Affordable ESP8266 based gateway build instructions

*** the instructions on the blog include some important updates ***
I created instructions to build a Gateway based on ESP8266 NodeMCU + RFM95W radio here:

Also note the PCB is the ‘NodeMCU Lora Gateway 1.3’ and needs 3 diodes (D0,D1,D2) to work properly. General purpose diodes are fine.
The software linked is specific for the US.

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Great writeup, thanks! I set up such a gateway about a week ago. It was very easy, and helped me troubleshoot one of my own LoRa nodes.

If I set up a 1 channel gateway, am I helping the TTN community, or am I just confusing people?

In a way, even a 1-channel gw will help increase coverage. But messages on any of the other channels (or another spreading factor) will not be picked up. So any standard node will only get through the times the message happens to be sent on this channel, right? Troubleshooting that could be quite confusing for someone with a node covered by my 1-channel gw.

Nice writeup, @GFlater! However, I think you should be clearer about the fact that this is a single-channel gateway, and not a real gateway. Like @mfalkvidd says, a single channel gateway is great for testing, but it will not really help the network (it only captures 3% of the channels*spreading factors) and it will therefore definitely confuse people. For the time being, we’re allowing single-channel gateways on TTN, but in order to keep confusion to a minimum, we will hide them from the maps (or somehow indicate that they’re not real gateways).

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Happy to see one of the NodeMCU gateway used @GFlater :wink:
Nice article :wink:

By the way you can also do the same with the WeMos Gateway Lora RF95 shield, it’s the new one, smaller and cheaper code should works as is (may be just changing DIO mapping)
https://github.com/hallard/WeMos-Lora, these one are so tiny (thanks WeMos), I love them

When using this hardware, I’d consider GitHub - JaapBraam/LoRaWanGateway: A LoRaWan Gateway in LUA instead:

It will listen to all spreading factors but only on one specific channel. It will send on whatever channel or datarate the router seems fit…

Also note that the software you’re referring to, GitHub - dlarue/ESP-1ch-Gateway-v2.0: Version 2.0 of the ESP 1-ch Gateway, including downstream messaging, is forked from version 2 of Maarten Westenberg’s code. Meanwhile Maarten has released https://github.com/things4u/ESP-1ch-Gateway-v3.0 as well. I don’t know which is best.

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Thanks for your feedback, yes I am aware this is a single channel gateway.
I am new to Lora/LoraWan , heard about it a month ago, then a week ago I was asked to build a gateway with a minimum of information (got a PCB and a radio, and used one of the NodeMCU’s that I had laying around and got a link to the github repo). Getting it working was surprisingly easy so I just went ahead and documented the process and challenges I ran into.

I will look at Maarten’s code, as I encountered some issues with the v 2.0 that I used, which I fixed.

My goal here is to document the whole process of setting up a gateway, setting up a node and get it all working. It fits in a bigger scale project for remote sensing and increasing coverage here in San Diego.

I certainly appreciate the feedback.

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3 posts were split to a new topic: How to use the “sensor node” in Maarten Westenberg’s ESP8266 gateway?

I want to add that this gateway build and the github code is specific for the PCB board mentioned and for US frequencies (915Mhz).

There is an omission in my build that will prevent it from properly working. Update to follow soon.

Hi,

This is my first post. I have little experience on the subject and no experience at all with Lora.

I was wondering that, since code exists to use the ESP8266 as a single channel gateway to listen to all the spread factors, if it was possible to use a number (8?) of ESPs in parallel to cover all the Lora channels and make a fully fledged gateway.

It seems too good to be true, and it is likely not to be feasible, but it would be interesting to know why.

Thanks
Riccardo

That is an interesting idea and we have discussed this locally. My personal project is focusing on nodes at the moment now that I have an active gateway.

There is a radio module from Semtech SX1301 that will handle a multi channel gateway and certainly could be hooked up to an ESP8266, but this part hard to get hold of.

I don’t know if there is any other alternative other than building a multi radio solution that you suggest or whether anyone has already done so.

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If one channel sends, it will destroy the seven others if they are still listening; see How vulnerable are our gateways really to be destroyed by e.g. nearby nodes? and Placing two LoRa gateway antennas on the same roof? So you will need to coordinate that.

And it’s probably not worth the money, given that a 100% compatible gateway might be even cheaper (like as it only needs one antenna). See also Four Channel RPi Gateway Board.