the weird part is i can see OTHER stations getting iGated through my station just fine, packets are flowing, the logs look normal. but my own transmitted packets never seem to come through my iGate. i vaguely remember reading something about how iGates are supposed to filter out their own heard packets or something to avoid duplication on the APRS-IS network but i cant remember if thats a Direwolf setting or just how the protocol works. anyone dealt with this before? been digging through the Direwolf user guide for an hour and my eyes are glazing over

im running the WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1 path on my beacons, RF is going out fine, i can hear other traffic on 144.390. the igate part of direwolf is configured with my passcode and everything, i double checked that like three times. server is set to rotate.aprs.net port 14580. filter is set for a 200km radius around my grid square.

is there something dumb im missing in the direwolf config? i feel like ive been staring at this for so long i cant see the obvious thing anymore

running a Mobilinkd TNC3 into a Kenwood TM-V71A, using APRSdroid on an old android phone. path is set to WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1 which i thought was pretty standard. symbol is the little car icon. my grid square is EN52 which isnt exactly the middle of nowhere, theres definitely igates around because i can see other stations popping up near me on the map.

checked the audio levels a dozen times, tried adjusting the deviation on the radio, even borrowed a friends TNC just to rule out hardware. same result. starting to wonder if maybe my path is wrong or something with the callsign-SSID setup. using KD9XXX-9 which should be fine for a mobile. anyone run into this before or have ideas what else to check

my path is set to WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1 which i thought was pretty standard for this area. running into a digipeater about 4 miles away that i can see on the map. is there something different about how messages get routed vs just the beacon packets? i feel like i must be missing something obvious here because the beacon clearly goes through fine.

also not sure if relevant but im connected to an internet gateway too through the radio, not just doing RF only if that matters at all

the other station says they see the message eventually on their end but its delayed by like several minutes sometimes. my path is set to WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1 which i thought was pretty standard. running about 5 watts. is this a path issue or is messaging just kind of unreliable by design? ive read conflicting stuff about whether you need IGate coverage for messaging to work properly vs just RF path to the other station.

also not sure if this matters but im in a somewhat rural area, theres one digipeater i can hit consistently maybe 30 miles away but i dont know if theres a good IGate nearby

i checked my SSID and callsign like five times, path is set to WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1 which should be fine for my area, i have three digipeaters within like 15 miles. symbol is set to a car icon. beacon rate is every 2 minutes which honestly might be too frequent but shouldnt cause it to not show up at all right?

the one thing im not 100% sure about is my audio levels from the phone to the TNC, i adjusted them a couple times but idk if they're right. could that cause it to transmit garbage that sounds like a packet but isnt actually decodable? or am i missing something dumb here

i drove around for like 45 minutes yesterday and the track on aprs.fi was just... partial. maybe 30% of my positions actually showed up. digipeaters in the area seem active because i can see them relaying other traffic. my RF power is set to high on the radio so that shouldnt be an issue. anybody run into this before or have ideas what to check? starting to wonder if its something with how APRSdroid is configured or maybe the TNC connection is dropping packets before they even get transmitted

the issue is messaging. i tried sending a message to another local ham yesterday, he could see my beacon fine but my messages just never showed up on his end. and ive gotten zero messages from anyone even when people said they were sending to me. tried adjusting my SSID thinking maybe thats the issue but that didnt seem to matter. path is set to WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1 which should be fine for around here right? our local igate is maybe 8 miles away and i hit it consistently based on the packets showing on the site.

is there something specific about how message routing works vs just beacon packets? feels like they should work the same way but clearly something is different. running RF only, no APRS-IS connection on my end.

the igate that used to pick me up is about 12 miles away, ran by W4something, and i honestly dont know if he's still on. might be the igate went down and not my setup at all. is there a way to check if a specific igate is still active without driving over there? i looked on aprs.fi and i cant tell if it's showing received packets or just the last known position.

also semi-related — anyone running direwolf as a software igate on a pi? thinking about just setting one up myself at this point. my location is decent, i'm on a small hill and already have a 2m antenna up for other stuff.

i checked aprs.fi and yeah my station was showing up with timestamps like every 30 seconds, sometimes faster. i know thats way too aggressive for a stationary station. ive since turned the rate way down but i guess my question is what are people actually running for beacon intervals when parked or at home? i dont want to disappear from the map entirely but also dont want to be that guy clogging up the channel. running a whip on the car and a j-pole at the house if that matters, no dedicated digi just the radio doing its thing.

the radio is on 144.390 which is correct for north america, and i have the internal TNC enabled. not using a separate TNC or anything. i wonder if the path is wrong or maybe the symbol isnt set right, but i feel like that wouldnt stop it from showing up at all? like even a misformatted packet usually shows up as something weird rather than not at all.

