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Author: Brad Brown

K1DQ Node Discontinued

Published by Brad Brown on July 19, 2024

We have been notified that the K1DQ packet radio node in Shapleigh, ME has been decommissioned.

While we will miss the tremendous reach that this node provided, we will see the W1YCA node returned to service this Fall, to cover Southern York County from Wells. In the meantime, check our map for other known nodes in your area.

If you know of, or wish to bring a full-time public access node online in your area, please reach out to us using the Contact form on our website or with Facebook Messenger.

Map Updates

Published by Brad Brown on March 31, 2024

The map on the Nodes page has been updated to better reflect active nodes in the Southern Maine Packet Group (SMPG). Nodes that have been down for a length of time are hidden from the map until they are reinstalled.

If you know of any updates to the Midcoast region, or are aware of any full-time public nodes not yet on the map, please reach out to KC1JMH.

Thank you!

March Storm Outages

Published by Brad Brown on March 24, 2024
AI generated image of ice accretion on an antenna array

Update: All primary nodes in Southern Maine are back and fully online; WS1EC, KC1JMH, and K1DQ. AA1LO is back on RF, but not available by IP.

Good morning packeteers! We hope you are safe and warm after this unusual snow and ice storm. We understand that many are without power, and some without Internet. At this time, several of our packet radio nodes aren’t checking in to our Internet monitoring service, a few of which appear to be entirely offline.

At this time, from Southern Maine, only WS1EC in Windham appears to be responding, and the site is without Internet. This means mail may be left, and will forward as forwarding partners come online, but Internet based lookup services like WX, SPACE, BANDS, QRZ, and the like, and the Winlink RMS Gateway are not available at this time.

K1DQ in Shapleigh and KC1JMH in Westbrook are unresponsive. We have not yet heard from friends in Southern York County or the Midcoast as of yet.

Franklin County’s W1FCA node appears to be fully online.

SSL Error

Published by Brad Brown on January 31, 2024

We are aware that our SSL certificate has expired for https://mainepacketradio.org. The renewal with our web hosting provider stalled and the website is now producing an error. We will have this sorted out soon. In the meantime, you should be safe to click through the error.

New Franklin County Node!

Published by Brad Brown on September 8, 2023
Franklin County Courthouse, Franklin County, Maine
Franklin County Courthouse
Source: Wikipedia

Congratulations to the Franklin County ARES for getting a packet radio and APRS node online this week! This new node is located in Farmington, ME, and is listening for local operators on 145.030 MHz as W1FCA-15, and on the national ARPS frequency 144.390 MHz as W1FCA-1. This node is connected to the Maine Emergency Packet Network UHF backbone, allowing traffic to travel the state and beyond!

Stay tuned for more announcements, there are things in development that we’re eager to share!

K1DQ Node Temporarily Offline

Published by Brad Brown on July 22, 2023
Source: Bing AI

From Dan K1DQ on Saturday, July 22nd: The K1DQ Packet will be off the air for a few hours on Sat. afternoon so I can switch the antenna over to the other 2 meter radio for some FSQ field coverage testing by KC1RWI.

Node Status Page is Back!

Published by Brad Brown on May 19, 2023
Node Status Page

We are excited to share our new Status page, accessible at the link in the menu to the left or by browsing to status.mainepacketradio.org. This page will provide live status for Internet connected nodes that the MEPN has been given information for.

As a cruel twist of fate, our status page itself had gone down for a little while due to technical difficulties shortly after implementation. It has been restored and continues to monitor our nodes.

We will continue to provide status bulletins and news for all nodes as we are made aware of changes to the network, including RF-only nodes, right here on this News page.

If you operate a node and would like it added to our maps and status page, or have news to share about it, please reach out to us. We can supply a dynamic DNS name and monitor its uptime.

K1DQ-15 Shapleigh [Back Online]

Published by Brad Brown on February 11, 2023

We have been notified by the Shapleigh node’s sysop Dan, K1DQ, that the node will be down today, Saturday, February 11th, 2023, for an exercise which requires him to temporarily repurpose some of the equipment. The node should be back online this evening. We ask our operators to utilize our maps to locate the next closest node if it is required to pass traffic during this time. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Downloadable Maps Relocated

Published by Brad Brown on August 31, 2022
Network Node Map
Compliments Roger, N1XP

The printable network maps have moved from our Files page to the author’s webserver, where it is easier for him to make quick edits and publish them more expediently. Links to these PDF files are located in our Nodes page under the interactive map.

We encourage amateur radio operators to download these maps for their station or their Emergency Operations Center in case the Internet is not available in the time of need.

Again, we want to thank Roger Pience, N1XP, for his contributions to the Maine Emergency Packet Network (MEPN) and the Southern Maine Packet Group (SMPG), who serves Maine’s Emergency Management Agencies and affiliated amateur radio clubs.

W1YCA-15 Node Move

Published by Brad Brown on June 8, 2022
Image from kindpng.com

The W1YCA-15 node will be taken down soon for maintenance and to be moved to its new home at the Wells Town Office. We will update this post when it returns to service.

KC1JMH-15 2m access is down (updated)

Published by Brad Brown on March 2, 2022

The Westbrook KC1JMH-15 node’s 2 meter VHF operator-access port was unavailable from February 20th until today, March 2nd. During which, the 70 cm UHF radio remained online and continued passing traffic along the statewide backbone between our other nodes.

We want to thank Richard Bates WD1O for going on-site and replacing a faulty component.

New links: NTS on BPQ32 nodes

Published by Brad Brown on February 28, 2022
Image from http://www.iconsmind.com/
Image licensed from http://www.iconsmind.com/

We added the following links to our Links section. Visit this section for official sources of information, guides and cheat sheets assembled by other organizations.

With this information, we’re hoping to permit the routing of messages sent to ZIPCODE@NTSME to automatically route to our Region 1 NTS traffic coordinator, Steve Hansen KB1TCE.

NTS Digital Net: BPQ32 Hub Operators – BPQ configuration and use for the purpose of passing NTS traffic

Deciphering packet frames

Published by Brad Brown on January 25, 2022

Have you ever wondered what all that obscure code means that flies by as stations transmit their connection requests and messages? The following link comes from one of the available software modems, which modulate and demodulate data to transmittable audio.

Example:

<RR P/F R1 >  - this is a "ready to receive' (RR) packet simply acknowledging receipt of packet #0 and ready to receiver #1.

<REJ P/F R1 > - this is  reject (REJ) packet meaning that the packet just received was out of sequence or a duplicate or not received accurately; ready to receive packet #1 instead.

This link is available in our Links section:
https://www.soundcardpacket.org/8headers.aspx

W1YCA-15 Maintenance

Published by Brad Brown on December 16, 2021
Maintenance Underway

Sysop Roger Pience, N1XP, will be performing maintenance on the W1YCA-15 node at York County EMA.

Services will be up and down throughout the day, Thursday, December 16.

Maine 2021 SET

Published by Brad Brown on October 8, 2021
Winlink demonstration at Wireless Society of Southern Maine 2021 Field Day

The Maine 2021 Simulated Emergency Test or SET is scheduled for Saturday, October 9th from 0800 to 1200 EDT, during which amateur radio operators will be demonstrating the effectiveness of their capabilities to send formal traffic across the state. This traffic will exercise the Maine Packet Network (MEPN) nodes, their ability to route BBS mail throughout the system, and their ability to gateway Winlink RMS messages to NTS traffic coordinators.

From the exercise plan:

Exercise Mission Statement

The purpose of the disaster exercise is to test and evaluate emergency communications and its support during a long-term, region-wide power outage caused by a solar geomagnetic
disturbance.

