A curious thing occurred this morning (7/19/2018).
Our node WA5EOC-URM2-MONT (approx 475' AGL) in Montgomery County TX heard beacons from the following nodes:
W5NGU-Rosston-SE
k5rwk-rk2d-richardson
K5UTD-Southeast
It was not strong enough to make a connection (we only received IP addresses), but, with some investigation, I was able to determine the node names.
This was not via a tunnel as they showed as current neighbors (ie. RF).
These nodes and our node are approx. 190 MILES away!
Surely we didn't just happen to see these 3 nodes mobile all at the same time near Lake Conroe.
Tropo ducting?
Our node WA5EOC-URM2-MONT (approx 475' AGL) in Montgomery County TX heard beacons from the following nodes:
W5NGU-Rosston-SE
k5rwk-rk2d-richardson
K5UTD-Southeast
It was not strong enough to make a connection (we only received IP addresses), but, with some investigation, I was able to determine the node names.
This was not via a tunnel as they showed as current neighbors (ie. RF).
These nodes and our node are approx. 190 MILES away!
Surely we didn't just happen to see these 3 nodes mobile all at the same time near Lake Conroe.
Tropo ducting?
Question: Is the node being fed straight 24 Volts or is the node being fed 48 Volts (802.3AF standard) with a Ubiquity inline converter (like a INS-8023AF-O) ?
Yes, ducting happens at microwave freqs. And, as Andre points out, it could also be aircraft reflections. (In particular, see the W3SZ web site.) And one other propagation enhancement is possible: rain scatter. Rain scatter is where microwave signals get bounced off the individual rain drops in a rain storm. I'm not sure what it would do with 802.11 signals, but it does work for CW. On CW, what you hear is keyed noise since there is no coherence between the individual reflectors in the reflected signal.
Keep an eye on tropo between yourself and these Richardson nodes. 2m APRS might be best for this, or listen to any 2m beacons that might be in that area. If the tropo gets real loud, keep an eye on your nodes and neighbor list.
Mark