This seems like a great technology to build resiliency and redundancy in a community, especially for places where cell service is spotty, or in the odd event where normal lines of communication are blocked.
The LoRa boards can be easily powered with a small solar panel for continuous use, and if put in a high enough place with a good antenna, they can have a surprisingly long range!
In addition to being genuinely useful, they also seem like theyโd be a lot of fun to experiment and play around with, printing cool 3D cases for them, or designing a better antenna or repeater setup.
If and of you already have experience with LoRa, Iโd be interested to hear your thoughts! :D
I have some experience with it but I am by no means a radio expert or ham radio buff.
If anybody is interested in setting up a node, Iโd highly recommend the wisblock/rak4630. Theyโre very low power and easy to power indefinitely with solar. It can seem daunting at first but itโs actually pretty straightforward once you do a little reading online.
You just need the wisblock, an 18650 battery, and a solar panel along with JST 1.5mm and 2.0mm connectors to hook them up and itโll start working.
Hereโs a zine if you wanna diy it. https://github.com/iffybooks/3.3v-solar-power-station
There are also more plug and play options out there too.
You got anymore of those Solarpunk Zines?
