This page contains a listing of various reports and presentations.
Iridium Certus with ArduPilot
In this report, I tested ArduPilot telemetry over an Iridium Certus 100 connection using a RockREMOTE UAV OEM modem, measuring latency, packet loss, and overall reliability under a range of configurations.
What I found was:
- A streamrate of 2Hz telemetry is needed (instead of the default 4Hz) to avoid flooding the link
- Using a “direct” connection (not using a VPN) gave 7-8% packet loss over UDP and 0% loss over TCP. Latency was 800ms for UDP and 1.2sec for TCP.
- VPN services (such as Wireguard or Zerotier) were not practical to use. Packet loss and outages were a minimum of 50%.
- For a stable service, the antenna should be place at or above the treeline/roofline. Any sustained “ground tests” should ensure the antenna is elevated to this height to give representative results.
In terms of airtime costs, running at a 2Hz streamrate will typically cost around $30/hour.
These results help provide practical guidance for anyone designing autonomous systems that rely on satellite telemetry — UAVs, USVs, ground robots, and remote sensing platforms.
Thanks to GroundControl for supplying hardware and airtime for testing.
Full report available here.