Last Updated on 23/07/2023 by Grant Little
Overview
If you have an interest in aviation then you can get access to free premium accounts from both FlightAware & FlightRadar24 if you provide data into their networks. FlightAware will provide you with an Enterprise Account and FlightRadar24 will provide you with a Business account.
There is a small initial outlay to do this, but the cost is relatively low even compared to 1 years subscription to one of these services.
Probably the easiest way of doing this is to use a Raspberry Pi. You can easily buy these online these days for fairly cheap.
You can also use a Linux or Mac computer (Windows appears to no longer be supported) with a free USB port for the required dongle.
These instructions are going to assume you are using a Raspberry Pi though.
Requirements
- A Raspberry Pi 3/4 with Raspberry PI OS installed, 8GB MicroSD card, access to the terminal and connected to the internet
- A USB ADS-B receiver dongle and an aerial. Something like this bundle https://webshop.jetvision.de/en/product/ads-b-usb-dongle-r820t2-small-indoor-antenna-bundle
- Optional – Get a USB dongle on it’s own and then get an external aerial. For example https://webshop.jetvision.de/en/product/a3-ads-b-antenna-1090-mhz-bundle/
Sign up for accounts at both flightaware.com and flightradar24.com. Make sure you remember your login details!
You will need the following information (specifically for MLAT calculations)
- Your antennas longitude
- Your antennas latitude
- Your antennas height above sea level
To find your longitude and latitude you can use Google Maps. Simply find your location on the map and click on that location. As an example I’ve chosen a random location within Western Australia and you can see the longitude and latitude at the bottom
To find your antennas height above sea level, find the height above sea level using https://freemaptools.com/elevation-finder.htm. Enter the co-ordinates you have found from Google Maps.
Add the estimated height of the antenna from the ground to this value to get the height above sea level. MLAT calculations require a level of accuracy, so please try and get this as accurate as possible.
Installation
FlightAware
FlightAware provides good instructions on how to install PiAware on Raspberry PI OS.
The following provides the basic instructions:-
Log into the terminal on your Raspberry Pi and run the following commands:-
curl -o piaware-repository_7.2_all.deb https://flightaware.com/adsb/piaware/files/packages/pool/piaware/f/flightaware-apt-repository/flightaware-apt-repository_1.1_all.deb
sudo dpkg -i flightaware-apt-repository_1.1_all.deb
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install piaware
sudo piaware-config allow-auto-updates yes
sudo piaware-config allow-manual-updates yes
sudo apt-get install dump1090-fa
At this point it is probably a good idea to restart your Raspberry PI to make sure everything is running and started correctly. You can do this by running
sudo rebootOnce this is complete, after a few minutes the data should start being sent to FlightAware. You can check this by using the following link https://flightaware.com/adsb/piaware/claim to claim your feeder.
Then to view your data feeder statistics you can click on https://flightaware.com/adsb/stats/user/<username> You will need to replace <username> with your FlightAware username that you created earlier.
More than likely you will only have one site defined, if so click on the “cog wheel” (settings) to the right of the site name.
Use the “Configure Location” and “Configure Height” to enter your location and height. Make sure you select “I know my antenna’s elevation above sea level (advanced)” with the calculation you performed earlier.
Once you have entered those details, you can click on “Send”. This will send the updated details back to your Raspberry Pi. Allow a minute or so for this to happen.
Once everything is configured then you should see all three indicators in the green:-
You should also be able to view a map with the aircraft being actively tracked. To do this click on the following link (View live data):-
This will redirect you to the PiAware software installed on your Raspberry Pi.
Upgrading
If you have has a previous installation of piaware and want to keep your statistics, then you can do so.
Log on to the website using this URL:-
Thanks for this post! Very concise and easy to follow.
I had an error trying to get the piaware-repository file so I had to run this command first: “wget https://fr.flightaware.com/adsb/piaware/files/packages/pool/piaware/p/piaware-support/piaware-repository_3.8.1_all.deb“
Good point, I missed getting the actual deb package. I’ll add in the instructions for that soon. Thanks for the feedback
I have now updated the document with the latest version of piaware as well as details for if you are upgrading from a previous piaware feeder installation
I want to supply data to ADSB-Exchange for the openness (am near a mil apt, so hope to get some new, interesting data here). But as a person not so adept at hardware and hacking– is there a chance to use a free FR24-provided unit and feed (FR24 of course, and) ADSB-E? Or what is the best plug&play unit (not the $290 one sold vie ADSB-E) to purchase?
Thanks
Marty
You always need at a minimum a USB DSB dongle. You can buy these online, I think they are about USD$50, often they come with a small desktop aerial. You then need a computer to plug it into. If you have a home computer that you leave running all the time then you can use that. If not, then the cheapest option is a Raspberry Pi, which is effectively a small computer (no monitor mouse etc), there are lots of instructions around on how to set them up (it’s really quite simple). If you don’t feel like that, then I think you will probably have to buy one of the device they have on sale. I really couldn’t tell you how much they cost. The setup I built at home is pretty simple (Raspberry Pi & USB dongle). Probably spend $150-$160 in total.
Not sure if that helps you or not
PS sorry for late reply
Is there an easy way to have the adsbx on the same port as Flightaware (8080)?
You can’t have 2 different services using the same port.
The only thing you could do would be to install a reverse proxy (haproxy for example) in front of the services (using a different port 80/443), then based on a path proxy the calls, e.g.
This can sometimes get a little messy for UI apps, as you effectively have to re-write the inbound URL requests, or somehow change the context path of the 2 applications. I have no idea if they support this.
Thanks for this information and instructions. I seem to have done things differently insofar as i have installed Flight Radar24 first (Pi 4) and now would like to share data with Flight Aware and ADSBE.
Could you kindly explain how I would go about doing this please?
Sorry, very late reply, somehow I missed this one. Without trying it, I’m guessing the process isn’t too different, but without specifically going through it I’m afraid I can’t provide specific instructions.
I realise this response is very late, so I hope you have managed to resolve it in the interim. I would be interested to hear how different the process would be.