More low cost RTK receivers

[Pheasant Surprise]

The floodgates apparently opened with the announcement of the u-blox ZED-F9P chip at the end of last year. Now there are ever more low-cost and decently high-spec RTK capable receivers hitting the market.

In addition to the Ardusimple RTK boards and Emlid Reach RS2 we also have the Drotek F9P Sirius RTK GNSS just announced.

Although this receiver is aimed at the drone guidance market this unit could also be adapted to work with precision ag applications.

Another interesting shake up to the market.

 

[aidan]

IF I understood programming, I woudl have built my own AgOpenGps

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

IF I understood programming, I woudl have built my own AgOpenGps

I think Brian might well be bringing a packaged solution to market.
@Briantee

 

[steveR]

I think Brian might well be bringing a packaged solution to market.
@Briantee

Be great when/if he does.

 

[Lofty1984]

@davedb

 

[Gerbert]

IF I understood programming, I woudl have built my own AgOpenGps

You can, look up cerea gps. Rtk gps for a couple of thousand euro. If you are handy enough.

 

[clbarclay]

It's a shame trimble screens won't accept input from non-trimble recievers for steering.

I did see a thread on another forum about adding a dummy RTCM message to the output from a non timble base station so it could be used by a trimble reciver. But I haven't seen anything like that for using alternative recievers on the tractor.

 

[pdagriservices]

Was nt there a chap on here or maybe Facebook? That made his own system for a few hundred quid? With RTK?

 

[PuG]

you can do it with existing cheap GPS modules (ublox neo-6), you only need a base station running off your own home system (with something like EoS server - https://eos-gnss.com/product/tools-apps/#1446476861077-2fd08bdb-0741 so you can use a simple waterproof GPS USB reciever and say a 10meter USB exsenstion cable to get it on your roof), if your lucky your in range 14 - 20km? of a permanent station: http://www.epncb.oma.be/index.php saves having to do it.

It doesn't have to be expensive. Then with your laptop in your cab using AgOpenGps, data connection perhaps via your mobile or a LoRa connection then another neo-6 you can synchronize with your base station to produce your own RTK from next to nothing.

The new ubox chips are nice because its done on the hardware but still pricey (comparatively speaking). What is MORE of a problem is getting a display bright enough to use in a cab. I'm waiting for the new generation of E-Ink's (like a kindle) with quicker refresh rates. This one is 6 seconds which is probably quick enough - https://www.waveshare.com/7.5inch-e-paper-hat.htm

What I want to do myself is use something like a Raspberry Pi4, see if AgOpenGps will run with Wine, then couple that with a waveshare screen which would be a really compact system.

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

Was nt there a chap on here or maybe Facebook? That made his own system for a few hundred quid? With RTK?

You might perhaps be thinking of Andreas Ortner? He's on here too I think.

He used the first generation of L1 only Emlid Reach receivers. I know he's working on updating his setup working with the new L1/L2/L5 Reach RS2 receivers.

This look familiar...

https://emlid.com/using-reach-rtk-affrodable-auto-steering-farm-austria/

 

[Hutcho]

you can do it with existing cheap GPS modules (ublox neo-6), you only need a base station running off your own home system (with something like EoS server - https://eos-gnss.com/product/tools-apps/#1446476861077-2fd08bdb-0741 so you can use a simple waterproof GPS USB reciever and say a 10meter USB exsenstion cable to get it on your roof), if your lucky your in range 14 - 20km? of a permanent station: http://www.epncb.oma.be/index.php saves having to do it.

It doesn't have to be expensive. Then with your laptop in your cab using AgOpenGps, data connection perhaps via your mobile or a LoRa connection then another neo-6 you can synchronize with your base station to produce your own RTK from next to nothing.

The new ubox chips are nice because its done on the hardware but still pricey (comparatively speaking). What is MORE of a problem is getting a display bright enough to use in a cab. I'm waiting for the new generation of E-Ink's (like a kindle) with quicker refresh rates. This one is 6 seconds which is probably quick enough - https://www.waveshare.com/7.5inch-e-paper-hat.htm

What I want to do myself is use something like a Raspberry Pi4, see if AgOpenGps will run with Wine, then couple that with a waveshare screen which would be a really compact system.

Hi, would this GPS antenna (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Waterproof...coding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=HRKS933W14514VXNW07S ) be suitable for use on the tractor as well as used in a home base station for future RTK correction? it has UBLOX 8 chip in it. I was hoping I could use with Field Navigator app on mobile phone or Agopengps if put a laptop/tablet in tractor. Many Thanks.

