Announcement

**Wolli** · 2016-12-19, 19:44

Hi BenB,

though I'm not a "Mac man", this may help or take you closer to a solution:

"ping 1", "ping 2" etc. normally appears, when the receiver (dvbt dongle) does not receive AC signals. In this case the feeder - of course - cannot send data to the FR24 server.

I suggest you to try the following: terminate the feeder and start just dump1090 with the option "--interactive". Should ACs be displayed in this case, the dvbt dongle is not "the bad guy".

Here a screenshot how it should look like when running solely dump1090 with option "--interactive" and ACs can be "seen" by the dvbt dongle:
NEW-1.gif

For detailed info on dump1090 see webpage
-> https://github.com/MalcolmRobb/dump1090
especially the section "Normal usage". Hope this helps at least a little bit. Good luck, -Wolli-

**BenB** · 2016-12-19, 20:36

Originally posted by Wolli View Post

Hi BenB,

though I'm not a "Mac man", this may help or take you closer to a solution:

"ping 1", "ping 2" etc. normally appears, when the receiver (dvbt dongle) does not receive AC signals. In this case the feeder - of course - cannot send data to the FR24 server.

I suggest you to try the following: terminate the feeder and start just dump1090 with the option "--interactive". Should ACs be displayed in this case, the dvbt dongle is not "the bad guy".

Here a screenshot how it should look like when running solely dump1090 with option "--interactive" and ACs can be "seen" by the dvbt dongle:
[ATTACH=CONFIG]8260[/ATTACH]

For detailed info on dump1090 see webpage

especially the section "Normal usage". Hope this helps at least a little bit. Good luck, -Wolli-

Hi!

I tried it and everything seemed to work, except for the fact that it doesn't 'see' any aircraft:

Code:

~ $ /Applications/FR24FeedOSX.app/Contents/Resources/dump1090 --interactive
Found 1 device(s):
0: Realtek, DVB-T Dongle, SN: 00000991 (currently selected)
Found Fitipower FC0013 tuner
Max available gain is: 19.70
Setting gain to: 19.70
Exact sample rate is: 2000000.052982 Hz
Gain reported by device: 19.70
Hex    Flight   Altitude  Speed   Lat       Lon       Track  Messages Seen .
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hex    Flight   Altitude  Speed   Lat       Lon       Track  Messages Seen .
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
...

Is this just a case of bad reception? Wouldn't this result in my feed being online but with no aircraft shown?

**Wolli** · 2016-12-19, 20:49

This apparently looks indeed, as if
-> the dvbt dongle is correctly "seen" by your Mac, but
-> the dongle does not "see" ACs.

Possible reasons:
a) no antenna connected to the dongle
b) "bad" antenna in use
c) bad position of antenna
d) malfunction of the dongle

Dongle malfunction is possible, but rather unlikely.
Are you sure, that ACs are currently flying near to your location? If AC's are flying quite near (let's say up to 5 miles away from your antenna's location) the dongle should see them, even if you use an indoor antenna). That's however a "thumb rule" and may not be true in every case.

**Oblivian** · 2016-12-19, 20:52

It's not a RTL based tuner!

Found Fitipower FC0013 tuner

Not all tuners are the same, in this case all software is coded for realtek chipsets

**Oblivian** · 2016-12-19, 20:54

Actually scratch that, its still got a RTL chip, but diff tuner.

I'd say that due to that ADSB is probably on the outter limits it can do in reality

Fitipower FC0013 22 - 1100 MHz

We need 1090. 10Mhz off

All but confirmed elsewhere

Fitipower FC0013 no 1090MHz ?!

http://forums.radioreference.com/software-defined-radio/278059-fitipower-fc0013-no-1090mhz.html

Hey I bout 10x Dongel which the Fitipower FC0013 to share the Data which Flightradar24. Before i bought the Dongel i looking here: Fitipower FC0013 22 - 1100 MHz (FC0013B/C, FC0013G has a separate L-band input, which is unconnected on most sticks) What should be the Factory: DEXATEK - DVB-T...

**Wolli** · 2016-12-19, 21:04

Originally posted by Oblivian View Post

It's not a RTL based tuner!

Yeah, I noticed that also, meanwhile. Thanks for your notice, Oblivian.

So the dongle may not be suitable - I don't have more infos, sorry. Suitable dongles have Chips
-> RTL2832U
and
-> R820T or R820T2
inside. Eventually, google for "RTL2832U R820T" to find a suitable provider.
I bought this one recently to have a spare part, which works. FR24 - on their webpage "Build your own" - links to this provider, from whom I bought my 1st dongle. Also working.

**Wolli** · 2016-12-19, 21:37

Hi BenB,

when you type
-> dump1090 --help
you can see that dump1090 has the option
-> --freq <Hz>
So you may try
-> dump1090 --interactive --freq 1090000000
Maybe this could help? Not very promising though, but before buying a new dongle...

**BenB** · 2016-12-19, 21:53

Thanks everyone for the responses!

A lack of aircraft is definitely not the issue here. I had aircraft flying right over me without dump1090 picking them up. I'm using a lousy indoor antenna, but if they're flying that close, I should be able to pick them up regardless.

The different tuner is a good point and indeed a likely culprit. I thought it was capable of receiving up to 1700 MHz (source: rtlsdrDOTorg), but this does seem to be wrong indeed; even at much lower frequencies (around 1000MHz) it seems to be struggling, as far as I can tell. I'm going to try with a different tuner that is capable of receiving 1090MHz properly and see whether that resolves the issue.

The --freq option doesn't make a difference. It seems to do the exact same thing as it did without that option.

Having said this, it still doesn't explain why the Flightradar page says that my feed is offline. Does it only say it's online when there are actually aircraft being tracked?

**Wolli** · 2016-12-19, 23:36

Originally posted by BenB View Post

Having said this, it still doesn't explain why the Flightradar page says that my feed is offline. Does it only say it's online when there are actually aircraft being tracked?

Mhhh. As far as I remember, when you firstly initialize your feeder, FR24 requires that at least two aircrafts are currently "seen" (at that time) by your receiver/feeder. I'm not sure though, whether this "restriction" still exists - though I'm quite sure, that this restriction existed at the time when I began feeding (two years ago now). I tried to find forum postings concerning this issue some minutes ago, but unluckily not successful. But I don't know whether this might be the reason for your "offline" status". Maybe other users can help? Maybe again Oblivian? Of course you may ask FR24 support concerning this issue.

Update: I now found something concerning that. In an "old" manual I read:
The feeder software will not issue a sharing key unless it detects decoded data on TCP port 30003 with positional messages from two or more aircraft.
But as you already have - I assume that - a "sharing key", this idea probably won't bring you further.

Update #2: When your feeder is configured with a valid sharing key and you receive "ping X" (i.e. no ACs momentarily seen by your equipment), your status should nevertheless be "online". My feeder's coverage area is presently not brilliant, and during night time there are often minutes when my feeder sees no AC, however the status is "online" on my feeder's "statistics webpage" https://www.flightradar24.com/accoun.../?id=blablabla

**BenB** · 2016-12-20, 00:40

Originally posted by Wolli View Post

Mhhh. As far as I remember, when you firstly initialize your feeder, FR24 requires that at least two aircrafts are currently "seen" (at that time) by your receiver/feeder. I'm not sure though, whether this "restriction" still exists - though I'm quite sure, that this restriction existed at the time when I began feeding (two years ago now). I tried to find forum postings concerning this issue some minutes ago, but unluckily not successful. But I don't know whether this might be the reason for your "offline" status". Maybe other users can help? Maybe again Oblivian? Of course you may ask concerning this issue.

Update: I now found something concerning that. In an "old" manual I read:
The feeder software will not issue a sharing key unless it detects decoded data on TCP port 30003 with positional messages from two or more aircraft.
But as you already have - I assume that - a "sharing key", this idea probably won't bring you further.

Update #2: When your feeder is configured with a valid sharing key and you receive "ping X" (i.e. no ACs momentarily seen by your equipment), your status should nevertheless be "online". My feeder's coverage area is presently not brilliant, and during night time there are often minutes when my feeder sees no AC, however the status is "online" on my feeder's "statistics webpage"

Thanks Wolli for your response!

I got a sharing key when I set it up for the first time, before even (attempting) sharing anything. I checked again to be sure and there's a sharing key in my fr24feed.ini file. Based on what you say in Update #2, my status should be online.

As it currently stands, it seems that I have four issues (potentially related):

Bad tuner (likely root cause of main issue)
Poor antenna (unlikely to be the root cause of not seeing any aircraft, however)
Feed not showing online status (despite having a sharing key)
MLAT not working (not really the main issue right now, but would like to get it to work at some point)

I'm going to work on (1) and (2), which may, hopefully, resolve (3) as well. If it doesn't, I'll contact FR24's support.

**Wolli** · 2016-12-20, 09:38

Originally posted by BenB View Post

I'm going to work on (1) and (2), which may, hopefully, resolve (3) as well. If it doesn't, I'll contact FR24's support.

Yep, a good plan. I would do it exactly in the same sequence order.
BTW: Concerning MLAT, don't be too optimistic though. As far as I know (and officially published by FR24), MLAT feeds are presently only supported when feeding from a Raspberry Pi. I don't see MLAT feeding supported when feeding from a Mac, but surprises sometimes happen.

And, please, post a status note here when you have news concerning your problem (hopefully a "problems solved" statement). Good luck, -Wolli-

**elljay** · 2016-12-20, 13:20

MLAT is running on my Debian Linux box. Haven't got a Mac...

**abhay9** · 2016-12-21, 09:17

Hi Benb,

I had similar problem, the solution was

1) Copy the .app file to Application folder

2) Terminate all other applicatoin using DVB, including terminal prosess if you are running

3) Disconnect the USB dongle and reconnect

4) Start the Feed

I think this will help, I use to get AC data on cocoa1090 and even FR24 feeder showed that I am connected to server and AC would show up, but in FR24 web page I use to be shown as offine. Once I copied the app file to Application folder, every thing fell in place.

I hope it helps you, later try to build a coaxial collinear antenna, search youtube for one.

Regards,
Abhay

**BenB** · 2016-12-24, 20:18

Originally posted by Wolli View Post

Yep, a good plan. I would do it exactly in the same sequence order.
BTW: Concerning MLAT, don't be too optimistic though. As far as I know (and officially published by FR24), MLAT feeds are presently only supported when feeding from a Raspberry Pi. I don't see MLAT feeding supported when feeding from a Mac, but surprises sometimes happen.

And, please, post a status note here when you have news concerning your problem (hopefully a "problems solved" statement). Good luck, -Wolli-

I actually did got MLAT to work, I think (I didn't receive any transponder data, but at least I didn't get any errors) by turning off the mlat-without-gps option off in the fr24feed.ini file. I do think it's meant to be supported, since it's in the official app and the setup process.

I'll definitely post again once I've got my ADS-B receiver; I ordered on Amazon.de however and it can sometimes take a while...

Announcement

Trouble setting up data feed on Mac OS X

Trouble setting up data feed on Mac OS X

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment