I’ve recently built a new AllStarLink (ASL) node for my MB7IBW gateway that I have recently brought up on air on the 2m band.
AllStarLink 3 has a lot of changes in it when compared to the previous version and this of course impacts my Node-Red Control Dashboard that I’ve been using to manage my first ASL node for well over a year now.
To build the node I used the RaspberryPi imager and added the AllStarlink 3 image as detailed on the allstarlink.org website.
Installing the system this way makes it pretty easy compared to previous installs but, it comes with some quirks which cause issues with Node-Red.
From the outset the plan has always been to have AllStartLink 3 and Node-Red running on the same Pi4 to keep it totally self contained. This was easy enough to achieve and works without issue.
Node-Red Control Dashboard for AllStarLink 3
Installing Node-Red onto a Pi4 is really easy and is fully documented on the Node-Red Website.
Once the AllStarLink 3 operating system was installed on my SD card, booted and operational I installed Node-Red. I soon realised that there were a few things I had to do before loading the Node-Red flow.
AllStarLink 3 no longer logs connect and disconnect messages in the connectlog like it did in AllStarLink 2. To get logging working again I had to create two new BASH scripts as detailed below and put them into /etc/asterisk/myscripts.
For the connect information I created the BASH script as detailed below.
Next I disabled the temporary filesystems that are used by default for the apache and asterisk logging as it’s useful to keep the apache logs for debugging and I needed the asterisk logs for the Node-Red dashboard.
Disabling the temporary file system is very easy to do, just edit the /etc/fstab and comment out the two lines as shown below.
# Comment out the next line for persistent Apache logs
#tmpfs /var/log/apache2 tmpfs defaults,noatime,nosuid,nodev,noexec,mode=0775,size=32M 0 0
# Comment out the next line for persistent Asterisk logs
#tmpfs /var/log/asterisk tmpfs defaults,noatime,nosuid,nodev,noexec,mode=0775,size=32M,uid=102,gid=106 0 0
# Note: These lines are wrapped, should be on 1 line in the /etc/fstab
Once the entries in the /etc/fstab were commented out I rebooted the Pi4 to get persistent filesystems.
The final thing that had to be done was to allow user repeater to use sudo without a password so that it could be used to perform reboot/shutdown/process restart as user root from within the dashboard.
# /etc/sudoers
# Allow repeater sudo without password
repeater ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL
Once this was all done I imported the Node-Red flow, configured the SSH nodes with login credentials for the Pi4 (important to use the user repeater for SSH), clicked deploy and the dashboard was ready for use.
Node Red AllStarLink3 Control Dashboard Flow
I’ve been using the dashboard for a few weeks now and it’s running perfectly, without error.
If you want to build your own Node-Red Control Dashboard for your AllStarLink 3 node then, just download the flow using the button below and import it into your flow editor.
I’ve spent some time this afternoon modifying my Node-Red Dashboard for controlling AllStarLink nodes to work with the new AllStarLink version 3.
My original AllStarLink Control Dashboard was designed to work with AllStarLink 2 which I have running on an old RaspberryPi 3b on the 70cm band. The dashboard has worked reliably ever since deployment and is in use daily.
With the release of AllStarLink 3 and all the changes that it entails I’ve had to make a few changes to the dashboard flows in order to make it compatible with AllStarLink 3 nodes.
This entails not only flow changes but also the addition of two new bash scripts that are called by Asterisk to log connect and disconnect messages as they are not logged by default any more. (Seems a bit of a step backwards)
Node-Red AllStarLink Control Dashboard v3.0 for ASL3
The changes also entail disabling the temporary filesystems used by default in the new ASL3 build so that log files etc become persistent.
I’ll spend some time using the new dashboard to ensure it’s working correctly and then will release it into the wild for all those that are brave enough to move over to AllStarLink 3.
Following on from my previous article on using Node-Red to build interactive log maps I’ve now reworked the flow to make it more efficient with less Javascript.
The original flow had a function that handled the issue of FT4 contacts being recorded in two different ways depending on which app you use for your FT4/8 operations.
<mode:4>MFSK <submode:3>FT4
or
<mode:8>MFSK FT4
The code I wrote to handle this wasn’t particularly elegant and so I decided to remove the code entirely and just use a simple change node.
M0AWS New node to handle FT4 more efficiently
This is the great thing about Node-Red, there’s always more than one way to do something.
With this fix in place and the old code stripped out of the format generic payload function, the new flow is much tidier and easier to comprehend.
