N4MI Ham Radio - (formerly N1ADM) My Adventures in Amateur Radio

Learning About Meshtastic

At Orlando HamCation, I ran across the booth for Spec5. They sell some very cool Meshtastic devices. I briefly experimented with Meshtastic a couple of years ago, but it had not really taken off in my area, so I didn’t get very far. More recently, several people in the area have installed nodes, so it is more interesting and useful now. In fact, there is a group working to install nodes to connect communities across the region. This will make Meshtastic more useful as an option for grid-down communication.

One of the devices I bought at HamCation is the Spec5 Ranger. It is a cool Meshtastic device with a keyboard, so messages can be sent directly through the device. You do need a phone, tablet or computer to configure it initially, but once it is set up it can be used alone.

I had this homebuilt Meshtastic device from my earlier experimentation, so I flashed it with the most recent firmware and configured it with my phone. This one does require a bluetooth connection to a phone or tablet to send messages. It is a LILYGO T-Beam ESP32 LoRa board with OLED display and 18650 battery.

I knew I would have limited range with the handheld devices and small 915 MHz antennas, so I wanted something that could extend the range. I ended up getting another Spec5 device, the Spec5 Relay to set up outside. It was very easy to assemble, and also easy to configure using the Meshtastic application on my phone. I have it mounted on a 15 foot mast at the edge of my property. It transmits and receives over a greater distance due to the better antenna, and placement outside. It has a solar panel to keep the 18650 batteries charged. I will be putting it on a 25 foot mast soon to extend the range even further. While the Relay can be set up in a repeater mode, I have it set up in client mode, which is the best setting for this location.

This is a screenshot from the Meshtastic Android app on my Google Pixel phone It is connected to my S5 Ranger by bluetooth. This is a view of all of the different configuration settings.

This is a view of the most recently connected nodes that my device can see. You can see my other two device on there (they are very close), but through the S5 Relay it is connected to several other nodes that are further away.

This is the map view from the Meshtastic application, showing several nodes that my S5 has seen from my house and while traveling around the area.

This view shows messages that have been received by and sent from my nodes.

I have one of my nodes connected to an old iPhone. The iPhone Meshtastic app seems to be functionally the same as the Android app, but it looks different.

So, what’s next. I will continue to learn more about the functions and utility of Meshtastic, and will try to help local users extend the mesh to reach more communities.

Raising the Tower

I have not posted any updates for a long time. Since my last post, the new tower has been raised. There is still some work to do. Mainly, running the cable and installing an entry panel. There was steady progress until hurricane Helene came through our area at the end of August. Here are some pictures of the construction and the finished tower. Most of the construction took place during the Summer of 2024.

It all starts with digging a hole. This one is 5 feet deep by 3 feet wide.

After the hole was dug, the rebar cage went in.

The forms for the concrete base were then added. I also added some trenches to lay conduit for coax. I have a wire antenna on the mast at the fence. The conduit will route that coax to the tower, then coax from all antennas will come from the tower to an entry panel at the shack.

The concrete for the foundation was poured, and after a few days of curing, the tilt base and tower were bolted onto the foundation.

Then the rotator and a tilt plate for the hexbeam were installed onto the tower.

Several friends came over for an antenna party to build the hexbeam.

After it was built, we tested the SWR and it was excellent on all bands, 20M to 6M.

A few days later, the hexbeam was attached to the rotator, and the tower and antenna were raised.

I mentioned that hurricane Helene introduced some delays in finishing the project. I had the tower fully lowered. The hurricane force winds came from the south, and the tower is on the north side of the house, so the tower and hexbeam were not damage. The biggest holdup is that the winds bent the mast and the eave mount for my VHF/UHF vertical on the roof of my house. The vertical is now hanging over too far for me to fully raise the tower. I need to get a lift to either remove or repair the vertical mount.

I also still need to install the entry panel, which will involve drilling through the wall to route the coax from the panel into the shack. I hope to get those things done in the next few weeks.

The Tower Finally Arrived!

I recently purchased a U.S. Tower MA40 crank-up tubular tower. The ordering process through the Ham Radio Outlet store in Atlanta was fairly easy and straightforward. I was told there could be a 20+ week lead time when I ordered it, but it arrived earlier than expected. If you are considering buying a new tower, be sure to include the cost of freight in your expense calculations. The cost of freight from California to Georgia was close to a third of the price of the tower itself.

