Mount Pleasant

The modem arrived and the mount got built and the modem got plugged in and it didn't work.

The old modem got plugged in and it sort of worked, but the BOC sent me logs showing lots of reboots. So limping along we're waiting for the stuff to be sorted out and the paper work to be completed and all to be resolved and life to go back to "the day before the storm hit".

Meanwhile, Google Maps released a world-wide view of their BETA service and I started playing with the software. A whole lot of hacks had appeared, almost over night, that showed off many and varied ways that Google Maps could be used on your own web-site. With a little tweaking I came up with a quick and dirty hack.

About 48 hours after I made my first hacked up version, Google announced the Google Maps API which allows you to make official Google Maps on your site. I signed up, did the work made a nice little map and have spent the past four days banging my head against a wall trying to give it the same functionality as I already had, but using the official API. This involves me relearning JavaScript, learning XML and XSLT all meaningful subjects, just not really all that exciting when all you want to do is show a map, but you get that :)

VoIP is coming, a bigger transmitter should allow for a smaller dish, the World Solar Challenge, 2005 is nearing, there's a project with one of my colleagues in Alaska in the wind, I'm writing some nifty code to sit as a pipe between irmp3 and mpg321 to make the play list on our mp3 player no-longer repeat itself ad-nauseum and I've got cattle to feed, tractors to drive, dogs to pat and fish to treat with WheatBix meal. Frances is off picking olives after her long running transcription gig for the Australians at War Film (http://www.australiansatwarfilmarchive.gov.au/) Archive finally got completed.

Graham's Creek

This is getting to be pretty straight forward, soon I'll be wanting to buy a smaller dish so I won't have to lug so much weight from the back of the van, but you get that.

VoIP isn't quite there yet. I've been playing with making the call settle, but at the moment it still takes around 30 seconds before both sides can hear each other and that simply just won't do. I've also been playing a little with Bluetooth and getting my Nokia 6310i to become part of my VoIP network. I can make my VoIP system detect an incoming GSM call and I can make a one-way outgoing call, eg. they can hear me, but I cannot yet hear them.

I invested in a high-gain GSM/CDMA dual band antenna because while VoIP isn't yet working we're currently on the fringes of Optus' GSM coverage. I briefly played with putting my phone in the van and talking to it over Bluetooth, but the hands-free kit doesn't like that and the phone gets completely confused.

And then the storm hit...

There was a little cold cell around Brisbane which caused hailstones to pile up to a meter high in some places. This being the (sub-)tropics and all, this was a regular occurrence - not. Two hours north of Brisbane, were we are, the hail also visited, but a larger problem was rain, lots and lots of rain in a very short time. It filled the dam, it filled the paddocks, the driveway and the electronics box. Fortunately the 240V side stayed dry, but the sensitive side, the electronics were not so lucky. It appears as if the hail damaged the water proofing, which then opened the way to allow water to drip in from the top and drip past the circuit boards to pool in the bottom. The next morning I turned on the equipment only to have the modem not respond.

Open up the box, lots of water.

After tipping out the water and drying the electronics for a few hours and warming the whole lot in the sun, I dared to switch it on. All was just fine and dandy. I hooked it all back up and proceeded to go back to work. I started composing an email to Gilat about their hardware and how it continued to amaze me that it keeps working regardless of how it gets treated, saltwater air, heat and now rain, only to find that the modem would go away for a little while every now and then. This happens on occasion when satellite operations does some work, but because of the water I figured I'd better give them a call. Suffice to say that the problem wasn't at their end.

During my call to the BOC the modem gave up. It refused to see the satellite and kept doing a self-test. After some lengthy phone calls to various departments and my insurance company - electronics insurance is worth every cent. Expensive hobby, satellite equipment.

Leeton

Unloading was never this simple.

Putting the dish together in its new home after a short drive from Moss Vale to Leeton proved to be completely trivial. The actual tuning took less than five minutes and the dish was up and running without any problems at all.

The wireless gear is acting up a little, so I'll likely spend a little time playing with that to see what is ailing it, because getting a wireless link over 20m should not pose any problem at all, seeing that we had many more metres and walls between the stations in Dunsborough, where it just worked fine.

During our stay here I also want to get the final bits of VoIP stuff working properly and get the whole thing running as our primary phone connection. If it all works as expected, I can even get a calling card and include that into the phone system and make cheap calls over the PSTN network if VoIP connectivity isn't available to that location. We'll see how it goes.

Moss Vale

After driving from Millmerran to Moss Vale via Perth (over 8000km) where all manner of changes were made to the electronics. I've not been happy with the comms box since we removed it from the back of the dish and in Perth we changed the way it fits together. Instead of having the two halves side-by-side, they are now back-to-back.

We sealed the two, the power and the electronics box, together and had to remove the connector to the wireless gear because it was located in the back of the power box. In doing that we decided to remove the external wireless gear, containing two base stations and a hub, and make it all integrated into the box.

