Continuing the discussion from Building a LoRa APRS 439Mhz iGate (Part 2) - #100 by MM0FMF.
Previous discussions:
Hi John, I have sent you a PM with annotated screenshots. if you find them useful, let me know and I’ll publish them here in the thread.
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I’ll be trying those settings this morning. Many thanks!
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James,
The iGate M0WIV-10 seems to be working and is receiving and uploading signals from the tracker M0WIV-11 which is also showing on aprs.fi although it is appearing as a balloon! This must stem from me using my callsign for balloons I think. Although I haven’t used aprs from a balloon, a website which tracks balloons using WSPR signals (which I have used) uploads data to aprs.fi. I’ll look at this in slower time for the moment I will concentrate on a bit of testing over the next few days.
Many thanks!
John
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Great news John. Well done. Yes you’re right about the balloon! Curious!
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M0WIV-11 is on aprs.fi with the last spot received 66 days ago. Are you sure it’s working?
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Well spotted! I didn’t check the date, that must have been one of my balloons!
More testing needed…
Edit: I am not sure what the July date in aprs.fi means, but it might be when it was first heard. Clicking info for M0WIV-11 show it was last heard a few minutes ago.
I will try a longer distance test this afternoon.
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Are you talking about this July date?
It shows the release date of the firmware that is currently on your tracker … there is a newer firmware available so you should consider updating! It can be easily done now with the webinstaller … the timeline is on Ricardos Github page:
73 Martin
OE5REO
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It does now but it was definitely 66 days when I looked an hour ago. You’ve done something to make it work!
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This site shows just the recent LoRa traffic, and confirms your six packets from earlier today: showing you as a pedestrian, not a balloon. But if you’d had that IGate running a month ago, you’d probably would have received a LoRa balloon: SP0LND-12 flying over Northern France. It’s still airborne (crossing the Pacific at the moment) and may be back over Europe again towards the end of the month…
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Martin,
Thank you. I didn’t build the tracker I’m using but I now have a board to build another so I will experiment with that to make sure I don’t wreck the tracker I have which works before updating it.
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This afternoon’s test seemed to be successful. I took everything to a local National Trust property where I often walk the dog and left the iGate in the car with antenna hanging from the rear view mirror powered from a LiPo battery pack. Internet connection was provided by a Huawei Mifi connected to the EE network. Of course this meant it was reporting the wrong position as I hadn’t changed the coords but for a short test I think this doesn’t matter.
This is the track.
The oval loop was the walk, the lines to and from the loop show the path taken by the car which was parked at the bottom of the loop where there is a small blue P sign.
I didn’t expect it to track me all the way round but it did. The top of the loop deviates from the path on the map which is either simply an OS mapping error or more likely, as this part of the walk was under tall trees, the GPS fix was inaccurate.
I’m impressed. Very many thanks to everyone who has helped me get to this position. 
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Next time, try leaving the iGate at home (connected to an outdoor antenna) and see how it covers you?
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The problem is I don’t have a good antenna yet, I’m just using the little stubby thing it came with. I do have a Yagi which would work - I could try that then see how far away I can get before it loses me but that, being directional, is not much use for a fixed station. I will see if I have the bits to make a 1/4 wave ground plane vertical, which is the way to go I think.
I’ve also ordered a mag mount antenna which should be better for mobile use.
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I’ve used a beam too John, with a masthead preamp (having disabled the Tx in the LoRa settings!)
I pointed it NW to follow me around Winter Hill and SE when Dave was on Kinder Scout. It’s the same antenna I use for balloon tracking.
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That would be an interesting exercise - I could point it down towards say Cornwall and see if it can pick up me down there.
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I’ve just configured a second tracker and as you say, it is very easy to do. I will update the original tracker tomorrow.
Many thanks for the suggestion.
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Mines on a ladder line Jpole… cheap, and easy to build! Bury it in some PVC pipe and chuck it up on a pole, job done! Mine works fantastically with extremely good distance reception!
Alan
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i can confirm the new fw with the gps setting works well on a t-beam i took m7rtb-3 for a walk this evening.
tried both ambiguity on and off.
Great work by the dev once again.
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I made a 70cm Slim Jim antenna this morning out of 450 Ohm ladder line and flew it from a 7m mast. The mag mount antenna also arrived and I’ve fitted that and a tracker to the car. A quick test with a drive around local roads suggests everything is working. I won’t be able to test pedestrian performance for a while but I’m looking forward to seeing a track of me slowly wandering up a summit, using a vehicle based igate at the base of the summit.
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