In car APRS map install almost complete

I have fitted the tablet mount in the car, unfortunately by using self-tapping screws into a piece of trim panel on the passenger side, and have tested to find the best position for the tablet so it does not interfere with the operation of the controls, it does block access to the stereo at the moment however this is a minor inconvenience.

The wiring has tested out in a temporary location and RF from the radio does not appear to interfere with the operation of the USB port thus allowing the mobile phone to remain tethered to the tablet over USB, the last job to do is tidy up the cabling by means of cable ties, keeping the radio cable away from anything else of course, the USB cable for the phone will run out loose from the hub as it will be reused in the charger as well for when the tablet is not in the car (for instance when I am at work and I require to charge the phone, the USB hub cannot deliver enough current for a fast charge), the hub was not powered externally during the mount install tests, the Bluetooth GPS unit, which got a lock relatively quickly, was though I suspect the connector does not quite fit the socket on the unit which results in poor to intermittent connection.

Otherwise everything is working, the tablet is displaying whatever the radio receives, the position from GPS and anything on the APRS-IS that is out of radio range, so all set for the off to Blackpool in April

73 de M0WNU

Addition to the in car APRS mapping setup planned

With me hoping to fit the mount for the tablet into the car on Sunday, attention has turned to how I would be able to type anything into the tablet while it is in the mount and off the keyboard dock, I decided a wireless keyboard with trackpad for this and as I've had good results with Logitech products in the past (I have a keyboard but lost the unifying receiver for it) I chose their K400, which we actually use at my work on one of the non-till computers (and it gets dropped on the floor sometimes), as this incorporates a trackpad it means I can still have the option of a mouse or a touchscreen, with APRSISCE/32 a mouse is needed due to the fact it is a desktop application not optimised for a touch screen.

The keyboard is of a decent size so it will fit in the glovebox or the space under the seat when not in use and the dongle can stay plugged into the USB hub which I plan to cable tie to the arm of the tablet holder, given how the setup is configured there would only be one spare USB port after this though this is not an issue as I'd only really use that for flash drives (the tablet does have a micro SD card slot onboard).

Unfortunately with pay day being some time away this will have to wait until then, however I hope to have the setup working ahead of the Blackpool rally so it can be used then not only filling in for where my FTM-400XDE cannot reach an igate or digipeater, but also gating others packets as well as the setup is able to do that.

Going onto the subject of igates, Coastal Chipworks, the company behind the TNC boards for the Raspberry Pi, have since ceased trading, which I discovered yesterday, so I am now having to look into an alternative method to get the Raspberry Pi to work as a two-way igate for this area, I shall keep you posted on my progress with that project.

73 de M0WNU

Testing the in-car APRS map display with USB hub on tablet

Today I had to do a run out to a local branch of discount supermarket Lidl, and thought it was a good opportunity to test out the map setup using a USB hub on the tablet, however some issues came to light during this before and after leaving the house.

The first issue was APRSISCE/32 causing the WiFi adaptor in the tablet to lock up under load, meaning my phone is tethered using a USB cable (Bluetooth was tested and found to be unacceptably slow, and RF from the radio, with the cables in a certain place, would cause the USB to drop and reconnect, which would cause the tethering to switch off in the phone, the USB cable feeding the hub itself was too long anyway and I've found a shorter one in which I have fitted a clip on ferrite to to see if that helps.

The other issue was the COM port allocation for the FTM-400XDE's supplied data cable, this conflicted with a Bluetooth serial port so the number was changed over to one that was not in use, this did involve disconnecting and reconnecting the plug, and to identify the USB port in which the data cable is to always be plugged in it was outlined with blue permanent marker, the phone used one of the other ports, this allows fitting of a wireless keyboard later on

The USB hub is powered from an in-car power lead with variable voltage set at 5 volts, though the computer and hub will only dictate a maximum of 500mA current per port (the data cable won't get close to that but the phone will).

The Bluetooth GPS box, though currently not fitted to the windscreen as it was previously, worked fine stuck to the top of the dash with the blu-tack already on it and unusually got sufficient satellites from cold start which certainly impressed me.

There is still a little bit of testing to do, using the cable that I put a ferrite bead onto, and then there will be the fitting of the mount in the car which has yet to be done though if the weather is not bad I can look into it on Sunday, but to be honest I'm not holding my breath, it is the UK and winter after all.

I hope to have this working ahead of the Blackpool rally in April.

73 de M0WNU

APRS in-car mapping again

The new tablet arrived a few days ago and I got it working with APRSIS32, the Bluetooth GPS receiver and the FTM-400XDE, so I took it out for a test run to see how it faired, it worked fine and was able to show me stations that the radio received, as well as gate them to APRS-IS but it also showed up stations out of range as I used my phone as a WiFi hotspot to connect it to the Internet, in a previous post I mentioned that I need a mount, I still do as it is not quite the end of May yet, in fact it’s only the beginning of May.

As the tablet is Windows 10 it should also allow me to update the firmware of the radio and reprogram it as needed, though I don’t have a need to do either in a hurry as the radio is working and as far as I am aware there are no major fixes though I will double-check Yaesu’s website in the coming weeks.

The best test for the setup will be long journeys though at present I have none planned, next one hopefully will be the Bowburn rally and after that the National Hamfest, though by the latter I should be an M0 by then.

I’ll keep you posted on this topic

73 de 2E0EIJ