I split it at POE becuase I do not intend for this to be the last permanent version of this super node. I will be powering other devices that will take the usbc power handoffs and the station g2s will have a direct power feed via the side connectors instead of the usbc port. This will allow me to remote manage the station g2 units via their usbc ports from the mini computers (whether they be raspberry pi or otherwise, I haven’t chosen yet) I also wanted to isolate the two power feeds as much as possible and using a usbc Y adaptor doesn’t really do that as there’s no active electronics there to prevent crosstalk. In the POE adaptors there is some level of isolation granted on the Poe side.
Step bits for your drill can really save you some hassle. I used one to drill 12mm holes in vinyl siding J channel for LED lights on the outside of my house….955 of them. Pilot holes and switching bits would have taken a ridiculously long time. That and the step bit didn’t walk around or get stuck.
@@ke6vdwit sure was…I installed 12V LED pixels along the roof line on the front of my house. Lights are spaced every 2 inches. They stick out just enough under the facia that you can’t really tell they are there, until you turn them on. No more stringing Christmas lights and I can change colors or patterns for more than just one holiday. I am digging your project though. I may do something similar here. If you ever make another node box save yourself the headache and use that step bit. I would have had the bulkhead holes done in less than 1 minute and it’s way safer!
@ You are right! You inspired me to order some step bits. I wish I had them for this project but had to wing it. I suppose it’s better that I drilled it in stages otherwise I can imagine the whole box spinning wildly as the drill catches plastic spurs. Are your led strips weatherproof?
Plenty of folks have already done so. The filters have always provided a very noticeable and positive difference. Even the "cheap" filters are better than no filter.
Actually I did but I forgot to mention it. Without filter going straight to Yag, we only saw around 200 nodes detected. This was close to what we got using the lcom filter.
24 วันที่ผ่านมา +1
Glad you like my filter that you bought from Airframes! LMK if you want more tech data.
I’m a rebel! Lol Really though that’s just an extra table not dining room. Plastic and nothing really scratchy to harm it. That table is soooo thick and hard and HEAVY. It took 4 people to put that table in there.
@@vinceparker2888 So here is the issue with that. The Station G2 uses an esp32 module and on that module is where the Bluetooth antenna is. There is unfortunately no way to make the Bluetooth external because of this.
So there is actually a way but you have to mess with the esp32 module to do it. I’ll post a photo of this in my posts here on youtube so you can see. @vinceparker2888
Congratulations: you likely just compromised your entire setup by electrically connecting both side plates of the G2 nodes as well as connecting them to the aluminum mount plate (depending on the thickness of the double-sided tape, or pressure on the cables/case). Also, the spurious RF emissions from many of these cheap PD and POE supplies can be surprising. The direct DC input option of the G2, without any cheap switch mode power supply stuff from the PD unit would likely be best unless you can confirm the clean output RF "silence" of your PD supplies. A TinySA here would be useful. It always surprises me when people set out to "improve" RF designs without actually testing those improvements from out of the box baseline. Not saying filters and such can't improve things, but how on earth will you know ? All the losses from those connectors alone tickle me suspicious.
Snarky there. It must feel good to be a legend in your own mind. First of all, the g2 sideplates are not connected together. The double sided tape mounting method was temporary for the test as I said in the video and the spacing prevents any metal to metal contact. Once the final version is decided, everything will be mounted with nylon risers and nylon screws through the plate. I needed to determine if I was going with two airframe filters or two of the other filters. I chose airframe. Now I can layout the setup and permanently mount things. There is nothing compromised in this build whatsoever. Losses from connectors? The station G2 provides an AMPLE 4W to easily compensate for connector loss and still meet legal requirements for Effective Isotropic Radiated Power. The cables are LMR400 variant and were selected as short lengths to mitigate as much insertion loss as possible. Past that, the connectors, well, they are connectors. I'm not about to open the filters and solder things to avoid the connectors, it would be a mute point. The POE converters do not emit RF harmonically or directly in the frequency ranges of the ISM band. They were selected for this reason. It always surprises me when comments come in from those who think they know it all and didn't even watch the whole video. Congratulations to you as well, Sad Ham. So, please, 3d print yourself into a box.
