[OZAPRS] Experimental LoRa iGate operational in Townsville

[andrew at 4852q.info]

Hi all,

 

I've been experimenting with Semtec LoRa technology for a few months now and
just commissioned an ‘experimental’ LoRa to APRS-IS gateway in Townsville on
432.900MHz to access use a bandwidth of 125kHz, Spreading Factor of 12 &
Coding Rate of 4/5.  The i-Gate callsign is VK4VAG-L1 and my test trackers
are VK4VAG-T1, T2 etc

 

So far I have tested a maximum path of ~10.2km line of sight pushing only
18dBm into a quarter wave wire antenna on 915MHz.  Still testing 70cm!

 

The experimental LoRa i-Gate is transparent into APRS-IS and for testing I'm
using the UI Lat/Long Position Report Format (without timestamp).  I've also
tested telemetry and weather message objects locally.

 

The trackers are built on an Arduino Pro Mini micro while the LoRa radio is
an AI-thinker RA-02 module plus a uBlox-6M GPS module.  Total cost less than
$16AUD.

 

The i-Gate is running on a Raspberry Pi platform, coded in Java (thanks to
Alex at IoT4Pi) and uses a LoRa Shield - total cost less than $100AUD.

 

I'm currently working on a LoRa digipeater of sorts.

 

The concept is based on work by Stuart Robinson, Alex Pawlin, Klaus
Hirschelmann and Vienna's LoRa enthusiasts at ÖVSV (Österreichischer
Versuchssenderver) which is the Austrian Experimental Broadcasting
Association. 

 

I'm just writing up some web-pages with photo's etc describing the i-Gate,
tracker, software and hardware experiments along with a LoRa 101.

 

Happy New Year!

 

 

Regards

 

Andrew

VK4VAG

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