[HamWAN PSDR] Site details?

[Nick Kartsioukas]

Yep, the LOS clearance over the trees is going to be the biggest part. I'm hoping the LIDAR data in the Ubiquiti tool is accurate enough to capture tree height. Good to know about the link distance!

> On Mar 17, 2023, at 17:48, Nigel Vander Houwen <nigel at nigelvh.com> wrote:
> 
> To Tom’s point, the distance almost doesn’t matter. We’ve had links much farther than the 28 miles you’re looking at. You would of course want to select a client setup with the most gain possible for reliability, but almost universally if you can see it, you can connect.
> 
> Nigel
> 
>> On Mar 17, 2023, at 17:34, Nick Kartsioukas <nick at explodinglemur.org> wrote:
>> 
>> I can see nothing from my roof.  From my original mail, "For example it looks like I "only" need a 35' mast for Baldi, but at 28mi away I'm not sure I can get connected reliably, vs Beacon or Capitol Park which are much closer but I'd need at least a 66' mast thanks to local terrain and trees."  Local terrain and trees are a challenge here which is why I want to gather and simulate as much as I can before I try to do something that a simulation would rule out.
>> 
>>> On Thu, Mar 16, 2023, at 22:17, Tom Hayward wrote:
>>> I can appreciate the desire to play around with the mapping tools and 
>>> coverage models. I have done a lot of that myself.
>>> 
>>> We've found that the most reliable predictor of coverage, aside from an 
>>> RF survey, is a pair of binoculars. Can you see the tower while 
>>> standing on your roof? 
>>> 
>>> Tom KD7LXL 
>>> 
>>> On Thu, Mar 16, 2023, 21:17 Nick Kartsioukas <nick at explodinglemur.org> wrote:
>>>> Because I enjoy playing around with radio coverage mapping tools and want to have the closest representation of reality?
>>>> I'm in an exceptionally non-optimal area for PSDR, so I want to have as much information as I can about required mast height and link budget for each site before I go actually installing anything.
>>>> 
>>>> On Thu, Mar 16, 2023, at 15:45, Stephen Kangas wrote:
>>>>> Nick, I'm not certain why precision matters here.  My experience 
>>>>> working with Bart & Doug assisting them putting up the Rattlesnake Mtn 
>>>>> sector is that they may deviate from the exact bearing only to provide 
>>>>> better coverage to the area below, avoiding obstacles and focusing on 
>>>>> the user community.  We're not talking really narrow beams here.  You 
>>>>> should be able to expect that if there is a sector antenna pointed to 
>>>>> your area that it is optimized for your chances of connection 
>>>>> regardless of how precise the sector antennas matches 0deg N bearing 
>>>>> offsets.
>>>>> 
>>>>> FWIW, Stephen W9SK
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>>> From: PSDR <psdr-bounces at hamwan.org> On Behalf Of Carl Leon
>>>>> Sent: Thursday, March 16, 2023 3:16 PM
>>>>> To: 'Puget Sound Data Ring' <psdr at hamwan.org>
>>>>> Subject: Re: [HamWAN PSDR] Site details?
>>>>> 
>>>>> Those are the standard. I think there is one single sector site where 
>>>>> that varies, but am not certain.
>>>>> Carl, N7KUW
>>>>> 
>>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>>> From: PSDR <psdr-bounces at hamwan.org> On Behalf Of Nick Kartsioukas
>>>>> Sent: Thursday, March 16, 2023 9:51 AM
>>>>> To: psdr at hamwan.org
>>>>> Subject: Re: [HamWAN PSDR] Site details?
>>>>> 
>>>>> Sorry, I phrased that part poorly.  Are all sectors aligned at 
>>>>> 0/120/240 when present, or do they deviate from those bearings?
>>>>> 
>>>>> On Thu, Mar 16, 2023, at 08:26, Doug Kingston wrote:
>>>>>> Not all the cell sites have every sector.  If a cell site is on the 
>>>>>> side of a hill or has a large obstruction immediately adjacent, we 
>>>>>> omit the sector facing into the obstruction as it would not serve any 
>>>>>> useful purpose.
>>>>>> We have tried to depict the available sector in the map on the 
>>>>>> website, but you may need to zoom in to see that detail.  If you have 
>>>>>> questions about particular sites, Feel free to contact me directly
>>>>>> (dpk at randomnotes.org) or mail the netops@ list or ask on our IRC 
>>>>>> channel.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> -Doug-
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> On Wed, Mar 15, 2023 at 9:15 PM Nick Kartsioukas 
>>>>>> <nick at explodinglemur.org> wrote:
>>>>>>> I've been able to find location info for most of the PSDR sites and antenna height info for some of them.  Do they all have sectors pointing 0/120/240 degrees relative to north?  Is there anywhere that has EIRP info?  I'm trying to see how tall a mast I need to get connected, and whether or not I can even make link for some of the sites.  For example it looks like I "only" need a 35' mast for Baldi, but at 28mi away I'm not sure I can get connected reliably, vs Beacon or Capitol Park which are much closer but I'd need at least a 66' mast thanks to local terrain and trees.
>>>>>>> At the moment I'm using https://ispdesign.ui.com/ (which now has LIDAR data for buildings/trees!) and have also used RadioMobile Deluxe in the past.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> Thanks!