Exercise Objectives

  • Demonstrate the ability to operate during a total regional grid failure emergency.
  • Demonstrate the ability to utilize EMA networks to communicate between the State and County EOCs.
    • Test County EMA radio repeaters and simplex channels
    • Test the Statewide RegionNet repeaters
    • Test the ability to utilize SHARES to relay messages.
  • Demonstrate the ability to utilize Ham Radio capabilities to communicate between the counties and amateur radio operators.
    • Test amateur radio communications between counties and operators on 80m, 40m, 2m, 6m and 70 cm simplex voice.
    • Test the ability to successfully transmit and relay Radiograms by VHF or HF including voice and Winlink.
    • Test the ability to retrieve web files via Winlink
    • Test the ability to use the Winlink System and Packet Network to relay messages.

For more information

See a copy of the plan hosted by the Wireless Society of Southern Maine at: http://www.ws1sm.com/Forms/2021_SET_Plan.pdf

If you are interested in participating, reach out to your local amateur radio club or emergency communications team.

Hardware issues at N1ZRL-15 (Updated 12/7)

Published by Brad Brown on October 5, 2021

We received an update from sysop Pete Thuotte, N1ZRL on December 7th:

N1ZRL Node situation. Need to drop the antenna and mast for gutter installation. Temporary re-installation to follow until, a final solution is found.

Pete Thuotte, N1ZRL

On October 5th, Pete Thuotte, N1ZRL, reported to us via our Facebook page that:

N1ZRL node not receiving well at all. Thought I found an issue with the 16 pin interconnect between Motorola Radius Gm300 and the TNC-PI. Well, it was a problem…replaced it basically rewired it all. Received well for awhile, not now. Maybe should rebuild setup, starting with antenna, mast and coax.

Pete Thuotte, N1ZRL

We wish him luck with his repair efforts, and will keep everyone appraised of any updates as they are received.

WS1EC Frequency Change

Published by Brad Brown on September 23, 2021
Photo borrowed from W6OAK

The 2 meter frequency for the WS1EC-15 node has changed to 145.050 MHz to remove internode communications from the operator access frequency. Internode operations will continue on the 70 centimeter statewide backbone frequency.

Printable Maps

Published by Brad Brown on July 30, 2021
Find Roger’s maps in the Files section

The Maine Packet Network is proud to announce that updated printable maps are now available in our Files section! Roger Pience, N1XP, has put a lot of effort into these, working with individuals and groups all over the state to gather accurate information. We couldn’t have built our dynamic map page without his help.

While our dynamic map can help you quickly find nearby packet nodes, we strongly recommend carrying a printed map with you in case you find yourself without Internet access.

We welcome any corrections and info on new nodes!

W1YCA Back Online

Published by Brad Brown on July 21, 2021
From Young Frankenstein (1974)
20th Century Fox

We have received word that the York County EMA node W1YCA has returned online on a new VHF frequency of 147.550 MHz, and it now supports the UHF statewide backbone! The application SSIDs have been renumbered to the standard scheme started by the Midcoast Maine Packet Network.

Roger N1XP, who reported the news to us, shares the following information, which will be included on our node map:

W1YCA-15 York Co. EMA Emergency Packet Network Node Returns on 147.550 MHz !
W1YCA-15 is part of the Maine Emergency Packet network reaching from New Hampshire into the Canadian Maritimes.
https://www.mainepacketradio.org/

W1YCA-15 Node, alias YCAEMA
W1YCA-2 BBS/Mail, alias YCABBS
W1YCA-10 Winlink RMS, alias YCARMS
A CHAT room will be activated later this month
W1YCA-5 CHAT, alias YCACHT

Please contact Jimmy, KC1ETT [kc1ett@arrl(dot)net] if you wish to have a mailbox on a packet node in York County or Brad, KC1JMH [kc1jmh@arrl(dot)net] for Cumberland County.

If you are new to packet and interested in Emergency Packet communications a “How To” will soon be available on the above mentioned web site or contact one of the SysOps above.

Roger Pience, N1XP

Field Day is coming, use Winlink!

Published by Brad Brown on June 18, 2021
ARRL Field Dayhttp://www.arrl.org/field-day-rules\

Did you know that you can leverage Winlink to earn up to 200 points? As long as the connection starts over radio, it counts! You can leverage one of the nearby packet radio nodes with your free VHF 2m station while your friends are raking in the contacts on HF. See our Node Map to find a node near you.

