I'm going to actually read this this time because I find it so hilarious.
Andrew Rodent Strutt, bio, overall IT experience, 19 years.
Number of years, security experience, 11 years.
That was the bio he actually sent me.
The guy who has been running a POC SAG network at DEF CON for five years
sent me the number of years he's had using a computer,
which I'm reasonably confident still isn't accurate.
The bio was like this long.
If you sent me that bio, I would have read that one, too,
just because, like, okay, he sent me a 12-page bio.
We're starting this talk by reading it.
So, again, for those of you who missed the last introduction,
this is Rodent.
He does awesome things.
He's been doing these awesome things for years,
and he's finally standing up in front of a bunch of you talking about how cool it is.
So if you actually want to operationally use radios,
this fine gentleman has a lot of experience,
and he's got it fitting in a bloody suitcase.
So pay attention and get licensed.
Thanks, everybody.
Thank you, Andrew.
Thank you, guys.
Thanks for staying.
So as I mentioned, and for the next recording,
this is for Sid the Hacker Dog,
and I work with Spirant Federal, Spirant Security Labs,
and I'm a member of the ARRL.
So call sign is Kila 6 Alpha Delta Sierra.
Our event call sign this year is November 7 Tango.
Tell a freak.
So this is just talking about my suitcase build.
I've done several iterations of this.
One, a long time ago, I bought a Motorola actual product that they had.
It was a suitcase.
It gave me the idea.
But that one, I spent a year trying to program it,
and I could not ever get the code plug.
And when I even brought it to a Motorola shop who specialized in old stuff,
they were stumped on how to program it.
So I used it as a volunteer firefighter in Afghanistan,
because with all the noise and uncoordinated environments,
we could barely talk with our handhelds like across the street.
And so I bought the repeater when I was over in Afghanistan.
A different one, a Motorola actual product that they made, Bat Labs repeater.
And it worked overseas, but I can't get it to be reconfigured to work in amateur bands.
So I started looking at different ways to build more suitcase repeaters.
I like amateur radio.
I like being able to provide services in emergencies.
And stuff like that for ARIES.
And so this is my latest one, and it seems to be working pretty good.
So we'll get a little bit into it.
I have the equipment here, and it's operational.
You can transmit on it right now on 440-800.
And I'll give you a little demonstration if it will cooperate.
Google data time.
Saturday, July 29th, 1.38 PM.
Is that right?
Yeah, it is.
So it has its own built-in repeater controller.
Most of the features on that I disabled.
And I have an IRLP node that is a much more qualified repeater controller
that I use externally that does APRS and a bunch of other bells and whistles.
And it's an IRLP, Internet Radio Linking Project, controller and linking device.
So that does some of the heavy lifting as far as like the CWID every 10 minutes.
And it allows me to do that.
And it allows the range to be significantly expanded beyond just the RF capabilities.
So most of it was just making decisions on how to do it.
I mean, I looked at big ones, small ones.
I looked at making suitcase repeaters with multiple handhelds.
For example, I have multiple of these Waxons.
Well, with the programming cables, you can cross-connect them, and they do crossband repeat.
And so with a little bit of effort, you can make two
of these become an actual repeater.
You still need a duplexer.
You still need some other stuff, but it was all about the final build decisions
and the hardware decisions, and then the required software and configuration
to make it work on amateur bands.
I prefer to use for this type of stuff, for repeaters, to use commercial grade equipment.
The duty cycle can handle the heat.
It can handle longer transmissions, and they're much more durable by magnitudes.
Amateur radio does make some good stuff, but it's not always metal case.
And so on.
So the decisions were for size, capabilities of the device.
I didn't want to reinvent the wheel numerous times.
So for example, the repeater that I chose has a built-in controller that does CWID.
It has the ability to do battery backup built into it.
So it has all the circuitry that I didn't have to rehack or modify so that I could
easily plug in 12 volts solar battery and utility 110 to 220, and it could do the failover
all automatically.
So that's why I chose this repeater.
It's a Motorola GR-1225.
It's widely available.
I think they're still widely available, but I think they're almost 30 years old.
So we'll get into a little bit more about the peculiarities of that.
So the practical uses for it, obviously, is the mobile applications and amateur radio
emergency service.