@@ke6vdw You *JUST* posted a video replacing the nylon standoffs and screws with metal screws, then proceeding with your "test", so I have no idea what you are saying when you claim the plates are "not connected". Bottom line is you cannot determine if it "works well" when you've fundamentally changed the RF behavior. If it *DOES* work well, you state you'll be changing it entirely again by going back to isolated side plates and different mounting ? Then what's the point at all ? This test offers no real value other than the qualitative comparison between the filters… literally nothing else (and zero baseline comparison to see if no filter is better). The low power levels at work here for the receive side are what really matters, which was my point about the connectors, cables, and filters. Nothing comes for free. Extra transmission power means literally nothing if you don't see the node transmissions in the first place because you've "lowered the noise" by inadvertently also lowering the signal. This is especially true with Meshtastic networks since the very nature of chirp spread spectrum signaling makes it more power sensitive than noise sensitive compared to standard signaling methods (where RF notch filters are more beneficial). The only way to know is to test, rather than just assume a filter will improve the final SNR. While doing similar tests for my Helium node deployments, I found the cabling and connector loss amounted to essentially throwing the baby out with the bath water, and so I re-engineered my node enclosure to remove as many connectors and cable length as possible, even at the expense of having to build a custom-sized weatherproof enclosure. The results were quantifiable only because of rigor in testing rather than just tossing "best practices" at it and hoping for the best. Your knee-jerk reaction to ridicule rather than affirm the concerns makes me question if your desire is to do something cool and useful here or just be praised for doing "something". "Legend in your own mind" ? Hrmmm 🤔
@@fiveangle First of all, ridicule is rude. Don't expect a kind reply to a rude opening. Ridicule is the act of using unkind words or actions to make someone or something look foolish. Synonyms of ridicule include deride, mock, and taunt. Ridicule implies a deliberate often malicious belittling. Why do I have to teach you how to be a kind human? Second, the screws are not touching the metal plate, period. Not sure why you do not get that.
Nice build, was there preference to split the poe vs splitting the usb C power?
I split it at POE becuase I do not intend for this to be the last permanent version of this super node. I will be powering other devices that will take the usbc power handoffs and the station g2s will have a direct power feed via the side connectors instead of the usbc port. This will allow me to remote manage the station g2 units via their usbc ports from the mini computers (whether they be raspberry pi or otherwise, I haven’t chosen yet)
I also wanted to isolate the two power feeds as much as possible and using a usbc Y adaptor doesn’t really do that as there’s no active electronics there to prevent crosstalk.
In the POE adaptors there is some level of isolation granted on the Poe side.
Step bits for your drill can really save you some hassle. I used one to drill 12mm holes in vinyl siding J channel for LED lights on the outside of my house….955 of them. Pilot holes and switching bits would have taken a ridiculously long time. That and the step bit didn’t walk around or get stuck.
Wow 955 of them? That is alot of work.
@@ke6vdwit sure was…I installed 12V LED pixels along the roof line on the front of my house. Lights are spaced every 2 inches. They stick out just enough under the facia that you can’t really tell they are there, until you turn them on. No more stringing Christmas lights and I can change colors or patterns for more than just one holiday.
I am digging your project though. I may do something similar here. If you ever make another node box save yourself the headache and use that step bit. I would have had the bulkhead holes done in less than 1 minute and it’s way safer!
@ You are right! You inspired me to order some step bits. I wish I had them for this project but had to wing it. I suppose it’s better that I drilled it in stages otherwise I can imagine the whole box spinning wildly as the drill catches plastic spurs. Are your led strips weatherproof?
You should test the dual node setup with one node with the better filter and the other node with no filter.
Plenty of folks have already done so. The filters have always provided a very noticeable and positive difference. Even the "cheap" filters are better than no filter.
Actually I did but I forgot to mention it. Without filter going straight to Yag, we only saw around 200 nodes detected. This was close to what we got using the lcom filter.
Glad you like my filter that you bought from Airframes! LMK if you want more tech data.
I'd be in the divorce courts if I did that on the dining room table.
I’m a rebel! Lol Really though that’s just an extra table not dining room. Plastic and nothing really scratchy to harm it. That table is soooo thick and hard and HEAVY. It took 4 people to put that table in there.
Is there a way to add a external bluetooth antenna to the G2? I have several heavy duty enclosures that limit bluetooth range.
