开云体育

  1. Direwolf
  2. Topics

Good volume level to start with?

 

I have a digipeater and igate at home, using a Retevis RT-95 (same radio as the Anytone AT-778UV) with its mic jack and external speaker jack connected to a Digirig Mobile which is connected to a Raspberry Pi 3B+ running Direwolf 1.7. I want to set up a, widerange digipeater-only at my club's repeater site only this time using a Yaesu FT-60R HT with its speaker mic jack connected to the Digirig. 5 watts would be all that's needed as that's all that the repeaters transmit at.
?
There are extremely few APRS users here, just one or two (we're trying to get more people interested) so I currently have no way to tell what the "average" level is. Since receive is via the speaker jacks on both radios, what's a good initial volume setting to use to be able to receive weaker signals without causing clipping or distortion later if we get more APRS users?
 

开云体育

Hi,

It is good that you realize that the audio volume settings (especially the transmit audio volume) are important for successful packet operation.

However you are mistaken when you assume that strong or weak FM signals change the receive audio volume, they don't. The audio volume changes the FM deviation (amount of change in frequence compared to the unmodulated carrier frequency) which is fully independent of the strength of the RF signal. That is the good news.

Also good is that both hardware TNCs and software.TNCs like Direwolf are generally pretty good in dealing with a wide range of receive audio volumes. Just monitoring the Direwolf console for the incoming audio levels is generally sufficient to tell whether or not an adjustment is warranted.

The transmit audio volume is much more important and you really do want to make an effort to get that close to optimal. If you don't have access to test equipment follow the rule of very slowly increasing transmit audio level to the point where the volume no longer increases (at a receive radio) and then reduce it again by a small amount. An audio decibel app on your phone can help with that task.

You are mentioning radio transmit power as well. For packet communication you often need more transmit power than a comparable voice radio station because you want avoid the hidden-node problem (which requires that everybody can hear your transmissions).

73,
Thomas
KK6FPP



Get

 

开云体育


Hello DW7GDL,


I have a digipeater and igate at home, using a Retevis RT-95 (same radio as the Anytone AT-778UV) with its mic jack and external speaker jack connected to a Digirig Mobile which is connected to a Raspberry Pi 3B+ running Direwolf 1.7. I want to set up a, widerange digipeater-only at my club's repeater site only this time using a Yaesu FT-60R HT with its speaker mic jack connected to the Digirig. 5 watts would be all that's needed as that's all that the repeaters transmit at.

In addition to Thomas's points, you should be aware that running a high level APRS digi with an HT might be bad news depending on the traffic levels.? HT's aren't designed for heavy amounts of TX cycles and your radio might overheat or fail per-maturely.? You also seem like you want to decode weak APRS signals and while a Yaesu FT60 is a quality HT, it's receiver is probably not as good as many common amateur radio mobile radios.? If you can swing it, I think you'll be better served on all fronts with using a mobile radio.? Could be a good opportunity to get a used ex-commercial radio for this fixed function role.

--David
KI6ZHD
 

Thomas: The 5W limit is per my club's president who's also the main repeater person, and is because we already have two 2m repeaters and two 70cm repeaters at the site plus another club's 2m repeater is nearby. We've already had interference issues happening and I think he wants to avoid that again after adding the digipeater. I'll tell him what you said though, and see what he says.
?
David: I suppose I could get a Yaesu FT-2980R. Digirig also makes a cable that will work on it. (I like their cables as they're well-made, shielded and already have ferrites, vs. some sort of homebrew cable solution.) A commercial radio like a Motorola would need the homebrew cable provided a Moto data connector could even be found in the Philippines. We do have connections in the US and Canada who may be able to help though. I mean, on the one hand I highly doubt that the APRS traffic levels would ever put a strain on the FT-60, but on the other hand there's what Thomas said about the hidden node problem.
?
It's all food for thought. Thank you both for the information. 73.
 

开云体育

Hi,

Definitely respect any power restrictions imposed by the site owner.
Topography is an important factor and if your antenna is high (tower, tall building, natural peak) in an otherwise flat landscape (minimal obstructions) then you can expect good coverage even with low power.
As for interference issues, proper selection of the frequencies used by all the transmitters at the site is important. There are spreadsheets that can help identify conflicts based on the frequency and bandwidth of each transmitter on the site. Note however that those calculators only handle the intentional emissions.
Commercial site owners normally require strong filtering (cavities, isolators) on transmitters to keep unintentional emissions (spurs, harmonics) from interfering with other users of the site.
Privately owned amateur radio sites are well advised to follow that example (some do, some don't).
Note however that no amount of filtering can prevent intermod when the sum or difference of two transmitter frequencies matches the frequency of a third radio on the site (something that gets more and more difficult to avoid the more transmitters are at that same location).
That is why frequency planning is so important.

