[aprssig] Using a TNC as a CW Beacon Only

[Stephen H. Smith]

fred at wb4aej.com wrote:
>      I am wanting to set up a beacon that would transmit (in Morse Code) my ID every two to ten minutes on a two meter simplex frequency.  I want to do this so as to be able to do some coverage tests (Have the radio/ID running at a proposed APRS location and drive around the area gathering signal strength reports in the different locations.  It would not be on the APRS frequency, but on a less popular simplex frequency (probably somewhere near 147.5 megahertz where I wouldn't likely be bothering anyone).  
>
>      Could a TNC-2 be programmed to send a Morse Code ID (my callsign) every two to ten minutes regardless of whether or not it receives packet data?  Or would it only identify when it is processing packets?  
>
>      Regards, 
>
>
>
>                                           
If all you want is to do a signal strength/coverage survey, why couldn't 
you just set the TNC for a normal packet beacon (i.e. APRS posit) once 
every minute or two?   If this is not on 144.39 this shouldn't cause a 
problem.  As a bonus, you could run a laptop with the AGW Packet Engine 
softmodem connected to the mobile's speaker, and an APRS application.  
This would let you verify that a packet burst is actually decodable in 
various locations.   [ With mobile data applications, it's perfectly 
possibile to have very high signal levels and still not decode anything, 
if the particular location happens to have a lot of multipath 
reflections smearing the data stream. ]






Stephen H. Smith    wa8lmf (at) aol.com
EchoLink Node:      14400    [Think bottom of the 2M band]
Home Page:          http://wa8lmf.com

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