Come join the DARC for the September 2026 Lecture and Lab – In this lecture and lab you will build mini DARC Flight Radar console. The build will take place at the Dallas Medical Center on the 3rd floor. Plan on attending in-person Septermber 26, 2026 start time is 10am central time. More details below.

This is an in-person event and is open to the public you do not need to be a member of the DARC or have a HAM radio license to attend and participate or purchase the DARC Flight Radar kit. We have a total of 15 kits available and they are first come first served on Lecture and Lab day and the kit cost is $15.00. Any questions or comments find us (KF5ZBL, KG5EIU) on the DARC Discord server or hit us up at: https://w5fc.org/contact/

This project creates a ESP32-based Plane Radar using a 1.28inch GC9A01 color screen that is hooked up to the ESP32 board that will show live aircraft near your house based on your geo coordinates. The data is collected from adsb.fi and displayed on the color screen with user selectable distance of 5/ 10/ 15/ or 25km and distant aircraft are shown on the rim of the screen as a red dot. This is a complete kit and includes the case, screen, ESP32 board, wire, usb-c cable, mini AC wall-wart to power the console.

You will need the bring your solder kit assembly tools along with some other handy things to make the build go fast and easy a laptop computer would be useful to program the ESP32 board using a chrome web bowser:  

Tools Needed/Required:

• Solder Iron, solder and associated accouterments to solder small electronic components
• Wire cutters, and strippers small screwdrivers and other general kit building tools
• volt/ohm meter (optional)
• X-acto knife with  a fresh blade
• Needle nose pliers
• Safety glasses

Handy Tools To Have For The Build:

• Small files, emery/sandpaper  
• Hot Glue Gun
• Laptop computer with Chrome browser

Additional details and information and links to the binary and more can be found in this link: https://makerworld.com/en/models/2872376-esp32-plane-radar-live-ads-b-on-a-round-display#profileId-3207083