@@vinceparker2888 So here is the issue with that. The Station G2 uses an esp32 module and on that module is where the Bluetooth antenna is. There is unfortunately no way to make the Bluetooth external because of this.
So there is actually a way but you have to mess with the esp32 module to do it. I’ll post a photo of this in my posts here on youtube so you can see. @vinceparker2888
th-cam.com/users/postUgkxDMKuYTcYMctl538kMKy4Xw0_ECM8BJRt?si=9tknzGktiwV8CNaX
@vinceparker2888
Awesome
Congratulations: you likely just compromised your entire setup by electrically connecting both side plates of the G2 nodes as well as connecting them to the aluminum mount plate (depending on the thickness of the double-sided tape, or pressure on the cables/case). Also, the spurious RF emissions from many of these cheap PD and POE supplies can be surprising. The direct DC input option of the G2, without any cheap switch mode power supply stuff from the PD unit would likely be best unless you can confirm the clean output RF "silence" of your PD supplies. A TinySA here would be useful.
It always surprises me when people set out to "improve" RF designs without actually testing those improvements from out of the box baseline. Not saying filters and such can't improve things, but how on earth will you know ? All the losses from those connectors alone tickle me suspicious.
Snarky there. It must feel good to be a legend in your own mind. First of all, the g2 sideplates are not connected together. The double sided tape mounting method was temporary for the test as I said in the video and the spacing prevents any metal to metal contact. Once the final version is decided, everything will be mounted with nylon risers and nylon screws through the plate. I needed to determine if I was going with two airframe filters or two of the other filters. I chose airframe. Now I can layout the setup and permanently mount things.
There is nothing compromised in this build whatsoever. Losses from connectors? The station G2 provides an AMPLE 4W to easily compensate for connector loss and still meet legal requirements for Effective Isotropic Radiated Power. The cables are LMR400 variant and were selected as short lengths to mitigate as much insertion loss as possible. Past that, the connectors, well, they are connectors. I'm not about to open the filters and solder things to avoid the connectors, it would be a mute point.
The POE converters do not emit RF harmonically or directly in the frequency ranges of the ISM band. They were selected for this reason.
It always surprises me when comments come in from those who think they know it all and didn't even watch the whole video. Congratulations to you as well, Sad Ham.
So, please, 3d print yourself into a box.
@@ke6vdw You *JUST* posted a video replacing the nylon standoffs and screws with metal screws, then proceeding with your "test", so I have no idea what you are saying when you claim the plates are "not connected".
Bottom line is you cannot determine if it "works well" when you've fundamentally changed the RF behavior. If it *DOES* work well, you state you'll be changing it entirely again by going back to isolated side plates and different mounting ? Then what's the point at all ? This test offers no real value other than the qualitative comparison between the filters… literally nothing else (and zero baseline comparison to see if no filter is better).
The low power levels at work here for the receive side are what really matters, which was my point about the connectors, cables, and filters. Nothing comes for free. Extra transmission power means literally nothing if you don't see the node transmissions in the first place because you've "lowered the noise" by inadvertently also lowering the signal. This is especially true with Meshtastic networks since the very nature of chirp spread spectrum signaling makes it more power sensitive than noise sensitive compared to standard signaling methods (where RF notch filters are more beneficial). The only way to know is to test, rather than just assume a filter will improve the final SNR.
While doing similar tests for my Helium node deployments, I found the cabling and connector loss amounted to essentially throwing the baby out with the bath water, and so I re-engineered my node enclosure to remove as many connectors and cable length as possible, even at the expense of having to build a custom-sized weatherproof enclosure. The results were quantifiable only because of rigor in testing rather than just tossing "best practices" at it and hoping for the best.
Your knee-jerk reaction to ridicule rather than affirm the concerns makes me question if your desire is to do something cool and useful here or just be praised for doing "something". "Legend in your own mind" ? Hrmmm 🤔
@@fiveangle First of all, ridicule is rude. Don't expect a kind reply to a rude opening. Ridicule is the act of using unkind words or actions to make someone or something look foolish. Synonyms of ridicule include deride, mock, and taunt. Ridicule implies a deliberate often malicious belittling. Why do I have to teach you how to be a kind human? Second, the screws are not touching the metal plate, period. Not sure why you do not get that.