Relevant Field Day Rules

7.3.5. Message Origination to Section Manager: 100 bonus points for origination of a formal message to the ARRL Section Manager or Section Emergency Coordinator by your group from its site. You should include the club name, number of participants, Field Day location, and number of ARES operators involved with your station. The message must be transmitted during the Field Day period and a copy of it must be included in your submission in standard ARRL radiogram or no credit will be given. The message must leave or enter the Field Day operation via amateur radio RF.

The Section Manager message is separate from the messages handled in Rule 7.3.6. and may not be claimed for bonus points under that rule. Available to all Classes.

          7.3.6. Message Handling: 10 points for each formal message originated, relayed or received and delivered during the Field Day period, up to a maximum of 100 points (ten messages). Copies of each message must be included with the Field Day report. The message to the ARRL SM or SEC under Rule 7.3.5. does not count towards the total of 10 for this bonus. Available to all Classes. All messages claimed for bonus points must leave or enter the Field Day operation via amateur radio RF.

Looking for contacts?

There’s a Google spreadsheet going around with a list of stations that you can contact during Field Day, and a form that you can use to add your group or station to the list.

The List
The Form

W1YCA Temporarily down

Published by Brad Brown on June 18, 2021
Unknown / multi-source

The W1YCA-4 (soon to be -15) node in Alfred at the York County EMA has been taken offline as of June 18th due to VHF radio issues. Work was already scheduled for next week to add a UHF radio for connection to the Maine Packet Network backbone, to add a UPS battery backup (to augment the generator), and to renumber the node SSIDs to our statewide network standard. Repairing the VHF radio will be added to the work detail.

Operators are encouraged to leverage the K1DQ-15 node in Northern York County or KC1ETT-4 node in Southern York County at 145.730 MHz, or the KC1JMH-15 node at 144.930 MHz in Cumberland County, in the meantime.

A New Ham

Published by Brad Brown on June 11, 2021
Dylan, KC1PDS Connects to KC1JMH-15

This is Dylan, KC1PDS, a recently licensed amateur radio operator. Dylan made his first connection with the packet radio network after his club meeting with the Wireless Society of Southern Maine.

Dylan is interested in setting up his own gear for use with packet radio. He has a Yaesu 7800r, just like the club uses for the WS1EC-15 node in Windham.

Brad, KC1JMH and Vice President of the club, discussed the equipment he would need, provided him a quick rundown of the software used, how to connect, hot to move around from node to node, and how to send and receive BBS and Winlink RMS mail.

We look forward to seeing Dylan’s call sign on the nodes again in the future!

Knox County 2Q21 Quarterly Exercise

Published by Brad Brown on June 1, 2021
The Maine Telegraph Newsletter – June ’21

With the recent work done to the Southern Maine Packet Group network to enable and connect to the Midcoast Maine UHF Backbone, the Knox County quarterly exercise was able to expand and share their simulated emergency test to Cumberland and York County.

The packet network was used to send messages between Knox, Waldo, Lincoln, Cumberland and York Counties around May 22nd, to and from representatives of each of the county’s Emergency Management Agency offices.

A full write-up is available on pages 6 through 12 of the Maine Telegraph Newsletter, June 2021 edition.

https://www.mainearrl.org/newsletter

New Maps and Node List in Progress

Published by Brad Brown on May 31, 2021

With the construction of new nodes and the addition of UHF to several others, we are working on updating our maps.

Roger N1XP is working on an updated printable PDF, which will be located in the Files section.

Brad KC1JMH has replaced the card style Nodes list with an interactive map that can be filtered and sorted. Looking at the list below the map, nodes will appear in order of distance from your location if you allow your location to be shared in your web browser (a pop-up should present itself to ask you).

As noted on our pages, this is a work in progress, as time allows between work and personal lives. If you spot anything wrong or missing with our data, please reach out to one of us. Our email addresses are good on QRZ, or you can use the Contact form in the menu to the left.

We want to share accurate and timely information from across the state, and we need your help!