watt at that added height plus the g2’s better selectivity should do it i think…

Unless we just go nuclear and toss a yagi up there…

Anyone seen anything in 915 that pushes like 180 degrees?

My base station will handle this side of the mountain. A 180 degree push on the other side would be more than enough…

[toxic shard]

That flat one I posted a few weeks back was 180 or so. Let me see if I can find it.

Can’t find it. It was too expensive anyhow.

[tardy steeple]

How hard is it too spot weld a battery cell ?

[toxic shard]

😬

[tardy steeple]

Saw this wanna do it .

https://youtu.be/ROzkbjWR8lw?si=J_aF7BuO8TQoTnr9

[fierce moss]

We have a few up ghost

Using a modified version of TCC’s build

[tardy steeple]

Nice

[steady solar]

@toxic shard did you get any messages? Sent to G2 and CARD

[toxic shard]

nope

Which node did they come from?

I've been messing with G2 so it's been up and down, but CARD should have received anything that could hop through SOL

[steady solar]

BLR1 since my indoor node is acting a fool

Sent another to card

[toxic shard]

SOL hasn't heard BLR1 in 3 days. Just sent a message from SOL to it now

Wonder if it was when Gary was in Terryville if that created a path that isn't usually there. Just a shot in the dark

[toxic shard]

ok, G2 is updated, now doing my liam map uplink (supreme is offline). I've fixed the power supply for G2 so now the PA is active and it should be full recommended power

I'd had it on a battery pack that does the needed 15v USB PD, but what I hadn't noticed is when I plug the MicroUSB in to charge that battery, it stops doing PD, so the PA wasn't on. I've taken the battery out of the loop and it's just on a good PD wall charger.

probably would need a more advanced power pack that can take PD in and give it out at the same time if I wanted battery backup

[tardy steeple]

Is the g2 available stateside or only overseas ?

[toxic shard]

It's available stateside

https://shop.uniteng.com/product/meshtastic-mesh-device-station-edition/

[tardy steeple]

Might have to pick one up

[toxic shard]

It's an interesting device. It's not perfect and some people aren't finding the benefits they hoped for. Others are. The main advice is to benchmark with the included antenna before using coax or an external antenna. Get that baseline before trying to get fancy without data

[tardy steeple]

Website says Ships From: Shenzhen, China

[toxic shard]

Mine showed up very quickly

know what, I got mine from Tindie I think

https://www.tindie.com/products/neilhao/meshtastic-mesh-device-station-g2/

[tardy steeple]

My bank card won’t work from an overseas site

[toxic shard]

I'll keep an eye out for a US distributor, but it probably won't happen in the short term

[fierce moss]

How did we get that test from Southington?

also, replied to ConnNet test you sent at 10:20pm on 10/11

---

Basic Recommended Node Settings For Our Mesh

Ignore MQTT: Disabled
Ok to MQTT: Enabled
Transmit: Enabled
Number of Hops: 7

Allow Position Requests and Precise Location (under the primary channel and ConnNet) are recommended but obviously not required

---

Connecticut MQTT Broker (Full In/Out for authorized clients)
Message me for a login. Anon is off.

ctpublicbroker.greatacresfarm.com:1883

MQTT Encryption Enabled (needed for firmware 2.5+)
Map Reporting Enabled

Make sure under Channels - LongFast (the Primary) that you have Uplink/Downlink/Requests/Position enabled
And any other channels you want to send. They will send encrypted.
Under LoRa - Ignore MQTT needs to be Off and OK TO MQTT needs to be ON
Under Module - MQTT - Map Reporting Enabled
I also enable my Neighbor Module, but that isnt needed

Forwarding map data ONLY to Lliams and Official MQTT

Forwarded/Subscriber Topic to use: msh/US/GAFnet

Standardized Secondary Channel

ConnNet
pJgk5XqJY8Ar+jSqC5W81g==
(128bit)

^if any mods saw the message in #general, if you could, please pin the above message. Ty!

[toxic shard]

I didn't see the reply on ConnNet

What message in general?

[fierce moss]

I was just asking the mods to pin that

[tardy steeple]

What’s this ?

