Adafruit lorawan gateway bonnet registration problem

Gateways Raspberry Pi Gateways
1

I have a Raspbery Pi 4 with an [adafruit Lora radio bonnet 915MHz (https://learn.adafruit.com/raspberry-pi-single-channel-lorawan-gateway/overview), configured, tested and working.( i can write to the display on the bonnet using python on the Pi.
I have queried the bonnet and it has given me its Gateway Id (dc:a6:32:ff:ff:0c:ae:95).
I’ve configured the JSOn file used by the test python script (below) I thik correctly
The Pi (and thus the bonnet )- can see the internet.
there is no port blocking going on.

I’ve registered a gateway on TTN using the Pi Gateway Id as the TTN gateway ID.
I can see the Lorawan hat (using tcpdump on the Pi) sending packets to the AU TTN network Pop (thethings.meshed.com.au) on port 1700, but my gateway continues to show “not connected” in the TTN portal.
I am at a loss as to what to try next.
anyone out there who has managed toget this working - I’d love some help !
Cheers
Pete

{
“SX127x_conf”: {
“freq”: 915000000,
“spread_factor”: 7,
“pin_nss”: 11,
“pin_dio0”: 3,
“pin_rst”: 25
},
“gateway_conf”: {
“ref_latitude”: -33.77341151,
“ref_longitude”: 151.27884022,
“ref_altitude”: 10,
“name”: “Radio Pi Bonnet”,
“email”: "prhewett@gmail.com",
“desc”: “Cork_Consulting_GW1_POC”,
“is_pi_zero”: false,
“servers”: [
{
“address”: “thethings.meshed.com.au”,
“port”: 1700,
“enabled”: true
},
{
“address”: “router.us.thethings.network”,
“port”: 1700,
“enabled”: false
}
]
}
}

2

but do you receive packets ?

3

no packets. On the “Traffic” tab on TTN portal - no traffic at all.
Note that I do not have any nodes configured (that’s today’s job !) but I am assuming the gateway should be calling home to TTN as soon as I power it up and run the test Python3 script.
I am following the instructions from learn.adafruit - so perhaps I should have a more thorough look at the python code to verify that assumption !

4

your gateway should at least have seen one packet.
it’s possible that you live in an area where no other nodes are active So nothing is received So far, finish your own node and check again. :sunglasses:

5

One really can’t assume traffic belonging to others will show up.

It can happen, maybe someplaces it does regularly, but populated areas where there are more likely to be unassociated transmitters are also places with things like buildings in the way. A gateway with a good antenna up on the roof might see more, one on someone’s bench, less likely.

And a single channel gateway is only sampling one frequency and spreading factor, which drastically reduces the chances of randomly finding something. Especially non-LoRaWAN LoRa uses seem quite unlikely to be picked up, unless the gateway happens to be configured for exactly the settings they picked.

6

OK so I have a node setup now (it’s a bout 2 feet from my gateway.) I have tested that the radio’s are working (i can send a signal form one Pi+bonnet to the other when both run a test python script. and this WORKS ! So radio is working.
So I’ve now reconfigured one Pi with the adafruit Lora Bonnet as a gateway and it is “Listening”. The python code should show a message on the display when it receives any packets.
the other Pi + Bonnet is now set to send a Lorawan packet every 5 seconds. It says it is sending but sadly nothing appears to be being received on the Gateway and nothing showing in the TTN console. I have a packet sniffer running on my LAN and it doesn’t look like the Pi Lora Gateway is sending anything to TTN… :frowning: so I guess I must have a configuration problem with the Node ?

7

sure your single channel 'gateway and your node are on the same channel ?
is your 'gateway registered @TTN and seen ?
is your application + node registered @ TTN
is your node using ABP ?

if you read a bit more on this forum you could have seen that there must be a minimum distance between node and gateway

8

My quick look at the Adafruit tutorial: https://learn.adafruit.com/multi-device-lora-temperature-network/using-with-adafruitio is that it is only using LoRa, not LoraWAN, and is single frequency.
Using TTN is a second stage of the tutorial.
So, does your setup work with Adafruit.io?

9

I didn’t see this before but wow ! . Adafruit’s documentation is incredible good

10

OK,
I finally got some time to work on this today and have made some progress ! My gateway is now visible on TTN !! Woo Hoo. It turns out I had set up TTN Gateway incorrectly. 50%20pm
Presently trying to get my node to work talk to the GW… In test mode the two of them (running a test script one each) - do work, So the radio config is correct and they are working (using the test script).
I’ve configured an application and device on TTN and I’ve launched “radio_lorawan.py” from the adafruit tutorial. It runs and displays correctly but…no packets seen on my gateway or on TTN.
I am wondering how the node get’s it’s radio config in this script ? (Frequency and spread for example).perhaps this is the problem ?

11

Beware that single channel gateways like that don’t really function properly in a LoRaWAN network.

Your node would have to be hacked to use only a single frequency and spreading factor (whichever unique combination your node-pretending-to-be-a-gateway monitors), which is not how a LoRaWAN node is supposed to work.

Building/buying these is highly discouraged.

12

yes I am aware of that thanks CSlorabox. It has been configured for a single frequency and a spreading factor of 1. I’ve intentionally made it non public so that it wont cause problems.
This is learning exercise POC and won’t be permanent.

13

Better re-check that, SF 1 is not a setting that exists, at least not within the capability of the chip you have.

14

Roger that. will check.