This is a relatively small free-standing tower at 40 ft high, and it’s really more of a super heavy-duty mast. It can be cranked down to 21 ft in the event of high winds or bad weather. I also bought the MAB-40 tilt-over base, which will allow the tower to be completely lowered for very bad conditions or to perform maintenance on the antenna or rotator.

I will be using a K4KIO hexbeam antenna with elements for 20M through 6M, and a Yaesu G-1000DXA rotator. I also need to start work on an entry panel with lightning protection for the coax and rotator cables. I will also route the cables for my existing wire antennas through the entry panel, and leave room for a few more.

I am very excited about the significant improvement the tower and antenna will make to my station. It will take some time to get the tower installed. The town I live in requires a Conditional Use Permit to install any type of tower on residential property. It definitely pays to learn about the municipal codes in your jurisdiction when planning to install a tower. I received some excellent advice through the ARRL Volunteer Counsel program. Fortunately, the Planning Department is supportive and giving me a lot of help to prepare the application, but the soonest it can be presented to the Board of Zoning Appeals is June.

For now, the tower is resting peacefully on the ground at the side of my house. There’s lots of work still to do, but I am getting closer to my dream of adding a directional antenna to the shack! More to follow as this project progresses.

AI Generated Ham Radio Images

I have been learning about how to use ChatGPT and some other AI models to enhance my participation in the Amateur Radio hobby. I am also starting to learn how to code in Python, to hopefully create some code that will be useful to me in the hobby. ChatGPT is especially helpful for learning Python and optimizing code.

Just for fun, I started using the image generation models in Dall-E to make some interesting pictures featuring my Louisiana Catahoula Leopard Dog sidekick Luke. Here are a couple that turned out really well. They don’t look exactly like Luke, but they are amazingly good for pictures created only with word prompts.

Portable 50 Watt VHF/UHF Station

I decided to build a small 50W VHF/UHF station to use for portable operations, such as supporting events or setting up in a temporary location, with a choice of using AC power or a battery. I don’t need anything fancy like DMR or D-Star, but I might want to to use it for APRS or WinLink.

After a bit of research and pricing options, I went with something that turned out to be a very easy build. I chose a Yaesu FTM-6000R as the transceiver. It has basic features, but has gotten some good reviews. It is also known to be a good transceiver for data, and is 9600 bps capable.

I also chose a 30 amp switching power supply and a mobile base station enclosure from PowerWerx, to make it a single unit that’s easy to carry around. The enclosure includes a short DC cable to connect the radio to the power supply. If I want to use a battery instead of the power supply, I just disconnect the T-connector from the power supply, and connect it to the battery. It was very easy to assemble the whole system.

I tested with the power supply and with a battery, and it works great. The whole unit is very compact and stable.

My next step will be to configure it for WinLink and APRS. I have a Mobilinkd TNC-4, and I ordered a DigiRig. The FTM-6000R has a 10 pin MiniDin connector, and DigiRig sells 1200 bps and 9600 bps cables for the radio. DigiRig also sells an adapter cable to use DigiRig cables with a Mobilinkd, and vice versa.

I’ll make another post after testing the setup with WinLink and APRS.

Station upgrades coming soon!

I’m working on some significant upgrades to my ham radio station. I finally received a Mercury IIIs amplifier. I was on the waiting list for about a year. I also got a Palstar HF Auto tuner to handle the increased power from the amp. For outside the shack I also got a K4KIO Hexbeam antenna. The only problem is that I don’t have a tower for it yet. That will be next, and hopefully soon! I’ll make additional posts as I bring the new equipment online.

LoRA 433 MHz APRS iGate and Tracker

It has been a year since I posted a new item! Time to get back to it! My last post was about a project for my IC-705 using an M5Stack microcontroller. I became interested in learning about other ham radio related projects using microcontrollers.

Searching online, I found two related projects to build an APRS iGate and a tracker. Both of these projects use inexpensive LoRa32 microcontroller boards. I chose TTGO T-Beam v1.1 boards that operate on 433 MHz. Make sure you buy the 433 MHz version of the board for the APRS projects. The board includes a small OLED screen, and has onboard WiFi, GPS and SMA connector for the antenna. You will probably have to solder the OLED screen to the board, but there are only four pins to solder.