[fierce moss]

Just a secondary channel we are using

Outside of ch0 for testing

[tardy steeple]

Ooo ok

[tardy steeple]

Putting a strip of tape on the battery in a t-beam is very useful

[toxic shard]

Smart

[steady solar]

Who is the absolute unit over here

[tardy steeple]

What does that even mean lol

[toxic shard]

That's my work G2

It's not actually on that building yet, hopefully by EOY

It's inside a building and not on USB PD (so no amp) and it's on the stock antenna. Not sure how that qualifies as an absolute unit?

[tardy steeple]

After you complete the steps for mqtt about how long does it take to appear on the map ?

[toxic shard]

very quickly. Double check the nodes have "Ok to MQTT" enabled.

And that uplink on the channel is on

And make sure you're pointed at the right broker and all the parameters are set per the instructions.

[tardy steeple]

I followed everything on https://meshtastic.liamcottle.net/

[toxic shard]

I'd set up my home G2 to do wifi mqtt last night, but it wasn't very stable (typical esp32 issues), so I reverted that. I'm back on my T-Beam Supreme as the wifi mqtt for the house.

Does your node have GPS or a fixed position set? If you have another node, do "exchange positions" with it, sometimes that triggers the position to go out over mqtt

what is your node id? (the hex)

[tardy steeple]

It’s a tbeam and it has gps.

[toxic shard]

Does the GPS have a lock?

[tardy steeple]

I’m not sure

[toxic shard]

Does it have a screen?

if so, gps status is on two of the later screens

[toxic shard]

Yeah, that shows 3 sats. The next screen should have your coords, no need to show that though

[tardy steeple]

Yes it shows

[toxic shard]

Does the final screen show your IP address?

[tardy steeple]

Yes

[toxic shard]

Can you show your MQTT settings screen?

in the app, or web client, or CLI info

[toxic shard]

hmm, seems good

and does the node have the normal public channel with uplink and position sharing enabled on it?

(turning in, will check back on the flip side)

[tardy steeple]

Yes

[steady solar]

Just a G2 casually hanging out at ESPN, gave me a chuckle. Figured it was replacing a satellite 😉

I sent another message to card and sol btw

[fierce moss]

So change the topic to something else.
/mesh/us/ghost

And go to channels/channel 0/and make sure mqtt uplink is on

[steady solar]

So this is weird, I keep seeing nodes appearing but getting "hops away: unknown" and I can't seem to complete a traceroute to these nodes despite seeing them.

[toxic shard]

Not received on CARD, will check SOL in a bit

[steady solar]

Okeydoke. I seem to see CARD a few times a day, SOL more consistently

[void cape]

I took the drone out two times in the last few days and the radio was still strapped to it. One of those days was when the solar flare was going on

[void cape]

I think the chimpanee node has been causing this somehow

[fierce moss]

Weird

My guess is it’s getting random weak packets.

By default a node only does a full beacon every 4 hours.

[tardy steeple]

It showed up after like 2/3 hours

[fierce moss]

Most node info shows up incomplete from partial packet details

Non-beacon/telemetry packets a

[toxic shard]

I've been having a lot more trouble with traceroutes lately, not sure why.

[sudden locust]

You can try to turn off GPS in the app if the GPS module is not installed, because the current firmware will try to probe all GPS types within one minute after the system starts, which will cause the system to respond very slowly within the first one minute, and the button response also can be felt significantly delayed, which may also affect MQTT.

[toxic shard]

Thanks Neil 🙂 Welcome to the CT channel, where the G2 fleet is growing 🙂

(Neil makes them)

[fierce moss]

Nice!

Thinking of replacing one of the main routers here with a G2.

Do you have anyone doing solar with them?

Was thinking a car battery/100w panel and trickle charger….
Dunno what is overkill or what is practical

[toxic shard]

They've got a wide external dc input range. Biggest challenge is the connector, and that's not a big problem, just not something you can order pre-made as far as I've found.