M0AWs Updated ADI Log Map flow
With testing complete and the two maps now live on my website the flow is finally ready for release into the wild.
If you fancy presenting your ADIF logs in a more visual, interactive format then just download the flow below and import it into your Node-Red flow editor.
Don’t forget that you will need to change the path to the log files in the file read nodes to suit your setup and change the location data in the My QTH trigger to match your callsign and location. Other than this the flow should just work.
I’ve not been on the radio much over the last few weeks as I’ve had my head down other radio related rabbit holes.
One of the rabbit holes is a Node-Red project to make my online logs a little more interactive. For sometime now my logs have been displayed on my website as nicely formatted, searchable HTML pages however, they don’t really allow the viewer (myself included) to see the global coverage of all the contacts so, I decided to write a Node-Red flow that would do just that.
M0AWS Interactive Log Flow
The flow itself isn’t too complicated and basically consists of reading in the individual ADIF formatted log files, processing the data and then sending the data in the correct format to the map node for display.
I’ve had to write a few functions to handle the processing of the ADIF formatted data but, these aren’t particularly complex and are fairly easy to understand even if like me, you’re not a Javascript programmer.
The flow is working perfectly however, I’m in the process of reworking the format generic payload function to reduce the amount of code and make it more efficient.
M0AWS SSB / CW / FreeDV Interactive Log World Map
M0AWS Interactive Log Map Layers Menu
The flow generates two maps, one for voice / CW /Satellite contacts and the other for WSJT-X FT4/8 contacts. Every pin on the map is colour coded by band with satellite contacts being denoted by a satellite icon.
Each pin / icon on the map is clickable and reveals the data of the QSO being displayed.
In the top right-hand corner of the map there is a drop down layermenu that allows the viewer to filter by band thus reducing the number of icons on the screen at any one time.
Seeing the data presented on a map really brings my logs alive. An example of this is that I had no idea I’d worked so many stations in India on the QO-100 Satellite.
The small icons in the pins show a microphone for SSB/FM/FreeDV contacts and a downwards pointing triangle in a box for CW contacts. Sadly I couldn’t find a Morse key icon in the collection available.
M0AWS filtered view of QO-100 Satellite contacts
I only use FT4/8 for testing new antenna designs however, it’s interesting to see the global coverage accomplished with this weak signal mode.
M0AWS WSJT-X FT4/8 Interactive Log World Map
Once I’ve finished rewriting the format generic payload function I will make the flow available for download here so that others can also create an interactive view of their radio logs.
If you want to have a look at the maps and try them out for yourself, they are available under the Logs menu above.
This Node-Red instance is running in a virtual machine (VM) on a 16GB RAM RaspberryPi 5 that is also running a number of other VMs at the same time so, it’s safe to say it’s not heavy on CPU and will run on the older Pi4 as well.
I’ve spent some considerable time of late coding a new version of adi2html that I use to convert my ADIF log files into online web pages for all my HAM Radio logs.
The old version that I wrote quite some time ago was written using BASH shell which was quick and easy at the time but, as the logs grew in size it got slower and slower to process the ever increasing number of log entries.
Now I’m retired I have the time to revisit these things and write better, more modern versions of my various programs that run silently in the background.
Writing the new version of adi2html in Python3
It’s taken a little over a week to put this code together, test and debug it, I don’t like to rush these things!
I’ve finally put v1.2 into production today.
The 585 lines of code produce a very nice, modern looking web page and can be used to convert any ADIF file into HTML. The code is extremely quick, taking less than a second to process almost 2500 log entries, a huge improvement over the old version of adi2html.
New look M0AWS Log web page
All of my logs are available here on my blog under the Logs menu above, feel free to have a look at them.
I now need to rewrite the log search functionality so that it uses the same format of presentation for the results.
Ever since I built my RaspberryPi/SHARI AllStarLink node I’ve had to manage connecting/disconnecting to/from other nodes using the Allmon2 or Supermon web admin interfaces. These work fairly well albeit, a bit clunky and buggy. It’s impossible to use from a mobile device though and so I have to get my Macbook out each time I want to connect/disconnect nodes.
Being a Node-RED fanatic I decided that I should put something together that was more portable, mobile friendly and much easier to use. A simple user interface is all that is required and can be achieved very easily using the standard Node-RED dashboard nodes.
Initially I started investigating the Linux command-line interface for Asterisk, the VOIP system that underpins AllStarLink (ASL). I very quickly discovered that the ASL node can be very easily controlled directly from the command-line and that this would be an ideal interface to use to enable node management via a Node-RED dashboard.
