Beginners guide to setting up a basic windows plane tracking system

[Analoguesat]

Heres a basic guide to setting up a windows plane tracking system at home.

You will need a sdr dongle (available for 15-20 quid from amazon/ebay etc), an antenna cut to 1090MHz which you can build or buy - build instructions here:

Plus cabling, various interconnects etc

Dont be afraid to have a go - windows systems are very easy to set up - detailed instructions can be found here:

Installing the MLAT-Client on Windows – LowFlyingWales.co.uk

If you follow this exactly you will join the LowFlyingWales team and feed data to them. This is a hobby site run by enthusiasts for enthusiasts. You can add feeders for the big boys later (FlightAware, FlightRadar24 etc) once you have some experience with the software.

Once you have the basic system up and running you will want to see what its tracking and there is a superb bit of free software called Virtual Radar Server which you can connect to the feeder software to display range charts, aircraft details etc.

Home - Virtual Radar Server

Once its all up and running you will end up with something like this with the multicoloured range splats. Im in a valley and the range rings are at 20 mile separation:







NB it is also possible to use a raspberry pi to do the basic tracking. They can be a bit tricky to set up if you havent used one before but I successfully followed these instructions to get the basic decoding going.

http://tinyurl.com/hmfrpuj

getting the feeder software running wasnt a great success though - every time I tried to add it in it broke something!

 

[jeallen01]

A/S -many thanks (as before!)

 

[Analoguesat]

The first time you run VRS you wont have the aircraft silhouettes or the logos. These need adding into VRS & can be downloaded for free from here:

SBS Resource Downloads | Kinetic Avionic Products

Download them, unzip them & copy the folder somewhere onto your hard drive. Then on the main VRS options tab point the various folders at the correct locations - the screengrab shows how its set up on my computer:

 

[Analoguesat]

Which operators logos you use is a matter of personal opinion - 4 types are available so download all 4 of them & switch around till you find one you like. I use set 1 and have found some of the logos are missing from the aircraft that pass here so Ive made up some extra ones to fill in the gaps by finding the logos online & resizing them. Here are a dozen or so of the ones I found missing. Feel free to unzip them & add them into your logos folder

 

[Analoguesat]

And of course the most important thing - have fun doing it & when you get stuck - and you will at some point - dont be afraid to ask. We have several members here on the forum who are enjoying this new hobby.

If you are a member of facebook then join the 360Radar group - its an active group supporting the LowFlyingWales operation.

 

[Analoguesat]

Windows will almost certainly auto load a driver for the sdr dongle - and it will be the wrong driver! You need to follow this procedure to get the correct driver installed:

How to load the windows sdr driver.

 

[Analoguesat]

You can also decode the "sms type messages" transmitted to and from aircraft with another bit of software. Chris has started a thread about this option here::

ModeSDecod2 Setup Windows

 

[Archive-8]

Just so you can get going:-

 

[Analoguesat]

The can (or something similar) is important - it acts as a ground-plane for the antenna.

 

[jeallen01]

My little FWIW's after knocking together a 12 section version of the co-linear today (it can't go very high off the ground, and there are a lot of buildings around here, so I thought I would make it as long as possible the first time) :
- Continuity check each joint several times during, and then again after, making every one because that showed I had had a couple of instances of the cores breaking (and, of course, the breaks were hidden when the sections were pushed against each other);
- Put a cap on the free end of the complete unit - can usually find these on the ends of the cable when delivered on a reel
- Tape the complete unit to a thin garden cane before you push it into the PVC tube - that keeps the cable straight when you push it into the tube, and should (hopefully!) reduce the likelihood that it bends or twists as that could damage the joints between the various sections
- At the antenna cable end, fit an F-connector joiner to the F-connector on the cable, and wrap the s/a tape around that (not like it's shown in the video) before you push it into the tubing, so that you have something to easily connect to/disconnect the external cable.

 

[Archive-8]

My little FWIW's after knocking together a 12 section version of the co-linear today (it can't go very high off the ground, and there are a lot of buildings around here, so I thought I would make it as long as possible the first time) :
- Continuity check each joint several times during, and then again after, making every one because that showed I had had a couple of instances of the cores breaking (and, of course, the breaks were hidden when the sections were pushed against each other);
- Put a cap on the free end of the complete unit - can usually find these on the ends of the cable when delivered on a reel
- Tape the complete unit to a thin garden cane before you push it into the PVC tube - that keeps the cable straight when you push it into the tube, and should (hopefully!) reduce the likelihood that it bends or twists as that could damage the joints between the various sections
- At the antenna cable end, fit an F-connector joiner to the F-connector on the cable, and wrap the s/a tape around that (not like it's shown in the video) before you push it into the tubing, so that you have something to easily connect to/disconnect the external cable.