And then, like I mentioned, I do the internet radio linking project with it.
And here's the node for it right here, which runs all off a battery.
And it does APRS, like I said, and it allows you to link to numerous different networks
all around the world.
I am building a new IRLP node to send to Iceland.
There's no IRLP nodes in Iceland.
And I have a ham buddy who talks on 2600 debt, and he got up to join a local club,
get his license, and I said, hey, I'm going to send you an IRLP node so I can call you
all the time and pester you.
So it allows for some cool stuff that you can do and expand on it.
Now the GR-1225 does have an expansion.
It's an expansion port, which I'm not using, but it's mostly for linking to POTS telephone
lines and to do phone trunking and some other stuff.
But I'm not utilizing that.
But it does have that capability.
That was one of the reasons why I chose this particular chassis.
The other thing I chose this particular chassis for is because it's just a shoebox.
And there is guys out there who are recasing them and putting them in racks and doing different
things.
Motorola also has their own transportable method for this particular chassis.
It's called a regular repeater.
So when I started doing a bunch of research and looking at different people selling stuff
and how they did it, I thought that this was a great choice to re-case, basically just
tear the top off.
It has a power supply, a 40 amp power supply, duplexer, controller, and transmitter all
built in in one unit.
So it was very simple to take it apart and just mount it in this case and remount the
case, mount the antenna connector, which is an in connector for UHF.
And the 110, 220, and the DC power input.
The last field day, I wanted to do battery and solar, but they didn't have enough power
to provide at that level.
So I ended up just using an AC converter, inverter, to go battery to 110.
But it also does 110 to 220.
So you can plug this thing anywhere and it will basically work.
So that's what it looks like when they sold it 30 years ago.
I do have a microphone that I got with me.
And it's kind of an important component because this is also how you program it, not necessarily
with a microphone, but through the mic jack.
So that's nice to have because you can turn off the repeat function and then also just
use it as a base station.
So for whatever reason.
I think they marketed it as a dispatcher's stuff.
They have several different markets that they would obviously sell this for.
But that was something I thought was nice.
A lot of those do have that.
Not all of them do.
I've worked with other repeaters that you can build custom with MaxStore or was it Maxtrack?
GE.
There's several different.
There's a CWID coming out of the thing every 10 minutes.
So there's other different manufacturers out there that you can use to pair up in multiple
devices to build a repeater.
But those are heavier.
They're meant for vehicles, stuff like that.
I chose this one because it had all the features I wanted and especially battery backup.
So this is some of the specs that helped me choose why I got this one.
I'm not big on the courtesy beep.
Some old ham operators or older generation ham operators don't like that stuff.
But the simple programmer, repeater controller on this, you can program it to do a courtesy
beep with selectable tone, length, and so on.
Do the CWID built into it.
And it's adjustable from 25 to 45 watts.
That was one thing that I was a little concerned about.
But I've since worked a little bit of a hack at it.
So I can get the power level a little lower.
It's all digitally controlled, which I found was very interesting looking at repeaterbuilders.com
and pulling through all the documentation to figure out how to program this thing.
And I did need help with a Motorola shop to tune the duplexer.
I don't have the equipment to do that.
So once I chose the frequencies and I knew how to program it and whatnot, I programmed
it and I brought it to them.
And then they did the duplexer so that you can use one antenna on one frequency or one
set of repeater pairs.
So that was the main piece of why I chose this one.
I have it kind of in between 25 and 45 watts because I'm not running it through an amplifier.
I think I have it if I did the math right or the heat right through my testing at like
50% duty cycle.
Earlier today I had it on a ham net.
And there's people calling into the net from Ukraine, Ireland, all over the US and just
to talk about us and technology and stuff like that.
They mentioned hackers.
I was like trying to get in there to talk about it, but didn't get a chance.
But when it was on the net, it was almost keyed up 100% of the time.
The hang time when you unkey, I had that set to zero.
So it will unkey and try to cool down as much as possible.
And I did build a fan into it, but with my testing I figured I needed to turn the power
down a little bit more.
It does get really hot.
So I'm either going to turn the power down even more and add an amplifier, a portable
amplifier, or I'm going to add a ton more fans and cooling and keep the power where
it's at in between like 25 and 35 watts.