[sudden locust]

I know a great guy in San Diego have a solar node with station g2, but I personally do not recommend using solar to power the station g2:) Because esp32 s3 consumes too much power, much more than RF PA. The main reason for choosing esp32 is that only ESP32 supports Store & Forward Module and wifi: https://meshtastic.org/docs/configuration/module/store-and-forward-module/

[toxic shard]

Neil's Nano G2 uses nRF52, but it doesn't support an external antenna or PA. Feels like there's room for a third line with nRF52 and PA, but obviously actually making a product viably is easier said than done.

nRF52, PA, LNA, and a proper solar circuit with low voltage cutoff, etc, would be the dream.

[fierce moss]

I’ve been using rak’s due to power yea.

But the main reason for wanting the G2 in this location is the output power.

This antenna will be mounted 50-70ft in the air over the shack.

With a G2, i can tweak the output power to make up for the coax loss

[toxic shard]

exactly my use too, though that LNA for rx is also a good benefit

[fierce moss]

Yea

But i want all critical mesh infrastructure to be grid independent

So if we toss on a solid car battery, a 100w RV trickle charger… I’m thinking it will be fine

[toxic shard]

I'd call it Expedition G2

Gary, have you played with Store & Forward? I haven't yet

[steady solar]

Welcome @sudden locust thanks for stopping by 🙂
Was considering picking up a station g2 to replace my finnicky tbeam - is there a recommended prebuilt (dedicated) way to power it via battery, aside from a battery pack? Perhaps something that utilizes 18650's - I see there is a battery docker for the G1.

[sudden locust]

In fact, you can use any 9VDC-19VDC External Power Supply (The maximum output power should be greater than or equal to 20W) to power the Station G2. Many users directly use the 12V cigarette lighter to power the Station G2.
more info: https://wiki.uniteng.com/en/meshtastic/station-g2#external-power-supply

Battery Docker is no longer in production because it is essentially a power bank that does not automatically shut down when the output current is low . Station G2's RF PA consumes almost no power in RX state, and many power banks may automatically shut down for protection due to low current output. However, recently, there are already many power banks that can output low current without shutting down, so battery docker is no longer needed. More info:
https://wiki.uniteng.com/en/meshtastic/station-g2#community-verified-compatible-power-banks-for-station-g2

[fierce moss]

I have not yet

[fierce moss]

Do you happen to know what the average hourly or daily power consumption is with the GPS disabled?

[toxic shard]

I got one of the VT103 power banks, not bad. It doesn’t fill the “ups” sort of need because the PD stops when charging through the micro port. Hunting for other options.

[sudden locust]

Power Consumption Measurement:
https://wiki.uniteng.com/en/meshtastic/station-g2#power-consumption-measurement

The average power consumption is actually related to the number of nodes and messages in the network. According to feedback from users who use VT103 power bank, the battery life with this 10000mAh power bank is about 8-12 hours. But I don't think their network is busy 🙂

[toxic shard]

Weird, felt like mine was lasting a lot longer on the VT103. Makes me want to do more testing.

I like this idea's direction. Imagine a phone with built-in meshtastic 😍 https://www.etsy.com/listing/1809409591/maglink-t114-magsafe-meshtastic-case

[toxic shard]

We are doing a cybersecurity capture the flag event at work (CTF) and I submitted a challenge to decrypt a meshtastic message. Hopefully someone gets it. The organizer AI-ed this image

[tardy steeple]

Would a motorcycle battery be a better option for sizing ?

[fierce moss]

Na. Too small

I want 2 weeks standby

Minimum

[tardy steeple]

Why not build a power bank outta 18650 or 21700s ?

[fierce moss]

I’ve built my own before. I have hundreds of 18650s that I’ve ripped out, capacity tested, etc.

But it’s a non-heated space.
A car battery and mppt charge controller is likely just the best solution.

[tardy steeple]

I used to manage a vape shop and we got an order to stop selling 18650s they told me go throw in dumpster and dispose .

Ya that’s not responsible at all took them home . I have a large box

Car battery seems like a better choice after thinking about it

[fierce moss]

48ah should be 5 days standby.
Could look at different options

5-7

Like…

https://www.facebook.com/share/UMynYCPzhqG2GQV8/?mibextid=79PoIi

Something like these in parallel would be 2ish weeks

Maybe talk him down to $50

Dunno

I’m running out of extra funds lol. I’ll see where I’m at this weekend.

