Airplane Tracking

Airplane Tracking

Participants	Melan
Skills	Linux, airplanes, radio, rtl-sdr
Status	Active as fuck
Niche
Purpose	Use for infra
Tool	No
Location
Cost
Tool category

Airplane Tracking

adsb_pi.jpg {{#if:No | [[Tool Owner::{{{ProjectParticipants}}} | }} {{#if:No | [[Tool Cost::{{{Cost}}} | }}

What

An LXC running on Coherence (sdr.dhcp.nurd.space / 10.208.42.113) tracking airplanes, in total there are 3 RTL-SDR dongles connected while only one is being used for ADS-B. The other two remain available for any other SDR purposes. The ADSB decoder used is ReadSB some of the services are running under Docker. The setup is heavily based upon this guide [1].

The antenna is located above the bar under the skylight. As of right now, we are using a PCB-based 1090Mhz antennae, however, performance remains poor and a better antenna is very much desired.

mlat

I still want to see if we can improve mlat reception. Previously, when the project was running in a VM we barely did any mlat calculations being likely because the timing in the VM was off. After it was moved to an LXC container, mlat receptions improved. What I would love to experiment with is moving the receiver itself to an embedded device such as a Raspberry Pi instead, to see if this causes any sort of improvement in mlat calculations. This should be fairly simple as it only means we need to move readsb and possibly mlathub to physical hardware instead. A better antenna will very likely also improve our mlat reception.

How

Automatic Dependent Surveillance Broadcast (ADS-B) is a surveillance technology in which an aircraft determines its position via satellite navigation and periodically broadcasts it, enabling it to be tracked. The information can be received by air traffic control ground stations as a replacement for secondary surveillance radar, as no interrogation signal is needed from the ground. It can also be received by other aircraft to provide situational awareness and allow self-separation. ADS–B is "automatic" in that it requires no pilot or external input. It is "dependent" in that it depends on data from the aircraft's navigation system. This signal is transmitted at 1090Mhz and 978Mhz.

Hardware

Flightaware Pro Stick Plus

Chip: R820T2
Amplifier: 19dB with 0.4dB noise figure and OIP3 +39dB
TCXO: 0.5 ppm
Filter: 1,075 MHz to 1,105 MHz pass band with insertion loss of 2.3 dB; 30 dB attenuation on other frequencies
Power Draw: 300 mA
Weight: 17 g / 0.6 oz
Dimensions: 95 mm x 32 mm x 13 mm
Antenna Port: SMA female (requires SMA antenna cable and optionally N-male adapter for large antenna)
Range: Over 300 nm/550 km depending on installation quality
Performance: 10-20% more Mode S messages in installations where filtering is beneficial

Installed SDR dongles

Found 3 device(s):
  0:  Generic RTL2832U OEM
  1:  Generic RTL2832U
  2:  Generic RTL2832U OEM < IN USE

0:
__________________________________________
Vendor ID:              0x0bda
Product ID:             0x2838
Manufacturer:           Realtek
Product:                RTL2838UHIDIR
Serial number:          143.831 ppm
Serial number enabled:  yes
IR endpoint enabled:    yes
Remote wakeup enabled:  no
__________________________________________

1:
__________________________________________
Vendor ID:              0x0bda
Product ID:             0x2832
Manufacturer:           Realtek
Product:                RTL2832U
Serial number:          flaw-ppm-0.939
Serial number enabled:  yes
IR endpoint enabled:    no
Remote wakeup enabled:  no
__________________________________________

2: < IN USE
__________________________________________
Vendor ID:              0x0bda
Product ID:             0x2838
Manufacturer:           Realtek
Product:                RTL2838UHIDIR
Serial number:          1354980354
Serial number enabled:  yes
IR endpoint enabled:    yes
Remote wakeup enabled:  no
__________________________________________

Feeds

We currently are feeding to the following services

Name	Link
Adsbexchange	https://adsbx.org/sync/feeder.html?4A&Nurdspace
Flightaware	https://uk.flightaware.com/adsb/stats/site/165985
Fr24feed	https://www.flightradar24.com/account/feed-stats/?id=34863
Radarbox	https://www.radarbox.com/stations/EXTRPI015576
Planefinder	https://planefinder.net/coverage/receiver/228977
ADSBHub	https://www.adsbhub.org/statistic.php (@ space only)
Opensky	https://opensky-network.org/receiver-profile?s=-1408232256
Piaware

Ports

List of open ports, whom they belong to, and their function.

Port	Service	Description
80	organizr	Handy dashboard that has easy access to the services
8080	Readsb	Webinterface
8081	Piaware	Piaware interface
8082	tar1090	Improved Visualization
8754	fr24	Fr24 feeder status
8888	Dozzle	Docker logs
9000	Portainer	Allow you to control Docker
30001	Readsb	TCP Raw Input
30002	Readsb	TCP Raw Output
30003	Readsb	TCP BaseStation Output
30005	Readsb	TCP Beast output
30053	Planefinder	Planefinder client