73,
Thomas
KK6FPP



Get

From: [email protected] <[email protected]> on behalf of JayMot DW7GDL via groups.io <jaymot123@...>
Sent: Sunday, September 1, 2024 11:53:00 PM
To: [email protected] <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [direwolf] Good volume level to start with?
?
Thomas: The 5W limit is per my club's president who's also the main repeater person, and is because we already have two 2m repeaters and two 70cm repeaters at the site plus another club's 2m repeater is nearby. We've already had interference issues happening and I think he wants to avoid that again after adding the digipeater. I'll tell him what you said though, and see what he says.
?
David: I suppose I could get a Yaesu FT-2980R. Digirig also makes a cable that will work on it. (I like their cables as they're well-made, shielded and already have ferrites, vs. some sort of homebrew cable solution.) A commercial radio like a Motorola would need the homebrew cable provided a Moto data connector could even be found in the Philippines. We do have connections in the US and Canada who may be able to help though. I mean, on the one hand I highly doubt that the APRS traffic levels would ever put a strain on the FT-60, but on the other hand there's what Thomas said about the hidden node problem.
?
It's all food for thought. Thank you both for the information. 73.
 

Hi Thomas.
?
The repeater site is in the mountains east of here at around 390 meters/1270 feet elevation, if not more. It has either a 100 or 150 foot tower, I forget which but I think 150, which gets our repeaters' signals over the surrounding mountains (high hills, really.) A 5W digipeater should easily cover the entire Metro Cebu area with no dead zones. According to the coverage map at ke2dbe.com it should cover around 120 km. with a strong signal level. 5W HTs are able to communicate over the voice repeater from all over the Cebu City area including nearby cities with relative ease considering their low power and rubber duck antennas. As long as the digi at the repeater site can decode packets from APRS HTs my own digi and Igate should easily be able to receive and repeat them as well as ship them out to APRS-IS. We won't actually know for sure until we get it set up and test it but I have high confidence that it will work fine.
?
All of our repeaters now have multiple cavity filters for high Q. Two more were recently added to the 2m voice repeater to solve a QRM problem caused by another club's repeater which is located nor far from ours. I suspect some of their members use wide FM deviation because what was happening was, if they had a net at the same time we did, whenever anyone sent the CTCSS or PL tone to open our 2m repeater it was also receiving and repeating the edge of the deviation from whoever was using their repeater at the time. If the digi's radio is configured for NFM it shouldn't cause any QRM issues with voice repeaters, either ours or those of other clubs.
?
As there's no standard APRS frequency in the Philippines, hams have to find their own regional frequency when setting up digipeater, taking into account the input and output frequencies of existing 2m repeaters in their area along with the digi's deviation. In the Manila area and central Luzon they use 144.440. We've selected 144.380 in Cebu based on the frequency pairs of any other repeaters within 150 or so kilometers.
?
There's a group of Filipino hams living in the US, Canada and Australia that have been providing free Yaesu C4FM repeaters to Philippine ham radio clubs and organizations to establish a digital voice communications system in the Philippines, with Internet connections so we and that group can communicate after any disasters. My club's? President is going to see if he can source a free 2 meter FM radio from them (used is fine) that Digirig makes a cable for, which would cut down on my own expense: I'll already be donating a Raspberry Pi 3B+, a heatsink case with fans, a Pi power supply, microSD card, Digirig Mobile plus its cables, and will install and configure Direwolf so by installation time it should be basically a turnkey system costing the club very little money. They (we, but it's coming from the club treasury) just needs to provide an antenna and the coax and I think they already have a spool of RG-8/U.
?
73, de DV7GDL (recent license upgrade but I haven't changed my account on groups.io yet.)
 

开云体育

On 9/2/24 23:20, JayMot DW7GDL via groups.io wrote:
...
As there's no standard APRS frequency in the Philippines, hams have to find their own regional frequency when setting up digipeater, taking into account the input and output frequencies of existing 2m repeaters in their area along with the digi's deviation. In the Manila area and central Luzon they use 144.440. We've selected 144.380 in Cebu based on the frequency pairs of any other repeaters within 150 or so kilometers.
?...

is interesting.
 