In very little time at all I had an experimental control dashboard working with the ASL node and was able to connect/disconnect to/from a single node. All that was required now was to extend this so that I could connect to a number of nodes with nothing more than a push of a button.
Completed v1.0 AllStarLink Control Dashboard – Node-RED Flow
The resultant flow consists of 3 sections, Connect/Disconnect Main Flow, Manage Node Subflow and /var/log/asterisk/connectlog Subflow.
The Connect/Disconnect Main Flow handles all the input from the buttons on the dashboard and the communication to the underlying Asterisk VOIP system.
The button status is denoted by 3 colours, green (Ready to connect), orange (Transitioning to/from connect) and red (Connected). Each button is updated automatically by the button refresh function that is triggered every 2 seconds.
The Manage Node Subflow provides a simple interface to restart the Asterisk VOIP system, reboot the RaspberryPi and shutdown the RaspberryPi. The node status is automatically updated every 45 seconds and will show when the Asterisk subsystem is being restarted or the node is being rebooted or shutdown.
Finally the var/log/asterisk/connectlog Subflow monitors the Asterisk connectlog looking for connect/disconnect messages so that it can signal to update each button status.
Node-RED AllStarLink Dashboard
Each section of the dashboard can be collapsed/opened by touching/clicking the little blue arrows on the right of the dashboard. The dashboard works fine on Android, iOS, Windows, MacOS and Linux.
If you’re not familiar with Node-RED and haven’t yet installed it to your PC, take a look at the Node-RED Getting Started Page. The information takes you through installing Node-RED onto a multitude of devices including PC and RaspberryPi devices.
Once you have Node-RED installed all you need to do is download the AllStarLink Control Dashboard Flow and import it to your Node-RED flow editor.
Note: The link above is now for v1.2 of the flow which includes some critical bug fixes. You can read about the bug fixes in the v1.2 release article.
Once downloaded, select Import from the burger menu icon on the right-hand side of the flow editor as shown below and import the flow file.
Node-RED Flow Editor import Menu Item
Once imported you will find that some of the nodes in the flow are not available. This is because you need to add them to the flow editor palette before being able to deploy the flow.
Drop down the same menu as shown above but, this time select Manage Palette. This will open another window where you will need to select the Install tab as shown below.
Node-RED Flow Editor Palette Install Tab
You need to install two node sets to complete the flow, node-red-contrib-bigssh and node-red-dashboard. Type in the name of each package one at a time in the search bar and then click the Install button. Once the two packages are installed you then need to configure the credentials for logging into your RaspberryPi. This is simply done by double clicking the blue Send Command to ASL node at the top of the main flow and then clicking the Pencil button at the end of the Credentials field. This will open another window where you will need to type in the IP Address of your ASL RaspberryPi into the Host field, then enter 22 into the port field, add repeater into the Username field (repeater is the default username, if you have changed this then you will need to add the new username name in instead) and then the password associated with the repeater login into the Password field. (Normally allstarlink)
Once this is done, do the same on the other blue nodes, namely “Get Node Uptime“, “Command =>> RaspberryPi” and “Tail ConnectLog”.
The final thing to setup is the dashboard size. Click on the downward pointing triangle at the top right of the menu bar (under the burger menu) and select dashboard. Check that the sizes are set the same as in the image below. For some reason, these settings aren’t always imported (Possible bug?) so, if your dashboard layout isn’t like shown above it will be because these settings failed to import.
ASL Dashboard Settings
You are now ready to deploy your AllStarLink Control Dashboard! Press the red Deploy button at the top of the flow editor window.
Finally, if you want to change the nodes that each button connects/disconnects you will need to edit the set flow var’s function at the top of the main flow. All you will need to do is replace the existing node numbers taking care not to alter the rest of the code in any way otherwise, it could stop the flow from working.
Once you’ve edited the node numbers, double click on the associated button node and change its Label to show the new node name.
Once your changes are complete, Deploy the flow again and your changes will be live.
This is version 1 of the ASL Dashboard, I already have ideas for version 2 that will also have the ability to enter a node number into a field and connect to it without the need to program it into a button.
Following on from my article about my QO-100 Satellite Ground Station Complete Build, this article goes into some detail on the Node-RED section of the build and how I put together my QO-100 Satellite Ground Station Dashboard web app.
The Node-RED project has grown organically as I used the QO-100 satellite over time. Initially this started out as a simple project to synchronise the transmit and receive VFO’s so that the SDR receiver always tracked the IC-705 transmitter.
