Cell Phone the Rocketeer's All In One Beacon, GPS, RC & Telemetry Unit

[Arnold Roquerre]

I have been using the "Family Locator Function" on my Sprint phones for awhile and it works reasonably well. I do not think there are too many fields were phone service does not reach. With, cell coverage all but ubiquitous, it seems a good choice to use to locate a rocket. Calling the phone with homing in on a rocket in the final 100' would work nicely if volume is turned all the way up. You simply follow the rings. One could change ring tons to fit the environment the rocket is going to be in. One of my children loss their phone and I found it in 10 minutes after reaching the area they had left it. I could not see it so I call teh number and followed the sound in the grass. Te best part is that the phone is standing in on double duty so no expense flying it. If the location service is already being used then it is free and the insurance covers loss - nice.

The only data currrently not available via the cell phone is altitude, but that can be remidied by putting the phone on auto answer. At apogee one just calls the phone and listens to the altitude beeped out.

I have even found myself using my cell phone to activate my remote control launcher. Rather than muck around with a Ham radio, I simply call my cell. Once I am contact with the phone controlling the launcher it is all but impossible for anyone else to access the remote control functions. The range is like anywhere in the world, so no FCC concerns over frequency use, line of sight issues or you can not use this frequency becasue it ain't allowed.

It seems the all but ubiquitous cell phone is going to morph into a nice little all in one rocket tool. Now, do not get me wrong, there are problems and it is not a perfect solution. On the other hand, it is very nice to be able to utilize a tool that one carries around with all the backup (emergency battery charger) and almost evryone else has on their person.

Since most fields are not in cell phone dead spots, one does not even need to drag around frs radios. I can not wait until throwaway cell phones come GPS enabled.

 

[Adam Selene]

A very interseting idea!

but i have been on several fields where my phone didn't work. of course that may only be because sprint sucks.

 

[Arnold Roquerre]

Originally posted by Adam Selene
A very interseting idea!

but i have been on several fields where my phone didn't work. of course that may only be because sprint sucks.

I keep my phone on auto roam, so I usually get service almost everywhere. It would be interesting to find how many fields are totally dead to any cell activity. One reason I have changed perspectives was when I was in Asia in a very remote area. I noted that I was a little concerned that there were no emergency radios to communicate in case of problems. The guide just looked at me took out his phone and dialed - very embarrassing. We were in an area were even line of site would be iffy and he is calling out. At the same time, an Australian gets a phone call from Sydney - his phone was satellite enabled. It turned out even mine worked. Sprint activated something before I left the states. With the cell phones that go into walkie-talkie mode if out of cell range, you end up with a device that kind of does it all. Of course, auxiliary power is a real must, but even transceivers need power.

It was wild to use my cell to remote control the remote rocket launcher and to realize that in terms of security it almost perfect. Once you connect to the phone, no one else can access the remote functions.

 

[Arnold Roquerre]

I have been using the tracking function for awhile now. On the whole, the GPS locator works as advertised. But, there seems to be a problem when the unit switches to roaming. You can be talking to the person and, yet, when running the locator, the phone is all but invisible. Phone support kept insisting the phone was in a building. It wasn't. The phone had switched to a stronger career signal. I am waiting for clarification from Sprint and I will test it out when I drive up to the location later this week. On the whole the GPS maps are very accurate.

 

[OverLord]

This is a VERY intresting thread that I will be watching closely. Please keep us updated. And thank you VERY much for posting it!
Look foward to reading more on this.


Mike

 

[m85476585]

My phone is pretty cheap, but I found a way it can give me GPS coordinates (not remotely though). There is a secret menu that lets me enable an E-911 test number, which displays the GPS location when I call. It's surprisingly accurate outdoors (and very inaccurate indoors). All modern cellphones have a GPS chip for E-911, but unfortunately service providers want you to pay lots of $$ to actually use GPS. If anyone has a Verizon LG5200 I can tell you how to get GPS.

Too bad Verizon doesn't have GPS tracking yet.

 

[Arnold Roquerre]

Sprint's tech support has finally gotten back to me. They verified what I thought. If the phone is in roaming mode, Family Locator will not work. Not a big problem, but something to be factored in.

The only other caveat is that one can only do an update every 10 minutes. The Garmin Rino is ever 10 seconds. You would basically do a locate before launch to verify the unit is functioning. You could actually leave the unit on. When the rocket is about 600' up send do a locate. If the phone is still in communication range after touchdown, you can do another locate on the way to the landing area.

 

[cjl]

Originally posted by m85476585
My phone is pretty cheap, but I found a way it can give me GPS coordinates (not remotely though). There is a secret menu that lets me enable an E-911 test number, which displays the GPS location when I call. It's surprisingly accurate outdoors (and very inaccurate indoors). All modern cellphones have a GPS chip for E-911, but unfortunately service providers want you to pay lots of $$ to actually use GPS. If anyone has a Verizon LG5200 I can tell you how to get GPS.

Too bad Verizon doesn't have GPS tracking yet.

Are you sure it is GPS? What most cell phone locators actually do is triangulate between the signal arrival time at several cell towers. This does not require any special equipment on the cell phone side, and still works when the weather is bad.

 

[heada]

When I purchased my Nextel phone over 3 years ago, (model i730) it had the ability to display the GPS that is would send to the E911 system. It also had the ability to enable/disable it for any other purpose as well as totally disable it (even for E911) I know it is GPS because it not only said GPS but would give the number of satellites that it used and resolution (normally 2 to 6 meter).

GPS enabled cell phones are nothing new and I think (could be wrong) but all new cell phones sold in the US have GPS abilities (but may not be enabled or provide access to end-users)

-Aaron

 

[Arnold Roquerre]

Originally posted by cjl
Are you sure it is GPS? What most cell phone locators actually do is triangulate between the signal arrival time at several cell towers. This does not require any special equipment on the cell phone side, and still works when the weather is bad.

It is definitely GPS. Sprint calls the service Family Locator. It costs about $10 a month.

 

[m85476585]

Originally posted by heada
When I purchased my Nextel phone over 3 years ago, (model i730) it had the ability to display the GPS that is would send to the E911 system. It also had the ability to enable/disable it for any other purpose as well as totally disable it (even for E911) I know it is GPS because it not only said GPS but would give the number of satellites that it used and resolution (normally 2 to 6 meter).

GPS enabled cell phones are nothing new and I think (could be wrong) but all new cell phones sold in the US have GPS abilities (but may not be enabled or provide access to end-users)

-Aaron

Definitely GPS. It was accurate to within a few meters, it gave the altitude (but how does it know?), it gave the resolution, and it gave something about the satellites. It is also called GPS in the instruction book (although there is no mention of getting it to show your location). It might fall back on triangulation if it can't get a GPS signal (bad weather like you mentioned, or maybe the time I was inside (under a metal roof)).