Tower Partners on Peavine: Sierra Electronics

Sierra Electronics has been keeping Northern Nevada connected since 1964. The company was built on public safety and mission-critical radio: hospitals, first responders, schools, and the wide-area systems that let people reach each other when it counts. That community focus is not marketing copy on their website. It is how Jarry Walton and his team have operated for more than sixty years.

When a tower owner with that history offers space on Peavine Peak for a nonprofit mesh repeater, it matters. Sierra Electronics is not just leasing us rack space. They are dedicating real infrastructure, at one of the best vantage points in the Truckee Meadows, to something that serves the public good.

Why sharing the heights matters

Tower compounds on peaks like Peavine are scarce, expensive, and hard won. The steel, power, shelters, and permits represent decades of work. Most operators treat that capacity as a commercial asset first and last.

Sierra Electronics takes a broader view. Their own history is rooted in keeping communities safe. They design, install, license, and maintain the systems that hospitals, public safety agencies, and local businesses depend on across Northern Nevada and the Eastern Sierra. Opening a site on Peavine to MeshEnvy fits that same instinct: put reliable communications where people need them, not only where the billing model is easy.

That is the heart of this partnership. MeshEnvy is a public service charity building backbone for rural and underserved Nevada. Sierra Electronics already lives in that world. Sharing tower space with us is an extension of the work they have been doing since 1964.

A site survey at the top

Jarry Walton met me at the summit for a site survey, and we walked the compound together looking at line of sight, existing infrastructure, and where a small mesh node could live without getting in anyone's way. He did not treat the visit like a vendor call. It felt like two people who care about coverage on the same ridgeline trying to figure out how to make something useful happen.

Peavine is one of those peaks you can see from almost anywhere in Reno and Sparks. The west summit rises to about 8,266 feet and already carries a dense cluster of towers and dishes. Sierra Electronics runs a trunking site up there as part of the radio backbone their commercial and public safety customers depend on. Standing on that crest, it is obvious why a community mesh node belongs in the same neighborhood.

Fence post first, tower mount later

We decided the fastest path forward was easy enough to execute on the spot. Jarry was generous enough to let us zip-tie a solar node to one of his fence posts so we could get something on the air and start learning what the site could do. One of his technicians will come back and mount it properly on the tower when schedules align.

That interim step is deliberate, not a shortcut. Getting something on the air tells us more than another afternoon of spreadsheet modeling. It also reflects the kind of partnership we want: low friction, respectful of their compound, and oriented toward learning before we ask for a permanent home on the steel.

A pilot with room to grow

Sierra Electronics maintains several other tower locations across northern Nevada, not just Peavine. We are excited to take this first step together: pilot a node at one of their sites, prove the model, and build from there. If the Peavine install performs the way we expect, we hope to expand to additional Sierra Electronics compounds in Elko and Galena.

Each new site would follow the same logic. A local operator who already serves the community from the heights agrees to share a little capacity with a nonprofit trying to extend that reach. That is how you stitch together backbone coverage across basins commercial carriers never found worth serving.

We have already seen how far a modest mount can reach. From Ophir Hill, a simple test node on a T-stake talked with both Spanish Benchmark and Peavine Peak across roughly thirty miles of basin and ridge. A repeater at Sierra Electronics' site should strengthen that northern Nevada spine in a much more permanent way.

Forest Service authorization

Peavine Peak sits on Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest land, so getting on the air at Jarry's tower is not only a conversation with the site owner. It also requires federal authorization. The U.S. Forest Service facilitated our grant to co-locate at the Sierra Electronics compound, which cleared the way for the pilot install you see in these photos.

Thanks

This pilot would not have happened without two organizations willing to put community benefit ahead of paperwork and profit. Sierra Electronics donated tower space, walked the site with us, and let us start small with a fence-post install while a proper mount is planned. That generosity comes from a company whose whole reason for being is keeping Northern Nevada safe and connected. Sharing their Peavine compound with MeshEnvy is not a side project for them. It is the same public-minded instinct that has guided their work since 1964.

The U.S. Forest Service made the federal side possible on Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest land. They facilitated our authorization to co-locate at the Sierra Electronics compound, reviewed our mission and nonprofit status, and granted us a generous exemption from rental and processing fees. Private infrastructure, federal stewardship, and a charity building community backbone only work when everyone at the table cares about the outcome.

More field notes from Peavine will follow once the permanent mount is in place and we have range data to share. For now, we are grateful to have partners on the mountain who understand that the heights belong to the community as much as to any single tenant.