No internet required… In this video, I build a public Reticulum node and test whether it can bridge completely different networks into one encrypted communication path. I send messages from a normal phone over LTE, through the internet and Starlink, then off-grid over LoRa—eventually using a $20 drone-mounted relay to reach a phone with no internet connection at all.
Both are terrible for that. I hope that it’s a small number of people that get killed relying on LoRa for emergency communications that result in the project(s) being sued out of existence.
Hey guys, I’ve got a great idea: Let’s buy some $15 Arduino-like devices with milliwatts of transmitter power and trust them to life and limb! Even stupider than the people who buy Baofeng radios to put in a “bug out bag” and never use. Those at least mostly work.
I’m actually interested in your reasoning why you feel that way. Care to expand on that?
By “both are terrible for that” I mean both Meshtastic and Meshcore are terrible for emergency comms.
My relevant experience: I’m a General class ham, have been for over a decade now, I’ve used my radio equipment for such things as manning way stations on ultramarathons. These utterly insane strips of sentient beef jerky will go for a casual 40 mile jog through the Uwharries. We kept track of the runners as they ran through the stations so no one got lost for too long, went searching when someone turned up missing, and occasionally called for an ambulance for injuries. The guy who slipped on a rock and hit his head was probably the most important radio call I’ve ever made.
20 watts of VHF punches through the forest no problem. I could reach both stations on either side of me direct, 5 and 3 miles away, I could hear everyone involved on a repeater we designated including folks at the fire department in Troy. It’s also not that hard to use, you push the button and talk.
LoRa uses a couple techniques to stretch the power it has, low power and that chirp modulation thing it does that I don’t fully understand to make it easier to pick out of the noise floor, but you’re still talking a tenth of a watt and a frequency that is strongly absorbed by vegetation. If you live in a forest, LoRa is useless. Even if you do set up Meshcore repeaters high on structures, which a couple of my buddies have done, repeater to repeater you get 30 miles of range, and about half a mile range to companion nodes on the ground. line of sight is VERY particular, I’ve had two identical nodes sitting on top of my car, one could hear a repeater the other couldn’t.
Couple that with most LoRa nodes like that, used for something like Meshcore or Meshtastic, are basically little external modems. The companion node itself isn’t really usable on its own, you need to pair it over bluetooth to a smart phone running the Meshcore app. And then you get the world’s half bakedest text messaging system. In most service, it’s like radio, but text. If your radio didn’t hear a message when it was transmitted because it was in the car or you were standing near a tree or the antenna was touching you…too bad.
I really want to be the ultramarathon jogger who trips on a root and hits his head in the woods at an event where the safety officer’s radio can be 3 feet too far to the left to send or receive any messages.
It might be a fun little toy in a city where you have a dense population and buildings you can put nodes way up high on, maybe it works in the desert where trees are illegal, but I live in a forest. I can shout farther than LoRa.
I haven’t messed with Reticulum. It is my understanding that Reticulum works over several media including but not limited to LoRa so it probably shows more potential.
Oh, a final note about Meshcore: It’s a FOSS project, so the low level packet protocol is very thoroughly documented but there are basically no user instructions.
You want to try training your normie family to use Meshcore? Keep a little walkie talkie they don’t directly interact with in their pocket with their phone, keep both charged, etc? Sure.