[fierce moss]

https://www.facebook.com/share/zDzmTeY9KHCUY8oM/?mibextid=79PoIi

That’d last 2 weeks-ish

There’s options

[tardy steeple]

How would you use them for power tho ? Like wiring wise .

[toxic shard]

The G2 has an external input, just need to get the right connector, wire it up, fuse for good luck.

[fierce moss]

Yup

[steady solar]

I'm jealous, wish we had the funding to do something like this

[tardy steeple]

@fierce moss Would something like this be beneficial to you ?

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1400291365/

[fierce moss]

hrmmm

thats kinda cool

[fierce moss]

see, im still seeing random packets of Unwin's nodes every once in awhile

just saw G2 and JW 10min ago

just got another now

its strange i cant see Chipanee....

if im getting packets from Unwin

even a few

[tardy steeple]

Kinda over Meshtastic prob gonna throw my nodes up on marketplace or something

Prob just gonna keep a tbeam in my window to help the mesh network

[toxic shard]

@fierce moss what node received them?

[fierce moss]

i see them on my base station

look at https://meshsense.wg4ry.com/

they are in there

[toxic shard]

Ahh

Seeing a bunch of nodes from N1GUT today

Saw a lot of far nodes today, ✈️ probably. Maybe that's how you saw me?

[tardy steeple]

Haven’t seen anything down my way

I even set up MQTT and still see no one I’m confused . I was watching Andy kirby on YouTube and he had like 100 plus nodes on his screen

[toxic shard]

I sent a test message on the public channel, didn't see it on your meshsense. But shortly after BL01 sent received which your meshsense got (I did not)

Are you not seeing these blue ones?

[fierce moss]

im not

i dont get most packets

but it gives me hope that putting it on the pole will reach chipanee

[toxic shard]

Sorry, the map question was for @tardy steeple

Chip really seems to be hitting this far

[tardy steeple]

I am that blue one in the middle

( edit that’s my grandma house )

[toxic shard]

I think you're the green one. The position might be off.

oh yeah, the position precision is very wide, so the dot won't be anywhere near where you actually are

Or the node, rather

These messages came through to the map via your node

I'm seeing 4 N1GUT nodes

[tardy steeple]

I have two going .
Tbeam
T1000e

I gave someone in the building one too

[fierce moss]

It was live just a few min ago

Dunno

Need to plan out moving this antenna up the pole lol

[tardy steeple]

https://footprinthero.com/solar-panel-tilt-angle-calculator

[toxic shard]

@fierce moss do you have the precision setting cli command handy?

The web client isn't saving what I'm setting

[toxic shard]

found it, but weird even cli won't set it

might be because i set the node to managed but was using the cli directly

dunno

I think i just pooched it by making it managed without understanding how to handle that. I'll figure that out another time.

erasing and starting over 🙂

[fierce moss]

Yea. Don’t set to managed without either an admin channel or setting the new PKI management keys

No reason to ultimately

[void cape]

You can still flash it even if you do that, I presume.

[fierce moss]

If course

Full erase and flash. Back up and running in 5 min

[toxic shard]

Haven't had a truly remote node yet, so I'm learning this stuff 🙂 I set up a node in Rocky Hill at a family place. Not seeing anything out there yet, but I figured better to get it out there and see what's what.

[fierce moss]

Do any of your home nodes have network connectivity?

[toxic shard]

JW+ does

Eventually I'll get a pi going, this is just to hold me over while I'm lazy

[fierce moss]

I may ask you to point your mqtt to my server later this week. I want to hit it to run some admin commands

Just for a little bit

Then i don’t have to drive to Terryville lol

[toxic shard]

Sounds like a good experiment. Happy to try it.

[tardy steeple]

Mqtt do you just see your normal area or like the entire state and beyond ?

[fierce moss]

?

My mqtt is used just for internal communications.

But if i temporarily link to unwin, it will push direct via his too.

I don’t want to rely on it as a bridge for the actual mesh, but till i get the real link going i can admin my node through him

My router in Bristol i can’t talk to quite yet

[tardy steeple]

I mean like with walkie talkies you have line of sight and then with DMR you can go global

I thought MQTT I can see and do more etc

[fierce moss]

DMR is just a digital protocol. It doesn’t let you go global.