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

Hi, would this GPS antenna (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Waterproof...coding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=HRKS933W14514VXNW07S ) be suitable for use on the tractor as well as used in a home base station for future RTK correction? it has UBLOX 8 chip in it. I was hoping I could use with Field Navigator app on mobile phone or Agopengps if put a laptop/tablet in tractor. Many Thanks.

Wouldn’t concern yourself too much about the antenna at this point.

What is important is the receiver chipset and understanding what rover receivers (tractors) you will be serving corrections too, and what correction input they will need.

Also don’t bother with the single L1 only frequency Ublox 8 series. It’s a waste of time.

What you want is a board that is capable of at least dual-frequency L1/L2 (and in future triple L5) and quad-constellation (GPS+GLO+Galileo+BeiDou) support.

It’s also important that you understand if your rover receivers will cope with the more modern MSM type RTCM 3.2 messages (and which flavour of MSM3, 4, 5 or 7) or whether they will want to talk old fashioned legacy 1004/1002 message types for just GPS+GLO correction.

I’ve learnt this through recent experience.

 

[cquick]

The easiest way to get started would be to buy a pair of Ardusimple RTK2B boards.
They will accept deprecated RTCM messages if you're working with an existing basestation, or could be used to generate them using RTKLIB Str2str, if you intend to use it as a correction source for older rovers.
My old pair of Ublox M8P dev boards are hopeless by comparison, but I'm sure will eventually find their way into gratuitous autosteer projects.

 

[Briantee]

I think Brian might well be bringing a packaged solution to market.
@Briantee

A farmer from Austria is getting some boards made up. all you would have to do is connect the parts and go. I can let you know the details when available. You guys have many rules in Europe when it comes to developing technology

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

The easiest way to get started would be to buy a pair of Ardusimple RTK2B boards.
They will accept deprecated RTCM messages if you're working with an existing basestation, or could be used to generate them using RTKLIB Str2str, if you intend to use it as a correction source for older rovers.
My old pair of Ublox M8P dev boards are hopeless by comparison, but I'm sure will eventually find their way into gratuitous autosteer projects.

Speaking of which, they’ve just released a tutorial...

Connect your simpleRTK2B to a Raspberry Pi

 

[clbarclay]

Interesting. A Tutorial on how to then use it to push out RTCM to a site like RTK2go would be useful.
Can SNIP be run on a pi using wine?

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

Interesting. A Tutorial on how to then use it to push out RTCM to a site like RTK2go would be useful.
Can SNIP be run on a pi using wine?

Good question. It may be more (platform) efficient to use a lightweight native Linux based caster in that situation rather than SNIP on Wine.

I suppose you could try a free copy of SNiP to see if runs on Wine if you have a Pi lying around.

The guys at Sub-Systems Carrier Corp had at one point plans to release SNIP natively for Ubuntu but it never came to anything

 

[Hutcho]

Thanks for your replies, it is much more complicated that I first thought, I've been reading up on past threads as well to try and get my head round it all.

So Basically we have an attenea passing a signal to the receiver which converts it to position data (either using a radio signal or mobile phone data (NTRIP) to correct it to RTK quality.

Could I connect the ardusimple board to a android mobile phone running a guidance app for lightbar type guidance when say slug pelleting on a ATV. Could I also use the same board to connect direct to a windows tablet running AgopenGPS which could in future communicate with a autosteer setup on a tractor. I have a old Trimble receiver/Agleader screen on a tractor that get RTK radio signal from a local mast, could I replace the current radio feed with my own from a ardusimple board?

I am a bit confused why the raspberry Pi computer is needed, would the tablet not run the programming?

Many thanks again for your help, and I'd like to say I think it is great that you have all persevered in this field when many have told you just to buy a packaged solution, I have various old lightbar systems that have packed in and found you have to buy a new system as the old is obsolete etc. At least if you build it yourself you can fix it yourself!

 

[cquick]

You could connect one to an android device, it's only USB after all, but I'm not sure what apps will work with it, and I'm pretty sure none have a built in ntrip client. Personally I would strap a windows tablet to the quad bike if you wanted to go down that route.

No need for a raspberry pi, the ardusimple board connects directly to the tablet via USB.

If you wanted to use your own correction data in a trimble receiver you don't need an ardusimple board on the tractor end, only an ntrip client running on a computer with a USB-to-serial adapter, so you can send the data into the appropriate pins on the back of the trimble unit.