Now we have two external wireless connectors, a better connector for the video repeater and easy access to the hub if we need to. We also brought along an old 85cm Foxtel dish, with some switching gear so we can point another dish to another location if we need to.

In re-organising the electronics box we found out that you cannot simply de-solder the RF unit off a Humax 5410Z because it won't boot afterwards. At this stage we didn't know if it had failed in transit, or not. Turns out it was happy when we gave it back the RF unit - which had been badly rusted due to salt water air in Dunsborough.

The plan was to setup in Perth, but a small yard and a big tree put an end to that, but it made us determined to reduce the size of the mount even further. For those who have been following this, we now are down from 26 bolts and 7 beams to 9 bolts and 3 beams and the observant will notice that this mount looks suspiciously like the travel mount we built during the Solar Challenge 2003.

Arriving in Moss Vale, the building of the mount took 20 minutes, the installation and alignment of the dish another 40 minutes (because there was a big roof in the way) and we were up and running.

The Bureau of Meteorology threw a Severe Thunderstorm warning with Large Hailstones at us and we decided after discussion with the BOC and the BOM, that it would be prudent to stow the dish, so we stored it in the Iveco, waited for a storm that never came and built it again in little time the next day.

The dish had a baby.

While in Moss Vale, I used some spare time to install some more satellite gear allowing the baby dish, which was kindly donated to us, to partake in the adventures and supply us with an additional Free To Air television feed for those days that there isn't anything good on the 'net.

I've also managed to get VoIP to work across the satellite link and after some fine-tuning, we may be on a winner there. The two CISCO ATA 186 telephone adapters are plugged into the network and each talks to my workstation which is running a copy of Asterisk. The Asterisk software in turn uses IAX2 to talk to Perth so we can talk to the world. I expect that soon we'll have some other VoIP connectivity which will allow people to phone us for the cost of a local call, where ever we are.

Millmerran

Setup in this location was started late in the afternoon and I'd forgotten how quick it gets dark by the time you get this far North. Fortunately I was ably assisted by the local home-owner who in a previous life was well acquainted with nuts and bolts. The whole frame was together in a matter of 30 minutes.

We waited until the next day to put the dish in place and the electronics now have a better spot with the feeder cables on the inside, going back up the centre beam like they used to. Alignment was simple and our cross-poll check with the BOC was great.

I'm not happy with the water proofing of the current setup, and the tarpaulin is stopping an airflow across the heat-sinks, but with overnight temperatures at 0°C, I suspect that cooking the electronics is not likely to be an issue. I do worry about the direct sun, but the temps only come up to 18° in the day, so direct sunlight is not nearly as severe as experienced in Crossing Falls and the rest of the top-end.

I need to replace one of the feeder cables which looks like it got pinched in transit and I'm trying to determine if it would be worth the effort to install the wireless gear inside the electronics boxes, or if outside will continue to provide the best solution.

I'm still looking for a nicer way to attach the boxes to the frame and suspect that some measuring and drilling may come to pass in the next few months.

Bishop's Creek

Installing the frame was achieved in under an hour and placing the dish on the mount was done in no time flat with the help of some locals. Our electronics solution still hadn't found its way to a point where I could say that I was happy, so I spent some time playing with some ideas I'd had on the road.

Instead of attaching them to the post or the dish, I placed them on the cross beam and with a ratchet tie, tied them to the beam. The location was a little clumsy because the feeder cables were going around the outside and were quite tight, but an improvement was found in Millmerran.

We were getting no signal and it was getting dark, when I noticed that I wasn't going past a tree like I thought, but straight through it. Moving the frame back a metre solved the problem and we were live 15 minutes later.

Packing up was simple with the new location for the beams against the firewall in the van and the electronics box behind the rear wheel. I'm not sure about it's location for any accidents or dings, but I suspect we'll have other problems then if that was ever the case. I'm still looking for a better spot.

Beaconsfield Upper

Our initial scout of this location had filled me with some trepidation. The owner wouldn't hear of defeat, but they'd be in South America when I needed to be on-line, so their level of concern was not quite the same as mine. Basically there were large trees between us and the satellite, but some gaps did exist and some planning was in order.

I improved the method used to construct the frame, this time bolting the three shorts together whilst it was on the ground, then attaching the centre beam and post. I did need to move the whole frame a few meters sideways to clear a tree after set-up, but apart from that, the whole thing is becoming routine.

The electronics boxes were mounted prior to the dish install, which required some fancy jiggling later on and an improvement was made at Bishop's Creek. We again used the dainty tarp to protect the electronics and left the dish to the elements. I made a concession by covering the feed horn with a rubbish bag.

Clean-up was swift and simple. The dish without the electronics boxes was much easier to handle for the two of us and it looks like it may stay separate from now on. Of course everything is lighter once you've lifted 160kg between two of you, now it's only 100kg :-)