But there are ways to use dmr over the internet

[tardy steeple]

I don’t know I thought MQTT was totally different I guess

[fierce moss]

Mqtt is a generic broker service. Lots of uses.

Meshtastic uses it as a service to forward packets

You can use it to bridge mesh networks. Or inject packets. Or scrape data

[tardy steeple]

Like when I was watching Andy Kirby it looks like the county is mapped

https://youtu.be/xZ77AvPyoXc?si=v5u3IU39a7c_L0yT

[fierce moss]

Dunno if they have any mqtt bridges. But terrain over there is very different. I’m sure they have some excellent height locations overseeing the ocean

[tardy steeple]

Understood

[toxic shard]

somehow I'm seeing "HILL" with zero hops. Weird

I don't buy it. Will observe more.

[toxic shard]

Seeing traceroutes in meshsense saying it's going through Chippanee which is what I'd hoped JW+ -> GFR2 -> d940

nevermind, that's OCTO G2, doh!

HILL is d984

[tardy steeple]

Just slammed my node in my car door . Case is done

[toxic shard]

youch!

[fierce moss]

that sucks

which one? can you print another?

[tardy steeple]

WisMesh Pocket

[fierce moss]

unwin-

[tardy steeple]

I don’t think they offer an STL for WisMesh Pocket

[fierce moss]

im semi-consistently seeing these

[tardy steeple]

What map is this from ?

[fierce moss]

my meshsense app

https://meshsense.wg4ry.com/

[fierce moss]

its gotta be chipanee....

seeing JW in there too

they pop in and out

[fierce moss]

im thinking the telephone pole instead of the tower.... that 3 pole tower is OLD....

that should work on the utility pole. just screw it in

zip tie the coax a few times on the way down

need to figure out the power still

[fierce moss]

going to wipe the db

see if it sees it without stupid planes

[toxic shard]

I sent this because my coworkers doing our cybersecurity capture the flag event were finding my node's traffic on Gary's website and going down the wrong path. They needed to decode and decrypt the binary file they'd been provided with (a message sent on the normal public channel, they needed to figure out it's a Protobuf, find the real secret key (it's not AQ== in reality), and learn how to make the NONCE. Two teams did it with only light prodding).

They saw me on Gary's site based on the node ID, but I think they were seeing messages on Liam's map's gated messages view.

One of them indeed saw that above message after I posted it lol

[toxic shard]

got another coworker on the meshtastic train, over in Plainville. Just a heltec v3 for now, though we all know you can't have just one

[fierce moss]

I PMd you

[tardy steeple]

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1813260805/

[calm dawn]

Man, I'm hearing lots of nodes this morning

[fierce moss]

Plane

[tardy steeple]

Why not a boat ?? 😆 jk

Good morning

[nimble vale]

Could have been a balloon 🎈

[calm dawn]

Was going on for a couple of hours...

[surreal sable]

UFO

[calm dawn]

Do we know who iZ1 is? I seem to be getting lots of packets from them

traceroute: BS1 -> BS2 -> !13c906a1 -> !a7577d6f -> iZ1

[toxic shard]

lots of junk on the mesh

[tardy steeple]

Anyone in here !6df2657e ?

[toxic shard]

this looks to be iZ1 https://meshtastic.liamcottle.net/?node_id=1129838624

!6df2657e is gary's base

just search the node Id on Liam's web map

[void cape]

Hah, I guess I should feel honored that you saw my node 9f04 lol

[fierce moss]

going to upgrade my base station. see if i cant fix some mqtt issues

i may have to go upgrade chipanee too...

OTA better fucking work lol

i hated climbing that roof

not that it was a bad roof to climb at all, just hate coming off the roof to a ladder

that step backwards...

[fierce moss]

yea it's strange JW+ isnt forwarding to GFR2

or any of them really

[toxic shard]

I’ll be home tomorrow night if you want me to try anything with JW+

[fierce moss]

BS1 driving to canada? lol

[tardy steeple]

Sigh, I'm disappointed in my G2 🙁. Seems like it misses a lot of messages. I have it setup with MQTT as a bridge to my virtual nodes and I have messages on my virtual nodes that never showed up on the G2. The G2 also slows to a crawl when it is unable to connect to a configured MQTT server, and the cherry on top is that the WiFi connection has horrible range and seems unstable. As much as I would love to use the G2 as a base station I think it's more suited as a car node or a node that just uses Bluetooth.

