LOL, I need to get my ham license so I can use my telemetrum! From what I've studied so far seems impossible.....
Really? The Tech test is not that bad. Read the book. Memorize as many questions as you can as they are online and it's a piece o' cake. I studied for about 4 months and did the Tech and General at one sitting. Did better on the General than the Tech but passed both. You just need the Tech to do the 70cm tracking. Get that Tech ticket and other options are out there.
The cost of APRS is dropping though not as economical as the EggFinder as you know. The SainSonic is a 1 watt GPS tracker/tranceiver that shows promise for rocket locating:
https://www.radioddity.com/us/avrt5...th-thermometer-tf-card-support-aprsdroid.html
1 watt on the 2 meter band, tunable, probably only for 4" or larger diameter projects due to size. It will store the track in a .KML file on a micro SD card for later download. B/T compatible too so technically, since it's a transceiver, if one bought two of them, could use one for the receiver and bond it to an Android device and use APRSDroid and OSM maps for "off grid", no internet required, GPS tracking on a map. A cheaper receive station would be a Mobilinkd TNC:
https://store.mobilinkd.com/ one can plug into any Ham handi-talkie and bond it to an Android device to use APRSDroid for on map tracking. Oh, it will telemeter the temperature of the device (a temp chip is on the board so it measures the heat production of the unit under power not the external temp) and the real time voltage.
So one can have a live "OnAir" report on the device health. I've run the thing all day long without issue.
Only downsides to it. Sirf 4 chipset so GPS altitude will likely be off and unacceptable to be considered for altitude record attempts above 30,000 feet. Lat/Long is perfectly fine. The instructions absolutely, positively stink. The user group has all the info to use and it's not that bad of a learning curve. Just leave out the micro SD card to program or it won't connect and one has to use the provided USB/serial cable. When done programming, slide the micro SD card back it. It uses APRS so it won't work with the Android program: "GPS Rocket Locator".
Sooooo. For a higher powered APRS tracker one can get going for a bit less than $200.00 not including an H/T (AP510 and Mobilinkd B/T TNC. More if you have to buy an Android device). If a flyer is already a Ham with a VX8/FT1D series or D7/72 radios they just have to shell out for the AP510. If one is interested, there is a U-tube video that can be searched for for programming details and the latest programming software and firmware is at that first link above.
Scroll down and click on "downloads" and then download the file at "AP510 APRS Software". Change the name and put .zip on the end and the files will unpack. I virus checked and it's clean. Or search online. You'll not find anything more recent. I'll probably be looking to Ebay away some of my older Byonics trackers in the future. Kurt