And you get pretty effective range on it.
I made a homemade antenna to be extra transportable.
And basically I just measured out the coax length for this center conductor.
So that's a quarter wave at 440 megahertz thereabouts.
And then I just tied a zip strip on the end of it so it won't fall out of the PVC pipe
and put it in there and glued it.
I do have the same antenna.
I have the same antenna for the POGSEC network that I use for this because they're near same
in frequency.
The POGSEC network is on 433.
This is on 440.
So I do have a five-eighths wave high gain antenna that I can run off of this.
But it was a little too strong for my room.
I was actually saturating and interfering with the POGSEC network.
So much so that there was enough radiation from this transmitter that it was activating
the amplifier on the other network.
So.
. . . . . . . . . and it kind of jerked up.
. . . they call it chatter and it . . . . . . . . . . . . . and so I realized and at one point
I put the antenna in my bathroom to get like enough isolation between the two.
And that worked for a while but I needed to use the bathroom and it's a lot of RF
exposure in there so I went back to this antenna.
So, I did want to ask these guys if maybe I can leave it here and bring the big antenna
and stuff like that, but I hadn't decided.
There's still pretty good range even with the quarter wave.
I think that's a zero dB J pole.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . in fact it's not that much.
not a quarter wave. But people were
able to use it with a handheld down at the
Cosmo, which is pretty decent range
for, you know, one to five watt
handheld into my potentially
zero dB J-pole.
So it's pretty decent range, and that repeats everything
out, obviously. So
how much time do I got?
Oh, I'm getting there. So the major
components to configure the thing is a beast,
and that was the hardest part.
Configuring the hardware and
recasing it and all the hardware
stuff was semantics. I had
to make the right decisions, choose the right hardware,
find a case that it would fit it,
and find a case I could drill without destroying
it, and stuff like that.
But the hardest part, and as I
mentioned before, the other repeater,
suitcase repeater I bought,
it was almost impossible to
reconfigure for
amateur bands. This one,
I spent months looking
around for the right software, the right configurations,
pulling through repeaterbuilders.com.
There's a ton of information up there.
Definitely use that as a resource.
But there was nothing that exactly
addressed my configuration,
my use case, and this particular
box. So there's
a couple different pieces that make it work.
Obviously the Motorola radio
service software, the RSS,
they have like 10 different versions
of it through many different generations
that are CPU and
speed dependent,
processor dependent,
adapter dependent, and it's a huge
mess. And Motorola does not like you.
using this for amateur stuff.
They don't like you buying the software through unauthorized
sources, so obviously do that appropriately.
And
some Motorola dealers don't know what to
do when you come and you want to bring it for amateur
radio, so you have to build a relationship and whatnot.
I did work a relationship
to get the duplexer tuned, but
otherwise I did all the research to
program it myself and to get the software
working and whatnot. So, old
operating systems. I read that you needed old
operating systems. So first I tried, I was like,
no, you don't need to go that old, so I tried,
I tried Windows 7 VM, slowed that down,
it wouldn't work. You turn off FIFO
buffers because over the serial interface,
this was before FIFO buffers were even
invented, before the new serial chips were even
invented, and it screws up the
programming, and you can very easily brick
the microcontrollers on this thing. So
first I tried Windows 7, thinking that it would work,
didn't work. Tried
Windows XP, thinking, oh, this will be
the kicker, because I saw a piece of information,
a guy did it with Windows XP, it still
didn't work. So I bought a utility
that you can slow the speed of the virtual
machine down, slowed it down to 100
megahertz, and I got it to, like, send
the header off the radio. So I knew I was on
the right track. I ended up having to get a
Windows 95 VM, slowed it down
to 100 megahertz, and then
that USB adapter that I showed you earlier,
I set the latency
on that to max, and I set the
buffers to the minimum.
And then it started to talk to the radio.
So, and before you try to write anything
to the radio with the appropriate RSS
software, you just want to read the existing
configuration. So I spent,
weeks and weeks, just trying to get
the configuration off of it, to read
it. And I knew it could
do amateur radio, I just needed
to retune the duplexer to be
on amateur radio. So once I got it to
read the configuration out, it was like,
yay, success, I'm talking to
it. Then I had to go through all the
many different things in the RSS software
to configure it. I disabled the
CWID, I set the hang
time to zero,
and I tweaked the
power. Now, the interesting thing that
I found about the power,
and a lot of radio equipment, even modern radio
equipment, it's analog controlled
with a potentiometer.