On the back of the board, there is a battery holder for an 18650 3.7 V lithium ion battery to power the board. The board can also be powered through the microUSB port, which also recharges the battery. There are other similar LoRa32 boards that you can use for these projects, and they are readily available on Amazon, eBay, and other online retailers.

Front and back of TTGO T-Beam v1.1 ESP32 433MHz LoRa32 board

Programming the board is fairly easy. The iGate and tracker project pages on GitHub include links to quick start guides. The quick start guides are in German and French, but you can right-click in Chrome and choose “Translate to English”. Even better, there is an excellent video by Tech Minds on YouTube that will take you step-by-step through the process of configuring and programming the iGate and tracker modules using Visual Studio Code with the PlatformIO plugin. This process will load the firmware onto the module, as well as a json configuration file that includes your callsign, wifi info (for the iGate), etc. I highly recommend viewing the Tech Minds video before you start these projects!

Lora APRS iGate json configuration file in Visual Studio Code

After programming the iGate and tracker, I was ready to test! I missed a step in my initial configuration of the iGate, so it did not connect to my home wifi on the first attempt. Once that was fixed, it connected to the internate and I was able to see the LoRa iGate symbol for my ssid N4MI-10 appear on the aprs.fi live APRS map. The iGate is operating on 433.775 MHz.

OLED screen showing LoRa APRS iGate configuration

N4MI-10 LoRa APRS iGate, operating on 433.775 MHz, displayed on aprs.fi

Once the iGate was operational, it was time to test the tracker. I chose N4MI-1 as the ssid for testing the tracker. I have some other APRS capable radios, so I will have to come up with a plan for assigning a ssid for each of them. The tracker powered up and initialized. Once it acquired enough satellites for a fix, I saw it transmit the first beacon, which was immediately picked up by the iGate. Awesome!

You can configure the tracker for smart beaconing in the json configuration file. You can also manually transmit a beacon using the middle button on the LoRa module.

OLED screen on LoRa 433 MHz APRS tracker

I took the tracker out for a short walk, and transmitted a beacon from several locations, all of which were received by the iGate and displayed on aprs.fi.

Positions from N4MI-1 LoRa 433 MHz APRS tracker displayed on aprs.fi

The transmitter in the LoRa board is very low power, about 200 mW, so the range with the small SMA antenna is limited. The range can be extended by using a better antenna at a higher elevation. Additionally, a small RF amplifier could be used to increase the power.

This was a very fun and relatively easy project. I am planning to attach a 70cm antenna at a higher elevation to the iGate in case other hams in this area would like to build and use LoRa 433 MHz APRS trackers.

M5Stack Remote Multimeter & iPad SDR-Control App with IC-705

The Icom IC-705 is an amazing QRP transceiver with lots of advanced features. Those features include built-in Bluetooth and wireless LAN, creating opportunity for display and control the IC-705 remotely. Some excellent free software recently became available to take advantage of the Bluetooth capability for a remote display using an inexpensive IoT development board. Also, an incredible iPad app was recently released that allows full remote display and control of the IC-705 via WiFi or LAN.

Remote S Meter and MultiMeter Projects with M5Stack

There are two very easy projects using code available on GitHub and an inexpensive M5Stack Core Development Kit: one to create a remote S Meter and another to create a more advanced and very useful remote MultiMeter.

The M5Stack is an ESP32 development system for IoT applications. This extremely powerful yet low-cost chip includes Wi-Fi and Bluetooth and has quickly become popular over the past year or so. The M5Stack Core Devel o pment Kit is currently available on Amazon for about $50.

The first project I completed using the M5Stack was the IC705SMeter, created by Armel, F4HWN. Once the code is installed and the M5Stack is connected by Bluetooth to the IC-705, it has a selectable display of the received signal strength, output power, and SWR. It also displays the current frequency, mode and filter. It was very easy to install the software and connect to the IC-705 by following step by step instructions in a YouTube video by Ham Radio Dude.

Remote S-Meter connected to IC-705 via Bluetooth

There is also another more advanced remote meter project, also created by Armel, called the ICMultiMeter. This project allows you to display the equivalent of the meter screen of the IC-705 on the M5Stack screen, which allows you to dedicate the IC-705’s screen to the waterfall while seeing all the signal measurements simultaneously on the M5Stack screen. The installation process is very similar to the S Meter project. A YouTube video by Tech Minds has easy-to-follow instructions to build and install the remote MultiMeter.

