VE6AB Technical

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BlackBerry Smartphone APRS RF

This photo is of my Blackberry Z30 running APRSDroid, and communicating via Bluetooth with the Mobilinkd TNC you see attached to the back of the Baofeng UV-3R.

This TNC has a built in Lithium-Ion battery, which will run for several days on a single charge.

The Blackberry Z30 provides the GPS required for the TNC, so it makes for a nice tidy cable free package.

My choice of the UV-3R was for its tiny size, as I wanted a very compact Radio/TNC package, but it has its limitations with the UV-3R only capable of 1.5 watts out on high power.

However being that I am never to far from my mobile, my ABWX mounted in the cargo bay of my mobile becomes a part of the solution.

I have my Argent Cable OT3m attached to my ABWX ADS-WS1 weather station set as a digipeater, and therefore this way I am able to easily get in to the APRS Network.

If the digipeater is shut off, I can also enable the digipeater of my OT3m by sending it an APRS message from my BB Z30 commanding the digi on.

I also can crossband through my Kenwood D710 mounted in the front of my mobile, as the UV-3R is a dual-band radio, and its as simple as un-plugging the TNC, and selecting the simplex UHF frequency also on the display before keying the PTT to crossband into a local repeater.

If you are having problems with the TNC (any TNC) decoding packets from the Baofeng UV-3R, the secret is to set the squelch open, as the UV-3R is very slow opening the squelch.

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You need not be concerned about battery life of the UV-3R set with the squelch open, as I have operated with this configuration for 12 hours straight, and the battery of the UV-3R still has close to 1/2 of it's capacity remaining.

Click on the photo for a closer look.....