neidu3Mar 8

Considering diving into meshtastic, and I have some newbie questions

https://sh.itjust.works/post/56494218

Considering diving into meshtastic, and I have some newbie questions - sh.itjust.works

So, I’ve been watching a few intros on meshtastic, just to get the basics down, but I believe my situation requires something a proper long term plan. Basically, I live pratictally in the middle of nowhere, and there are unlikely to be any other meshtastic nodes around, so I will probably need a setup that is partially based on repeaters, so I’m thinking something like this, where my entry into the ordeal is done in multiple stages. It is my understanding that diving into meshtastic quickly becomes an addiction and a hunt for more nodes, and I don’t see this as a problem in itself, I just want to figure out what to expect in terms of neighboring nodes. 1. Simple handheld device. Nothing fancy. Something simple and cheap to bring with me when I’m traveling. While I doubt I’ll be able to see any nodes at home, I travel often, so it would still be usable and hopefully fun to toy around with. 2. Semi-permanent car install for longer range. Partially as a repeater for my handheld radio, and partially to log and see where I can find “neighbors”. As a lot of the aforementioned travel is done by car, I think this is a viable strategy in preparation for step 3. 3. Installing a solar powered repeater on a nearby mountain. So, if I find out that I do have other radios not too far away, I think it’s safe to say that I will need a repeater or two on one of the mountains that surround me. We’re talking solar panels, and something that can run basically unattended. Long range is key here. 4. If the above work and I end up linking to a larger pool of nodes, then I might go for something fancier at home. How much does this strategy make sense?

Show threadBigboye57Mar 8

I am in a similar scenario as you are living in a more rural location. I started with hand held devices that I would take in my car to see if it was worthwhile to continue exploring. I ended up finding many people around me but I could not reach them from my house. I ended up using an old TV antenna at my house to run a node up on that gave me access to my broader community. I live in the flat Midwest so went with a high DB antenna and it has worked great.

My thoughts are nix the dedicated car based module and go straight to a high location after hand held. Height is king for Meshtastic.

My last note is be aware of antennas you use as higher DB is not always the best. Higher DB means the sensitivity of the antena becomes flatter and more perpendicular to the horizon(in standard installations) where as lower DB radiates in a big bubble.

So if you are in very mountainous terrain very high DB antennas are not always best as they do not handle elevation changes great but rather blast out to the horizon which may not be useful. Also if you have a hill blocking you, your are out of luck. Think of Meshtastic as basically line of sight.

If you have any questions fire away and I can share what I know, I am not an expert by any means but I have got my hands dirty.

Show threadBigboye57
One addition, you do not have to break the bank on any of this. If you are tech savvy and can do basic soldering I would suggest piecing your nodes together yourself. If you are looking at the 100 dollar solar nodes you can do that for much much cheaper yourself with a bit of work.
Mar 8 at 11:59pmWeb
Show threadneidu3Mar 9

I don’t a lot of hobby electronics, so building a repeater more or less from scratch is the plan, yes.

I still think the car setup is needed, at least temporarily until I’ve found some potential neighbors that I can reach with a repeater. I very much doubt I’ll be able to reach anyone without them, as I live here:

…gotta get over those mountains. And that picture was taken from one of the few locations reachable by car, and I’m willing to bet better positions can be reached by foot. But NFW I’m hiking all the way up there just to test - I wanna map out other nodes in the region first.

Show threadBigboye57Mar 9
Beautiful picture. My car setup if my handheld on my dash and a USB feeding it power if it needs to recharge. It has worked well for me
Show threadneidu3Mar 9
How easy is it to wire in a pocket node to a laptop for datalogging? While the form factor isn’t much of an issue (I intend to print my own case), I was wondering what sort of I/O protocol (if any) these devices usually support.
Show threadBigboye57Mar 9

There is a python CLI you should look into. This gets out of my comfort zone so likely not using the right terminology but you can connect via serial and they will dump very detailed logs over that connection. I am not sure if those detailed logs are saved though, or you would need to capture live.

I have used this for troubleshooting but there is loads of information being passed over.

Show threadneidu3Mar 9
Dumping live serial is fine. In fact, I think that might be easiest since I’ll be dumping NMEA strings for positioning at the same time. Should make it easier to parse and map later in.