UBLOX MAX-M8Q Breakout For Active Antennas

This is an assembled breakout board with a uBLOX MAX-M8Q-10 module and SMA female connector suitable for connecting to a suitable

active patch antenna

.

Available in two versions: a 3V board, or with regulator and level convertors for use with 5V microcontrollers/supply (select above).

Suitable for HAB Usage Max Altitude 50,000 meters / 161 feet in Flight Mode.

The board is constructed on 1.6mm PCB and features a PPS LED and Supercap for retaining settings through power cycles. It also has improved power filtering over previous versions.

On the header are TX, RX, TP (PPS Output), I2C SDA/SCL and GND.

Power Supply

• For 3V versions supply is 2.7V to 3.6V
• For 5V versions supply is 4.5V to 30V

Baud rate

• The default baud rate is 9600bps

The MAX-M8Q

The MAX-M8Q delivers all the benefits of the u-BLOX 8 GPS platform in a more compact form factor than ever before: high-sensitivity, intelligent power management. Supporting temperatures down to -40’C and featuring a TCXO for better power saving and quicker startup the MAX M8Q is an ideal module.

As per the data sheets the MAX M8Q can use up to 22mA under acquisition (5mA in power save mode once tracking).

Resources

• Datasheet

• Customer feedback on setup (thanks to

  David Taylor

  ): “You need to send a command to the board to enable Galileo. You could likely do that with a binary U-BLOX string with the 3.17 version of GPSD currently included in the RPi OS. It’s much easier with GPSD 3.20 which you can get a back-port onto the Buster RPi OS, but if you need to support an RPi 1B you’ll have to build GPSD from scratch as the processor has differences from the 3.20 back-port”.

Dimensions

The breakout has the following dimensions: 22mmx22mmx1.6mm approximately.