rns.recipes

I have quite a few radios that I could hook up for use with reticulum on UHF and was hoping to get some feedback of people that have used it.

1. Modem 73 seems to be the most popular way to use reticulum on UHF, have you used it and if so how well does it work?

2. Have you had any issues from local HAMS about transmitting encrypted data?

3. Are you able to actually use it with anyone? Even LoRa does seem to be lacking reticulum usage so I imagine UHF is much worse.

Really just looking for general feedback as I am very curious about making use of this on UHF.

I did some experiments with Modem73 on HF and VHF/UHF. It seemed to work fine, but the carrier detect was a bit fiddly to use. But that could be user error. Because of the Raspberry Pi shortages I switched to 1200bd fsk using direwolf, which can run on a RPi Zero W. Hard times...

Ah, encryption....as long as the ancient rules are in place you can do two things: simply obey the law and keep using legacy modes like cw and phone and let the hobby slowly die. Or try to save the ham radio hobby by doing new and innovative things. That's an opinion, by the way :)

I live in a rural area and, as far as I can tell, I'm the only Reticulum enthusiast here. So no, I can't use it with anyone. But that doesn't stop me from experimenting with Reticulum over the aether. I do so by sending telemetry data from remote sensors (weather station, off grid solar installation, temperature loggers, etc.) over radio links.

Maybe an unofficial frequency plan for Reticulum on HF/VHF/UHF can be made, so hams who want to experiment can find each other more easily.

Yes, right now. Well, not technically 2 meters but 70cm, still the same deal.

My setup is a UV-K5 with an All-in-one audio cable running modem73 with the modem73interface. The UV-K5 is connected to my desktop via a USB-C cable.

In modem73, the configuration is using COM PTT, with mode QPSK code rate 3/4ths. There is a Raspberry Pi 4b and another UV-K5 out in my car connected to a power bank with a cigarrete plug battery eliminator and another AIOC.

The Pi4 is setup to run as a Transport node in boundary mode. It's a distance of only about 400 meters or so but I've tested modem73 out to 5+ km line of sight, and over thousands of km HF.

To answer your questions:

2. No. While I can't answer for every region, VHF/UHF simplex is more or less completely dead. You're more likely to find people who will be interested in wanting to test with you then those who want to bitch to the FCC/or your regions equivelant. If you are in the US, there are also legal avenues like a business license under Part 90. A few people I know are looking into that and hopefully I can share more info soon.

As long as you are not:

• squatting on public safety frequencies
• attemping to commercialize a large portion of spectrum space
• intentionally going out of your way to bring attention to yourself

you are going to be completely fine.

3. Be the change you wish to see in the world

Btw, with regards to the Pi: Pis are overrated. Can't believe there is another "Pi shortage" but any cheap laptop, Android phone, or thin client will be far more performing than a Pi. There's modem73 for Android too.

(posting from the Internet now)

You can even load images if you are patient enough and have a clear channel (took about 43 seconds per image @ 8PSK 3/4)

Btw, with regards to the Pi: Pis are overrated. Can't believe there is another "Pi shortage" but any cheap laptop, Android phone, or thin client will be far more performing than a Pi.

Side point, but if you happen to be in the uk there's the british heart foundation ebay store where I've seen and bought old laptop with double the specs quadruple the ram for half the price of a raspiberry pi 2b which are more than capable of being a router and have some additional benefits like being able to temporarily move them if their battery still works and not having to deal ssh assuming the screen and keyboard works (nice if you happen to have live in a building with nasty fire-walling).

Phones also exist there which I've avoided because I like the reliability of plugging in Rnodes with usb on a laptop but they are absolutely usable too. Plus someone you know properly has an old phone just a drawer that you can get for free if you ask.

My point is be savvy and you could probably get a combination of a backbone, i2p and rnode on one transport node for 25 pounds or less.

welo wrote:

Btw, with regards to the Pi: Pis are overrated. Can't believe there is another "Pi shortage" but any cheap laptop, Android phone, or thin client will be far more performing than a Pi.

Side point, but if you happen to be in the uk there's the british heart foundation ebay store where I've seen and bought old laptop with double the specs quadruple the ram for half the price of a raspiberry pi 2b which are more than capable of being a router and have some additional benefits like being able to temporarily move them if their battery still works and not having to deal ssh assuming the screen and keyboard works (nice if you happen to have live in a building with nasty fire-walling).

Phones also exist there which I've avoided because I like the reliability of plugging in Rnodes with usb on a laptop but they are absolutely usable too. Plus someone you know properly has an old phone just a drawer that you can get for free if you ask.

My point is be savvy and you could probably get a combination of a backbone, i2p and rnode on one transport node for 25 pounds or less.

+1 for this
There is a never ending supply of 2nd hand thin clients on eBay that you can get for cheap just about everywhere. Some of them like certain models of Dell Wyse 3040's can work off 5V 3A just like the Pi's can too, and have eMMC flash which is far more reliable than a Pi SD card and better for Reticulum'ing

Didn't know it was such a sensitive topic :) Yes I use a Dell Wyse 3040 as a transport node and an old laptop on which I write this message. But a pi is small, has gpio, is cheap (the Zero and Zero 2W anyway) and most of all: a pi just works because of the excellent software support. Perfect for portable builds of which I have plenty. Right tool for the job, you know. ;)

Thanks to everyone for all of the responses. I finally got to reading them all and have used your information to hook up my digirig with modem73 and was able to get reticulum transmitting over it.

I have found myself having similar results. No one seems to really transmit over UHF/VHF but I have been talking with some people nearby me and I think I have the ability to get a small network going, I hope to have around 3 people hooked up on it.

I think the current plan is using some cheap computers and hooking up both UHF/VHF radios and lora. I hope to expand the reticulum network some more