[arm-allstar] OpenVPN (Mobile) and Personal VPN Server using Asus router @ home

[Travis French]

Good Afternoon,

I am following up on my original email as I am still having an issue with incoming connections to my mobile node. Outgoing works great as always expected. It is connected through OnStar's 4GLTE if that makes a difference.

So, I originally connected my mobile mode to my home VPN that is built into my Asus router. It was showing my "home" IP address in Supermon so I thought I was there. Maybe too easy. No incoming connections. I quickly assumed I needed to add entries to the rpt.conf file since my home and mobile node had the same WAN IP address. Not the case. No incoming connection local or otherwise.

Thinking maybe that the Asus VPN server was the issue, I set up another dedicated Raspberry Pi this week running PiVPN. Of course, I turned off the Asus VPN. Both options work great for access to my LAN remotely. And in both cases, my WAN IP looks as though I am at home. In both cases still, I cannot receive incoming connections on my mobile node local or otherwise.

I have all applicable ports forwarded to my local VPN IP address. Hopefully that is correct?? I have also switched off my firewall and set the VPN to DMZ temporarily to see if that was the issue. No luck.

At this point, I am feeling really silly and must be missing something fundamental.

I am not a network expert but I am learning a lot. Any guidance or nudge in the right direction would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you very much in advance,

Travis K2PCB


-----Original Message-----
From: Travis French 
Sent: Thursday, November 21, 2019 1:47 PM
To: 'ARM Allstar' <arm-allstar at hamvoip.org>
Subject: OpenVPN (Mobile) and Personal VPN Server using Asus router @ home

Good Afternoon,

I periodically read about people referencing the use of a VPN and from what I am gathering, this is allowing them to make their mobile node visible so that it can be connected to. Correct me if I am wrong.

I have OpenVPN capability through my ASUS router at home which works great already and allows me access to my home network. I guess I am having trouble even after reading through the OpenVPN documentation on how to set this up so that my mobile node can use this VPN and instead of seeing my network be seen by the internet. Again, am I wrong in thinking that this is even possible?

My questions:

Has anyone down this using the VPN server in their home router?
Do I need to run a different type of VPN server or standalone server on another pi?
Is setting up a home server a waste of time in lieu of a commercial VPN service from a performance perspective?
Once set up, can I assume that my mobile node then have a static IP address that would be my home IP on a different port?

I was wondering is someone could point me to a resource that could help me answer some of these questions and/or steer me in the direction of a setup guide?

Thank you in advance,

Travis K2PCB