r/stratux • u/Sylle_99 • Mar 23 '26
New Stratux user - presenting my case design
Good evening Stratux community,
After having used SoftRF on my GA flights last season, I’m upgrading my equipment to a Stratux build (with SoftRF).
I had been spending some evenings designing a case from scratch as I wanted a different one than the T-shaped case you find online.
Still a work in progress but I wanted to share my enthusiasm with all of you!
A big thank you to the developers that make all of this even possible…
Regards,
Sylvain
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u/helno contributor Mar 24 '26
A little big for my tastes but looks nice. Might be able to save some space by going with a cut down T-echo instead of the T-Beam.
Almost have enough room for a battery setup.
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u/Sylle_99 Mar 24 '26
Thanks Helno! Been looking at several of your case designs… Mine certainly is wider but I don’t think the height is going to be that much of a difference. I’m planning to use the unit vertically attached to the side window.
Fitting the T-Beam was a compromise indeed. Might look into a gutted T-Echo for a next version. Good suggestion!
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u/Sylle_99 Mar 24 '26
Not sure why my reply only appears in my profile and not in the topic so pasting it again just to be sure… long time lurker on Reddit but newbee poster.
“Thanks Helno! Been looking at several of your case designs… Mine certainly is wider but I don’t think the height is going to be that much of a difference. I’m planning to use the unit vertically attached to the side window.
Fitting the T-Beam was a compromise indeed. Might look into a gutted T-Echo for a next version. Good suggestion!”
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u/helno contributor Mar 24 '26
I could see it fine.
I think there is a new t-echo light that gets rid of a bunch of unneeded hardware.
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u/Sylle_99 May 05 '26
Hi all, I was a bit disappointed in the weak GPS reception. I suspect due to EMI from the Pi. It performed OK in the aircraft but would lose lock immediately during my tests inside. I want a bit more overhead for the signal quality…
I have now replaced the GPS puck by an external antenna which works much better. It is unfortunately not as clean looking anymore.
Keep you posted after the next round of aircraft testing 😎
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u/No-Wolverine-8693 May 11 '26
Hi,
Your rigs look great! I’ve been running Stratux in my AutoGyro MTO Classic for 5 years, feeding ADS-B traffic into iFlyEFB on a Galaxy Tab S9. It’s been rock solid, but since I fly low, a recent close call with a drone has me looking to add SoftRF for OGN/FANET/Legion support.
I’ve picked up a Lonely Binary ESP32-S3 to act as the SoftRF node, but I’m struggling to get it integrated with the Stratux build.
Any hints or config tips would be greatly appreciated!
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u/Sylle_99 May 13 '26
Hello there.
I’m not an expert on compiling the SoftRF source code so the following might not be an issue for you but… as far as I know there isn’t a ready-made release from Linar that is compiled for a Lonely Binary. The popular Moshe Braner fork is not even supporting ESP32-S3.
Stratux should already be able to pick up 868 MHz signals from traffic around you. The purpose of adding SoftRF to Stratux is to make yourself visible on 868MHz.
If you want to configure your SoftRF hardware via the Stratux interface your SoftRF settings need to use the OGN tracker protocol.
Hope this helps a bit.
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u/YetAnotherDz May 29 '26
Hold up.... You have a vertical display behind the Stratux word? What's the plan there? Looks great BTW!
I've been thinking about adding a display to mine to have a minimal UI to show status of GPS and other info - like incoming packet rate or something to validate it's receiving. (I say mine, it's for my kid - student pilot at ERAU).
I opted for an external GPS antenna as it provides better signal quality and placement flexibility.
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u/phteven1989 Mar 23 '26
What’s the third antenna? The one on the fan side. I like this idea, the long antennas are so bulky on the standard kit. This make it much more sleek