HamWAN and Tri-State Repeater Launch VHF D-Star Repeater in East Memphis

 3 August 2015  ryan_turner

KK4IOH Michael Knight

On August 1st, members of HamWAN Memphis Metro and Tri-State Repeater installed a VHF D-Star repeater module at the Hilton Hotel located in east Memphis, TN. Owned and operated by Tri-State Repeater, HamWAN Memphis Metro helped by providing the network necessary to make this D-Star repeater internet-connected. The repeater is on air, transmitting on 144.940 and receiving on 147.440 MHz in D-Star digital voice mode.

“This connection enables crystal clear world wide communications 24 hours a day,” said Tri-State Repeater Director Michael Knight (licensed General Class KK4IOH).
“If HamWAN weren’t available, we would’ve had to either leave the repeater un-networked, pay for cellular service, or navigate the difficulties of getting a connection through the site sponsor with a public IP.”

The repeater is open to public use and will soon have emergency power. With a Hustler G7 antenna, “it has good coverage of all of Shelby County” said Knight. The repeater’s status can be viewed at https://wb4kog.com/ both on the internet and on HamWAN internally.

“While we’ve had a few AllStar repeaters on network so far, this is the first D-Star repeater to join HamWAN” said HamWAN Memphis Metro president Ryan Turner. “With D-Star reflector REF067 on network, when additional D-Star repeaters join our network, we can join them together even if the internet is down. This is an exciting opportunity for us with wide-area emergency communications.”

Tri-State Repeater Association Inc is a non profit amateur radio repeater group founded in 1975. With about ten repeaters in and around the mid-south, they offer communications capabilities on both voice and packet radio. For more information, visit their website.

HamWAN Memphis Metro provides high-speed wireless data networking for amateur radio operators in the 10 county Memphis Metro region, making up over 5,000 square miles and nearly 2,500 radio operators. MemHamWAN supports microwave and IP networking experimentation, education, and emergency use by deploying a redundant, engineered infrastructure. With microwave connectivity, operators are able to participate in the regional wide area network. Operators may remotely access radio receivers and transmitters, stream media, use voice-over-ip, and many other things. For more information, visit memhamwan.orgor twitter.com/memhamwan.

HamWAN site live

Midtown Memphis Cell Site Live!

October 20, 2014 ryan_turner 

In cooperation with Tri-State Repeater Association, HamWAN Memphis Metro is pleased to announce the deployment of our first cell site, located in midtown Memphis, TN.
Three sectors and one point-to-point link have been installed on the tower above the Southern College of Optometry, offering strong coverage of midtown and downtown Memphis, West Memphis, and even parts of Bartlett and Germantown. The equipment was funded out of pocket by the board members. The 10 MHz channel plan has been selected, with the router configurations published on Github. If you’re in the red area on the map below, you potentially have line of sight to the cell site! Read on for more details about the installation and how to get connected.


Currently, network connectivity speeds are limited due to tree obstruction of the PtP link; over the coming weeks we will be updating equipment to address this issue.

The Installation
Over the 19th and 20th of October, K0RET, KK4IOH, and Sam (future ham!) spent their weekend cleaning up the tower on SCO by removing two antennas and a dish, as well as numerous runs of bad coax and hardline. With this work complete, they then mounted the cell site hardware on the tower, ran wiring to it, and attached it all.

Parts used in the installation include:

3x Mikrotik Metal 5SHPN with power adapter
2x Ubiquiti Antenna AM-5G19 5Ghz 19dBi 120-deg Dual-Pol Sector with SMA jumpers (dual polarity for future use; we get less than 19 dBi since we’re off the center frequency)
2x SMA to N connector adapter
1x Laird SAH58-120-16DB 16dBi 120 Deg sector (single polarity, this is the north sector)
~150 ft Ubiquiti TOUGHCable Carrier, 8x shielded Ubiquiti cat5e 8p8c connectors
4x 16″ section of SuperStrut
8x 1″ OD U Bolts, each with two nuts, plates, washers, and lockwashers
6x 2″ strut-mount pipe clamps
3x 16ga mast
1x Mikrotik SEXTANT G 5HPnD with power adapter
4x RiteAV 10/100/1000 RJ-45 Shielded Surge Protector for Lightning
1x Mikrotik RB260GS Switch
Various zipties, vinyl tape, mastic tape, velcro cable wrap, cat6 1 ft cables

Next Steps
In the coming weeks, we’ll be helping Tri-State with some additional maintenance, fixing the downtilt of the sectors (right now they have too high of a downtilt angle), replacing the PtP link with something higher gain (right now it is severely limited due to trees), installing Flighttracker 24 receiver hardware, converting the WB4KOG-4 APRS digipeater to an igate on the HamWAN network, and adding an exterior network camera.

Additionally, we’d like to return to the site to put all of the equipment on battery backup, install a server, and replace the switch with a router. We’d also like to put a PtP link from SCO to Hilton to get WB4KOG’s D-Star repeater on the network, marking the first HamWAN connected repeater!