Build a town node

The anchor of a Waycast town: it hears every report in range, relays valid ones, injects official National Weather Service alerts into the mesh, and announces itself once a minute so passing cars show ⌂ your town's name. Runs unattended — it's a set-and-forget appliance.

1. Order the parts

Part	Where	~Price
Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 (2 GB is plenty) + SD card + PSU	raspberrypi.com	$50–80
RAK2287 concentrator module — SPI version, US915, with GPS	RAK store	$80–100
RAK2287 Pi HAT (the adapter board)	same page, "Pi HAT" option	$15–20
915 MHz antenna — mount it high; this sets your town's radius	any 915 MHz fiberglass/whip with the right connector	$15–50

Why a concentrator instead of a $25 dongle? The SX1302 hears all spreading factors on 8 channels simultaneously — a town node should hear everyone, always. The GPS variant has a GNSS module onboard, so the node knows its own time and position — no extra GPS hardware needed.

2. Prepare the Pi

Standard Raspberry Pi OS (64-bit, Lite is fine). Enable SPI:

sudo raspi-config nonint do_spi 0

Seat the RAK2287 on its Pi HAT, the HAT on the Pi's 40-pin header, LoRa antenna on the RF port, GPS antenna on the GNSS port (both come with the module). Never power the concentrator without the LoRa antenna attached.

3. Install Waycast

git clone https://github.com/alviso/waycast.git
cd waycast/peer
./setup.sh

setup.sh builds the mesh peer (patching the Semtech HAL for the RAK2287's quirks), installs two systemd services, and enables them at boot:

waycast-peer — the radio: receive, validate, relay, beacon
waycast-injector — polls NWS and injects active weather alerts

4. Configure your town

sudo cp node.conf.example /etc/waycast/node.conf
sudo nano /etc/waycast/node.conf

Set three lines:

NODE_LAT=45.52          # your node's location
NODE_LON=-122.89
NODE_NAME=YourTown      # what car screens will show: ⌂ YourTown

(With the GPS antenna attached and sky view, position and time come from the concentrator's own GNSS and the config is the fallback.) Then:

sudo systemctl restart waycast-peer waycast-injector

5. How you know it's working

journalctl -u waycast-peer -f

Within a minute you'll see the startup banner (vmesh_peer up: 915.0 MHz SF7/125k …). Then:

Every frame it hears is logged with frequency, RSSI, and the decoded report: [rx OK ] Crash 01E1902F/7 … rssi=-77
[relay] lines mean it's re-broadcasting valid reports
[inject] tx Weather … appears when NWS has an active alert for your area
A car device (or a bench transmitter) in range shows ⌂ YourTown within a minute — that's the presence beacon

6. Placement notes

Range is antenna height and quality, little else. A node on a shelf hears a neighborhood; the same node with a fiberglass antenna at roof height hears a town. Start indoors to validate, then move it up.