Electrum Lightning Network walkthrough

[blueflue]

well thank you for helping me out getting some clarity about the issue.
do you mind sharing the link to the other person with this issue?

the only reason i came to lightning is to save on fees and now i will have to pay a much higher amount than on any on-chain transaction
first and last time i'm using lightning.

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[Rath_]

do you mind sharing the link to the other person with this issue?

Sure. I will send you a private message in a moment.

the only reason i came to lightning is to save on fees and now i will have to pay a much higher amount than on any on-chain transaction
first and last time i'm using lightning.

Electrum might not have been the best choice for the first time, but you simply got extremely unlucky with the suggested peer. If you had opened a channel to a different node, I am quite sure that you would have had a much better experience. I would suggest you using either BlueWallet or Phoenix Wallet next time. I have been running an LND node for quite some time now and I haven't run into any major problems, but it's quite a bit more complicated than using Electrum.

If you decide to close the channel, I would appreciate if you could let us know here how much you ended up paying. I hope that the cooperative close will result in significantly lower fees.

[CryptD38]

Hello
To transfer an amount between my 2 wallets, if I understand correctly the lightniht network is the best way to minimize fees AND the fastest?

Here is my case
Wallet A ~1,4 mBTC (btc purchase made with CB)
Wallet B empty
I am with Electrum 4.1.2

The idea is to transfer the whole amount from wallet A to wallet B using lightning.
I am at the confirmation stage with a transaction fee of 0.0038 mBTC
1/ Is this correct?
2/ Is there a particular procedure to do this?
3/ What are the optimum settings to do this properly?

[nc50lc]

Hello
To transfer an amount between my 2 wallets, if I understand correctly the lightniht network is the best way to minimize fees AND the fastest?

Both wallets should have an open channel before they can send Bitcoins through lightning, and the receiver should've some "receiving capacity".
In your case, it's less advisable to use lightning since you'll have to open a channel on both wallets and create inbound capacity to "Wallet B".

You may consider sending on-chain right now while the average fee is very low.
Current priority fee is 2-3 sat/vB.

Lightning is best used for small recurrent transactions.

[BlackHatCoiner]

To transfer an amount between my 2 wallets, if I understand correctly the lightniht network is the best way to minimize fees AND the fastest?

No, because of the bold part. If you want to make one transfer, the lightning network won't reduce you fees. It can be used if you want to make many micro-payments between two wallets. The transactions that open and close the lightning channel happen on-chain and thus, you'll have to pay for both of them normally. It reduces the fees of the intervening TXs. So if you just want to make one transaction between two wallets, LN won't assist you.

Essentially, LN helps two parties decide the final balance of who gets what, after lots of transactions. It's very practical thought. There's no point on clogging the block chain with lots of transactions.

[CryptD38]

Thank you for your quick answers. If this is correct, I am less enthusiastic about this network. I need to bring more anonymity for small recurrent needs of bitcoin exchange of small amounts (10$~100$):
1/ annual recurring purchase on a website for a service
2/ balancing (non recurring) a few times a year of purchase (or receipt of donation) on a wallet with btc chains that are published on the bitcoin network to transfer them between my different wallets

Really no interest in either case?
if NO, what would you see as a solution for these 2 cases?

[nc50lc]

Really no interest in either case?
if NO, what would you see as a solution for these 2 cases?

I see, it's just a few times or once a year, so just time them when the average fee rate is low (like now for example).
There's no advantage on using lightning for those use-case, as the matter of fact, the other party might close your channel due to inactivity before you can even perform your next transaction.

[BlackHatCoiner]

I need to bring more anonymity for small recurrent needs of bitcoin exchange of small amounts (10$~100$)

If you want anonymity then Bitcoin isn't your thing. You should use Monero. Not to mention that the fees are high for transferring small amounts of BTC. If you just want privacy, then use CoinJoin or mix them.

