Steve, I had a problem very similar, well exactly the same, I can only link
about 50 feet.
Not saying they are exactly accurate, but I think my TM was the culpret
because it has the problem in two different rockets.
If I removed the tm from the rockets and had it stand alone, I had a very
good link.
again, like you with no equipment I cant really measure and compare my tm
operation.
Based on hours of fiddling, I believed it was the antenna or something to do
with the antenna. I tried a larger gage that should increase the signal
bandwidth a bit, and still didn’t improve link reliability.
Another flyer also could not get the flight on their system back when I flew
in august. So its not the dongle for me.
I am wonding myself if the rf calibration may be an issue. Maybe its off
just enough that it still beeps the data, but not quality enough for the
data link.
Ill, be soldering on an sma and mounting a 7" whip antenna, so we will see
if I get a better link, I imagine the whip will be better still.
I just rdf my rocket.
At this point, I would like to make a pcb to use as a rdf becon in my
rockets from now on. The long tones of the tm, can lead to a sore arm... My
last recovery was in 8' tall cornfield in KS, and the beeps were hard to
find so with lots of space between them you have to move slow, Most of the
time on tippy toes stretching my arm as high as I could. Cramps!!
-----Original Message-----
From: Steven Saner
Sent: Sunday, September 21, 2014 10:09 PM
To: Altus Metrum
Subject: Re: [altusmetrum] Telemetrum Issue
On 09/16/2014 03:05 PM, Keith Packard wrote:
Steven Saner <[email protected]> writes:
I was actually sort of hoping that it did indicate an error, because
last weekend I had a problem with the unit. For some reason I could not
receive any signal using the teledongle while the unit was on the pad
unless I was within about 10-20 ft of it. At the flight line it would
not link up at all. I've never had that happen and everything was in the
same configuration (and same rocket) that I've flown before.
Weird. Maybe something got damaged on the board? If you can't sort it
out, we can take a look at it...
-keith
I got a chance to do some testing this afternoon. I used my FT-8800
dual-band mobile radio to help with testing. First I connected my
directional antenna that I use with the Telemetrum to the radio and was
able to hit a nearby 70cm repeater, so the antenna seems ok. Then I
started up the Telemetrum in pad mode about 80 yards away and I was able
to pick up the intermittent tone on the radio nice and strong. In fact
it would receive the signal with no antenna connected. I then connected
the Teledongle to my laptop at the same location and tried to pick up
the signal. On occasion it acted like it got some data, but most of the
time it did not. This was the behavior that I experienced at the last
launch. I tried my normal directional antenna on the Teledongle as well
as a small whip antenna. No joy on either of them. If I walked the
ground station towards the altimeter, it would finally link up when I
got within maybe 50 ft or so.
I then switched the altimeter to idle mode and tried to communicate with
it in that mode. Again, for the most part it would not. At one point it
did bring up the altimeter config screen, but I wasn't able to send a
reboot command.
When trying to communicate both the red and green LEDs in the Teledongle
flash. The USB communication with the Teledongle seems fine. Below are
the outputs of the ver command to both the Telemetrum and Teledongle
using minicom:
ver
manufacturer altusmetrum.org
product TeleMetrum-v1.2
serial-number 1002
current-flight 6
log-format 1
software-version 1.4.1
ver
manufacturer altusmetrum.org
product TeleDongle-v0.2
serial-number 586
software-version 1.4.1
So, based on all of this, it really seems that the problem is with the
Teledongle. I took the cover off and I don't see any visual indication
of a problem. I don't really have the test equipment to test it further.
Is there anything else that you can think of that I should try?
If there is someone reading this that has a Teledongle in the Wichita,
KS area that would like to loan me theirs to compare with, that would be
cool.
Just to do it, I drove down the road with my mobile radio to see how far
away I could get and still hear the tone from the Telemetrum. It was
hanging only a couple feet up off the ground and at about 1/2 mile I
could still hear the steady beep. After that it got sporadic, but I
would occasionally hear it up to nearly a mile away. I figure that is
probably pretty good. In addition to only being a couple feet off the
ground, there was a lot of vegetation in the line of sight as well.
Thanks
Steve
--
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Steven Saner <[email protected]> KD0IJP
Andover, Kansas USA
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