Over time I added more and more functionality until the QO-100 Ground Station Dashboard became the beast it is today.
M0AWS QO-100 Ground Station Control Dashboard built using Node-RED.
Looking at the dashboard web app it looks relatively simple in that it reflects a lot of the functionality that the two radio devices already have in their own rights however, bringing this together is actually more complicated than it first appears.
Starting at the beginning I use FLRig to connect to the IC-705. The connection can be via USB or LAN/Wifi, it makes no difference. Node-RED gains CAT control of the IC-705 via XMLRPC on port 12345 to FLRig.
To control the SDR receiver I use GQRX SDR software and connect to it using RIGCTL on GQRX port 7356 from Node-RED. These two methods of connectivity work well and enables full control of the two radios.
M0AWS Node-RED QO-100 Ground Station Dashboard Flow as of 12/06/24
The complete flow above looks rather daunting initially however, breaking it down into its constituent parts makes it much easier to understand.
There are two sections to the flow, the GQRX control which is the more complex of the two flows and the comparatively simple IC-705 section of the flow. These two flows could be broken down further into smaller flows and spread across multiple projects using inter-flow links however, I found it much easier from a debug point of view to have the entire flow in one Node-RED project.
Breaking down the flow further the GQRX startup section (shown below) establishes communication with the GQRX SDR software via TCP/IP and gets the initial mode and filter settings from the SDR software. This information is then used to populate the dashboard web app.
M0AWS Node-RED QO-100 Ground Station Dashboard – GQRX Startup Flow
The startup triggers fire just once at initial startup of Node-RED so it’s important that the SDR device is plugged into the PC at boot time.
All the startup triggers feed information into the RIGCTL section of the GQRX flow. This section of the flow (shown below) passes all the commands onto the GQRX SDR software to control the SDR receiver.
M0AWS Node-RED QO-100 Ground Station Dashboard – GQRX RIGCTL Flow
The TCP RIGCTL -> GQRX node is a standard TCP Request node that is configured to talk to the GQRX software on the defined IP Address and Port as configured in the GQRX setup. The output from this node then goes into the Filter RIGCTL Response node that processes the corresponding reply from GQRX for each message sent to it. Errors are trapped in the green Debug node and can be used for debugging.
The receive S Meter is also driven from the the output of the Filter RIGCTL Response node and passed onto the S Meter function for formatting before being passed through to the actual gauge on the dashboard.
Continuing down the left hand side of the flow we move into the section where all the GQRX controls are defined.
M0AWS Node-RED QO-100 Ground Station Dashboard – GQRX Controls Flow
In this section we have the VFO step buttons that move the VFO up/down in steps of 10Hz to 10Khz. Each button press generates a value that is passed onto the Set DeltaFreq change node and then on to the Calc new VFO Freq function. From here the new VFO frequency is stored and passed onto the communications channel to send the new VFO frequency to the GQRX software.
The Mode and Filter nodes are simple drop down menus with predefined values that are used to change the mode and receive filter width of the SDR receiver.
Below are the HAM band selector buttons, each of these will use a similar process as detailed above to change the VFO frequency to a preset value on each of the HAM HF Bands.
The QO-100 button puts the transmit and receive VFO’s into synchro-mode so that the receive VFO follows the transmit VFO. It also sets the correct frequency in the 739Mhz band for the downlink from the LNB in GQRX SDR software and sets the IC-705 to the correct frequency in the 2m VHF HAM band to drive the 2.4Ghz up-converter.
The Split button allows the receive VFO to be moved away from the transmit VFO for split operation when in QO-100 mode. This allows for the receive VFO to be moved away so that you can RIT into slightly off frequency stations or to work split when working DXpedition stations.
The bottom two Memory buttons allow you to store the current receive frequency into a memory for later recall.
At the top right of this section of the flow there is a Display Band Plan Info function, this displays the band plan information for the QO-100 satellite in a small display field on the Dashboard as you tune across the transponder. Currently it only displays information for the satellite, at some point in the future I will add the necessary code to display band plan information for the HF bands too.
The final section of the GQRX flow (shown below) sets the initial button colours and starts the Powermate USB VFO knob flow. I’ve already written a detailed article on how this works here but, for completeness it is triggered a few seconds after startup (to allow the USB device to be found) and then starts the BASH script that is used to communicate with the USB device. The output of this is processed and passed back into the VFO control part of the flow so that the receive VFO can be manually altered when in split mode or in non-QO-100 mode.
