the RTL-SDR V4 I bought finally arrived last week and I’ve been messing around with it since.
It’s definitely a very temporary setup for it (pic related), but it’s at least good enough so I can listen in on flights arriving and departing my local airport.
I was wondering how much of a challenge it would be to get a more permanent setup in a place with better reception, and to then get it up and running on an OpenWebRX+ instance for people to tune into.
Any other ideas for future me that anyone can suggest?
What airport is near you? What’s the frequency? I’d love to mess with a software radio. Would be easy enough to record all the conversations for air traffic control, and then remove the silent bits using some software?
It’s Fort McMurray Intl. I actually found this forum through your YouTube, because I remember a few years back there was another forum about tech stuff (not sure if I’m just blind or if it’s now gone) that you had told me about when I was still in high school.
as for recording signals and whatnot, you absolutely could do that. and most SDR software out there come with the ability to squelch the output so it only records if it’s above a certain dB range.
I’ve been aware about services like Broadcastify where you can listen in on various trunked radio systems used by first responders through your browser. Considering I’ve had RadioReference premium for a while just collecting dust, I could instead put it to use by setting up sdrtrunk to stream feeds of bylaw and fire/ems comms, because currently there’s zero coverage for Fort McMurray.
I’ve been hooked on this neat little kit. Listening to truckers chat with eachother on NFM radios, decoding ACARS messages sent by planes flying above. I’ve even been able to listen to first responders through sdrtrunk already! (although considering the 2.4 MHz sample rate on the dongle, I’d need to have 2 running together in order cover the entire band that their systems run on, so I’m only able to listen to half of the radio calls made)
I’m located in the Parsons Creek area, and the window I have the antenna set up by is facing towards the highway and it’s got some good coverage considering how scuffed the setup is.
as for the frequencies, all of them transmit in AM on these freqs:
118.100 MHz - CYMM Tower
121.900 MHz - CYMM Ground (only tower is audible from my setup, but the carrier is still visible for transmissions from grounded aircraft)
128.500 MHZ - CYMM ATIS (Automatic Terminal Information Service, basically a 24/7 automated voice reading out weather conditions, etc)
135.700 MHz - Edmonton Center
There is also 2 stations which broadcast from Ft McMurray which are for the Edmonton Area Control Center (CZEG):
132.700 MHz - Bison Sector
134.450 MHz - South Sands Sector
Yeah, that went away. Check out https://ymmnerds.com – it’s a tech club at Keyano College that includes community members.
The aircraft stuff sounds cool! You probably already know how to decode the ADS-B stuff. But the ACARS messages sounds awesome. Is that like the engine talking to the manufacturer, etc?
I think it would be cool to do a stream of something interesting. I used to do a stream of police/fire/ambulance in Terrace BC way back in the day (maybe 15 years ago), just because it was fun. But it wasn’t SDR. Just a scanner hooked into a microphone jack.
I should note those aircraft frequencies you posted. I’ve been doing a lot of drone flights near the airport recently, and that would help with the whole permissions thing (ie: keeping an eye out for aircraft).
Anyway, welcome to HTMF. This place has been in existence in one form or another for at least 25 years, maybe more.
Ah yes, that was the one. I didn’t know about the ymmnerds forum, just made an account on it. I’m actually very interested in hearing more about this club, I’ve done too much computer networking and not so much social networking heh. I’d love to someday drop by and say hi to everyone!
I’ve been quite the lone wolf since graduating. I’ve spent the last 2 years dabbling in radio, mostly listening in on Russian military comms sent via shortwave. Most commonly Russian Air Defense forces and their various naval fleets via online SDRs, the one in Kotka, Finland is great for milcom listening.
Nice to meet you all! Gosh I haven’t touched a forum in years let alone a small obscure one like here, this is certainly a refresher.
I think you should post there about your SDR stuff! And if you feel up to it, come to Keyano and do a short presentation about it!
The club is just a bunch of nerds, mostly computer science students at Keyano, but also a few instructors, some community people, high school students, etc. We just started in September. We’ve done web workshops, drone stuff, coding, and lately we’ve been doing PC building. We might do a PC building session at Startup YMM across the street from Keyano soon. And I might do a drone safety / license workshop soon too.
But if you want to come and show off your SDR experience, it would be cool! If not, then post on the forum there and share your experiences.
