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    <div class="moz-cite-prefix">Sorry to come late to the party, one
      thought I had was a mesh system using multiple AP's and or the
      robots themselves for repeating the signal.  Just a thought.<br>
      <br>
      BTW, Love that part of PA, grew up near there and used to go to
      West Point Park (now gone and part of a housing development)<br>
      <br>
      Bill<br>
      <br>
      On 10/26/2018 2:26 PM, Charles West via TriEmbed wrote:<br>
    </div>
    <blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:CAGojqS=3mBFcOsU=y4XkWg74Af5JW4=p1xbusx1ah7mRnX0jUw@mail.gmail.com">
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        <div>Thank you guys so much.  This is a number of viable ways to
          solve the problem and I think I can be much more confident in
          how I am going to approach this.</div>
        <div><br>
        </div>
        <div>Thanks again,</div>
        <div>Charlie<br>
        </div>
      </div>
      <div class="gmail_extra"><br>
        <div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Oct 25, 2018 at 7:13 PM, Rodney
          Radford <span dir="ltr"><<a
              href="mailto:ncgadgetry@gmail.com" target="_blank"
              moz-do-not-send="true">ncgadgetry@gmail.com</a>></span>
          wrote:<br>
          <blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0
            .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
            <div dir="ltr">
              <div>A distance of 1km is not that far and can be easily
                achieved with off the shelf WiFi systems. I am currently
                working on a project that has an Ubiquiti M2HP radio
                attached as the base system mounted at the top of a
                building with an omnidirectional antenna, and the same
                radio with a smaller omnidirectional antenna mounted on
                the mobile unit and we can easily get that distance.</div>
              <div><br>
              </div>
              <div>The previous solutions are good, but to me, WiFi that
                just works out of the box is a simple solution.</div>
              <div><br>
              </div>
              <div>As for my balloon communications, I had a 2-meter
                radio in the ham band, broadcasting at about 2W and was
                able to get 100+ miles, but that small antenna was up in
                the air over 15-20 miles high. I also tried using WiFi
                with a parabolic dish on the ground and I was able to
                test that out to over 2 miles on the ground, but that is
                a directional antenna - not very good for  your setup.</div>
              <div><br>
              </div>
            </div>
            <br>
            <div class="gmail_quote">
              <div>
                <div class="h5">
                  <div dir="ltr">On Thu, Oct 25, 2018 at 3:23 PM Charles
                    West via TriEmbed <<a
                      href="mailto:triembed@triembed.org"
                      target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">triembed@triembed.org</a>>
                    wrote:<br>
                  </div>
                </div>
              </div>
              <blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0
                .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
                <div>
                  <div class="h5">
                    <div dir="ltr">
                      <div dir="ltr">
                        <div dir="ltr">
                          <div dir="ltr">
                            <div>Hello!</div>
                            <div><br>
                            </div>
                            <div>I'm in Lansdale, PA now but I was
                              hoping I might be able to pick you guy's
                              brains.  My current big project is trying
                              to build one or more robots to deliver
                              food/drinks on golf courses.  I'm
                              currently trying to figure out the best
                              way to maintain continuous(ish) contact
                              between a access point/basestation at it's
                              base of operations and 1 or more robots
                              operating on the course.</div>
                            <div><br>
                            </div>
                            <div>At a minimum, I would like to have the
                              robot report its basic status (battery
                              percent, GPS position) but it would also
                              be great if it could stream video when
                              required to allow teleprescence steering
                              or determination of what is going on.  The
                              robot would probably be about 1 km from
                              the base station at max. <br>
                            </div>
                            <div><br>
                            </div>
                            <div>I'm currently considering 3 possible
                              solutions but I'm pretty open to ideas:</div>
                            <div><br>
                            </div>
                            <div>1.  Use a mobile hotspot/cell modem:<br>
                            </div>
                            <div>        For fixed $130 and monthly $20,
                              I can get a mobile hotspot which provides
                              one gig of data per month and more data
                              for $5/gig.  If I keep the reporting
                              really light, this could work but the
                              communication would have to be kept pretty
                              limited.</div>
                            <div><br>
                            </div>
                            <div>2.  XBee:</div>
                            <div>         These modules seem to float
                              somewhere between $25 and $60 in prices,
                              so a pair would be somewhere in the $50 to
                              $120 range.  Sparkfun had a good guide to
                              XBee (<a
                                href="https://www.sparkfun.com/pages/xbee_guide"
                                target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">https://www.sparkfun.com/<wbr>pages/xbee_guide</a>)
                              but they are listing almost all of their
                              products as retired (besides old series 1)
                              and most of the stuff I read about XBee is
                              from 2015-2016 so I am not sure what the
                              best options are anymore.  In any case, it
                              looks like it would provide a low baud
                              rate connection over the desired range. 
                              The main problem is that it requires
                              working through XBee and making my
                              basestation have to have special software
                              to forward information.  I'm also not sure
                              about security and it is certainly not
                              going to be streaming video.</div>
                            <div><br>
                            </div>
                            <div>3.  Long range Wifi:</div>
                            <div>        Rodney's done some work in this
                              area before with his weather balloon
                              projects.  I don't recall off the top of
                              my head how far he managed to get but I do
                              remember he had to use higher power than
                              allowed without a higher grade amateur
                              radio license.  That power level would not
                              work for a commercial operation.  There
                              are some companies that are selling
                              solutions aimed at farms (<a
                                href="http://ayrstone.com/www/?v=7516fd43adaa"
                                target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">http://ayrstone.com/www/?v=<wbr>7516fd43adaa</a>)
                              and there seem to be off the shelf
                              solutions that can get 500 ft (mostly
                              aimed at hotels).  The hotel systems seem
                              to be in the $350 range and the farm
                              systems in the $500 or so.  The robot
                              could use a high gain antenna, but it is
                              not clear how much it helps.  These
                              systems have security built in and
                              potentially can stream video if the range
                              is long enough.  Like hotspots, writing
                              software for them would also be easy.  <br>
                            </div>
                            <div><br>
                            </div>
                            <div>What do you guys think?</div>
                            <div><br>
                            </div>
                            <div>Thanks,</div>
                            <div>Charlie<br>
                            </div>
                          </div>
                        </div>
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