Introduction In previous posts I looked at using the ICM20948 9DOF IMU with Raspberry Pi4B and Arduino Uno (Ref.1/2). The ICM20948 is a replacement for the MPU9250 (now end of life) on the popular GY-91 board often used with OpenPlotter. The Raspberry Pi Pico 2 is a very small microcontroller that lends itself to remote… Continue reading ICM20948 9DOF IMU on Raspberry Pi Pico 2
RTL-SDR for MARMOTsat CubeSat_2m
Introduction During the past two years I have been able to successfully receive CubeSats CANVAS, ENSO, Veronika and EIRSAT-1 (Ref.1/4). Recently a new Canadian 3U CubeSat MARMOTsat was launched by SpaceX Transporter 17 on July 7th 2026 (Ref.5). MARMOTSat has 3 transmitters in the 10m/2m/70cm bands. Technical details are given in Ref.6/7. Equipment Setup Figure… Continue reading RTL-SDR for MARMOTsat CubeSat_2m
AIS & GNSS on OpenCPN ECN Charts
Introduction In the previous post I looked at receiving AIS on OpenCPN using the latest ECN charts for the Montreal harbour (Ref.1). Since 2017 I have been using Raster BSB charts. In this post I compare various chart formats such as Paper, Raster BSB and ENC. ENC charts are vector charts and contain a wealth… Continue reading AIS & GNSS on OpenCPN ECN Charts
AIS on OpenCPN ENC Charts
Introduction In a previous post I looked at receiving AIS & GNSS on OpenCPN using BSB Raster charts which I have been using since 2017 (Ref.1). Today I purchased new vector S57 ENC charts for the St Lawrence River close to Montreal (Ref.2). I tested reception down at the Port of Montreal. Equipment Block Diagram… Continue reading AIS on OpenCPN ENC Charts
RTL-SDR Rx AIS Power Calibration
Introduction Several years ago I looked at calibrating the RTL-SDR receive level in dBm in connection with LoRa transmission (Ref.1). The same can be done for receive levels for AIS. In my last post I looked at AIS reception from my new QTH along with signal levels (Ref.2). Measurement Setup GNURCTx Level SigHoundRx Level GqrxRx… Continue reading RTL-SDR Rx AIS Power Calibration