Thanks for including the U.S. stations in the decision process of the “new VARA” APRS freq.
WA7GMX

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? All:

Noticed at least one DX station on 30M VARA APRS today (see attached). There used to be quite a few Europeans on Robust Packet APRS, but those numbers have dwindled to a handful of stations and a few I-gates.?

?

G4HYG is my "co-conspirator" in the migration to the the new APRS-over-VARA ;channel.?? He pioneered another non-packet mode for APRS transmission two decades ago.??? The program "APRS Messenger" sent APRS packets over PSK63 or MFSK16.? [At the time, before FT-8 exploded onto the ham radio scene, PSK31 was the hot weak-signal DX mode.]??

The frequency 10.149.700 MHz was the center of the actual APRS Messenger RF channel in the 1990's & early 2000s.? We are now trying to migrate APRS-over-VARA to the same channel center -- this is done by setting the radio dial frequency to 10.148.200 Mhz USB .

Here is what I am seeing this morning on this frequency with my TS-2000 and G5RV-type 105' dipole:? Note the "Wall-to-Wall" DX from the US west coast to Scotland UK at the same time.

---

Stephen H. Smith??? wa8lmf (at) aol.com
Skype:??????? WA8LMF
EchoLink:? Node #? 14400? [Think bottom of the 2-meter band]
Home Page:?????????

30 Meter?? APRS-over VARA? Frequency Change
Coming 1 Jan 2025.?? Details Here:
????

- APRS over VARA? --
??

"Studio B" Ham Shack on Wheels
??

-
?

FYI, WinRPR is a free software modem, which will do Robust, HF, 1200 and 9600 baud packet. For ~$100, one can build a Teensy modem with a display and bluetooth, which has almost all the features of a SCS Tracker.

Ron
WA7GMX

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Speaking of Pinpoint, does anyone know if it is possible to

create a custom APRS icon with overlay? Specifically, a green

six pointed star with a letter, I for Igate, or a black diamond

with V for VARA, etc. Every time I try to change the overlay, it?

will not save and does not appear to be working. The only link to?

documentation is broken. Are there any detailed Pinpoint docs?

?

You will have to edit the symbol sets located in \Symbols? under the main PinPoint directory.? There are a pair of .files? primary.png and alternate.png .? Each has alpha layer transparency.??

Load them into a graphics editor like PhotoShop, Paintshop, Corel PhotoPaint, etc and make the necessary changes.? Note that each symbol in the combined graphic grid of 16x8 symbols lives in a square of 48x48 pixels.? You could design a new symbol in a 48x48 pixel editor by itself, and then copy/paste it into the correct position in the 16x8 icon image. ??

[I have done this in UIview to replace generic "satellite" with an image of the space station on my APRS webserver pages.?

Note that any graphic changes you make to YOUR display will have absolutely NO effect on what others see on their maps.?? All that is transmitted over APRS is a two-character alphanumeric code that selects the appropriate cell of the other station's pre-composed symbol grid.

[NOTE:? I have been successfully overlaying the letter "V" on the black diamond for "VARAgate" in UIview.]?

[NOTE2:? I edited several revisions of the APRS symbol set about 20 years ago, including the current "Rev H" symbols for UIview.]

---

Stephen H. Smith??? wa8lmf (at) aol.com
Skype:??????? WA8LMF
EchoLink:? Node #? 14400? [Think bottom of the 2-meter band]
Home Page:?????????

30 Meter?? APRS-over VARA? Frequency Change
Coming 1 Jan 2025.?? Details Here:
????

- APRS over VARA? --
??

"Studio B" Ham Shack on Wheels
??

-
?

开云体育

Not as many 'takers' as previously. -K0ION

?

This is what is showing on the test receiver here.?? I think I have been so successful in getting people to move to the new 30M APRS-over-VARA channel that the old channel is now completely empty -- days ahead of the cut-over on New Years eve.? I'm thinking of doing the cut-over earlier now.?

---

Stephen H. Smith??? wa8lmf (at) aol.com
Skype:??????? WA8LMF
EchoLink:? Node #? 14400? [Think bottom of the 2-meter band]
Home Page:?????????

30 Meter?? APRS-over VARA? Frequency Change
Coming 1 Jan 2025.?? Details Here:
????

- APRS over VARA? --
??

"Studio B" Ham Shack on Wheels
??

-
?

开云体育

Not as many 'takers' as previously. -K0ION

_._,_._,_

---

I noticed the same thing today on a weekday compared to Sunday.....

How about zooming the map in to just North America, so we could see some actual detail?

---

Stephen H. Smith??? wa8lmf (at) aol.com
Skype:??????? WA8LMF
EchoLink:? Node #? 14400? [Think bottom of the 2-meter band]
Home Page:?????????

30 Meter?? APRS-over VARA? Frequency Change
Coming 1 Jan 2025.?? Details Here:
????

- APRS over VARA? --
??

"Studio B" Ham Shack on Wheels
??

-
?

Thankyou!

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I had my radio on all night on the new freq and am not getting any decodes. I hear a few beacons but nothing decodes. I have Soundmodem set for 300 band.

Pic attached.

Brian VE3GMZ

?

The whole point is that APRS-over-VARA? DOES NOT use classic AX.25 packet as it's transmission mode.? Thus the Soundmodem, which only decodes AX.25 packets, is useless for receiving APRS-over-VARA.??

You need to use the VARA soundcard soft-modem instead, linked to an APRS application like PinPoint, YAAC, APRSis323, UIview, etc.? Details here:

????

Note that unlike the Soundmodem, the VARA modem does not have an internal display of the decoded raw packets. You need to have an external APRS application linked to it to see what is going on.