IC MultiMeter connected to the IC-705 via Bluetooth

SDR Control Software for iPad

Having a remote meter is wonderful, but what if you’d like to have a full remote display and control of the IC-705? An application recently released for iPad will do just that. SDR-Control for Icom, available on the App Store, allows remote operation of the IC-705 without additional hardware or software. The app costs $50, but has tons of features, to include an integrated logbook, CW keyer and FT8/FT4 tool. An important caveat is that the IC-705 and iPad must be connected to the same WiFi network. The app will also control IC-7610 and IC-9700 transceivers connected to the same network via LAN. A YouTube video by Tech Minds provides an excellent overview of the SDR-Control app.

Once installed on the iPad, the app includes an integrated instruction manual explaining all of the functions, to include connecting the app to the IC-705. There is also an online version of the instruction manual. Following the instructions in the manual, I was able to connect to the IC-705 in just a few minutes. I found the app to be very easy to understand and use. When using the integrated FT8/FT4 tool, I did have to consult the manual to adjust the signal levels. Once that was done, it worked very well. The FT8/FT4 tool does not have all of the functionality of WSJT-X (no DXpedition mode), but it works well for casual operating. So far I have only used the app with the IC-705. I don’t yet have my IC-7610 or IC-9700 connected to my home network, but I plan to do that soon so that I can control the transceivers from anywhere in the house.

SDR-Control app connected to the IC-705 via WiFi

I made several FT8 contacts using the integrated FT8/FT4 functions in the app

Waterfall screen on the SDR-Control app showing stations sending FT8 signals

5BWAS & 5BDXCC Plaques

Ever since I got my ham radio license, just over 6 years ago, I have been interesting in DXing, contesting, and awards. I started out at the bottom of a solar cycle, which helped me learn how to make contacts under less than ideal conditions. I’m not as much into the competition with other hams, but it’s satisfying to set and achieve my own personal goals. Now that band conditions are starting to become more favorable, I was recently able to achieve two longtime goals, which are the 5 Band Works All States (WAS) and 5 Band DXCC awards.

The last band I needed for both WAS and DXCC was 10 meters. The band conditions improved enough over the past few months to make that possible. I was also able to add endorsements for 30 meters, 17 meters and 12 meters. I still need Alaska and Hawaii for WAS on 6 meters, and Hawaii for WAS on 160 meters. Maybe someday!

I was able to complete the Triple Play WAS award a few years ago.

New IC-9700 for the shack!

After a long wait, I finally added an Icom IC-9700 to improve the VHF and UHF capability in my shack. I decided to place an order in late December, but all of the ham radio dealers were out of stock at the time. I placed the order, and the dealer estimated delivery in February. That later slipped to March, and then to April. This morning, April 3rd, it finally arrived!

It took about a half hour to get the radio connected and in place.

Initial setup was fairly easy, since I already had the power cable, USB cable, ground wire, and coax routed to the spot on my desk for the IC-9700. Since my current VHF/UHF antenna is a Diamond X500HA for 2M and 70cm, I will not get to use the 23cm right away. I used a Diamond MX-72N duplexer, because the IC-9700 has separate 2M and 70cm connectors.

To make programming the radio a little bit easier, I purchased RTSystems WC-9700 software. I use RTSystems programmers for all of my other radios, and it saves a lot of time and effort. The D-Star Calc feature makes adding D-Star repeaters and reflectors a breeze.

The IC-9700 has lots more features and settings than any of the other VHF/UHF transceivers I used. Even though I am very familiar with the Icom interface and controls, it’s clear that I will have a learning curve to get the best out of this radio. To help with setting up and learning the many features of the radio, I also got a copy of the Radio Today Guide to the IC-9700, by Andrew Barron, ZL3DW. I also have his guides for the IC-7300, IC-7610, and IC-705.

If you buy one of the new Icom transceivers, get this book!

I’m looking forward to seeing what this radio can do. I am going to try out using digital modes on VHF and UHF. My long-term plans include getting a new triband (2M, 70cm, 23cm) antenna to take full advantage of all three bands. I am also considering adding additional antennas to work amateur radio satellites.