Messages

16

OGN-R PilotAware / Re: OGN History data

« on: August 08, 2019, 07:08:18 pm »

Hi Alex,

You didn't state for what purpose you wanted to use the information although as you described, the glider track data is mostly transitory. With your own OGN-R station you can collect your own local daily stats (which you may already be doing); the extent to which that information can be shared/used may present some GDPR questions? To get an overview of all FLARM traffic in say your area you can go to http://ognrange.onglide.com and select a ground station and date range and see the sort of tracks/area covered. The data is in bulk and anonymous so it is not possible to see the specific track of any individual flight. Not sure if any of this helps to solve to problem you are looking to solve.

Best regards
Chris

17

OGN-R PilotAware / Re: Version 20190707 Uplink range

« on: July 13, 2019, 06:36:03 pm »

Many thanks. Great installation.

KR
Chris

18

OGN-R PilotAware / Version 20190707 Uplink range

« on: July 12, 2019, 05:06:22 pm »

Hi Lee,

Quick question about this release.
The visibility of the aircraft being rebroadcast over the uplink seems to be limited to around a range <16kms - previously I thought this was much further out. This being the case (snapshot attached) I might suggest that this is a rather small circle (unless the 'circle' is an elongated ovoid favouring the forward direction of travel). At 15kms two aircraft heading towards each other at 125kts will not appear on the screen for long giving little warning - they will suddenly appear and be gone. A typical range I might be using on SkyDemon en route is about 20-30nm which is about the range I would like to know about. If the aircraft are  already identified their position could be broadcast. I appreciate there is a desire to limit the RF chatter but I'd much rather get an overview of what was ahead (and left and right) - such as a swarm of gliders so that I was forewarned, especially if as happens one goes in and out of the range of a base station and they all disappear! If they have been seen at any point on the screen then one is forewarned. If aircraft are already close-by I want to be looking out of the cockpit, not down at the screen.

The MLAT and uplink are a brilliant addition to PAW. I'm sure Keith would agree - more ground stations are still needed - excellent work so far - more volunteers needed! Their coverage radius is pretty good with the transmit power available. Reception and getting a reliable two-way link in a metal plane can be much more of a challenge when positioning the aerials. This is often at the front to enable PAW to give a good forward view (but where much of the local ground around can be obscured). In terms of OGN-R any ground station in range in any direction would be just as valuable. Is any thought being given to an approved omni-directional aerial that could be affixed (installed) to say the underside of a plane or other solutions? This would greatly increase the effectiveness of the ground network especially in areas of fewer ground stations. This would reduce the number of drop-outs and increase effective coverage which I suggest will be essential to keep ahead of the game.   

Keep up the great work
KR
Chris

19

Technical Support / Re: Broken 869.5 Aerial, where can I get a replacement?

« on: July 07, 2019, 12:52:44 pm »

 The current GPS location and other data is reported at the top of the Traffic screen
eg. Date: 2019:07:07 12:48:55: Lat=51.68458 Lng=-1.24518 Alt(gps)=191 Alt(qne)=-2 Trk=0 Kns=0

KR
Chris

20

OGN-R PilotAware / Re: Memory corruption or SDR aerial fault?

« on: June 28, 2019, 06:16:34 pm »

Hi Ridders,

I have an standard OGN-R aerial supplied by Keith (which is very good) but a 10+ metre cable-run to where the Pi and NooElec Smart SDR have to be (indoors). It is connected to the aerial with good quality thick coax (11mm) and n-type connectors to a 1 metre pigtail. The outer range for gliders that OGN-R has  logged  is >70kms and that is from only 68m agl. I have located my SDR inside in the dry as Lee suggested. You could reuse whatever cable you are using and see what results you get with the SDR inside. It is a right royal pain getting to the aerial - I had to hire a long ladder and use my kind neighbours drive :-( - however well worth it!!!. I live in an area where there are several OGN-R receivers within 30kms, I have noticed that OGN-R appears selective about what aircraft it wants a station to report on. On busy days it seems to request reports primarily from the most local ones (within 10-30kms) when I have seen more than a dozen simultaneously being reported by my station, as seen on ognrange.onglide.com - with occasional random links to ones much further out. Not sure what criteria OGN-R uses to select who sends in reports on what or whether it moves the SDR gain about to limit the range. Hopefully you will get very good results with the shorter cable run and an indoor setup. Very timely as the gliding and competitions are just getting going - lets hope for some decent weather!

