New whooper beacon on 4095.65

[Teotwaki]

PV....PhotoVoltaic?

Hours of sun, or....

Hmmmmm....

"PV" as referring to photovoltaic works for me.    Hours of sun is interesting but how would it be used as a telemetered metric? The calculated hours of daylight numbers are available in lots of websites. If there was partial sun available (light clouds?) how could we communicate that via CW and then use the information to ascertain the beacon's health?

Offgrid systems are all about AmpHours (AH) into the batteries and AmpHours out.  Measuring PV current across the hours of daylight can give a sense of AH if you know the solar panel is averaging 18 volts into the charge controller. If the beacon's current consumption has been measured in the build phase that would provide a baseline for when it has been deployed. I don't know how monitor and log AH with a microcontroller in a beacon and then transmitting it via CW Interesting problem though. Look at Windy with it's minimalist telemetry crying out for help but the owner has not driven out there and installed a new battery.

Couldn't check DW on the Kiwi southeast array; someone's has had it tied up for a while. I try to get in, listen and get out to free it up for the next listener. Anyhow the omni is receiving DW pretty well at S3

BAT 12.6  TMP 55  PV 0.0

[syfr]

Yeah, who knows about the PV meaning?  It's fun to guess.

It's quite strong today with a nice steady whoop into KFS-South

[Teotwaki]

A strong signal tonight with little fading. The format changed/evolved a little. In the past it sent "DATA DATA" before sending the telemetry. Now it gives 5 slow (1/3 rate?) "whoops, pauses and then starts off with the BAT, then TMP and last of all it sends the PV numbers.

[syfr]

I heard that just now.  It's certainly changed its stripes a bit.

Now...the mystery of "PV"..............   :-)

[Teotwaki]

strong on the SDR
Bat 12.6  TMP  46   PV 0.0

[Teotwaki]

Good signal on the KFS SE Kiwi SDR

BAT  12.6  TMP  55    PV 0.0

[Teotwaki]

Fair signal on the KFS SE Kiwi SDR, weak signal on the omni

BAT  13.5   TMP  65    PV 0.2

The PV number was at 0.6 about an hour ago then slow decreased until resting at 0.2

[DYGradio]

Catching a few "whoops" fading up and down here this evening, signal too far down in the noise to copy any telemetry. A bit stronger on the horizontal long wire as compared to the vertical, I can make out the "DW" ID but not much else. I believe I caught the TMP at 55. 02:45 UTC 10 JAN 2021

[Teotwaki]

Fair signal with fading on the KFS SE Kiwi SDR

BAT  13.8   TMP  75    PV 0.6

The PV number started at 0.9 and dropped slowly, 0.8 then 0.7 with BAT starting about 12.8 and rising rapidly to 13.8

[syfr]

DW has become the "channel marker" for this slice of spectrum . While Windy is usually able to be found (in it's S , H or original full featured version) The Whooper is a real stalwart.

May it continue to whoop for a long time!

[cwguy]

Also hearing it well on the Northern Utah SDR at 0233Z.

BAT 13.0  TMP 46  PV  0.0

[Teotwaki]

Around 08:30 PST today it was reporting PV as 2.2 (big!) and battery as 13.0 volts

Right now it's reporting 14.0 volts,  PV is 0.5 (assuming amps) and temp is 61

[Teotwaki]

Format has been tweaked a little. The PV telemetry seems to have been switched from X.X Amps to xxxx mA. No longer uses a decimal point and leading zeros are dropped. So 400 mA is never sent 0400 but 2 Amps can be sent 2000

I also count seven "DW" markers, six sets of 30 whoops and one set of 5 slow whoops before telemetry in the sequence.

[Teotwaki]

Very strong on the KFS SE kiwi SDR and decent on the KFS OMNI kiwi SDR.

More changes have crept in when I wasn't watching

six sets:  30 whoops and "DW"
1 set of 5 slow whoops and a "DW"

BAT  12.8
O TMP  54
I TMP   68
PV  O

Then a last "DW" and the cycle repeats

Am guessing that "O TMP" is outside temperature and "I TMP" is inside (of something?) temperature.

[Teotwaki]

4 MHz propagation is pretty good tonight.

I am hearing the desert whooper on the KFS Omni, Sedona and Utah kiwi SDRs