I resolved to automate the uploading of images to an S3 bucket and to improve upon the scripts from the Instructables article.
I played around with different antennas and such, but found it tedious to always copy the images from my outdoor Raspberry Pi to my computer so I could look at them. I gave this project a try recently using this well-written Instructables article, a totally hacked-together antenna I made, and a very old rtl-sdr dongle:Īnd on my very first attempt, I decoded this image from NOAA19 as it passed over my area:įrom that moment, I was hooked. This has all gotten a lot easier with RTL-SDR dongles, more powerful Raspberry Pi computers and simpler antenna designs that get the job done. I’m not an expert in any of these areas, but the idea of receiving images directly from weather satellites as they fly overhead has intrigued me for many years.
WXTOIMG PROFESSIONAL SOFTWARE
Sometimes the emphasis is on software defined radio hardware and techniques, sometimes it’s about antenna design, or maybe the article is written by a real weather enthusiast who always use the abbreviation “wx” for weather. This type of project has been documented before. This probably isn’t the first you’ve read about using a software defined radio (SDR) to receive weather satellite images. If you have never used AWS before, I suggest you set up an account and get familiar with what S3 is. I won’t go into the details of using a Raspberry Pi for the first time - this project assumes you know your way around the Pi and are comfortable with installing software on it. This is a very long article with lots of steps, so take your time - I won’t be able to help everyone debug all their issues. The dipole antenna kit comes with 3m of RG174 coax, but I used 10 feet of RG58 coax. coaxial cable to go from your antenna to Raspberry Pi + RTL-SDR dongle.
Here’s a great article on design or you can just buy this dipole kit, also from the RTL-SDR.COM blog. a simple dipole antenna with elements 21 inches (53.4 cm) long and that can be adjusted to have a 120 degree angle between the elements.You can sign up for the free tier for a year, and it’s still cheap after that. an AWS account for hosting images and web content in an Amazon S3 bucket.I recommend the RTL-SDR V3 dongle from the excellent RTL-SDR.COM blog. I have heard that a RPi Zero may not be powerful enough. a modern Raspberry Pi (version 3 or 4), probably with Wi-Fi since it may be deployed outdoors.
WXTOIMG PROFESSIONAL FULL
Oh, you want a site like this, too? Full of images you decoded from space? Then let’s get started, my friend. Have a look at my AWS site that is updated automatically all day long. With this project you don’t need your own server or have to run your own website infrastructure.
WXTOIMG PROFESSIONAL HOW TO
This project will show you how to create a fully automated ground station that will receive and decode NOAA weather satellite images and upload them to your own website served from an Amazon AWS S3 bucket.
Project source code at GitHub: wx-ground-station