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APRS is great for tracking your Vehicle. For those on the fence about APRS capable radios

Romer

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When I leave on a trip I remind my wife she can track me on APRS.fi with my call sign as long as my Radio is on. That helps her feel better. It also provides an avenue if I break down on my own, there is a tracking mechanism to find me. Not like an Inreach where I can phone home. A less capable, but available system

I haven't learned all the other capabilities with APRS like sending texts, tracking other vehicles and I am sure more. This feature alone is enough to justify it.

It doesn't replace a GPS track due to not every Beacon ping hitting and straight lines being drawn in between registered Beacon pings

My week to/from Moab
APRS Track Full view.jpg


and a closer view of Moab. Jax Trax on the bottom, 3D on the top left and Fins and Things in the middle right
APRS Track Moab view.jpg

It will even give you all kinds of info about what you were doing at each beacon point. A zoomed in view of Fins N Things
1682345761789.png
 

nuclearlemon

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i used it years ago when coming home from idaho in a snowstorm...i texted treeroot when i had service and told him to watch my tracks and make sure i wasn't stopped for an abnormally long period of time while i tried to find a backway around closed interstates.
 

Romer

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Dave- if you read my post I didn't at all say to use this for accuracy. My wife or others knowing I am moving and ABOUT were I am is good enough. I also didn't suggest it was real time. I read that "Typical intervals would be every 5 or 10 minuets" . Although I saw one user who recommended 10 minutes and another said he thought longer than 10 minutes in a densely populated area. My Beacon is set to every 5 minutes and I believe that is acceptable as most of what I was doing was in low or no population areas. I also don't typically have my Radio on unless I am on a trip out of town.

I appreciate the technical spiel. I am just trying to SIMPLY relate a feature of APRS. I always appreciate your technical expertise so please don't take that wrong :)
 

nakman

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Ken I never once noticed your beacon... clearly it's transmitting to the website, but if I had seen you pop up on my radio I would have noticed, and probably messaged you. I saw @rover67 and @CardinalFJ60 constantly, also @satchel had it on during our run on Friday and we were able to message each other. did you ever see my callsign pop up?
 

Romer

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Ken I never once noticed your beacon... clearly it's transmitting to the website, but if I had seen you pop up on my radio I would have noticed, and probably messaged you. I saw @rover67 and @CardinalFJ60 constantly, also @satchel had it on during our run on Friday and we were able to message each other. did you ever see my callsign pop up?
Yeah, I need to learn how to set that up. I saw some dialogue in the other thread on doing that. I don't know how to see others on my Radio. It must be possible as I think you have the same 400 unit. I will look into that. Thanks for the reminder.
 

Romer

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I dug into the Beacon rate a bit and every where I looked it said Home stations and digi repeaters set to 30 minutes

Mobile, or some called it Tracking. For example this site says https://www.jpole-antenna.com/2018/09/25/aprs-ssids-paths-and-beacons/ the faster you are moving the faster your beacon should be

The rational from what I read elsewhere is Home stations and repeaters are not moving so they have no need to update their Beacon as frequently. Moving mobile stations are a different situation.

I am going to leave mine set at 5 minutes. Not disputing what you are saying Dave, just lots of different opinions on the internet. I only have mine on when traveling so not feeling like I am a bandwidth hog :)
 

satchel

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I've been leaving mine on smart beaconing so maybe I should set that lower. It does seem to ping a lot for me. @Romer i was able to see your truck moving all over on aprsdroid though I don't recall if I could see you in the list on my radio. I'm guessing my radio may be filtering out non mobile stations as well.
 
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Romer

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I've been leaving mine on smart beaconing so maybe I should set that lower. It does seem to ping a lot for me. @Romer i was able to see your truck moving all over on aprsdroid though I don't recall if I could see you in the list on my radio. I'm guessing my radio may be filtering out non mobile stations as well.
That's cool Trey

You should do what you feel comfortable with. I feel I have done my due diligence researching this and am comfortable with what I have. Dave has a strong opinion and he is entitled to have it. It is an opinion though and I am comfortable with my settings.
 

nakman

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Yeah, I need to learn how to set that up. I saw some dialogue in the other thread on doing that. I don't know how to see others on my Radio. It must be possible as I think you have the same 400 unit. I will look into that. Thanks for the reminder.
If we have the same 400 unit then it's just a matter of hanging out together to compare settings. I have a constant flow of popups, so often I don't even really hear the beep anymore... which I kind of liked as it reminds me I'm not alone in the world. But I don't see messages when they come in- I did look back and see where Dave messaged me (I wrote you back btw) and Trey had to tell me I had a message, which worked but I had to go look for it. So there must be a better setting somewhere.

