Posted: 1/26/2009 9:59:50 AM EDT
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Hey guys. I am a geek. I have had my license for about 2 years, but only really started using it about 2 months ago. I have been reading up on APRS, and find it pretty interesting. I am interested in the technology, but am having a hard time justifying building a system. Other than tracking where I am, what else could I possibly use this for. I was thinking about joining a RACES/ARES/SKYWARN group in the spring, and I can see the benefits there, but other that that, what are some practical uses for it? Take care. Mike F |
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I got into HAM radio back in 2001 because of APRS. With the right hardware its plug and play. I used to have a Kenwood D700 set up in a car with a dedicated $20 radio shack "hockey puck" GPS hardwired too it. Sold that car and never set it back up. I've also used a sound card interface into a Yaesu 1500 for a home beacon/digipeater. I used to have a D7 handheld as well, but I loaned that out to a friend and never retrieved it.
Honestly with the base APRS packets you do mostly position or weather reporting. There are subgroups that made hardware or used the comment section of a packet to send special info over and had another application to decode it. Steve KC8SLY |
I've messed with it on and off for several of years. I'm not on now since I'm in an apartment. I use UI-VIEW and Precision Maps 8.0 with an old Kenwood 2 meter mobile and a Kantronics KPC-3+ TNC. My Grandpa helped me get the TNC set up and I have completely forgotten how he did it
I have a TinyTrak3 for a mobile tracker. It was really easy to set up and get going and works great. The International Space Station used to have an APRS digipeater on it (Don't know if it still does) and I made some long distance APRS contacts through it. Pretty cool stuff! Other than storm spotting/EMCOMM/event support I'm not sure what practical uses it has. I've had fun experimenting with it though. |
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My friend at work is into it, he has it on weather balloons that he flies experiments on so he can recover them.
Its pretty cool, he can plot the tracks on Google earth and you can see the balloons path across the earth, including the alittude. If I recall correctly he built the TNC out of components that came as a kit. Mike |
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I built a tiny trak inside of a delorme tripmate gps. http://www.byonics.com |
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Hey guys. I am a geek. I have had my license for about 2 years, but only really started using it about 2 months ago. I have been reading up on APRS, and find it pretty interesting. I am interested in the technology, but am having a hard time justifying building a system. Other than tracking where I am, what else could I possibly use this for. I was thinking about joining a RACES/ARES/SKYWARN group in the spring, and I can see the benefits there, but other that that, what are some practical uses for it? Take care. Mike F I love the APRS packet stuff. Been running an APRS Internet Gate for a couple of years now. Have a byonics tracker in the motorcycle, several aprs radios etc. If your looking for some quick info on how to get started, you can check out my site, http://www.ka1mzy.com and click on the APRS information page. It'll give you a quick-E instructions on some things. Anything else, feel free to email me at the email address on the site. Practical? Not really. It's FUN though. I recently did about a 3200 mile roadtrip. The family could track my position as I passed through 5 states and could see my progress on findu.com, as well as other sites for ham operators who know what they are doing. It's also EXPENSIVE. There are loads of resources for help such as the yahoo groups, and of course you can probably get answers to lots of stuff right on here in this forum. A lot of the older guys have NO idea how to use a modern forum like this and are skeered'. The yahoo groups are popular however annoying to navigate. What do you mean by building a system? There are very few areas who do NOT need another IGATE. |
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If you guys want to play around with APRS/packet in the shack then you don't need a TNC, there is software that will do the TNC emulation. Check out AGW Packet Engine, most packet software will interface with it (UIView, etc.). Also, MultiPSK will do it natively. There are probably others as well. All these have free versions that work well (note: this assumes you have a sound interface setup between your radio and computer).
I've done a lot of packet stuff from the shack without having to spend a dime. If you want to do things portably then a TNC is highly recommended unless you want to carry a laptop around. |
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I meant assembling a tracker for my truck. Not building an IGATE or digipeater.
What do you mean by building a system? There are very few areas who do NOT need another IGATE. Mike F The trackers can be purchased completed so all that needs to be done is soldering up power, an antenna and programming the tracker. It's very simple. I put the microtraker in a plastic case (that it came in ) and used a pigtail for the antenna connection to keep it from breaking. Theres a photo on my aprs info page of it. ETA, easier just to post it I suppose :) I had a good friend of mine solder the connections on it. He has a much better solder kit to do it, plus I was nervous about soldering on a 200$ radio transmitter. 
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I meant assembling a tracker for my truck. Not building an IGATE or digipeater.
What do you mean by building a system? There are very few areas who do NOT need another IGATE. Mike F The trackers can be purchased completed so all that needs to be done is soldering up power, an antenna and programming the tracker. It's very simple. I put the microtraker in a plastic case (that it came in ) and used a pigtail for the antenna connection to keep it from breaking. Theres a photo on my aprs info page of it. ETA, easier just to post it I suppose :) I had a good friend of mine solder the connections on it. He has a much better solder kit to do it, plus I was nervous about soldering on a 200$ radio transmitter. http://www.ka1mzy.com/images/8000.jpg what do you need to program them? i saw they come preprogramed from the vendor. i assume you just attahc the antenna and plug it an and BAM instant aprs? |
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I meant assembling a tracker for my truck. Not building an IGATE or digipeater.
What do you mean by building a system? There are very few areas who do NOT need another IGATE. Mike F The trackers can be purchased completed so all that needs to be done is soldering up power, an antenna and programming the tracker. It's very simple. I put the microtraker in a plastic case (that it came in ) and used a pigtail for the antenna connection to keep it from breaking. Theres a photo on my aprs info page of it. ETA, easier just to post it I suppose :) I had a good friend of mine solder the connections on it. He has a much better solder kit to do it, plus I was nervous about soldering on a 200$ radio transmitter. http://www.ka1mzy.com/images/8000.jpg what do you need to program them? i saw they come preprogramed from the vendor. i assume you just attahc the antenna and plug it an and BAM instant aprs? You download a program from byonics and run it with the unit powered up and connected to a serial port. On the right end of my 8000, theres a 9pin serial plug. Programming is quick and painless. I did have some trouble at first getting it to recognize the unit, however I think it was more of a computer/serial port problem. But it does work. 
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You know, I was never really interested in APRS until the last few days. I read the article in QST and downloaded Kenwood's excellent APRS/Echolink supplement manual for the D710A and saw they are really trying to get the word out that the vehicle tracking component is but a small piece of Bruninga's vision.
After reading the Kenwood book I'm starting to Jones for a D710A. Big chunk o' change but looks like they built a ton of capabilities into it for both APRS and VoIP. And this next quote sounds to me like the "open source" (I use that loosely) answer to D-STAR's costly hardware. 
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Technically, D-Star is an open platform. Just nobody but ICom is using it.
Here's a good APRS primer that a member of my local club wrote. He even has a how-to for the sound card-based node. (I've set one up, but I don't have any computer/radio interface. It did work when I manually interfaced it, though.) http://www.stevecrow.net/aprs-primer/ |
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I'm running a D710A that I picked up at Dayton last year with a GPS-710 module. It is very easy to setup to do position reporting. http://greenlightlabs.com/gps-710/ |
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