Reply To: Mayfly with LoRA module physical connection

Matt, LoRa is a big leap beyond the Xbee 900 MHz self-meshing and local network stuff.

Shannon set up an Xbee 900 MHz network for us in 2012, which I think is still in use. Short story is that 1 km range is max and bandwidth is low for standard HTTP Post requests.

LoRa is much longer range (5-10 miles or more) and lower power. It does this with very low bandwidth, but it uses its own data transmission protocol that is hyper efficient. A special LoRa server platform needs to receive the data, which decodes the packet and forwards it in any format you want (i.e. HTTP Post to Monitor My Watershed). We use The Things Network (TTN), but there are also commercial options. You do need a LoRa receiver, which costs $50 to $2000, depending on capabilities and range (I’m happy with my $250 Laird RG191). TTN has many community gateways around the US, so you might not even need one.

I’ll keep you in the loop, and reach out to you for help testing.