M0AWS Node-RED QO-100 Ground Station Dashboard – Powermate VFO Flow
The bottom flows in the image above set some flow variables that are used throughout the flow and then calculates and sets the RIT value on the dashboard display.
The final section of the flow is the IC-705 control flow. This is a relatively simple flow that is used to both send and receive data to/from the IC-705, process it and pass it on to the other parts of the flow as required.
M0AWS Node-RED QO-100 Ground Station Dashboard – IC-705 Control Flow
The IC-705 flow is started via the timestamp trigger at the top left. This node is nothing more than a trigger that fires every 0.5 seconds so that the dashboard display is updated in near realtime. The flow is pretty self explanatory, in that it collects the current frequency, transmit power, SWR reading, PTT on/off status and S Meter reading each time it is triggered. This information is then processed and used to keep the dashboard display up to date and to provide VFO tracking information to the GQRX receive flow.
On the left are the buttons to change band on the IC-705 along with a button to tune to the VOLEMT on the 60m band. Once again there two memory buttons to save and recall the IC-705 VFO frequency.
The Startup PTT Colour trigger node sets the PTT button to green on startup. The PTT button changes to red during transmit and is controlled via the Toggle PTT function.
At the very bottom of the flow is the set transverter IF Freq function, this sets the IC-705 to a preselected frequency in the 2m HAM band when the dashboard is switched into QO-100 mode by pressing the QO-100 button.
On the right of the flow there is a standard file write node that writes the 2.4Ghz QO-100 uplink frequency each time it changes into a file that is used by my own logging software to add the uplink frequency into my log entries automatically. (Yes I wrote my own logging software!)
The RX Audio Mute Control filter node is used to reduce the receive volume during transmit when in QO-100 full duplex mode otherwise, the operator can get tongue tied hearing their own voice 250ms after they’ve spoken coming back from the satellite. This uses the pulse audio system found on the Linux platform. The audio is reduced to a level whereby it makes it much easier to talk but, you can still hear enough of your audio to ensure that you have a good, clean signal on the satellite.
As I said at the beginning of this article, this flow has grown organically over the last 12 months and has been a fun project to put together. I’ve had many people ask me how I have created the dashboard and whether they could do the same for their ground station. The simple answer is yes, you can use this flow with any kind of radio as long as it has the ability to be controlled via CAT/USB or TCP/IP using XMLRPC or RIGCTL.
To this end I include below an export of the complete flow that can be imported into your own Node-RED flow editor. You may need to make changes to it for it to work with your radio/SDR but, it shouldn’t take too much to complete. If like me you are using an IC-705 and any kind of SDR controlled by GQRX SDR software then it’s ready to go without any changes at all.
With the recent explosion of artificial intelligence (AI) art generators that are making the news of late for all the wrong reasons, I decided to see if I could put it to good use and design some futuristic QSL cards.
Having recently been contacted by the Special Callsigns QSL Manager and being advised that there were 18 QSL cards waiting for me, I decided it was time to create some QSL cards of my own for future use.
Having never used any form of online AI and not having any artistic abilities I was amazed how easy it was to create images using nothing more than a paragraph or so of text to describe what it was I wanted to create.
Since all the QSL cards I received were for contacts on the QO-100 satellite, I set out to create a visually futuristic QSL card that was based around a radio HAM operator and satellite communications.
M0AWS – 1st attempt at creating a futuristic QSL card image using AI Art
To my surprise the results of my first image generation were surprisingly good. The AI generated an image that resembled the simple text that I entered, although I never requested a one legged HAM operator!
Pleased with my very first attempt I gradually improved the description of what I was looking for, adding more and more detail to the text and including things that I wanted to see in the image. Over a fairly short period of time this approach started to generate some very interesting images.
M0AWS – AI Art QSL Image attempt 2M0AWS – AI Art QSL Image attempt 3M0AWS – AI Art QSL Image attempt 4
With each iteration I gradually got closer to what I was trying to achieve but, never quite got exactly what I wanted so, I decided to rewrite the descriptive text adding even more information than before. The text was now a full blown paragraph with quite specific things described including the angle at which the scene was being viewed from.
The other option I wanted to try out was the theme functionality that the AI offered. This allows you to set a theme for the image from things like steampunk, cartoon, manga, real world and many more. The results were quite impressive and added yet another angle to the image generation.
M0AWS – AI Art QSL Theme 1M0AWS – AI Art QSL Theme 3M0AWS – AI Art QSL Theme 2
I disappeared down the theme AI Art generation rabbit hole for quite some time and generated some very interesting and fun results. The best by far though was the Thunderbirds themed image, this did put a smile on my face!