[calm dawn]

Wow, for the cost that seems... less than ideal

[fierce moss]

The first sounds like mqtt configuration issues, not the g2. There’s a lot of issues in mqtt between 2.4 and 2.5+ atm…. I’m seeing them as well.

But the WiFi/other stuff is common for all esp32 devices

It should be RIGHT next to your access point

[tardy steeple]

Didn’t know that . It’s in my kitchen as my window sticks out of the building slightly

[sudden locust]

You may want to set position.gps_mode to not_present or disabled
Currently, the meshtastic firmware will try to test all gps types within the first minute after the device is powered on, which will cause the device to respond very slowly in the first minute after powering on, and the response to buttons is very slow, which may also cause some abnormalities, such as WIFI, MQTT.

If you have installed the GPS module, ignore this suggestion. This problem will only occur if you do not have the GPS module installed.

Wifi coverage is limited by the official ESP32 module, and we have no chance to optimize the 2.4G antenna and RF front end:(

[toxic shard]

Finally got a battery for my Nano G2 Ultra. If I can find some low profile hardware to repalce the poke-y bits of the current nuts, it'll be in the daily driver rotation

(no YOU have too many nodes)

[tardy steeple]

I’ve been just using this it’s always attached to my book back as well

[sudden locust]

like this? #enclosures-discussion message

[toxic shard]

That's pretty nice. I was thinking something more like these, though maybe metal fasteners aren't the way to go https://www.ebay.com/itm/403266381299

[toxic shard]

I've got my T1000e in my pocket any time I'm not in bed. Form factor is hard to beat, but the range is small so it works better when within a good mesh.

@sudden locust If the rear PCBs had a hex hole to capture a nut it'd be really slick. Not sure PCB shops can punch a hex hole though.

[fierce moss]

They probably can.

[steady solar]

Think it would reach another node through a few walls and about 50ft of distance?

I want to keep a low profile node at my desk at work and my mobile node is always in my car outside

[toxic shard]

Yeah, it’d do that fine I’d think

[steady solar]

I could easily shove the card on top of my dock plugged in to USB and even my co-workers would probably never notice lol

[toxic shard]

It’s very discrete looking.

[steady solar]

I really like that about it

Welp breaks out credit card

[toxic shard]

I couldn’t get out from Target in Southington this time. Worked a week or two back. Need to work on Southington.

[calm dawn]

I just renamed my T114 the "junk drawer node". Transmit power is reduced to 8db to avoid the issues, and it's paired with a battery I salvaged from a roadside vape find. Obviously, with the reduced transmit power it will always be on client_mute.

But I was able to directly hit Gary's router from up the road, so even at 8db it seems to be usable

[toxic shard]

did you send in for a replacement?

[calm dawn]

Yeah, I just had to give them my order #. So, I figured I'd make use of the old one

[toxic shard]

Starting a test today on how long SOL, a RAK-based node, will run on a 20Ah 12v LFP battery fed through the RAK Green Power module. First of several tests I want to do. SOL has an internal 3.7v LiPoly battery, maybe 2000mAh, so the LFP basically keeps that between 94-100%. In the future I want to take the internal battery out and run the same test on just the LFP+Green and see what that does. I'm trying to determine the bounds of large-battery deployments as an alternative to solar in limited cases.

I don't have an ammeter that'll accurately record this low power, so doing it the brute force way with a long-ish duration field test.

[fierce moss]

I’m going to start playing with the g2 this weekend. See if i can do some power tests.

Start looking at what will be needed to replace tfg

Coax, mounts, etc.

The unit itself should be easy. The solar part will be harder.

[toxic shard]

The pricing on solar is coming down so low you can almost brute force it in some cases.

Like $50 100W panels often, and $175 100Ah LFP batteries.

[fierce moss]

Yea

[toxic shard]

(bit more if you want a heating element)

That still too much for a dabbling hobby node, but not bad for a serious infra node