On Thursday Evening 29th Jan 2026 we performed another test, this time pushing out luck somewhat!
I ran my current beacon in plain carrier mode, Clive used the new receiver unit I built which has the small lenses on each of the 4x Photodiodes plus infra red band pass filters in between. See here: https://m0dts.co.uk/archives/637
Clive had the unit mounted temporarily out of an upstairs window at his home in Darlington, the receiver was pointed in the general direction of myself through some gaps between trees. The receiver has 15-20deg beam width so is quite different to use compared to the large Fresnel lens Rx.
Based on the screenshots I received back from Clive it appears that we have managed to get a signal between us, this is quite amazing for the size of receiver and transmitter!!
During the test we switched off the beacon and the signal clearly disappeared at the receiver but didn’t return when I switched back on, this appears to correlate with a band of light rain passing between us at the time…
We hope to do another test soon to confirm this and tweak Rx settings some more but it is quite encouraging and would certainly allow EbNaut messages to be sent with this minimal equipment.
