Base station setups

Projects
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Hello i am new to AgOpenGPS, i am currently studying the RTK part. I am going to install a base station in my farm because i no longer want to rely on the providers to save subscription costs and to have independence since my provider offers a terrible service.

I decided on going for the ardusimple starter kit with LR radio, later will upgrade the ANN-MB basic antenna for the survey antenna. I have 2 fields separated by 5ish km so i think it is more than enough.

So i made this post to see your base station setups, i want to invest a bit and build a high quality structure and wanted to get some ideas…

Thanks

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I don’t have an RTK Base but I found this nice guide that’s very informative. Hope it helps:

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Your own base station is the way to go if you don’t live somewhere where there are free ones. The price dealers charge for one year you can have your own base station and money in your pocket.

I used the wifi ntrip master to send the correction signals to rtk2go.com and then back to wifi though a router in my tractor. Many people use their phones as wifi hotspots to do the same thing.

There are quite a few people using radios as well and I think they work good but I have no experience with them. I thought about going with them but wifi was cheaper and more familiar for me .

A permanent place for your antenna is important. If your antenna moves all you lines will move as well. I used the survey antenna but I think the magnet one is fine.
It’s best to survey your base station in and write down and save your coordinates. That way your corrections won’t change if your station loses power.

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Is there any alternative caster to who i can send corrections via esp xbee ?

I’m doing it allready to rtk2go , but i whant to add another xbee to send to another caster.
So when one stops just switch in tractor to other one

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Is there much difference in price on this setup over the f9p with the ntrip master

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Radio goes from $80 to $200 more per device (short range to extra long range), you need a radio module and a radio antenna for each device (rovers and base station). There is no access to internet in my farm other than cellular data but its going to be more expensive in the long run than the radio, that’s why i decided on radio.

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emlid.com, rtkdata.online, centipede.fr

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I run the same LR ardusimple kit as you, only on a mobile base. It works great, but make sure the base is visible from anywhere in your fields. Maybe it’s just me but in my experience line-of-sight has been a big deal with the radios. Doesn’t take much of a dip or rise in the field to block the signal.

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The LR is only 20mW, compared to 1W on the XLR

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I did upgrade my base to the XLR, so if you haven’t purchased anything yet then it is definitely worth the extra power if the line of sight is compromised at times.
also one thing to remeber if the signal is blocked for a small section of the feild its not a problem, only if it lasts 30 seconds or 1 min.

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I seen Ardusimple has a ethernet port that conects to the xbee port, so is the pie still nessasary?

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The pi is more featured than an ardusimple Ethernet port or wifi module.

RTKbase can serve two Ntrip servers while hosting a local server. With Tailscale I can remotely connect to the base from anywhere. I really like the pi based base stations.

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where can I find info on setting up a base station with the pie?
right now I have been using radios but have been tempted to do the RTKtogo route.
Would it be possible to send the RTK corrections over the radio signal and the internet? So when I could Choose what singe I want to use based on what field Im in.

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Some reading here:

and here:

Also many guides posted on this forum.

You can have both NTRIP and radio with the “Stefal rtk base”.

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The RTKbase GitHub page has some instructions. It’s only a few commands to install and setup RTKBase onto a working Pi. Takes 5 minutes if you have a Pi and know your way around it.

If it’s your first time setting up a Pi with an OS, connecting a Pi to your network, using SSH, etc then that will take you some time to figure out, but there’s a million internet tutorials on how to do that stuff.

You can plug a radio into the Pi using a USB adapter, or connect with wires to the Pi’s serial pins. Your F9P can connect without USB or serial wires too. There’s a “setup and detect” button for F9P, but you can use other receivers too.

The RTKBase software has sliders where you can turn on/off, in any combination.
NTRIP A
NTRIP B
NTRIP Caster (local)
RTCM TCP
RTCM Serial (radio)

So you can serve rtk2go, centipede, host locally, forward over TCP, and run a radio, all at the same time, or in any combination. All with different messages or the same, whatever you want.

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Couple things:

  1. Those who use XLR or radio corrections, what is your real world experience for distance from your base?

  2. Does it pay to get a “survey grade” antenna for the base or does the u-blox antenna provide the same accuracy once corrected?

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1.The radio is really good as long as you have line of sight, if you can see where the radio is broadcasting from you will most likely get a signal. If you go behind a building or trees for a small section thats not a problem as long as for the most part you have good line of sight.

  1. I have no experience with the survey grade antenna, but the standard is just fine, if you want to up grade spend more money upgrade on the radio side, more power and better antennas will have a noticable difference.
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Interesting, i was tunnel-visioning on the GNSS antenna but the radio antenna might be more important. Are you using the stock antenna or did you make/buy a bigger one?

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I just used the stock antenna fro both radio and GPS, but I did up grade to the XLR radio