KRs
Chris

21

OGN-R PilotAware / Re: Version 20190418 and GS-OGN PAW Flag Missing

« on: May 25, 2019, 10:44:30 am »

Hi Lee

The recent builds of OGN-R have been 100% stable with the connection to the PAW ground station being unbroken and the MLAT data being continuously received. The OGN-R is running with two SDR's and a 2.5A Raspi power supply and no throttling has been observed that I can see. The service always reconnects after the periodic background upgrades. Looking very good.

Many thanks
Chris

22

OGN-R PilotAware / Re: Version 20190418 and GS-OGN PAW Flag Missing

« on: May 11, 2019, 10:21:15 am »

Hi Peter,
I feed Flightradar24 (EGUB13) and the upload stats to that reveal there was about a 15 minute internet break on Friday night at around 1am (presumably BTInternet doing some maintenance/update) that being the only break during the entire week. I'll continue to check whether any subsequent internet drop-outs (which are rare) correlate to the OGN-R/PAW disconnects.
Best regards
Chris

23

OGN-R PilotAware / Re: Version 20190418 and GS-OGN PAW Flag Missing

« on: May 10, 2019, 04:56:46 pm »

Attached screenshots to go with previous post.

Best regards
Chris (PWRADLEY)

24

OGN-R PilotAware / Re: Version 20190418 and GS-OGN PAW Flag Missing

« on: May 08, 2019, 10:06:22 pm »

Hi Lee,
Many thanks. This evening I've switched from a 2.4A Apple supply to a 2.5A genuine Pi Supply.
I have two SDR's running (1090 and 869.525); both Nooelec; one regular one and the other a Smart.
The OGN-R rebroadcasts to the PAW is shown in the attached picture. When the OGN-R and PAW disconnect (even though both are apparently operating) there is no uplink data present.
Is there any way for me to monitor the under-voltage condition?
Best regards
Chris

Later: I ran vcgencmd get_throttled which returned 0x0, so far so good.

Next Day (Fri 10-May-19 ~16:00-16:30)
PAW and OGN-R had become disconnected but neither the OGN-R box or PAW reporting any under-voltage (0x0) as far as I can tell.
I restarted the OGN-R service and immediately the was MLAT received by the PAW and Flag returned to Radar screen.
Standard OGN-R Service restart.
pi@ognpaw:~ $ sudo service rtlsdr-ogn stop                                                                                                                           
pi@ognpaw:~ $ sudo service rtlsdr-ogn start 
The screen shots attached in the following post show the situation before and after the restart.

25

OGN-R PilotAware / Re: Version 20190418 and GS-OGN PAW Flag Missing

« on: May 07, 2019, 07:14:28 pm »

Hi Lee,

Hi Lee,

The fix sorted it. Many thanks.

Occasionally (a couple of times per week) the OGN-R/PAW uplink disconnects and it stays disconnected (evidenced by no uplink station in the OGN-R MLAT table [which continues to be updated] plus no flag in PAW Radar). On restarting just the OGN-R, the uplink immediately resumes and PAW once again sees the MLAT traffic in Radar and displays the 'OGN-R 1' flag as expected.

I am not able to test whether the OGN-R when it has disconnected is effectively 'down' as a rebroadcast station, or whether it would accept an uplink request from a different PAW and is just unable to reconnect to PWRADLEY.

