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TinyGS and STEM Kit bundle

TinyGS and STEM Kit bundle

Regular price R 5,190.00 ZAR
Regular price R 365.00 ZAR Sale price R 5,190.00 ZAR
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We've developed a bundle of two kits to support the LoRa community, wanting to build TinyGS ground stations. 

The MK01 STEM kit introduces the MaxIQ ecosystem and gives the owner access to great Space STEM content and experiments.

The Tiny GS kit allows one to build a ground station capable of receiving telemetry from currently 14+ active satellites. Become a valuable member of a network with 1000+ ground stations.
Based on the TinyGS ground station solution, you will build and “program” a stand-alone ground station. The software will auto-tune to a 70cm/±433MHz LoRa based satellite currently in a polar-orbit, allowing you to listen in everywhere on earth.

In the bundle:

  • 1 x MK01 STEM kit
  • 1 x MK05 TinyGS ground station kit
  • Access to the STEM and TinyGS Canvas course with guides, content and experiments

Not supplied with the kit, yet recommended:

We predominantly use the Domino4 hardware and firmware ecosystem, all the xChip and coding libraries are curated on their GitHub site (domino4.com).

Virtual workshops:

From October 2022, all those with kits will be invited to join a Canvas course where we share support and teaching materials for this kit, and encourage collaboration. To get onto the list, please contact judi at maxiq.space.

Background:

Bjarke Gotfredsen issued a post in March 2022, here is the post:
I configured one of the extended cores with a LoRa radio in the 400-450 MHz range. I downloaded the firmware from https://tinygs.com/, did a few mods, and tested it with a duplicated setup with standard small dipole antenna. When I confirmed a test packet from the one to the other worked, I downloaded a 3D quadrifilar helicoidal antenna .scad file, calculated an antenna for 436MHz (using http://jcoppens.com/ant/qfh/calc.en.php), and spent 18 hours printing the antenna in the picture. Added some wire to the groves, found an unused antenna cable and got it connected to the LoRa radios U.Fl/Ipex antenna connector. Waited overnight to get some sats flying over and got my first packets a few hours ago. Notice the 800 miles distance in the screen shot. I have ordered another antenna from Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B086YV2QLS. Follow my ground station here https://tinygs.com/station/Domino4@1739593222. Don't worry about the black chips in the picture, they are just prototypes of our white production chips. This TinyGS project is a fun way of engaging the space community, especially where I am sitting at the end of the world. We have a close relationship with the South African Space Agency, and they have previously installed our xChips for a weather station on Antartica. We plan to get one of these TinyGS ground stations to Antartica, when they go back next summer in November. If you are interested, I will be updating https://github.com/domino4com/TinyGS as I go along.

 

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