Is there a way to configure the mesh channel on something other than  1?  Setup (v1) makes it seem like you can, but it does not seem to really do that...

W8QPP

First,  you do have to reboot for the change to take effect.

Second, do you have other mesh nodes in range?  I believe that if a mesh node sees another mesh node with the correct SSID when it powers up, it will come up on the WiFi channel the existing network is on, no matter the WiFI channel setting the router is programmed to.

I played with two mesh nodes, and if I set one on channel 1 and one on channel 7, if I turn them both off, whichever one comes up first chooses the channel and the other one will follow.  From then on, I think it will stay on whichever channel they ended up on until both are powered off, but I need to experiment with it a little more.

I believe this isn't the way we want it to work, but it's deep down in the proprietary hardware/firmware of the router and we haven't figured out how to change it.

I would really like to operate on channel -1 so we're out of the part 15 interference altogether, is this an option?

Do you really mean channel "-1" or channel 1? 

As far as I understand from previous discussions, this is buried deep down in the hardware or firmware on the WRT-54 series, and we haven't figured out how to make it choose one and only one WiFi channel.

You can set a channel, but when the router reboots, if it hears another mesh node with "BroadbandHamnet-v1" SSID, it will go to that same channel.  It only uses the channel you chose if it doesn't hear another router. 

By the way, is there a way to tell what channel a mesh node is actually on from its own web interface?   Right now, the only way I can tell is to use another mesh node to do a wifi scan.

I mean Channel -1, although channel 0 would be cool as well.  As referenced in the HSMM-MESH Wikipedia page:

2.4 GHz custom frequencies

Using professional grade hardware or modified consumer grade hardware it is possible to operate on 802.11b/g hardware on channels that are effectively "0" at 2.407 GHz and "−1" at 2.402 GHz. Using these channels allows amateur operators to move away from unlicensed Part 15 operators but may interfere with amateur radio satellite downlinks near 2.400 GHz and 2.401 GHz.

If the mesh will automatically join a node that is available, and if that node isn't in the Amateur Radio Portion of the 2.4GHz band, would an amplified node be breaking the law by connecting to a node on channel 8?  Can we actually choose a channel above channel 6 in the Broadband-Hamnet code and still operate as part 97?