Best regards
Chris

26

OGN-R PilotAware / Re: Version 20190418 and GS-OGN PAW Flag Missing

« on: April 24, 2019, 11:07:01 pm »

Hi Lee,

I rebuilt the OGN-R from a full image which down-dated it to the 20190413 build. On start-up the OGN Flag reappeared in the PAW Radar.

I ran the OGN-R update script which ran successfully but the PAW Radar Flag did not reappear after the services restarted.

It would appear that something may have happened as a result of the update.

Best regards
Chris

27

OGN-R PilotAware / Re: Version 20190418 and GS-OGN PAW Flag Missing

« on: April 23, 2019, 10:13:50 pm »

Hi Lee and Peter,

Many thanks; you are right this is RADLEY/PWRADLEY.

I have 2 SDR's; Both NooElec; one standard (1090) and the other Smart (Flarm). The power supply which I have been using for months is the uprated Raspberry Pi one. Getting lots of hit on both SDR's so they seem to have been working well. I have now switched the power feed over to a 12v Anker hub with USB charging ports to see if that makes a difference.

On running the config script as Peter suggested I get a strange error message at the end which I haven't seen before. "can't read vrs.Configuration.Template.xml".

As an aside is there a way planned to be able to run both SDR's off a powered hub to reduce the power load into and through the Pi. At the moment the SDR's are connected into the Pi using very short USB extenders as they cannot both fit side-by-side in the mandated USB ports.

Hope this helps.
Best regards
Chris

                                                                                                                                                                                                             
########################## Summary ##########################                                                                                                                                                 
Station Name is                : Radley                                                                                                                                                                       
Station APRS Server is         : aprs.glidernet.org:14580                                                                                                                                                     
Station Latitude is            : 51.684570                                                                                                                                                                   
Station Longitude is           : -1.245022                                                                                                                                                                   
Station Altitude AMSL  [M] is  : 67                                                                                                                                                                           
Station Altitude GEOID [M] is  : 47.650                                                                                                                                                                       
Station SDR PPM is             : 0                                                                                                                                                                           
Station SDR Gain is            : 40                                                                                                                                                                           
Station SDR Freq Centr is      : 923.600                                                                                                                                                                     
########################## Summary ##########################                                                                                                                                                 
                                                                                                                                                                                                             
sed: can't read vrs.Configuration.Template.xml: No such file or directory     
 

28

OGN-R PilotAware / Version 20190418 and GS-OGN PAW Flag Missing

« on: April 22, 2019, 11:55:58 am »

My OGN-R is co-located with my PAW which I use as a ground-station (when not airborne) to check the OGN-R and PAW.
In PAW Radar display, my GS-OGN flag is not appearing (other notifications in that area are such as G-BNNZ +20nm did appear whilst checking). I normally use the GS-OGN Flag to check that the OGN-R is broadcasting.
OGN-R Traffic confirms that it is connected to the PAW and rebroadcasting to it; the PAW Rx count is incrementing quickly as expected and the PAW Radar shows MLAT traffic; the PAW Traffic screen also shows the rebroadcast MLAT transmissions being received.
Is there any reason why the GS-OGN flag is not currently being triggered in PAW (2019018 4.14.79-v7+), OGN-R 20190418?

29

OGN-R PilotAware / Re: Latest Version 20190403 and vrs

« on: April 06, 2019, 10:25:32 am »

Hi Peter,

Many thanks. Understood.

30003 confirms lots of data being sent.

Best regards
Chris

30

OGN-R PilotAware / Latest Version 20190403 and vrs

« on: April 05, 2019, 05:09:48 pm »

Lots of Mode-S MLAT being detected with location calculated but not currently being transmitted to my vrs. Is it possible to add these into the port 30103 feed as I think I'm only seeing the Flarm/OGN/PAW traffic atm. Ideally it would be good to see this; the Mode S MLAT and ADS-B traffic in vrs as the positioning onto a map is good. I can see all these in PAW Radar of course (and an excellent display it is too). Great work. Is there any way to check what 1090 traffic is being sent to 360Radar?