You can just get in there with a screwdriver, if you know
where to turn, on the right pot, and adjust
the power. This thing actually
uses the microprocessor and sends
a PPM
transmission to adjust
so at the speed it sends the pulses
is what determines the
power output. So it's really
strange. Like, when I got into the RSS
and started to look at RSS software,
and I looked at the power settings, there was
like 24 bars, or 12
bars of, it wasn't just a
power setting. I had to tune
each bar to get the appropriate
I've learned later that
it's mostly for
the different channels, so you'll set your duplexer
on a center frequency, and it gets less efficient
as you vary off those frequencies.
So you want to adjust the power
so either SWR or
reflection from the duplexer,
so when you get off the center frequency, like
on channel 12 versus channel 1, and you're going to get off the center frequency.
You're tuned for channel 6, that you're not going to fry
your radio. So I set the power max in the
middle, and then I taper off on the other side.
So, it was a
lot to be able to configure
it. I read all
over the place, and there's guys on eBay selling
ancient laptops with all
the Motorola software on it, and all the
adapters for like thousands of dollars.
Like, here's what you need to configure it.
There's no other way to do it
ever. You need to buy this.
It wasn't acceptable for me. Now, I did find
through the repeater builders forums,
there was one guy that mentioned that he was able to do
it with virtualization for a totally different
piece of equipment, for a different newer generation
stuff, but when I saw that, I figured
there is a way to make this work.
Like, I'm a big virtualization guy.
I like making old technology work with
new technology, and so when I saw that
little tidbit of information, he said, well, I did it
with an XP VM. That's what
made me think, oh, I'll try it with XP,
Windows 7, and so on, but the only way I could do
it was with Windows 5,
Windows 95, and 100
megahertz, and with that USB to
serial adapter that could even slow it down even
more, so that was
a big deal, and I was pretty happy
with that because all the information out
there was saying that it couldn't be done, and then
eventually I was able to do it, so I was pretty
happy with myself on that, but
I think a lot of it mostly depends on that
serial adapter. Even though they
said that you could do it virtually, they wanted you
to have a physical serial
port, and I
think it's mostly for, like, multitasking,
so if the device isn't available
for that microsecond or what have you,
it'll lose contact with the
radio, and you'll brick it,
and these are hard to find, they're not cheap, and
so on, so at all costs, I
just wanted to make sure I would not brick
the radio, so
I was very, very careful about
working with the serial adapters
over virtualization,
and then the other thing that
Motorola does, and I'm not sure why they do this, but they
do this serial magic
where they have different ways of
configuring the multiple generations that they
have, and so they sell this thing called the
RIB, the Radio Interface Box,
and it basically drops
voltage into the serial,
you can plug power into it, and
or a 9-volt battery,
and this was the only way you can
configure it. There were people saying that you
could do it ribless, they sell
stuff out there to do it ribless,
and they even said that it would work with the
GR1225. I bought one,
it doesn't work, and I went
through the guy who's making them and selling
them, and he said, oh yeah, it'll work, it'll work. I mean,
I sent him a video saying, no, dude, this
doesn't work. So, I ended
up buying an actual real,
I bought a Chinese knockoff one,
and they had the schematics for it, it looked
exactly like the Motorola one,
it didn't work for some reason. So, I ended up
buying an actual Motorola RIB,
which wasn't very expensive, they were just very
rare on eBay to find.
And this was the final piece that I needed
to be able to configure it.
I also found guys who were saying that it would work
with just DB9 to the
RJ45, it
doesn't work. It has to go DB9,
through the RIB, to DB25,
to RJ45. And I
looked through all the wiring and the schematics,
and it drove me crazy
because it looked right, but
for some reason, Motorola is very
particular about how they want to be programmed.
So, this was a major piece,
I had to get this paired to that,
I didn't have to modify it or anything, but I had to get
the cable for the GR25,
RJ45 to DB25, an actual
Motorola RIB. I tried a
RIBLESS, and it still didn't work.