anyone run into this before, is there something obvious im missing

the radio shows it's transmitting — i can see the TX light flash every 2 minutes like its supposed to — and occasionally ill even hear my own packet come back through a local digi. but aprs.fi just doesnt seem to care half the time. checked my callsign a dozen times, its definitely right. is this a path issue or could it be something with the IGate coverage in my area? i looked up the local digipeaters on the RF coverage map and there seem to be a few around but i dunno if theyre all connected to the internet backbone or whatever.

also is there any way to tell if a digi is actually igate-connected short of just watching aprs.fi and hoping?

my commute takes me through a pretty dense metro area and then out into some rural stretches so i wasn't sure if i needed to cover both scenarios with one path setting or if theres a smarter way to do this. i dont want to be that guy hammering the digis every 30 seconds with a path that just creates redundant packets everywhere. anyone running a similar mixed urban/rural route and have advice on what path actually makes sense? also does the beacon rate matter as much as the path or is path the bigger concern

my NMEA feed looks correct when i monitor it through the radio's display, shows the right lat/lon, so im not sure if its a digipeater thing or what. using WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1 path which i figured was pretty standard. anybody seen this kind of thing before or have a idea what might cause it

The weird thing is I can see other stations hitting those same digis just fine so its not a coverage issue. I checked my callsign and SSID setup probably a dozen times. Running -9 for mobile which should be right. Symbol is set to car. Honestly not sure if its a TNC config thing or if im just not understanding how the path actually propagates through the network.

Anyone dealt with this? Is there something in the TM-D710 setup specifically that bites people? I did update the firmware a while back but I dont remember if that changed anything with the TNC behavior.

running a TM-D710G with a homebrew vertical on the roof, using WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1 which i thought was pretty standard. but when i check aprs.fi i sometimes see my packets showing up with like 6 or 7 hops listed and other times barely any. my buddy who lives about 8 miles away says he sees my beacons fine direct sometimes but sometimes not at all.

also tried reducing to just WIDE2-2 based on something i read on a mailing list but honestly im not sure i understand the difference well enough to know which is better for my situation. im in a semi-rural area, not super dense with digipeaters but theres a few around. is there a good way to actually test this without just guessing?

but when i go to aprs.fi and search my callsign theres just nothing there. not even old packets. checked the RF output on my 857D and its definitely transmitting, the SWR is fine. i did notice that when i watch the received packets i can sometimes see digipeaters near me so theres coverage in my area for sure.

one thing i should mention is i changed the comment field recently, not sure if that matters. also been using it on 144.390 obviously. anybody run into this before or have ideas what to check next?

i did notice the squelch might be opening on noise occasionally but i dont think thats the issue. my antenna is a decent mag mount on the roof of the car, nothing fancy but it worked fine for regular 2m stuff. is there a known issue with the D710 TNC timing or something? ive read conflicting things about the audio levels needing adjustment but i cant find where that setting even is on this radio.

also worth mentioning i moved to a new area last month and there arent as many digipeaters here as my old QTH, could that just be it? feels like there should be at least one close enough to hit though.

Should I switch to WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1 for better local coverage, or consider higher power? Currently running 2-2 but wondering if 2-3 might help in West Texas-style sparse coverage.

Also considering adding a temporary fill-in digipeater for our upcoming SAR exercise - any recommendations for minimal hardware setup?

we're both going through the same igate i think, at least we're both hitting W5XYZ-10 based on the heard-by info. is this a simplex messaging thing where the igate has to be two-way capable or am i missing something in my config. i went through the menu on the 710 and the message settings look right to me but honestly that radio has a million menus and i might have screwed something up somewhere.

also kind of a side question — does anyone actually use APRS messaging regularly or is everyone just doing position tracking these days. feels like half the igates out there are receive-only and that kills the two-way stuff

i went back and double checked the lat/lon i entered in the radio and it looks right to me, at least the degrees part. wondering if maybe i fat-fingered the minutes or the N/W hemisphere designator somewhere. gonna check again tonight but wanted to see if anyone else has run into this and what the usual culprit is. the symbol is showing up correct at least (house icon) so its not a total disaster

the weird part is i can see other stations beaconing fine and they show up consistently on aprs.fi with nice tracks and everything. mine looks like a drunk connect-the-dots where half the dots are just missing. igate coverage in my area should be decent, there are like three of them within 30 miles according to the map.

i did try bumping my beacon rate down to every 2 minutes thinking maybe i was flooding the channel but that didnt seem to make a difference. running about 5 watts to a 5/8 wave mag mount on the roof of the car. is there something dumb i'm obviously doing wrong here or is this just what mobile APRS is like

Fixed 5-minute beacons: Consistent coverage, predictable bandwidth usage. Smart beaconing: Works well above 5mph but seems problematic for pedestrian speeds - sometimes goes 20+ minutes without beaconing when stationary.

For emergency communications work, is reliability of fixed intervals worth giving up the efficiency of smart beaconing? APRS should give general landscape picture within 10 minutes but smart beaconing can create gaps.