{"id":295601,"date":"2025-12-02T22:04:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T22:04:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/295601\/"},"modified":"2025-12-02T22:04:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T22:04:07","slug":"lora-repeater-lasts-5-years-on-pvc-pipe-and-d-cells","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/295601\/","title":{"rendered":"LoRa Repeater Lasts 5 Years On PVC Pipe And D Cells"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sometimes it makes sense to go with plain old batteries and off-the-shelf PVC pipe. That\u2019s the thinking behind [Bertrand Selva]\u2019s clever LoRaTube<\/a> project.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>PVC pipe houses a self-contained LoRa repeater, complete with a big stack of D-size alkaline cells.<\/p>\n

LoRa is a fantastic solution for long-range and low-power wireless communication (and popular, judging by the number of projects built around it<\/a>) and LoRaTube provides an autonomous repeater, contained entirely in a length of PVC pipe. Out the top comes the antenna and inside is all the necessary hardware, along with a stack of good old D-sized alkaline cells feeding a supercap-buffered power supply of his own design. It\u2019s weatherproof, inexpensive, self-contained, and thanks to extremely low standby current should last a good five years by [Bertrand]\u2019s reckoning.<\/p>\n

One can make a quick LoRa repeater in about an hour<\/a> but while the core hardware can be inexpensive, supporting electronics and components (not to mention enclosure) for off-grid deployment can quickly add significant cost. Solar panels, charge controllers, and a rechargeable power supply also add potential points of failure. Sometimes it makes more sense to go cheap, simple, and rugged. Eighteen D-sized alkaline cells stacked in a PVC tube is as rugged as it is affordable, especially if one gets several years\u2019 worth of operation out of it.<\/p>\n

You can watch [Bertrand] raise a LoRaTube repeater and do a range test in the video (French), embedded below. Source code and CAD files are on the project page. Black outdoor helper cat not included.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sometimes it makes sense to go with plain old batteries and off-the-shelf PVC pipe. That\u2019s the thinking behind…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":295602,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[2306,86,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-295601","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mobile","8":"tag-mobile","9":"tag-technology","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=295601"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295601\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/295602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=295601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=295601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=295601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}