Hello,
?
I'm using the same radio on VHF for APRS and WINLINK.
If you are using the correct Digirig cable for this radio, I set my volume to 2 on the Retevis. (VOL 1 is bearly hearable). I split the audio to the Digirig and a small Kenwood speaker. I'm using Windows 11 right now and my setting for the input is set to -3,5 dB. My packets are around 50% when received by Direwolf 1.7. But sometimes the RX is not working (other question asked here in this group). So I'm not receiving packets. It has worked before. It does work perfect with Soundmodem.
?
73 Phil ON4VP
 

开云体育


Hello Phil,

If I was to guess, you have the input mixer level on your digirig set to 100% listening to your Retevis radio.? Bring that input mixer level down to say 50-60% and then increase the radio's output audio level up to have Direwolf's heard audio level average around "50".?

Beyond that.. when you start Direwolf, send us the output of that window to see how it's starting up.? Also send us your direwolf.conf file to see if there are any other possible optimizations.

--David
KI6ZHD



On 09/09/2024 03:08 AM, Phil, ON4VP via groups.io wrote:

Hello,
?
I'm using the same radio on VHF for APRS and WINLINK.
If you are using the correct Digirig cable for this radio, I set my volume to 2 on the Retevis. (VOL 1 is bearly hearable). I split the audio to the Digirig and a small Kenwood speaker. I'm using Windows 11 right now and my setting for the input is set to -3,5 dB. My packets are around 50% when received by Direwolf 1.7. But sometimes the RX is not working (other question asked here in this group). So I'm not receiving packets. It has worked before. It does work perfect with Soundmodem.
?
73 Phil ON4VP
 
Edited

Hi David,
?
The audio problem has been solved in another message. Thanks.
I have the levels around 50 now. Radio output level is set to '2' on the Retevis and around 50% on the slider in the soundcard properties.
These are the two images after I made all changes.
?
?
?
This is the content of the Direwilf config file after cleaning up the things I don't use or need:
?

#############################################################
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? #
# ? ? ? ? ? ? ? FIRST AUDIO DEVICE PROPERTIES? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? #
# ? ? ? ? ? ? ? (Channel 0 + 1 if in stereo)? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? #
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?#
#############################################################
ADEVICE0 4
ARATE 48000
#############################################################
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? #
# ? ? ? ? ? ? ? CHANNEL 0 PROPERTIES? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?#
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?#
#############################################################
CHANNEL 0
MYCALL ON4VP-10
MODEM 1200
#MODEM 9600
PTT COM14 RTS
AGWPORT 8000
KISSPORT 8001
#############################################################
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? #
# ? ? ? ? ? FIXED POSIION BEACONING PROPERTIES? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?#
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?#
#############################################################
PBEACON delay=1 every=10 overlay=D symbol="digi" lat=51^04.92N long=005^00.99E power=14 height=60 gain=6 comment="Digipeater & Igate Laakdal" via=WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1
#############################################################
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? #
# ? ? ? ? ? ? APRS DIGIPEATER PROPERTIES? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? #
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?#
#############################################################
DIGIPEAT 0 0 ^WIDE[3-7]-[1-7]$|^TEST$ ^WIDE[12]-[12]$
#############################################################
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? #
# ? ? ? ? ? ? ? INTERNET GATEWAY? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? #
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?#
#############################################################
IGSERVER belgium.aprs2.net
IGLOGIN ON4VP-10 22778
IGTXVIA 0 WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1
IGTXLIMIT 6 10
#PBEACON sendto=IG delay=0:30 every=15:00 symbol="igate" overlay=I lat=51^04.92N long=005^00.99E power=14 height=60 gain=6 comment="Digipeater & Igate Laakdal"
#############################################################
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? #
# ? ? ? ? ? ? EXTRA COMMANDS PROPERTIES? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?#
#? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?#
#############################################################
FX25TX 1
PERSIST 63
SLOTTIME 12
RETRY 5
FRACK 5
MAXFRAME 4
#Set MAXFRAME to 1 for HF Packet
#MAXFRAME 1
PACLEN 128
#PACLEN 64 FOR HF
DWAIT 0
TXDELAY 40
TXTAIL 10
?
?
73 Phil ON4VP

1 - 10 of 10