planeMapper

A local ADS-B radar display on a 6-colour e-ink screen. Receives live aircraft positions via RTL-SDR, renders them on a map centred on a ~100nm radius, and refreshes the e-ink display every 60 seconds.

Concept

• Pi 5 decodes ADS-B signals from a USB RTL-SDR dongle
• dump1090 exposes a live JSON feed of aircraft positions
• A Python script pulls the feed, renders a map image with aircraft overlaid
• Image is pushed to a Waveshare 7.3" 6-colour e-ink HAT via SPI
• Wall-mounted, always-on, low power

Hardware

Item	Link	Notes
Raspberry Pi 5	—	Already owned
Nooelec NESDR Smart v5 RTL-SDR dongle	Amazon	0.5PPM TCXO, SMA input. Alternative: RTL-SDR Blog V3
FlightAware 1090MHz ADS-B antenna	Amazon	Purpose-built for 1090MHz, 5.5dBi
Waveshare 7.3" 6-colour e-ink HAT	Amazon	E-Ink Spectra 6 (E6), 40-pin GPIO, SPI, driver board included

Estimated cost: ~$200 USD

Software Stack

1. dump1090 — decodes ADS-B from RTL-SDR, serves JSON at http://localhost:8080/data/aircraft.json
2. Python script — fetches JSON, renders map image using Pillow, pushes to display via Waveshare driver
3. Waveshare Python library — handles SPI communication with the e-ink HAT
4. OpenStreetMap tiles — base map, pre-cached for the local area

Pipeline

RTL-SDR dongle
    → dump1090 (ADS-B decoder)
        → JSON feed (aircraft positions, headings, altitudes, callsigns)
            → Python renderer (Pillow)
                → map image with aircraft overlaid
                    → Waveshare SPI driver
                        → e-ink display

Refresh loop runs every 60 seconds.

Map Design

• Centred on home airfield
• ~100nm radius coverage
• Base map from OpenStreetMap
• Aircraft plotted as rotated arrows (heading-aligned)
• Callsign and altitude label per aircraft
• Colour-coded by altitude band (6 colours available)
• Home airfield marked

Aircraft Icons

• Rotated triangle/arrow pointing in direction of travel
• Short track line behind showing recent path
• Colour coded by altitude band or aircraft type
• Size optionally coded by aircraft category (heavy/medium/light)
• Differentiation options: commercial vs GA, helicopters, military
• Could highlight a known squawk code (owner's own aircraft)

Build Order

1. Get ADS-B receiving working — RTL-SDR dongle + dump1090, confirm aircraft visible
2. Get base map rendering — OpenStreetMap tiles, 100nm radius circle centred on airfield
3. Plot aircraft on map — pull live positions from dump1090 JSON, draw heading arrows
4. Push to e-ink — convert image, send via Waveshare library, set refresh loop
5. Polish — airspace boundaries, callsign labels, altitude colour coding, frame/mount

Notes

• E-ink only consumes power on refresh — extremely low idle draw
• Display powered directly from Pi GPIO, no separate PSU needed
• Pi Zero 2W could work as a low-power dedicated host once software is built and optimised on Pi 5
• ESP32/Pi Pico not suitable — no USB host for RTL-SDR dongle
• Script estimated ~100-150 lines of Python
• Hardest part: converting lat/lon to pixel coordinates within the display dimensions