Greater Ottawa Mesh Enthusiasts

About

Welcome to the Ottawa mesh group! See the information below for the default frequencies, and please join our Discord to chat with us more.
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Both MeshCore and Meshtastic are protocols that run on top of LoRa radios. LoRa (Long Range) is a low-power wireless modulation well-suited for long-distance communication at modest data rates. By building on this technology, both systems enable communities to create decentralized, low-cost networks.
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Most of the city is currently running MeshCore, with a medium-sized presence of Meshtastic users in the Orleans area. Orleans also has some MeshCore users, and there are repeaters there that link up with the downtown MeshCore mesh.
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MeshCore

To get started and connect to the mesh, begin with a companion node. Pick a build that fits your needs, then flash MeshCore companion firmware to the device.
From there, you can explore repeaters builds and mounting options to expand coverage and strengthen the Ottawa mesh.

Resources

Recommended Repeater Build Instructions
Compiling Wifi Firmware for Heltek v3
MeshCore to Discord using Meshcore-HA
Ottawa Deployment
Repeaters & Coverage
Frequency Settings

Watch an overview on YouTube YouTube

Meshtastic

The Meshtastic section is a work-in-progress.

Getting Started

Frequency Settings

Useful Resources

Austin Mesh – Useful information and real-world testing of mesh nodes
Cold Weather Charging of Lithium-Ion Batteries – A great write-up on repeater performance in extreme cold with LiPos

MeshCore vs Meshtastic

Feature	Meshtastic	MeshCore
Routing	Peer-to-peer mesh where every node can forward traffic, making it flexible for ad-hoc use but prone to congestion in larger networks. Because it relies on nodes that are typically moving, coverage can also be unreliable and sporadic.	Relies on fixed repeaters for routing, providing a more stable and scalable backbone for city-wide coverage.