And then this is just a standard DB9,
so this was a major
piece, and it delayed me weeks
after I'd built it, and
everything was working,
but I wanted to configure and change some of the other
settings, and I went through
pulling my hair out trying to figure out how to get it to
talk on the right operating
system, with the right serial configuration,
and the right wiring. So, that was a major
piece, and hopefully
I never lose this thing.
You don't have to reconfigure
it very often, very rarely.
Some repeaters, they get configured and they
stay that way for their entire life.
So, but it's nice to have,
and it's good know-how. I like
working with this old equipment, and
intend to build more stuff
to do this.
So, I was trying to find a
quote from Vlad, because he's pretty good
with quotes, and giving me tidbits
of information, but I couldn't find one.
I searched through all my emails trying to get a quote
from him, but I ended up finding this quote from
ARRL and Ares.
Hamradar's motto is, when all else fails.
So,
this is one of the reasons why I built this,
and I demonstrated it at the
amateur radio field day,
so that on a
fly, you can roll up anywhere with no power
or very little power and infrastructure
and still be able to get radio communications.
And so, when I did it out there, I ran
it all off my car and an AC
inverter, and it worked great.
Everyone was doing a bunch of HF
contesting at the field
day, but no one had set up an
on-site UHF repeater to talk just
point-to-point with everyone.
So,
I brought it up, and they liked it, and then I
turned on the IRLP, and so we could link
to other places, which was very cool.
So, I'll do a quick demonstration of that.
I think we're linked up, but let's see here.
I'll call into the Las Vegas Western Reflector on IRLP.
Let's see if it'll work.
So, what I've done is I've connected the repeater through IRLP to a reflector, which is point-to-multipoint.
So, I don't know who's connected to the reflector
at this time, but it's going to work.
But there can be hundreds of nodes that are connected to it and whatnot.
So, I'm basically using this as a repeater controller and a link.
I'm obviously using a hotspot right now, but I use an open VPN tunnel, so that's all contained
and more secure.
And it works quite well.
So, this can run forever off of batteries.
I forgot to charge the other big battery, but I used that for a day and a half, and
it ran that.
This is also a 70-centimeter transmitter, but this only does like a quarter watt.
It's basically acting as just another unit.
So, it's like a user on the repeater.
It transmits through the input, and the repeater transmits on the output, and it comes out.
So, this will do the CWID.
It'll link to other repeater networks and so on.
And I'll do another one where there may be some other chatter from other networks here.
Note 925, Western Reflector, Las Vegas, Nevada, link off.
So, there's another super busy network.
And that's the CWID, obviously, and if you can read that, November 7, Tango-R, for repeater.
Slash-R, yeah.
So, were you decoding it, or are you just ... So, I'll connect to another repeater network
that there's usually a lot of traffic on, and it's called the WIN system, the Western
Inner ... Western something Inner Tie, I always forget.
It's a weird word, and I give Shorty trouble for it.
And ...
Yeah, so, here.
But on this network, there's like ...
Welcome to the WIN system reflector, 9100, link on.
There's anywhere from like 40 to 50 repeaters connected to this repeater all the time.
It's basically down to Mexico, all the way up to Washington, D.C., and Idaho, and throughout.
So, currently, we're connected to that, and so I have a footprint of thousands of miles.
So, if there's a little break, it just sounds like some normal chatter, if there's a little
break, I'll ask for a demonstration from these guys, and usually, people will pop up
on frequency and say, hey, I'm in Washington, hey, I'm in Mexico, and so they want to show
off.
Yeah, that's on your end.
Yeah, that's on your end.
All right.
Thank you.
This is K6ADS in Las Vegas.
Can I get a demonstration on the WIN system, please?
Hi, this is K6ADS in Las Vegas. Can I get a
demonstration of the wind system please? I have to get a break in between transmissions
to catch them. So when I transmit there's like a half a second delay and then on the
other side there's another half a second delay so you really, when you're linking across
multiple repeater networks you have to catch it. There we go.
One system demo, KF6ADS.
Hey, I appreciate the call back. I'm actually giving a talk here at DEF CON in Las Vegas
about internet radio linking and mobile repeaters so I appreciate the quick come back and giving
us a demonstration of the wind system. This is K6ADS. I'll be clear and monitoring.
