Meshtastic progress

    Have been on Meshtastic for a while now, It seems the popularity is still growing. Although at this moment it is very unreliable. Only 50% of messages are delivered, especially when 2 or more hops are desired. With direct contact there is no problem. It also depends on how many signals are on the "band". It seems the little transceivers are not waiting for a empty "space" to transmit. It think that makes it unreliable as well. In the old packetradio days we used digisquelch modules in our modems to avoid these problems. I hope this whole LoRa system will develop in time, we'll see. It's happy experiment time!

Old setup with Heltec V3

I first started with Heltec V3 modules. They are cheap but unreliable and like power. The nice thing is you can see some data on the screen. Bluetooth has low range and you need to reset the device regulary. The follow up was a Lilygo TTGO Lora32 V2 module. There is a display but you can't scroll through data like with the Heltec. The Lilygo has excellent Bluetooth, much better as the Heltecs. And I have the idea the receive is also better. But still it likes too much power. So, for that I bought XIAO nRF52840 & Wio-SX1262 modules, they have no displays and as far as I can measure they take only about 8mA of current. 

New setup with XIAO nRF

I exchanged the module in my solar node now. It still is experimental. I want to know if this works better as the setup I used to have. I mounted it again on my flagpole in front of the house, I might put it in my tower next year when the weather gets better. But only if it proves to be reliable.

I already noticed the bluetooth has low range. You can't have it all. So far it receives well. I need to experiment with it for a few days to see how it behaves.

Really small LoRa module...