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# UK
_Regional · started by MeshiAgatte on Tue, Jun 2, 2026 2:16 AM_
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## Original post
**MeshiAgatte** · Tue, Jun 2, 2026 2:16 AM
I see that there are ~3 Lora nodes in Great Britain as of writing. I've ordered radio hardware and am interested in joining their ranks; was wondering if they would be able to introduce themselves here?
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## Reply 1
**welo** · Tue, Jun 2, 2026 9:32 AM
https://rmap.world/v3/ has quite a few more nodes from way back and at least one or two are probably still running, just on old software that hasn't been updated. So you are in slightly better company than you think.
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## Reply 2
**Anonymous** · Sat, Jun 6, 2026 8:38 AM
I'm from Scotland and have two RNodes already running, although I haven't marked them on RMAP. So far I haven't seen anyone over LoRa.
Would like to hear from other UK users.
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## Reply 3
**Anonymous** · Tue, Jun 9, 2026 1:28 AM
They all seem to be using different frequencies and SFs, so how do they ever hope to mesh together?
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## Reply 4
**aetherlab** · Tue, Jun 9, 2026 9:35 AM
Well, this is a major issue for LoRa, isn't it? The settings differ on location and environment. This is why we need location based settings grouping, that are well propagated and shared locally, so devices can actually talk to each other. This is why, for example, I have set the Sofia network to specific setting and have shared this setting on all the aethernode repeater/gateway nodes. It's a setting, that works best in here for distance and street level penetration. So not only shared settings will guarantee people do get in touch directly and mesh, but also they get access to the local services rns.sofia provides, such as powerful repeater nodes in high places, having 24 hour power backup and good internet connection, transport, propagation node, high-speed interface to the world via TCP gateway, echo-bot, and soon - weather bot, that uses the local sensor network, we deploy with aethernodes. No one can expect people to get together and mesh without any primary, community forming guidance. Of course all can change later, but than, when people already have each other meshed, knowing about each other, in a living, breathing community - this is easy, as propagating any changes will be almost instant. I am sure multiple networks will also pop-up, but the primaries, the early adopter networks - those bare the burden of being there for everyone and kinda giving the first tones and notes to the symphony Reticulum is. They will provide services, knowledge and a way in for all, that seek communication freedom, and also teach them what it is to share at least your battery life (and provide transport for others), at most your home, resources, hard earned money, time, knowledge (by building and deploying nodes, services, networks, repeaters, servers, power backups, providing internet, parts, designing PCB's, teaching, preaching...) and capacity to believe in it all, even when it looks dire. And don't give up.
This forum is a great example of this! And I am grateful to Zenith for it!
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## Reply 5
**Anonymous** · Tue, Jun 9, 2026 3:44 PM
@aetherlab I'm really interested in using weather sensors and Reticulum, has this been implemented yet?
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## Reply 6
**aetherlab** · Tue, Jun 9, 2026 4:15 PM
Yes, but we don't use Reticulum as the information carrier. This will load the network needlessly, as we measure every 15 seconds on both sensors. The aethernode has sensors and Nick has developed the sensor exporter and the env-map we use. All code is shared on our git.
https://git.aetherlab.org/explore/repos
The sensors are shown here in this thread - https://rns.recipes/forum/showcase/aethernode-and-aethermobi-building-blocks-for-urban-deployments
I have them connected to one of the OrangePi Zero LTE's I2C ports (TWI0), both in parallel.
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## Reply 7
**MattJ** · Tue, Jun 30, 2026 6:35 PM
A bit late, but I'm in the UK, running the Godiva rnode in Coventry.
So far, it has a range of about 200 meters down my street, so not great! I've bought an SDR to try and diagnose the poor range but haven't figured it out yet.
My dream is to some day be able to connect to Birmingham without going over the Internet, since it's the UK's second largest city, though with this range that's a lot of hops!
Happy to change my settings if someone knows some that are better.
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## Reply 8
**welo** · Tue, Jun 30, 2026 7:22 PM
**MattJ** wrote:
> So far, it has a range of about 200 meters down my street, so not great! I've bought an SDR to try and diagnose the poor range but haven't figured it out yet.
Your public configs seem fine, probably check your antenna?, what micro controller are you using? If nothing else try a higher error correction rate cause it could just be radio reflections from the buildings or something other noise occasionally messing with your signal.
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## Reply 9
**MattJ** · Wed, Jul 1, 2026 8:00 PM
It's a Heltec v3, with the stock aerial (maybe 5 cm long?). With the quick go I've had with the SDR, I've not seen too much activity near 867.500MHz- just a burst every minute or so, presumably from a Meshtastic node or something. Speaking of Meshtastic, I did receive fairly frequent notifications about new nodes being spotted, but struggled to get that to send something out and get an acknowledgement (different hardware, though).
