It’s interesting how nodes in the periphery disappear and instead we get more nodes from downtown. That’s because there’s just so many nodes there, they push out peripheral nodes out of the limited device node db. Many expected to see a lot more nodes in the periphery.

Seems to work so far. Hops have dropped significantly and more people are getting messages in LongFast. I’m getting more complete conversation with few to no missing messages.

I ordered one but it hasn’t shipped yet. I’ll post once I get it.

Did you find out how thick it is?

For your second node, since you’re gonna get a second node, get something with replaceable antenna. There’s a huge difference in signal between the small stock antennae and something like this.

That’s the standard - listing the raw cell Ah - and it always has been dodgy. I guess in this context ironically it seems more dodgy because they also list the effective capacity. :D

Most battery banks advertise their raw cell Ah/mAh ratings, which of course isn’t the effective Ah at 5V. It seems like Heltec tried listing both ratings here.

Given the connector it’s got, I suspect it might be splashproof or intended to be/become water resistant in a future iteration.

Thanks!

Do you have a link with info on different antennas and pattern characteristics?

Interesting. I guess it’s a self-limiting problem. In effect LongFast would be limited by the number of nodes in your vicinity. Even in a large network, messages propagate to 3 hops so you won’t be able to see messages from further away, even if the mesh has thousands more nodes further away.

This mesh doesn’t seem to have 100-node limit. It seems to be a device limit where a device can only remember up to 100 nodes and it seems to be removing old ones as it discovers new ones.

What about topical channels if the mesh grows large, to hundreds or thousands of people? E.g. ask support questions in “Local Support” instead of “LongFast”

Would you create a public channel that doesn’t need vetting, posting its info publicly somewhere?

So something like “Local Community Mesh” with local people in it. How would you share the channel with new people who get a Meshtastic device?

Who’s in your private channel?