I used half a roll of amilgum tape, top and bottom of the conduit.

And I used an f joiner to make a plug on the bottom of the aerial.

Good building. :-)

 

[jeallen01]

Chris

The cap on the top of my conduit is one of those conduit box connectors I mentioned in the conversation - put a small disk of polythene (from an icecream box!) coated in solvent adhesive inside the end and also around the end of the conduit before I pushed the connector down on the end of the latter. When the adhesive had dried, I hacksawed the threaded bit off the end - looks quite neat, and saved quite a bit of the s/a tape.

Will hope the weather is better tomorrow (been raining all day here) and I can erect and connect up the collinear, the discone which came on Thursday and was put together this morning before I got the collinear, and the diplexer to allow both to be connected to the cable to the house.

After that then the really hard work will start.

 

[Analoguesat]

Great stuff - but why not just hang the antenna out of an upstairs window - then you can spend the evening tinkering

I got some great range with the antenna dangling down the front of the building

 

[Archive-8]

For about the first week of plotting, I used the aerial in my frontroom window.

And only once I had things setup the way I like, I popped the aerial up outside.

But I started of with my Mk2 twig 8 element, I even bought a few different types of coax to see if the coax I used to make the twig would make much of a difference.

Simple answer was no it doesn't make much difference, to my setup.

A pre-amp/filter is worth thinking about.

 

[jeallen01]

A/S

If I hung a 1.5m tube outside the window, it would be lying on top of the utility room roof below, and with no way to secure it in place, and so it actually easier for me to mount it elsewhere! All the dishes (except the Sky dish now) and/or now the antennas are/will be down at the end of the garden between the garage and the high fence where there is more room, and less likelihood of anyone "complaining"/ "investigating" about them "breeding" (this is quite a built-up urban area with a lot of houses around us) because they are pretty well screened from being seen - also, the cabling is now discretely (well for most of the length!) all in place for that to happen.

 

[jeallen01]

Chris

A "pre-amp/filter" would probably the start of this all getting rather more "expensive" if you want low noise and decent bandpass/rejection performance - although I have got a very cheap (a few quid) 47-2400MHz line amp on the way to see if that helps with my inevitably long cable run from the antennas to the house (and not just for this virtual radar stuff but also because I want to use my mil airband scanner on the same system.

 

[jeallen01]

Just installed Mlat Client, and got it running with up to the point where it went through the process shown on the screen-dump on the Low Flying Wales site and connected , did the handshake, /compression/UDP/Split sync steps - but then did not connect, and keeps repeated new lines giving Date & Time +"Reconnecting in 30 seconds", but hardly ever does connect. When it did, I got a message
Date/Time + " Server 0.0 kB/s from server 0.0 TCP to server 0.0kB/s UDP to server
The "Aircraft: 0 known, 0 requested by server" - Then it disconnected again.

Also since the above I am getting some messages which show that the reconnection is intermittently happening, but a lot of "reconnecting messages

Is this all normal?

PS: Not actually connected the antenna up yet - just trying to get the s/w running properly on the machine!

 

[Archive-8]

Just installed Mlat Client, and got it running with up to the point where it went through the process shown on the screen-dump on the Low Flying Wales site and connected , did the handshake, /compression/UDP/Split sync steps - but then did not connect, and keeps repeated new lines giving Date & Time +"Reconnecting in 30 seconds", but hardly ever does connect. When it did, I got a message
Date/Time + " Server 0.0 kB/s from server 0.0 TCP to server 0.0kB/s UDP to server
The "Aircraft: 0 known, 0 requested by server" - Then it disconnected again.

Also since the above I am getting some messages which show that the reconnection is intermittently happening, but a lot of "reconnecting messages

Is this all normal?

PS: Not actually connected the antenna up yet - just trying to get the s/w running properly on the machine!

The m-lat client runs every 15 secs or so. But it's job is to take the data packets from the dongle, strip all the unnecessary bits and forward the remaining data to one of the mlat servers, depending on your region, me it's rx2.

Try connecting the aerial up and trying again.

 

[jeallen01]

Chris

Many thanks - at least I now know what to expect and will be connecting the antenna up this afternoon.

 

[Archive-8]

Chris

Many thanks - at least I now know what to expect and will be connecting the antenna up this afternoon.

The mlat (dos style) client sends the data in bursts, of about 15 seconds.

Do you have the rx number you are on? Then you can see if you are synced with the lfw mlat server, via the web link. If you need the links to the m-lat & coverage server pm me.

If you have the (beta windows app) client, that connects to another port number, and sends data constantly.

By using 4 base stations we can track the aircraft via mode-s. A bit like the tracker system the police use.