Will try taking the rnodes to a large park at some point and see how it works with a direct line of sight. Will be interesting to see if it lives up to the multiple-kilometers range I've seen online...
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## Reply 10
**welo** · Wed, Jul 1, 2026 8:46 PM
How's the location of your Heltec v3; where you have planted it
I will also note that the Heltec v3 is less powerful than the Heltec v4, 22dbm compared to 28dbm, which equates to double radius. Also the stock glue antenna that comes with Heltec v3 (and v4) has no gain and is kinda ass, you might want to buy a relatively cheap 5dbi antennas (they are like 5ish pounds per if you buy a pack of them on aliexpress) will get you up to 27dbm horizontally to compensate
And make sure you're attaching the antenna in the right place because I've seen someone run the thing without a lora antenna cause they attached it at the bottom instead of next to the screen (which I think is wifi rather than lora, honestly not that sure what that antenna attachment is for).
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## Reply 11
**MattJ** · Fri, Jul 3, 2026 1:41 PM
I had placed it on the 1st floor outside windowsill for my testing, so probably 4 meters or so from the ground. So certainly below the tops of the houses on my street, but should be enough to see over some of the parked cars at least.
As for the power, I've got it set to 14dBm as I thought that was the legal limit for the 867.500 MHz frequency.
From what I've read, Meshtastic in the UK uses a higher frequency band: 869.40 to 869.65 MHz. That apparently has a much higher power limit of 27dBm and a 10% duty cycle.
Should I just use that? I guess it could conflict with Meshtastic but it seems much more usable for a general-purpose network like Reticulum than the current band.
I'll have a look for an aerial that will make the most of my v3, though unless I switch to the other frequency band I think I'm limited in terms of "effective" power, which I think would include gain from an aerial...
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## Reply 12
**welo** · Fri, Jul 3, 2026 6:14 PM
Yea it's better to conflict with meshtastic than to miss out on that large increase in max range. I don't have a local meshtactic grid, only meshcore, but I reckon it meshtastic isn't popular enough to cause too much interference.
Also I can't find find the link anymore but I remember reading that the 10% duty cycle limit only applies if you have no interference avoidance system which rnodes do have (you can turn it on with `rnodeconf`), so it's in a bit of grey legal zone for reasons I don't fully understand. I personally put the duty cycle at 25% per hour but you do whatever you want
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## Reply 13
**lrtn** · Mon, Jul 6, 2026 5:52 AM
I am looking to set up some transport nodes on reticulum in what is a very crowded meshcore space (london). They occupy the upper quarter of Sub-band P (869.4 – 869.65 MHz) which affords the 27db and 10% duty cycle.
So I'm thinking of going on the lower quarter to avoid them and the TX's that sit in between.
This is using a 62.5 kHz bandwidth (not the default 125kHz)
Interested to hear other peoples thoughts? Haven't considered SF and CR much yet.
869.43125 MHz Reticulum?
869.49375 MHz
869.55625 MHz
869.61875 MHz Meshcore
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## Reply 14
**G6PHF** · Mon, Jul 13, 2026 10:20 AM
Hi,
New to reticulum, done a bit of meshtastic and meshcore but I see much more potential in this. Used to be heavily involved in amateur packet radio, running a early IPIP gateway at the local university. Looking on the rmap I don't see anybody else in my area. I am sure there are people running mesh[core|tastic] that don't know about reticulum or see it as being no different to what they do already. They don't realise there is so much more potential.
Any ideas how to get more people interested?
Thanks
M
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## Reply 15
**Anonymous** · Wed, Jul 15, 2026 6:17 PM
**lrtn** wrote:
> I am looking to set up some transport nodes on reticulum in what is a very crowded meshcore space (london). They occupy the upper quarter of Sub-band P (869.4 – 869.65 MHz) which affords the 27db and 10% duty cycle.
> So I'm thinking of going on the lower quarter to avoid them and the TX's that sit in between.
>
> This is using a 62.5 kHz bandwidth (not the default 125kHz)
>
> Interested to hear other peoples thoughts? Haven't considered SF and CR much yet.
>
> 869.43125 MHz Reticulum?
> 869.49375 MHz
> 869.55625 MHz
> 869.61875 MHz Meshcore
>
I heard people were having issues with the lowest band for some reason. Also there is a point ro be made that by using the band right next to meshcore (869.55625) there would still be a 125khz band available.
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## Reply 16
**G6PHF** · Sun, Jul 26, 2026 10:56 AM
I've set up a UK Reticulum Discord server for anyone in the UK who'd like to collaborate, chat, and coordinate tests in a more real-time environment.
It's at https://discord.gg/hUYdZaqnN
It's certainly not intended as a replacement for this forum, which remains the best place for documenting information and sharing knowledge.
If this isn't appropriate, no problem. Admin, please feel free to remove this post.
Thanks!
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