RAK833 - Packet forwarder

Hi guys,

I have recently received a RAK833 concentrator and finally got it working with the legacy LoRa-net packet forwarder. Starting from the LoRa-net github repo, I have forked both lora_gateway and packet_forwarder to make it compatible with the RAK833. This is just a preliminary version, with some workaround to make it compatible and of course there is still something to fix and it is intended just for testing purposes.

Instruction

1 - Setting up working direcotry

cd ~
mkdir git
cd git
git clone https://github.com/RAKWireless/RAK831_LoRaGateway.git
git clone GitHub - nrdmtt/packet_forwarder: A LoRa packet forwarder is a program running on the host of a LoRa gateway that forwards RF packets receive by the concentrator to a server through a IP/UDP link, and emits RF packets that are sent by the server.
git clone GitHub - nrdmtt/lora_gateway: Driver/HAL to build a gateway using a concentrator board based on Semtech SX1301 multi-channel modem and SX1257/SX1255 RF transceivers.

2 - Build and install libmpsse

sudo apt-get install libftdi-dev
cd RAK831_LoRaGateway/libmpsse/src/
sudo ./configure --disable-python
make clean
make
sudo make install
sudo ldconfig

3 - Build lora gateway

cd ~/git/lora_gateway/
make all

4 - Build packet forwarder

cd ~/git/packet_forwarder/
make all

Starting the packet forwarder,

cd ~/git/packet_forwarder/lora_pkt_fwd and
sudo ./lora_pkt_fwd

Tests

  1. The project has been tested with both TTN and also with a private lora servers like https://www.loraserver.io/. With both lora server, packets are received correctly.

  2. The project has been built both on x86 debian and raspbian. Just remember to install building tools.

Some tips

  1. Before starting the packet forwarder, remember to modify your global_conf.json and local_conf.json, that you find in ~/git/packet_forwarder/lora_pkt_fwd, to reflect your configuration.

  2. You must modify library.cfg (~/git/lora_gateway/libloragw) to reflect you configuration. I have a RAK833 for the EU market (868 band ), so if you have a different model, before building lora gateway, update library.cfg

  3. You have to first build lora gateway and then you can build the packet forwarder

  4. If you change the directory of the project, update make files accordingly.

2 Likes

Hi I’m thinking to built my GW with RAK833, could you tell me which shield did you use to connect it to RPi ?
The new stack V3 will work fine with this setup?
Best,

Marcelo

Hi,
For the first set of tests I have soldered the micro-USB connector to the gateway and connected it to the raspberry. I have than ordered a m-sata to USB adaptor on aliexpress, as suggested in the guide provided by RAK (adapter) (official guide)
If you need a more elegant solution, you can found an open source adaptor on GitHub, converting m-sata to 40-pin raspberry connector. (link)

Regarding you second question, what are you referring to with “new stack v3”?

Best regards
Matteo

Ok thanks for your answer, I had ordered the hat from PCBWay.
Related to V3 stack, I mean, if this new packet forwarder it will be compatible with RPi and RAK833?
Sorry I’m new on this maybe my question is not so clear.

There is a new software for RAK833 + Raspberry Pi, which is based on the latest SX1301 driver lora_gateway v5.0.1 and semtech packet_forwarder v4.0.1.

We’ve tested it with TTN and loraserver.io successfully.

You can find the source code here: