[time-nuts] Star Box

David McGaw n1hac at alum.dartmouth.org
Sun Aug 18 12:42:34 EDT 2013


Hi Joe,

I take all manner of tools and scientific electronic equipment, custom 
receivers and the like, through security, including international 
travel.  Rarely do they ask and usually are just curious.

David


On 8/18/13 12:40 AM, Joseph Gray wrote:
> Magnus,
>
> Thanks for the comments. I did find the manual online. I will have to read
> through it when I get a chance. From the past comments in the archives, I
> was hoping to hear about anyone's experience using this in a GPSDO and
> whether it would be better than other brands.
>
> I have set it aside for now, as I have other projects that need to be
> finished before the end of the month. Early next month I'll be away for
> some training. I'd take some of my projects with me to work on in the
> evening, after training, but I'm afraid I'd get arrested by the TSA when
> they see electronic stuff :-)
>
> Joe Gray
> W5JG
>
>
>
> On Sat, Aug 17, 2013 at 5:00 AM, Magnus Danielson <
> magnus at rubidium.dyndns.org> wrote:
>
>> Hi Joe,
>>
>> On 08/16/2013 04:47 AM, Joseph Gray wrote:
>>> I just picked up a Star Box for $10. It has an Allstar DGPS board
>> inside. I
>>> saw several mentions of similar boards in the archives and I have found
>>> some documentation on the net. Has anyone actually used one of these in a
>>> GPSDO? Does it work any better than the usual Motorola, Rockwell, or
>> other
>>> available boards?
>>>
>>> The other thought is, since this is a DGPS board, how difficult would it
>> be
>>> to use it to obtain a more accurate position fix? Or do I need other GPS
>>> boards to correlate this one with?
>>>
>>> I'll admit that so far, I have only skimmed the documentation that I
>>> downloaded. If I need to RTFM for my answers, just tell me so.
>>>
>>> Some data on what I have:
>>>
>>> Star Box Part No. 100-600304-100
>>> (DGPS Base Station option is checked)
>>>
>>> Inside the box is a carrier board that has a power supply and an RS-232
>>> TX/RX chip. The GPS board that plugs onto the carrier has a label on the
>>> underside that says "VAR 100". This corresponds to the suffix of the part
>>> number on the box. The top side of the GPS board has the GPS receiver in
>> a
>>> large metal box that is imbossed "ALLSTAR 12" and "CMC", which is the
>>> manufacturer (since then bought by Novatel?).
>> Grab the manual, set it on self-survey and you have a nice little receiver.
>>
>> Since it does both code and carrier phase, you have added precision.
>> Since it is a DGPS base station, it naturally have a built-in
>> self-surveying using the power of that combined tracking.
>>
>> Hook it up to a good choke-ring, it deserves it. Multipath is what kills
>> precision for this one.
>>
>> It will output DGPS corrections, such that any other DGPS receiving GPS
>> you have can quickly acquire accurate lock, but you need to provide a
>> link for the RTCM messages.
>>
>> Love to have one even if I have similar stuff.
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Magnus
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