Off-grid messaging
Meshtastic 20.25This project is made for the Meshtastic Device Design Challenge, with Hackster.io, Seeed Studio and Meshtastic.
Challenge Rules:
- Designers and engineers, unleash your creativity and build innovative MESHTASTIC devices with the brand-new Seeed Studio Wio Tracker L1 Series Meshtastic Development Kits.
- In this design challenge, you’ll take the provided dev kit components and turn them into a unique working product — maybe at least a case, an extra keyboard add-on, or any other peripheral that brings your chosen use scenario to life.
- Use a Seeed Studio Wio Tracker L1
The Seeed Studio Wio Tracker L1 is a low-power, scalable Meshtastic node featuring a Nordic Semiconductor nRF52840 for efficient processing, and a Quectel L76K GPS for precise location tracking.
Meshtastic is a community-driven, open-source project that enables people to use inexpensive LoRa radios as a long-range, off-grid communication platform in areas without existing or reliable communication infrastructure
My proposal and worked out project:
Are you ready to take your communication device go off-grid? Introducing Meshtastic 20.25! Made to go camping or hiking, during a festival or just commuting to the office.
In the core a Seeed Studio Wio Tracker L1. On top of that added a mini keyboard from a TV remote, E-ink screen for power-saving visuals and a vibration motor for instant alerts. All housed in a case with a solar panel on the back!
Originally Meshtastic devices were made to work as a Bluetooth companion device connected to a phone with a messaging app. But what if you don’t want to carry a phone on your hike? That’s fine, the Wio Tracker L1 devices have a single menu button and a tiny joystick, so you can twist your thumb for minutes, to twiddle something down.
Not really useful if you are hanging on the edge of a cliff and want to type an SOS message to your friend… Let’s include a keyboard! And maybe even an SOS button?
During your camping trip you go off-grid for multiple days. But the commonly used always-on-OLED-displays consume battery capacity all the time, even when you are not looking at your device. That is why I will use an E-ink screen that only refreshes when it is needed. And to charge the large internal battery on-the-go, just flip it over and hold it in the sun, there is a solar panel on the back!
While you lay down in your beach-chair, your FOMO starts creeping up. Did you miss a message? I got you covered, there is no need to keep refreshing the screen to see if there are new messages, a vibration motor will be added to work together with the buzzer to instantly alert you of something new!
Meshtastic off-grid communication, always available, always useful, always fun! Welcome to 20.25 😉
For several weeks, I did document each step for this project on the Hackster.io website. Some higlights here. For the fill project write-up and code deployed, visit the project page.
After sending in the project, it was time to wait. The 10 participants of the last round all had very good projects. Briljant ideas, well thought and designed products, good documentation. But then the final verdict came in:
Congratulations on receiving both the Base Award and the Bonus Award — this result was carefully evaluated by our judges along with feedback from the community. You are the winner!
The price for winning the Bonus Award, is a trip to the Maker Faire Shenzhen 2025. I’m looking forward to this trip and will share this experience!