I didn't use any aprsdroid or aprs.fi while out there, as most of the time I was out of cell range and/or didn't want to mess with tethering an ipad. I was watching that on the way out while on I-70 a little bit. I think it's cool when folks augment their beacons to include forum handles, vehicle descriptions, etc., just makes this a lot more friendly. I saw a few of those while in Moab, which I recognized. One of the Colo 4x4 recovery guys does that also, for example.
 

nakman

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trying to decide what radio to get for the Tundra. I let the FTM-400 go with the 200 so that's Mike's now.. and I liked that radio, and actually knew how to operate it, well at least at a cursory level. So I have been casually searching for a used one, but don't see any atm... they are discontinued.

Lee has the newer FTM-500 and I sat in his rig and played with it for a bit, but didn't really like it. Seemed like a step backwards in interface, and nothing was intuitive. I would probably learn it in time, but that gets me thinking if I have to learn a whole new radio all over again maybe there's more to life than the Yaesu brand. But they are readily available, for $500 https://www.hamradio.com/detail.cfm?pid=H0-018368

The only other one I really know about is also discontinued, the Kenwood TM-D710GA. That radio may actually be better than a FTM-400, but I know nothing about it other than what I glean from forums, and I have never had a Kenwood. Maybe it's easier to learn than Yaesu? I dunno. but being discontinued, if I'm going to go this route why not just hold out for the radio I already know how to operate.

I don't have a long list of needs here- I want dual bands on 2m... I want the APRS stuff. I thought the messaging & beacons and all that were kinda neat. The holy grail remains a radio that can put my friends on a tablet. I definitely don't want to run multiple radios... it's already enough with the FRS stuff, and thankfully I can leave the CB at home finally. Are there any other rigs out there to consider?
 

DaveInDenver

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Kenwood has left the ham market for all practical purposes. They still offer some HF/6m radios new but no mobile or HTs AFAIK. Apparently their supply chains ran dry and they focused on government and business customer orders for VHF and higher radios.

It's too bad since I could use an other TM-V71 and those are going for more used than they were new. Sad face.

APRS is a real limited market new it seems. I think it's only Yaesu that offers anything new with it built-in. The only other dual band on the markt you could use is an IC-2730 for APRS if you add a modem and client software on your phone.

I think it works like the old FT-8800 did where you had to assign the PTT to the APRS side for it to work, which means you'd only be able to monitor the voice side and be careful about transmitting.

I'm not sure if the ID-5100 can do APRS. It does DPRS through D-STAR repeaters, though.
 
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rover67

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I have a TM-V71 but I think Cardinal has the FTM-400? Him and Daniel seem to like them and had them working well on our last trip this summer. maybe get one of those. Theres one on ebay for like $360.

my TM-V71 took some external hardware to get to work, I do love it though.
 

nakman

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DaveInDenver

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what do you think of this one
Not sure if you noticed but that one is in Tokyo and just says the FTM-400XD, but doesn't say the U.S. model number. I don't know the bands in Japan to tell anymore but you'd probably want to make sure it works on our bands here. Yaesu puts an 'R' at the end of the U.S. models, so it would be FTM-4000XDR here. If you see an 'E' I think that is, clever enough, a European model (e.g. FTM-400XDE). I've also see 'H' as trailing, not sure 'bout those, but may be the Japanese market.

Edit to add. Japan is IARU region 3 and JARL is their coordinating body, so their band plan for 2m and 70cm looks like this.


Screen Shot 2023-12-14 at 5.54.00 AM.png

I know everyone remembers their license test. The U.S. is 144 to 148MHz on 2m and 420 to 450 MHz on 70cm. What would be important though is knowing where the FM simplex and repeaters are located if you want the radio's automatic mode selection thing to work right.


Screen Shot 2023-12-14 at 6.08.01 AM.png

Screen Shot 2023-12-14 at 6.07.47 AM.png
 
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rover67

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well nevermind then, maybe there isn't one on ebay :/
 

nakman

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yeah great comment Dave, thanks. the search continues...
 
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