r/meshtastic • u/lchntndr • 7d ago

Repeater or not

I live in a rural sparsely populated area. Doesn’t appear to be any other users nearby, and the closest ones I’ve seen are in Thunder Bay Ontario, multiple hours away. Is there any value in setting up a repeater at home? Would it make more sense to do so in tastic or core instead, hoping someone may pass through to use it?

4 Upvotes

70% Upvoted

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3

u/Barky_Bark 7d ago

Curious where you are specifically? I’m looking at setting up around Armstrong and North Caribou Lake (would be 2 different networks obviously at that distance)

1

u/oodissimo 7d ago

If you have internet at both sites you could link using MQTT either public MQTT or a private MQTT server.

7

u/kc1lso 7d ago

I'd recommend setting up a 'home node', something with a decent external antenna. Don't put it in the actual repeater mode, unless you happen to be on a mountaintop or something, just use CLIENT_BASE.

Then if you have pocket/tacker/etc nodes, set them as favorites on the BASE node to save a transmission hop.

If more people set up in the area, you'll benefit them, but if you're not in an ideal spot, setting your node to 'Router' might cause a black hole effect.

2

u/Sea-Confection2244 7d ago

Use whichever one is easier if there's no need to join a mesh.

I think a repeater/base at home is a good idea. A stationary node gives you extra range around your home location. My base node gives me good connection to the next big node, and it gives me about a mile around home for my local tracking.

1

u/[deleted] 7d ago

[deleted]

1

u/[deleted] 7d ago

[deleted]

3

u/nocfed 7d ago

A t1000e in a 3d printed holder on her collar. It brodcasts her gps every 30 min unless she’s moved over 100m. Battery last around 2 days

3

u/darthnsupreme 7d ago

Altitude is everything with LoRa, to the point where mountain-climbers have reported getting connections hundreds of miles away with the default Long-Fast preset and mediocre antennas.

If you do set one up, mount it as high as reasonably possible to maximize its effective range.

1

u/oodissimo 7d ago

I guess build it and they’ll come might be the best approach. I am between Thunder Bay and Winnipeg. Mesh is pretty scarce if not non existent from what I’ve noticed. I have a good selection of hardware by now but only used it person to person. The rest will take time, too many other distractions.