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Katie McRobert, general manager at the Australia Farm Institute, said Australian farmers sourced their GPS signal from one satellite, which was a critical risk

by causi 4y ago

Katie McRobert, general manager at the Australia Farm Institute, said Australian farmers sourced their GPS signal from one satellite, which was a critical risk to rural industries. All that went out the window when the Inmarsat-41 satellite signal failed. Can somebody who actually knows what happened fill us in? Because saying you depended on one satellite for GPS makes no sense. Based on the article as-written, this is headline is wildly misleading. The tractor failure has fuck-all to do with GPS. It sounds like their satellite data link failed and the tractors shut down without a control signal.

tivert 4y ago
> Can somebody who actually knows what happened fill us in? Because saying you depended on one satellite for GPS makes no sense. I have no real knowledge of this, but maybe they were relying on that satellite to transmit DGPS corrections for their region or something, to improve accuracy. Edit: Found this while replying to a now-deleted comment: Even if it's not exactly DGPS, it seems like it's some kind of accuracy-improvement service: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2023-04-18/inmarsat-i-4f1-satelite-outage-asia-pacific-gps-farms/102234678 https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2023-04-18/inmarsat-i-4f1-...: > He has got a workaround for now, using the old free-to-air GPS that is a lot less accurate, but he said he was disappointed with the lack of information on the outage. IIRC, regular GPS positions have an error of at least a few meters, which is not good enough if you're trying to plant crops. Edit2: Just digging around, I found this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNSS_augmentation#Satellite-based_augmentation_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNSS_augmentation#Satellite-ba... > The Australian SBAS [Satellite-based augmentation system] using Inmarsat 41, which famously suffered a failure in April 2023.[6][7]
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
Animats 4y ago
It's a commercial GPS correction service. It corrects for atmospheric conditions which affect RF propagation slightly. There are many ground stations which receive GPS. They send correction info to an uplink station which rebroadcasts corrections using a geosync satellite. These services are regional, not worldwide, since they need ground stations and a geosync satellite with the right coverage. It's not free; there's a substantial subscription charge. Here's one that works in the US.[1] We used Novatel's for the DARPA Grand Challenge 20 years ago. [1] https://novatel.com/products/gps-gnss-correction-services/terrastar-correction-services https://novatel.com/products/gps-gnss-correction-services/te...
- ryanjshaw 4y ago
  Naïve question: it's a farm, you own the land, it's mostly flat, I'm wondering why there isn't any "deploy your own positioning service on a bunch of high poles" product?
  - themoonisachees 4y ago
    Because farmers aren't (for the most part) software hackers, and the equipment they pay top dollar for is using the subscription service Also, the subscription is probably considerably cheaper than buying the equipment to replicate it.
    - Animats 4y ago
      The John Deere RTK Radio 900, which does exactly that, costs about $1000 used. You put it on a tripod next to the field, or on top of a building. If you want season to season repeatability, it has to be in the same place. This is GPS correction, not a completely standalone navigation system. There are more components for big farms. There are repeaters to re-broadcast the correction signal, which in the US is in the 900MHz ISM band. Some Deere dealers have their own stations throughout a farming community. There's a fee to use that. It's like having your own server instead of using "the cloud". Works fine, takes more attention.
  - dagw 4y ago
    There exists several companies that offer exactly that. However it's expensive and most smaller farmers just don't see the need.
    - Nexxxeh 4y ago
      I suspect that's now "didn't see the need"...
    - Animats 4y ago
      It's really expensive.[1] "To put together a one-inch accurate RTK system for John Deere tractors, you start with an Autotrac automatic steering kit, which is $5,040 plus installation costs of $1,200. Then you add a monitor. John Deere offers three monitors: the basic Greenstar display for $1,700, Model 1800 colour display for $2,250, and Model 2600 touchscreen display for $6,294." "The standard receiver with StarFire 1 capability is $3,144. That gets you accurate to within eight inches either side of the desired path. To move up to StarFire 2 and its sub-four-inch accuracy, you need software upgrades: $5,040 for the Autotrac software upgrade and $2,500 for the receiver software upgrade." "To go from SF2 to RTK, you need a receiver that includes a radio to communicate with the RTK base station and with the satellites. This costs $1,695. You also need RTK activation, which costs $3,780." "Add it up. From square one, with the top-end monitor, you’re looking at around $30,000 to equip the tractor for RTK. But wait. You need a base station. A two-channel base station will cost another $15,000 or so." [1] https://www.grainews.ca/news/what-rtk-can-do-for-you/ https://www.grainews.ca/news/what-rtk-can-do-for-you/
MarkusWandel 4y ago
The article does say that without the GPS service, they are 4% less efficient (in terms of slightly overlapping swathes of seeds/fertilizer/whatever) and this is enough to be uncompetitive. Back when I was a kid on a family farm, accurate within 4% would have been great (with manually driven tractors)!
- causi 4y ago
  I'm willing to bet your accuracy was better than 4% across an entire field.
- salawat 4y ago
  Seems like this level of hyper-optimization being required out the gate is more a problem in and of itself. Call me a luddite; but if we're at the point that one needs bloody GPS to remain competitive, I'm beginning to question the resilience of our food production system as integrated with the global market. Everyone needs food. Period. If you can't get that food from where you grow to somewhere that needs it, that sounds more like the problem that needs solving. Then again, I think practically every problem reduces to logistics problem if you dig deep enough.

by causi 4y ago

tivert 4y ago

> Can somebody who actually knows what happened fill us in? Because saying you depended on one satellite for GPS makes no sense. I have no real knowledge of this, but maybe they were relying on that satellite to transmit DGPS corrections for their region or something, to improve accuracy. Edit: Found this while replying to a now-deleted comment: Even if it's not exactly DGPS, it seems like it's some kind of accuracy-improvement service: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2023-04-18/inmarsat-i-4f1-satelite-outage-asia-pacific-gps-farms/102234678 https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2023-04-18/inmarsat-i-4f1-...: > He has got a workaround for now, using the old free-to-air GPS that is a lot less accurate, but he said he was disappointed with the lack of information on the outage. IIRC, regular GPS positions have an error of at least a few meters, which is not good enough if you're trying to plant crops. Edit2: Just digging around, I found this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNSS_augmentation#Satellite-based_augmentation_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNSS_augmentation#Satellite-ba... > The Australian SBAS [Satellite-based augmentation system] using Inmarsat 41, which famously suffered a failure in April 2023.[6][7]

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

Animats 4y ago

It's a commercial GPS correction service. It corrects for atmospheric conditions which affect RF propagation slightly. There are many ground stations which receive GPS. They send correction info to an uplink station which rebroadcasts corrections using a geosync satellite. These services are regional, not worldwide, since they need ground stations and a geosync satellite with the right coverage. It's not free; there's a substantial subscription charge. Here's one that works in the US.[1] We used Novatel's for the DARPA Grand Challenge 20 years ago. [1] https://novatel.com/products/gps-gnss-correction-services/terrastar-correction-services https://novatel.com/products/gps-gnss-correction-services/te...

ryanjshaw 4y ago
Naïve question: it's a farm, you own the land, it's mostly flat, I'm wondering why there isn't any "deploy your own positioning service on a bunch of high poles" product?
- themoonisachees 4y ago
  Because farmers aren't (for the most part) software hackers, and the equipment they pay top dollar for is using the subscription service Also, the subscription is probably considerably cheaper than buying the equipment to replicate it.
  - Animats 4y ago
    The John Deere RTK Radio 900, which does exactly that, costs about $1000 used. You put it on a tripod next to the field, or on top of a building. If you want season to season repeatability, it has to be in the same place. This is GPS correction, not a completely standalone navigation system. There are more components for big farms. There are repeaters to re-broadcast the correction signal, which in the US is in the 900MHz ISM band. Some Deere dealers have their own stations throughout a farming community. There's a fee to use that. It's like having your own server instead of using "the cloud". Works fine, takes more attention.
- dagw 4y ago
  There exists several companies that offer exactly that. However it's expensive and most smaller farmers just don't see the need.
  - Nexxxeh 4y ago
    I suspect that's now "didn't see the need"...
  - Animats 4y ago
    It's really expensive.[1] "To put together a one-inch accurate RTK system for John Deere tractors, you start with an Autotrac automatic steering kit, which is $5,040 plus installation costs of $1,200. Then you add a monitor. John Deere offers three monitors: the basic Greenstar display for $1,700, Model 1800 colour display for $2,250, and Model 2600 touchscreen display for $6,294." "The standard receiver with StarFire 1 capability is $3,144. That gets you accurate to within eight inches either side of the desired path. To move up to StarFire 2 and its sub-four-inch accuracy, you need software upgrades: $5,040 for the Autotrac software upgrade and $2,500 for the receiver software upgrade." "To go from SF2 to RTK, you need a receiver that includes a radio to communicate with the RTK base station and with the satellites. This costs $1,695. You also need RTK activation, which costs $3,780." "Add it up. From square one, with the top-end monitor, you’re looking at around $30,000 to equip the tractor for RTK. But wait. You need a base station. A two-channel base station will cost another $15,000 or so." [1] https://www.grainews.ca/news/what-rtk-can-do-for-you/ https://www.grainews.ca/news/what-rtk-can-do-for-you/

MarkusWandel 4y ago

The article does say that without the GPS service, they are 4% less efficient (in terms of slightly overlapping swathes of seeds/fertilizer/whatever) and this is enough to be uncompetitive. Back when I was a kid on a family farm, accurate within 4% would have been great (with manually driven tractors)!

causi 4y ago
I'm willing to bet your accuracy was better than 4% across an entire field.
salawat 4y ago
Seems like this level of hyper-optimization being required out the gate is more a problem in and of itself. Call me a luddite; but if we're at the point that one needs bloody GPS to remain competitive, I'm beginning to question the resilience of our food production system as integrated with the global market. Everyone needs food. Period. If you can't get that food from where you grow to somewhere that needs it, that sounds more like the problem that needs solving. Then again, I think practically every problem reduces to logistics problem if you dig deep enough.