Pet tracker TK911 Pro 4G (working solution with Home Assistant)

Just to help others searching for a cheap option to track their adventurous dogs I got this tracker working.

http://www.tkstar-gps.com/Product/tkstarwinnes4gpetgpstrackertk911pro.html

It supports a 4G LTE SIM, it makes use of the watch protocol on port 5093 and several parts are available, like a cover for better water resistance.

My setup below. Only for configuration I used a SIM with SMS support.

Tracker TK911 Pro with data only SIM (XIPO xonnect) -> LTE network -> Home router with portforwarding for TCP 5093 to my Home Assistant Server. In the Traccar XML config file (..\addon_configs\a0d7b954_traccar\traccar.xml) I enabled port 5093 with the line <entry key='watch.port'>5093</entry>.

To configure the tracker just use the common statements:

admin123456 [YourPhoneNumber]
timezone123456 +[number] or -[number]
upload123456 10 (update interval in seconds)
sleep123456 off
gprs123456
adminip123456 [your.pubic.ip] 5093

Check also: https://keekatek.com/posts/trackers/tkstar-sms-commands#send%20data%20over%20gprs
Good to know you can replace your ip by a duckdns if you like. You'll have to register first, but after that with the add-on your ip will be updated

Don't forget to reboot Home Assistant to load the configuration and you should see some hex in de logs from the add-on.

INFO: [T59ebea89] connected
INFO: [T59ebea89: watch < 176.XX.XX.XXX]
INFO: Event id: 9119029687, time: 2024-01-27 22:19:59, type: deviceOnline, notifications: 0

To add the device in the web console use the Device ID which is printed on the back of the device.
Don't forget to update your password and reset the password on their website as well https://www.mytkstar.net/Monitor.aspx. You can ask support to delete your profile, but I don't know if they will ...

Also will search about to use a reverse proxy as I cannot use a VPN like WireGuard from the tracker itself. Recommandations are welcome.

Happy tracking!!

Unterixa year ago

Hello Peter,
thank you for sharing !
This prompted me to buy the same for my dog. It works very well with Traccar but I cannot adjust the frequency of position reports. As soon as it is switched on, it returns a position approximately every 3 seconds, which uses the battery more than necessary.
I tried several times to modify this frequency via the command "upload123456 20" (for 20 seconds, with default pwd) but without success.
Any idea ?
Thanks in advance.

Peter Hantona year ago

Nice to read a comment on my post.

I just tested and it should work.

This is what I got on my device (TK911-Pro (70SALASE_V_4.0 2023/12/01))

removed the data-only SIM
placed a SIM with SMS credit on it
'imei123456' > response 'xxx UPLOAD:60 xxx'
'upload123456 90' > respone 'upload ok'
'imei123456' > response 'xxx UPLOAD:90 xxx'

Checked the Traccar log from the WEB-UI (xxx8082/reports/logs) and got a message every 90 seconds
911xxxxxxx watch 5b53xxxxxxxx

I checked other sites and manuals and I could not find any alternatives for the 'upload' command.

Hope it helps. Otherwise you could try to reset your device, but thats more work.

Ryan3 months ago

Hi Peter! Just wanted to say thank you so much for sharing your findings. Very happy to say I just got my TK911 working, thanks to this post.

My Notes

There are lots of sellers for the TK911 on AliExpress, and it appears to come in 2G and 4G variants. I found a few 4G listings at very low prices, but then when I went to add them to my cart, they automatically switched to the 2G version (!). Buyer beware.
Before you try to make it all work in Traccar, it's good to confirm that the devices and your SIM cards are working by tracking your devices via the manufacturer's site first.
Once you issue the adminip123456 <ip/domain> <port> command, the device will no longer send location updates to TKStar's servers.
Hologram (my SIM provider) supports sending inbound SMS (i.e., to your tracker) for free via their web UI / dashboard. To inspect the replies, expand the Activity Log console at the bottom of the page:
At first, I thought Hologram's SMS messages weren't going through, so I downloaded the official apps (Winnie GPS & TKSTAR GPS) and created an account there. Don't bother doing this; the apps only support sending a limited subset of commands to the device anyway.
The keekatek.com link in Peter's original post contains a list of commands that the TK911 accepts, and is more complete than the official manual that the device came with. Unfortunately, the link is dead; here it is on archive.org.

Try the check123456 and imei123456 commands liberally; they will respond with a summary of the current configuration of the device. (I was not able to get a response from status123456, ever.)

Ryan3 months ago

One More Note

It will take a few minutes for your device to register with Hologram's servers. The very first time this happens, you will receive an SMS (from the device, in Hologram's dashboard) like the one below:

{"new_imei": "8039779624985842", "msg": "Device 7331671 first attach with 8039779624985842"}

Any SMS commands you send before receiving this message will fail.

Charlie7 days ago

Hi Ryan!!
I'm just looking for those devices you mentioned and I found this: https://es.aliexpress.com/item/1005005834177155.html

I believe I would set it up to my own traccar server with SMS configuration

Could you share what you bought?. Could you share how many days the battery works?

Ryan7 days ago

Which item should you buy?

The link you shared above is exactly the kind of sneaky listing I warned about in my first bullet point. Here is a screenshot of the item after I add it to my cart—notice that the listing title itself says 4G, but the product thumbnail and badge both say 2G:

Here is the listing I ordered from. Note that it is more expensive than the one you shared. tbh I have no idea how to test whether it's actually 2G or 4G, but my understanding is that most (if not all) US mobile operators have already shut down their 2G and 3G networks, so I'm pretty sure it wouldn't work if it were a 2G device.

Maybe you will have good luck with the 2G item. I personally would not risk it, given the difficulty of returns on AliExpress, and how much difficulty I've had debugging issues with GPS trackers so far.

Battery Life

Honestly I haven't used it that much since I got it, so don't quote me—but I think it lasts more than 24h, less than 48h. I believe I set the update interval to 20s, but again, not 100% sure.

Charlie7 days ago

Thanks Ryan for your quick response. My bad, I wanted to share this one instead: Aliexpress link

What it concerns me about this solution it's its battery life. I assume you disconnect it at home and you switch on when you go outside. Otherwise, 2 days is too less. Maybe increasing updates to 1 minute could help.

Could you explain why you are not using it?. Did you find it useless?

Thanks!

Ryan7 days ago

I mean, I really got it because I had already set up Traccar for my car, and it was so much work that I wanted to find other applications for it. Now that I've got them working, I've decided I don't want to bother trying to remember to keep them charged when I won't really need them 99% of the time; they sort of became a solution in search of a problem.

For the time being, I leave the trackers in the glovebox of my car. If I ever take the dogs camping, or anywhere new off-leash, I will put the trackers on. BUT Li-ion batteries degrade faster when you store them fully charged or at high temperatures, so I keep them at about 50% SOC.

Peter Hanton6 days ago

Battery life is certainly a problem. I no longer use the tracker and I keep my dog on a lead, especially now that the wolf is active again in my country (the Netherlands). But earlier when I still used the tracker, I wanted to receive updates quickly with an escape attempt and then the battery will really drain fast.

I am still looking for a tracker for a scooter. These may be on battery, but it seems that in practice they quickly cut such a thread and then it is of no use to you.