So that's a demonstration of the system and the linking. Sometimes you can run into some
grouchy ham radio operators and that's just the way that it is. So, but that's a demonstration
but feel free to use the repeater if you have a license. If you're within eye shot of another
amateur radio operator you can as an unlicensed radio operator use the ham band. So just
use our event call sign November 7th Tangle, N7T and if you're around another ham radio
operator or like such as myself I can give you a demonstration of the system and the
radio. I can give you a radio and you're welcome to try it out and test it. So that's
about it. I think I'm good for time.
Any questions? I think he was first here. Go, eyeball. So he's asking about the serial
driver for the programming of the Motorola device. So and when I'm using virtualization
so in Windows it has the driver, is the host operating system for Windows 7 so that driver
and then through VMware that just translate that back into the VM. So the specific adapter
that I have the driver allows you to tweak latency in the buffers. Some USB adapters
are just plain dumb and they just connect and they just work. This driver actually lets
you tweak some of those settings. So I'm going to show them. So, I'm going to show
So, I don't remember how I found that one,
but it's been super advantageous that I've had that USB adapter.
So, it's just using the Windows driver.
Inside the virtual machine,
it's just a standard serial port as far as the VM is concerned.
So, good questions.
You were first here. I'll get you.
Go ahead, sir.
Is there a model of the IRP controller?
This is, the question is,
is there a model of the IRP controller that I'm using?
This is called a nano node,
and the guy also makes micro node.
There's a couple different iterations of it.
It's basically a Raspberry Pi with a UHF transmitter built into it.
It's semi-proprietary,
but it's a very good package, a very good system.
But it's proprietary enough where I messaged the guy
after I paid $600 for it,
and I asked, hey, could I get a shell on my own Linux machine,
and he said no.
So, I said, well, I'll deal with that.
Thank you very much, sir.
So, thank you. Good question.
So.
Lindsay.
So, the question is, when am I going to get my general?
Are they doing tests here at DEF CON?
We'll do, you got three VEs?
Probably.
Get some VEs. We'll do the test.
Now, I brought the book.
I was reading it on my Kindle.
I plan on doing it this DEF CON,
but I don't think they're doing tests.
They are?
Yes, sir?
But not today?
Okay, we'll work it out.
Okay.
So, even more encouragement for me to upgrade my license to general,
and I will definitely do it, I promise.
Mark my words.
Great question. Thank you.
More questions?
Sir?
Why did I choose 440?
The antennas are smaller.
It seems to propagate a bit better
in certain different environments.
I've ran other repeaters on two meters,
144, 140 megahertz,
and those work fine,
but for some reason, I like 440 better.
I like 70 centimeter better.
It seems to propagate better through stuff,
and it still does a decent amount of range.
But the other major kicker is the antennas are smaller.
That's one of the reasons I'm not a big fan of HF.
You need giant amplifiers, giant antennas.
HF has a purpose and a place, and I'm not against it,
but it's noisy.
The antennas are huge.
It takes a lot of power, a lot of amplification,
and so this works well.
So, great question.
I appreciate that.
Yeah.
Any other?
There.
Another question.
So the question is that I don't like HF,
and that's why I haven't upgraded my call sign.
Maybe.
I just haven't felt a big need for it.
I have done HF contesting and whatnot,
like I did at the last field day.
So I've experienced it a lot.
My Elmer's been giving me trouble for it
for the last 20 years.
But I just haven't had a big purpose for it,
a big need for it.
Especially with IRLP, and this is one of the things.
This is the oldest linking platform that's out there.
There's now All Star and a few others, and also DMR,
and other linking digital modes and whatnot.
But this is the first one, and it relies on PGP for the links.
So the guy that built it, Dave Cameron,
built it strong and encrypted from the very beginning.
So even though it's a new type of linking, it's the oldest one.
So it's old school with old school, so on.
So good question.
Any other questions?
Is there a PL on the repeater?
Yes, it is on 440, 800, and the PL is 123.
The offset for a repeater for standard 70 centimeters
is 5 megahertz positive.
Any other questions?
Thank you very much.
I appreciate it very much.
Thank you.