(Day 1) figured I'd share my adsb-b and acars plane tracker setup I built over time

[BenCos18]

system is currently very much a WIP hence the janky mounting for the raspberry pi boards atm
eventually they'll be getting a case and another custom 3d print to secure them to the joist also

the raspberry boards are running of a tplink 5 port poe switch and also a decent cheap tenda unmanaged poe powered poe switch as I ended up needing an extra line and didn't feel like running it again lol

the pc does acars (currently feed Airframes - https://airframes.io with acars over iridium data from satellites in the sky)
It has a airspy r2 cable tied to the rafter beside it with a clip to secure the cables in place

the other stuff has a pi that does ads-b data (currently feeds a good few sites though my personal favorite is AIRPLANES.LIVE - independent unfiltered ADS-B and MLAT aircraft tracking. Learn about ADSB aircraft tracking and join the community. - https://airplanes.live )

the green sdr is acars also just it's the more old fashioned stuff and uses a antenna mounted just behind it

the grey antenna is a 1090 mhz antenna for the blue sdr and ads-b
the larger one in the back is a acars antenna from vinnant.sk (the of126s model iirc)

then the rest of the wiring is just either power or data lines and yes I know it's a bit of a cleanup (the box in the first image is removed in the past few days as I found the pi and sdr in it was getting too hot really

 

[BenCos18]

final system will have two cases for the pi that mount beside the poe splitters I have

 

[Dan]

No way man that's ace! Do you have two of them running that there then? Are they independent or do they each do a job individually?

At the start of the 6 week school holidays I was trying to get my 12 year old daughter to get an interest in it. I was showing her what kind of things you can do with them. Showed her some cool alarm clocks and there was a robot that walked and some other things.

I'd have totally done all the playing with it but she wasn't interested so I might ask the wife get me one for Christmas.

Thanks for posting a Day 1 thread.

 

[BenCos18]

No way man that's ace! Do you have two of them running that there then? Are they independent or do they each do a job individually?

They all do different stuff
the pc runs the acars over iridium stuff with the airspy r2 sdr and a hc610 -28 antenna outside pretty much in the gutter

One of the pi board runs ads-b and the other does acars (the older one)
the sdrs are just mounted in a 3d print on the rafter to try and get them from being just sat in the insulation


eventually I have a plan to redo the cabling with some better kmr240 or lmr one day but for now rg58 works
the hc610 run has kmr240 though as it's a several meter run at least iirc

 

[BenCos18]

this is the coverage I get from the ads-b stuff for example

https://adsb.electronenclave.com/

(easiest way to share it) cloudflare tunnels are handy

 

[Dan]

You surely can't be DIY most of that went rate over my head lol (I'm not a sparky).

Did you choose DIY as an option when signing up?

 

[Moley]

Hmmm...that looks too complicated for me. I think I'll stay with Flightradar24. Currently a 777 going overhead on it's way to Toronto

 

[BenCos18]

You surely can't be DIY most of that went rate over my head lol (I'm not a sparky).

Did you choose DIY as an option when signing up?

haha I'm defn a DIYer tbh
I know some stuff but I don't pretend to be an expert

 

[BenCos18]

Hmmm...that looks too complicated for me. I think I'll stay with Flightradar24. Currently a 777 going overhead on it's way to Toronto

fair haha
that said take a look at airplanes.live also btw
No censorship vs flightradar which does censor stuff on request

 

[BenCos18]

I know this stuff but not necessarily all electrical stuff for example
most of what I know is self taught from books since I was quite young still and some videos over the past few haha

 

[Moley]

fair haha
that said take a look at airplanes.live also btw
No censorship vs flightradar which does censor stuff on request

Looks pretty good. Graphics are not as good as the FlightRadar24 app but then the web version of FlightRadar24 graphics are pretty poor too. I like the 'U' option which just shows military aircraft. It's currently showing just a A400 over Chester, an Apache over Cambridge and an Irish Air Corps Augusta.
If something has squawked 7700 is there a way to find out what the problem is?

 

[BenCos18]

Looks pretty good. Graphics are not as good as the FlightRadar24 app but then the web version of FlightRadar24 graphics are pretty poor too. I like the 'U' option which just shows military aircraft. It's currently showing just a A400 over Chester, an Apache over Cambridge and an Irish Air Corps Augusta.
If something has squawked 7700 is there a way to find out what the problem is?

not easily
the odd time I see stuff over acars but you could try liveatc though

 

[Moley]

I wish all military would show up. I was working at Spalding yesterday. I could hear and, when clouds cleared, see the 'dog fights' going on overhead. Nothing showing up though.

 

[BenCos18]

I wish all military would show up. I was working at Spalding yesterday. I could hear and, when clouds cleared, see the 'dog fights' going on overhead. Nothing showing up though.

likely has no receiver where you are
It's all community ran so it's using data that private receivers like mine send for example

 

[BenCos18]

It's defn a pain though
the odd time my reciever goes down and it stops done the odd plane that happens to be using mode s from showing on the global map of the airplanes .live site