can you suggest some directional antenna which will suit for catenna 4450. Thanks for your valuable support
realize that if you don’t use/need that accuracy (for a battery 4.2 is accurate enough for example) you waste a lot of bandwith and energy.
So always try to achieve the smallest payload possible.
this one worked for me
@BoRRoZ is right, and since you only need 3kms, perhaps the antennas you have are sufficient, with just some repositioning. Are you in a urban or rural area? Where is the gateway (indoor, outdoor, height from ground…) and where the node too.
Your RSSI and SNR figures are very poor, so data loss is not surprising - your packets which did get through, only barely did so.
If the gateway in use is your own, you may be able to monitor raw packets yourself (particularly look for the fixed or OTAA-assigned device address in their unencrypted header) and thus rule out any network issues, but those are less likely to be the problem anyway.
Really what you need to do is figure out why the signal quality of the packets that do get through is so weak. Is there a clear line of sight between the node and the gateway? Do you have antennas properly connected to each? If I recall, on the Catena boards (or in your case the Feather M0 LoRa hosting a Catena sensor board) you must calculate the length of an antenna for your frequency, cut a piece of wire, and solder it to the appropriate pad on board.
What is the power source for your node? Some things like USB charger batteries can be very tempting for their convenience, but generate large amounts of RF noise which interferes with radio links.
Are you sure all of your components are actually 868 MHz models, and not 915 MHz versions being operated on 868 MHz where their RF networks will be mistuned?
Finally, even if a long packet isn’t getting your data dropped by usage limiters, the longer your packet the more likely it is to be corrupted in transmission causing either a radio checksum or a MIC failure leading to it being discarded. If possible, try to transmit efficiently packed binary data fields, and render to printable text on the receiving side. For example, if your battery reading comes from a 12-bit ADC you could probably just transmit the actual 12 bits, either across two bytes or even better by using only 12 bits of those two bytes, and packing something else like status flags in the remaining 4.
Gateway has been placed 40 meters above the ground level and it is an outdoor gateway.
we are in a rural area. node is placed in the ground level in between trees. both gateway and node are placed in a rural area. Thanks
Even if in between trees, it seems strange that you have such a poor SNR (this is what I obtain at 3km with an indoor gateway, 10m above the ground…). I would try to test the connection at the same distance but in a clear area (or putting the node at some height on the trees), but also check what @cslorabox is suggesting regarding antennas and connections (including shortening the payload…).
I would suggest also taking a look at the orientation of the water meter. If it’s using an internal antenna or the antenna is not square to the gateway you may simply be in the wrong RF plane for a good signal.
thanks @BoRRoZ @cslorabox @UdLoRa @Crumble1970 with your suggestions so far.
We have tried
- reducing the payload by sending only the values we need.
- confirmed that catena board is for IN band and not US model.
- wire antenna is intact with catena. (havent yet tried a directional antenna as suggested).
What I would like to try now is to increase the transmission power. does any one know how I can play with the transmission power value, specifically where in the code I can change it?
We are using: https://github.com/mcci-catena/Catena-Sketches/blob/master/catena4450m102_waterlevel/catena4450m102_waterlevel.ino
Any help is appreciated. thanks.
Sorry, I didnt understand it. Can you please elaborate what you mean by this?
Where in the World are you, it might not be legal for you to increase the power ?
I thought of adjusting within the allowed limit? Are the libraries already configured to use the maximum allowed limit? I’m in India.
Hi - If you open the water meter - How does the antenna show up? I.E horizontal / vertical?
If the anteanna is pointing towards the gateway you may be in its black spot. Antennas tend to transmit around the antenna
Libraries are normally set for 25mW, the limit in a lot of places. The library however does not know where in the World it is when used, so you would need to check the limits for your part of the World.
Increasing power limits to overcome ‘range issues’ is not the normal case.
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thanks for the clarification. My antenna is vertical i.e perpendicular to earth. so it isn’t pointing to gateway.
Previously i have posted an issue with my nodes not transmitting to my Multitech outdoor gateway at 3km range. some of you here in the forum mentioned that 3km is not a big range for an outdoor gateway even if it is amidst trees. i have also read elsewhere that this range is quite achievable. since we are not getting good signal at this range i want to share the google map of my end node and gateway in the below link
and get your views under the following conditions:
- Gateway is present in the location called Kinisi in the above map.
- Node is marked by latitude and longitude as in the “from location” of the map.
- Gateway is present at 20 meters above ground level.
- Node is surrounded by lots of trees and it is placed at 2 meters above ground level.
- There are lots of trees between the node and gateway as seen in the google map satellite picture.
Given this above conditions do you think of any experiments that i can make to improve the signal strength.
Additionally i want to mention a peculiar building half way between node and the gateway. i’m not sure if this is of any reason to worry about but just mentioning incase.
This building is called Matirmandir, a meditation chamber in the shape of a globe standing at 25 meters height with several gold platted discs covering its entire outer surface.you can see the picture of matirmandir and some general informations here:
https://www.auroville.org/contents/678
and technical details of the discs here: https://www.auroville.org/contents/685
Incidentally the RSSI value near matirmandir which is 700m from the gateway is mere -120db.
Thanks for your inputs
In front or in the back? if in front, I think there is something wrong in the hardware of the node or of the gateway. Do you have a second node for testing?
I combined your related same questions with this previous topic.
Did you try increasing the node’s antenna hight, or use directional or better antenna’s ?
@BoRRoZ thanks for merging. I created a new topic because the previous one was closed.
I havent purchased a directional antenna yet. In the process of getting one. But I did try the node at various locations and as I mentioned, at 700m, I am already getting RSSI -120. However, at a slightly different direction, I get RSSI -115 at 3.7kms.
In front. I tested with multiple Catena 4450 boards and also DIY node with Arduino Uno. All giving similar poor results.
On the gateway side, I am using https://www.multitech.com/brands/multiconnect-conduit-ip67 powered over ethernet. I’m using Laird omnidirectional outdoor antenna and using antenna gain of 3. I tried increasing the value to 5 but it gives poor results compared to 3.
I couldn’t find the tech specs of this antenna on multitech site but looks like this is it: https://halberdbastion.com/sites/default/files/2018-08/Laird-OF86315-DATASHEET-2017.pdf
How can I debug if this is an issue at Gateway end?
Thanks
it’s getting a long story - i’ll be watching this closely 
please answer UdLoRa’s question ’ Do you have a second node for testing?
I tested with 5 different Catena 4450 boards and also with one DIY node with Arduino Uno. All giving similar poor results.