[OZAPRS] Digipeaters and iGATE's

[Owen Duffy]

Hi Tony and All,

On 20/10/2014 17:51, aprs at tonola.com.au wrote:
> Hi Liz and others.
>
> I have been running a Rpi here with APRX in receive only mode for
> about 6months and it has not missed a beat other than a short period
> when the internet went down, even then the R-pi just picked up and
> carried on when the net came back.
RPi availability has improved dramatically in the last 6 months or so. I
have a few of them, and one runs a very simple music player app
permanently and was inclined to freeze about once a week, but that seems
to have stopped in recent months.

Raspbian is behind current software on other Linux platforms, and
certainly until recently I would not have thought of using it for an
APRS node.

I have been running a range of APRS nodes with considerable success.
>
> The pi and radio both run on the shack solar powered 12 volt rail. 
> The tnc is a tnc-pi which plugs directly onto the pi
This afternoon I was testing a solution for 12V - 5V conversion as the
COTS devices were all very noisy... ruined the VHF radio altogether.

The device I tested this afternoon is a 5A SM converter for the RC
world, about $6 and it works a treat:
https://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/__32129__Turnigy_5A_8_26v_SBEC_for_Lipo_AUS_Warehouse_.html
.

The RPi with TNC-X and WLAN stick drew 0.13A at 12V, 0.11A at 13.8V...
that is close to constant power input so the conversion efficiency looks
good (within the limitations of measuring current to 10mA).

>
> I agree it is much easier on the network running the IGate on receive
> only
You mention aprx, you will be aware that it was originally an iGate. I
evaluated a number of recent version and the digi was severely broken. I
have done a lot of work on it and fixed the digi bits that I found
broken, and extended it a little. It has been reliable to the extent
development allows, it has run for up to a week until I take it down for
update.

I have made a bunch of changes to assure that it restarts after power
failure, properly initialising modems that require such, and improved
security. Looks good.

73
Owen