---

P.S. ? your attached screen shots, apparently captured with a cell phone, are far far too large -- 4000x3000 pixels (probably the native resolution of? the phone's cam).? You need to downsize these radically before emailing them.??

All cell phone mail apps have provisions for downsizing photos before sending them - reduce them to something like 1388x720 or 800x600 before mailing.

---

Stephen H. Smith??? wa8lmf (at) aol.com
Skype:??????? WA8LMF
EchoLink:? Node #? 14400? [Think bottom of the 2-meter band]
Home Page:?????????

30 Meter?? APRS-over VARA? Frequency Change
Coming 1 Jan 2025.?? Details Here:
????

"Studio B" Ham Shack on Wheels
??

-
?

开云体育

On Mon, Dec 23, 2024 at 07:29 PM, WA8LMF wrote:

WIDEn-N paths are NOT used on HF!??? I have seen several new users running PinPoint without changing this factory default.??

Sorry! Please provide path guidelines for APRS newbies like me. Recommendations found online are highly inconsistent:

: WIDE2-1

: WIDE1-1

: No path at all, or GATE, WIDE2-2.

Thank you!

?

73, Markus HB9BRJ

_._,_._,_

---

It constantly amazes me how the Internet propagates incorrect and/or out-of-date infomation.....

The first two links above are from Australia, and for some reason are blindly copying VHF/2-meters conventions, and suggest they be used on HF.?? Since Australia is so far separated from the rest of the world, radio-wise (and geographically) their non-standard path conventions have almost no impact on the more populated parts of the world.

The third one, from Indonesia, is a direct copy (without attribution and minus the animated graphic), of my own web page? at:
???? ??

Again, this applies to 2M/VHF -- not HF.??? HF practice is discussed here on my web site:
???

Some basic? practices and thoughts about HF APRS operation.???

1)?? On VHF, radio transmission is primarily line-of-sight. Radio coverage from a given location is a) relatively predictable and b) easily blocked by objects (trees, buildings, hills). As a result, digipeating (relaying transmissions using other stations) beyond the line-of-sight makes sense.?

2)?? On HF, radio transmission primarily uses sky-wave propagation -- the bending of radio waves far beyond the horizon due to refraction in the atmosphere 100Km or more above the earth. This refraction is due to the upper layers of the atmosphere (the ionosphere) becoming electrically charged by radiation from the sun.? This charging? effect constantly varies with time-of-day, season-of-the-year and the roughly 11-year cycle of solar activity.??Further, one-time events on the sun (solar flares, coronal mass ejections -a.k.a. CMEs, etc) can disrupt the ionosphere at any time.

As a result, radio propagation varies WILDLY from hour-to-hour and day-to-day.? You simply CAN NOT expect a given other station being available consistently to serve as a digipeater for your station on HF.

3)??? Digipeating a transmission takes as much air time as the original transmission.? One digi hop DOUBLES the air time. Two digi hops TRIPLES the air time.? This drastically reduces the capacity (messages-per-hour) possible on the shared channel.

4)??? On HF,? data rates are far far slower than on VHF/FM,? further reducing the capacity of the shared single radio channel.??

5)??? On VHF, digipeats occupy a geographic area of perhaps a city-county-shire-province-canton-parish, allowing the same radio channel to be used simultaneously in many places in the country at the same time.???? On HF, your transmission (and it's digipeats) may occupy a THIRD OF A CONTINENT or more at once, further enormously reducing the capacity of the shared single radio channel.

Path settings (WIDEn-N values) control the amount of digipeating done. On VHF this works. On HF, digipeating SHOULD NOT be used!? Most current APRS programs and APRS-enabled radios arrive "out-of-the-box" with their digipeat paths defaulted to the standard WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1,? suitable for two digi hops on VHF.?

When programs are used for HF operation, these hops should be removed -- i.e. the path box should be left blank. ??

A) ?? Digi hops on HF are heavily discouraged

B) ?? The few digipeaters that do exist on HF DO NOT respond to WIDEn-N paths -- They use "ECHO" instead.

C) ?? Adding the path values to your transmission only makes your transmitted packet longer, taking up more air time and making it less likely to be decoded successfully at the other end. ? ??

D)??? "GATE" as a path element is an anachronism from over 30 years ago,? that is needless today.
??? "GATE" in a path tells a handful of old hardware-based TNCs (mainly Kantronics "KAM" dual-port) to cross-band digipeat from HF to VHF. (You would have two radios, one HF and one 2M, attached to ports on the same TNC.)
??? The hope was that then a local 2-meter station would hear you and igate your transmission to the Internet. This dates from an era, decades ago, when 24/7 always-on home internet connections were uncommon (most people still had on-demand dial-up connections) leading to few if any igates on HF.?? Again, due to the unpredictable nature of HF propagation, you never knew what geographic area(s) you would be GATED to on VHF.?

Today, there are numerous igates directly receiving off HF -- the "GATE" clause in a path just makes the transmission needlessly longer.

??? Once again, FOR HF, the path settings should be blank.

P.S.? I invented the double WIDEn-N construct for APRS paths on VHF over 30 years ago, ? to solve digipeating problems with brain-dead Kantronics KPC-3 TNCs that were widely used as digipeaters at the time.

---

Stephen H. Smith??? wa8lmf (at) aol.com
Skype:??????? WA8LMF
EchoLink:? Node #? 14400? [Think bottom of the 2-meter band]
Home Page:?????????

30 Meter?? APRS-over VARA? Frequency Change
Coming 1 Jan 2025.?? Details Here:
????

- APRS over VARA? --
??

"Studio B" Ham Shack on Wheels
??

-
?