PSWS Selection

[Victoria Hill]

Kia ora!

I am brand new to the HamSCI community. I don't have a radio license, but my organisation is looking at running a citizen science project focused on developing ground-based measurement tools to monitor the ionosphere.

Given my lack of experience with radios (and very, very limited coding experience), I'm wondering which PSWS others would recommend I look at building?

I should note, I'm located in New Zealand, and Amazon isn't very good out these ways (for sourcing components).

Thanks!
Vic

[Kristina Collins]

Welcome, Vic!
 

My guess is that you'll probably be most interested in this one, which we're still working on the documentation for, but it depends on your budget and what exactly you want to observe.

Can you tell us a bit more about your organization?

73 (radiotelegrapher's "Best Regards"),

-Kristina KD8OXT

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[Victoria Hill]

Thanks for getting back to me, Kristina!

I work in Science Engagement at Tūhura Otago Museum in Dunedin, New Zealand. We're wanting to create a bit of a project to promote the Solar Tsunamis research project being led by University of Otago. They are using ground magnetometers, so I was looking at the documentation for those as it would be cool to be able to replicate the work that they are doing and the data they are collecting as much as possible. One of the UO research team members has expressed some interest in this, so they could potentially help with the install of a GM if that's the direction I went in.

Thanks,
Vic

[Victoria Hill]

Sorry, I should add that the other reason I was looking at the GM was that I think I can source all of the components relatively easily. Reputable sources to ship the RX888 SDR and Beelink Mini PC are proving tricky to find for this little part of the world.

[gxgri...@virginmedia.com]

Hello Victoria

It's terrific that you have found your way to HamSCI. Welcome aboard!

If you have looked at the map of HamSCI Personal Space Weather Stations at https://pswsnetwork.eng.ua.edu/home do zoom out ... you'll see that as a community we do have a station reporting from New Zealand - from almost the very north of South Island - 'Marahau'. This is a station run by Chris Mackerell, a short-wave listener. You can find his details and contact on QRZ.com as ZL2005SWL. Chris has been of great help to me on several occasions, providing unique data. 

I wish you well with your project.

kind regards

Gwyn G3ZIL

Southampton, UK

[Victoria Hill]

Kia ora, Gwyn!

Thank you for the warm welcome! Oh, that's helpful. I had seen that station. Thanks for those details; I'll definitely reach out to Chris.

Thanks,
Vic

[David Witten]

Victoria,

While I think that some variant of the setup suggested by Christina is a good oneOne or more of the ground magnetometers can be run with or without the rest of the kit.

The original setup was meant to run using a Raspberry Pi 3 or Pi 4, but has also been tested with other small single board computers that may be easier for you to buy.  That software is still available.

The full Beelink type setup may be somewhat hardware specific as regards the radio component. It is pretty highly tuned to produce maximum performance with the RX-888.

On the other hand, The newer software is designed to run using a small adapter board with most mini-pc's or even an old laptop.

As the original designer (with lots of help) of the magnetometer setup and code, I would be happy to work with you.

There are a number of considerations to explore, and I would be happy to do what I can for you.

Dave Witten,  KD0EAG

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/hamsci-psws/a1f78926-dfe3-4ee7-83c0-3506a176739an%40googlegroups.com.

[Victoria Hill]

Hi David,

I would love to take you up on that offer! I have a couple of RPi 3 B+ that I can use so I don't think that part will be a problem, and it looks like I can get the MagPi kits shipped over no problem. The rest of the list I can source locally.

Thanks,
Vic