Elkhorn, Wisconsin-based maker agency Mayhem XLabs has launched a compact gadget which turns a LILYGO TTGO improvement board right into a devoted tracker for radiosondes — with a tuned antenna for prolonged reception vary.
“NOAA launches climate balloons usually twice a day from areas all around the US,” Mayhem XLabs writes of the game of radiosonde chasing. “After the balloons burst and fall to the bottom you’ve gotten an hour or two to seek out and retrieve them earlier than their batteries die. Till the batteries die the balloons continually transmit their location. This tracker will use the GPS coordinates transmitted by the balloon to get you to with a number of toes of its location.”
A specially-crafted tuned antenna offers this radiosonde finder an extra-long vary, its creators declare. (📷: Mayhem XLabs)
The tracker in query relies on a LILYGO TTGO LoRa32 433MHz improvement board, however with one main change: a specially-tuned antenna. “The gadget comes with the usual 433GHz TTGO antenna, which we discover has very restricted vary on the ~402 to 406MHz vary of most NOAA climate balloons within the US,” Mayhem XLabs explains.
“So along with the usual antenna we offer a {custom} made quarter-wave monopole antenna tuned to have an SWR [Standing Wave Ratio] of lower than two for frequencies round 404MHz.”
The corporate has examined the tuned antenna to over a 130-mile vary. (📷: Mayhem XLabs)
The distinction is stark: with the tuned antenna, the gadget is proven choosing up a balloon launched over 132 miles away — a serious improve over the vary accessible with the extra general-purpose inventory antenna. An inner 18650 battery affords “various hours” of runtime, the corporate claims, and the {hardware} is suitable with Mirko Dalmonte’s MySonde Go firmware for linking to a smartphone — although comes with an easier open supply various preloaded.
The tracker and tuned antenna bundle is now accessible on the Mayhem XLabs Tindie retailer at $45; MySonde Go is obtainable on Dalmonte’s web site, and suitable with an off-the-shelf LILYGO TTGO LoRa32 433MHz improvement board, albeit with out the good thing about Mayhem XLabs’ custom-tuned antenna.
