Future Range test from uk coast to Amsterdam coast

Being located in Norwich Norfolk UK it would be interesting if we can get communication working from the nearest coast line at Great Yarmouth norfolk uk over to mesh user 2u30h8tx196 or 6bwirf4agnm located on the Amsterdam coast maybe possible due to free air over the sea but probably a long shot as it likely 130 miles+

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I’m into this! We’d have to analyze what atmospheric conditions and altitude would potentially make this possible. Maybe drones? Current range record is 23 mi so we don’t know :wink:

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Tropospheric ducting over the water has forecast websites.

@Rahul_Subramany @Jin_Gotenna @Raphael @danielagotenna — I think that’s the whole goTenna team on here… What conditions would make what @TheTeaDrunkGeek is suggesting possible? Or is it not possible?
Adding @gua742 who I believe still has the goTenna Mesh range record for his ideas!

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@TheTeaDrunkGeek to get radio LOS for that distance one of you would have to be at 13,000 ft. I recommend skydiving :slight_smile:

http://www.hamuniverse.com/lineofsightcalculator.html

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Could you explain what this means? Thanks!

Yes, this is possible under very ideal conditions. Tropospheric ducting is nicely described in this article:

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When a High pressure area goes over a low pressure zone, if the signal
originates below the high pressure zone, the signal bounces off the high
pressure area instead of going through it into the troposphere. It bounce
back towards the earth. The effect is like a duct or tunnel. The signal
keeps it strength. It usually occurs over bodys of water. Many examples
of this in the Amateur radio experiments.

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@femmesh, it’s worth a try, but 130+ mile is a big challenge given our link budget.

I’m going to tread into technical theories for a moment here, first the Free-Space Path Loss,
or loss if RF signal propagates in Space, literally. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-space_path_loss). The link budget required to propagate 130 miles at a frequency of 869 MHz is around 136 dB.

The link budget of goTenna MESH, CE version, is actually close to 136 dB, however, we humans live on Earth, and in this case the atmosphere introduces loss, and the receiver environment is not noise free. Even with tropospheric tunneling, which behaves like a wave-guide under certain seasons and time of day when the temperature is just right, losses due to propagation, reflection, refraction, scattering, etc. will accumulate. To account for that, a path-loss exponent is typically introduced, and will raised the link budget required to 160 to 190 dB, significantly higher than what MESH can do.

But theory be damned, we should just do it a see what happens. The trick is to get high off the ground level as possible, mountain tops, etc, and Google for the time of the day the troposphere is most ideal for tunneling.

Good Luck!

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Well I did think it would be a long shot but now looking back at the map perhaps a better test would be dover uk to calais france, across the channel its going to be roughtly 30 miles this is probably a more achievable goal.

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@TheTeaDrunkGeek – I believe my cofounder has already seen this range hit with goTenna Mesh units at a public safety demo (on a drone)… we should aim higher for your Channel test :slight_smile:

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Although it was CB radio, I was able to listen in on a conversation between a couple of guys that was crystal clear and sounded like they were at the end of my road. However, they started mentioning town names and I found out that they were well over 300 miles away. It was a really clear week, and I was really tempted to see if I could send a signal back, but I didn’t.

Go for it! I’d love to see how far a Mesh can talk. Will you be using anything to make the signal directional?

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