M0AWS – AI Art QSL Thunderbirds Themed
At the other end of the spectrum I tried the Salvador Dalli theme, it produced an image that was very like the work of the famous artist but, wasn’t quite what I was looking for.
M0AWS – AI Art QSL Salvador Dalli Themed
After much fun I eventually settled on the image I was after, a futuristic scene of a radio HAM with a satellite ground station over looking a mountain range and city below.
M0AWS Satellite QSL Card generated using online AI
I’m really pleased with the results from my ventures into AI generated art. The next challenge is to create a QSL card for HF bands Contacts.
I’ve been active on QO-100 for a few days now and I have to admit that I’m really pleased with the way the ground station is performing. I’m getting a good strong, quality signal into the satellite along with excellent audio reports from my Icom IC-705 and the standard fist mic.
I’m very pleased with the performance of the NooElec v5 SDR receiver that I’m now using in place of the Funcube Dongle Pro+ SDR receiver. Being able to see the entire bandwidth of the satellite transponder on the waterfall in the GQRX SDR software is a huge plus too.
M0AWS QO-100 Satellite Log map showing contacts as of 23/06/23
As can be seen on the map of contacts above, I’ve worked some interesting stations on some of the small islands in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. The signals from these stations are incredibly strong on the satellite and an easy armchair copy.
DX of note are ZD7GWM on St. Helena Island in the South Atlantic Ocean, PP2RON and PY2WDX in Brazil, 8Q7QC on Naifaru Island in the Maldives, VU2DPN in Chennai India, 5H3SE/P in Tanzania Africa and 3B8BBI/P in Mauritius.
There are many EU stations on the satellite too and quite a few regular nets of German and French stations. I’ve not plucked up the courage to call into the nets yet, perhaps in the future.
There are a lot of very experienced satellite operators on QO-100 with a wealth of information to share. I’ve learnt a lot just from chatting with people with some conversations lasting well over 30mins, a rarity on the HAM bands today.
We also had our first Matrix QO-100 Net this week, an enjoyable hour of chat about all things radio and more. We have a growing community of Amateur Radio enthusiasts from around the world on the Matrix Chat Network with a broad spectrum of interests. If you fancy joining a dynamic community of radio enthusiasts then just click the link to download a chat client and join group.
I’ve been making a few improvements to my QO-100 Node Red Dashboard whilst waiting for the 2.4Ghz hardware to arrive. I’ve added the ability to split the RX and TX VFOs so that I can tune away from the TX frequency for working split stations or for tuning to slightly off frequency stations. I also added a series of tuning buttons to the top of the GQRX side of the dashboard to enable easy tuning using the trackball connected to my Kubuntu PC. This worked well but, I really missed having a real VFO knob like a conventional radio.
As I had a Griffin Powewrmate USB VFO from a previous SDR radio I added it to the flow as well so that I had a physical VFO knob for the SDR receiver. Details on how I got it working using evtest and a simple BASH script are in the Griffin Powermate article.
M0AWS QO-100 Node Red Dashboard Flow
The Node Red flow is looking a little busier with the addition of split mode and the Griffin Powermate USB VFO which has really enhanced the useability of the solution. It’s very impressive what can be achieved with Node Red with a little imagination. You really don’t need to be a heavy weight programmer to make things work.
M0AWS QO-100 Node Red Dashboard as of 07/06/23
I also put together some code to calculate the S Meter reading from the dBFS data the GQRX SDR software generates. It’s not 100% accurate but, it’s close enough to be useful.
On the IC-705 side of the Dashboard I also now display the 2.4Ghz uplink frequency so that it’s available for logging.
So with the QO-100 Dashboard ready to go live I have now started putting together the 2.4Ghz transmit path of the ground station. I have the 2.4Ghz transverter and matching 12w amplifier from DXPatrol, the IceCone Helix 2.4Ghz antenna from Nolle Engineering, some LMR-400-UF and connectors from Barenco and an appropriate water proof enclosure from Screwfix to fit all the kit into however, I’m now being held up by one simple little SMA male to SMA male connector that I need to connect the transverter and amp together.
M0AWS Waterproof enclosure from ScrewfixM0AWS Laying out the 2.4Ghz TX kit in the enclosureM0AWS LMR-400-UF coax from Barenco
The SMA connector has been ordered but, is taking a month of Sundays to arrive! Hopefully it’ll arrive soon and I’ll finally get on the QO-100 satellite and start enjoying the fun.
More soon …
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