With Meshtastic radios emitting at most 100mW, line-of-sight frequency and the protocol being robust ONLY when mesh density and node reachability is at an IDEAL sweet spot - it wasn’t very usable beyond experimentation. In my area I couldn’t reliably exchange messages 20mi away :/ I ended up taking down my Meshtastic node and selling all equipment to another ham wishing to get a head start :)

#hamradio #cwmouse #meshtastic

I ran into Meshtastic and started playing with it. Not quite ham radio, but it is radio technology, affordable and easier to share with friends. So far I have only a single Rak Wireless device in my kitchen. Very compromised setup for 915Mhz, but surprisingly I pick up a number of nodes through repeaters on the Santa Cruz Mountains ridge. The plan is to setup a solar node above the roof line and get more direct coverage and range. I’m interested in emcomm aspects of Meshtastic and exploration of it as APRS replacement.

#hamradio #meshtastic