1/ annual recurring purchase on a website for a service

This can happen on LN, but once in a year? It's too long and your provider must accept LN payments. I guess, though, that it can work, it's just not worth it.

2/ balancing (non recurring) a few times a year of purchase (or receipt of donation) on a wallet with btc chains that are published on the bitcoin network to transfer them between my different wallets

I'll need you to explain further this one. I haven't understood a thing.

[CryptD38]

Re
Thank you for your follow-up. I understand that the lightning network is not the best solution.
I have opened a new thread so as not to disturb this discussion thread.
Thank you for helping me there  !
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5336691.msg56986167#msg56986167

[TechXL]

I'm seeing this error in Electrum UI when trying to open a LN channel (after trying any trampoline method in the drop down menu: ACINQ, Electrum trampolin, trampoline hodlisterco)

Could not open channel: Exception("Remote peer reported error [DO NOT TRUST THIS MESSAGE]: b'local/remote feerates are too different: remoteFeeratePerKw=253 localFeeratePerKw=9978'")

Moving the fee slider all the way to the right produced barely higher remoteFeerateperKw amounts so not sure how to get past this issue.

Any helpful pointers are much appreciated.

[Rath_]

I'm seeing this error in Electrum UI when trying to open a LN channel (after trying any trampoline method in the drop down menu: ACINQ, Electrum trampolin, trampoline hodlisterco)

There seems to be something wrong with your server's fee estimation. Try connecting to a different Electrum server. Click on the green dot in the bottom-right corner, right-click on some server and select "Use as server". Electrum should also connect to a different server on each restart.

[TechXL]

I'm seeing this error in Electrum UI when trying to open a LN channel (after trying any trampoline method in the drop down menu: ACINQ, Electrum trampolin, trampoline hodlisterco)

There seems to be something wrong with your server's fee estimation. Try connecting to a different Electrum server. Click on the green dot in the bottom-right corner, right-click on some server and select "Use as server". Electrum should also connect to a different server on each restart.

For security/trust purposes I only connect to my own Electrum Server (EPS) instance. Is there anything specific I could tweak via CLI or config file editing?
(I'm able to send regular on-chain payments and adjust fees accordingly so issue is only present with LN.)

[Rath_]

For security/trust purposes I only connect to my own Electrum Server (EPS) instance. Is there anything specific I could tweak via CLI or config file editing?

Check out the following quote. I believe that's why you are unable to open a channel.

Please note that Electrum Personal Server (EPS) cannot be
     used with lightning wallets, because channels funding addresses
     are arbitrary.

Is there any particular reason why you chose EPS over ElectrumX?

[TechXL]

For security/trust purposes I only connect to my own Electrum Server (EPS) instance. Is there anything specific I could tweak via CLI or config file editing?

Check out the following quote. I believe that's why you are unable to open a channel.

Please note that Electrum Personal Server (EPS) cannot be
     used with lightning wallets, because channels funding addresses
     are arbitrary.

Is there any particular reason why you chose EPS over ElectrumX?

I meant to say I run Electrum Rust Server v0.8.9 (so a full Electrum server) . It's the one that came with my Nodl node as it's best recommended or Pi performance reasons.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Check out the following quote. I believe that's why you are unable to open a channel.

Didn't know about that. What does it mean that the funding addresses are arbitrary? I'm not sure that I've understood. EPS allows you to enter a master public key and it should derive from there, whether the lightning channels fund arbitrarily or not.

Is there any particular reason why you chose EPS over ElectrumX?

First one that comes into my mind, you can run a pruned EPS. In ElectrumX, it has to be a full node.

[BlackHatCoiner]

What has happened with the swap feature? My channel's capacity has 0.049 tBTC, but I cannot receive anything. I'm trying to swap the lightning funds with on-chain funds to increase my receiving capacity, but it only allows me up to 0.002.

Is this a bug? Is there any other way I can increase my receiving capacity in Electrum?

[Rath_]

I'm trying to swap the lightning funds with on-chain funds to increase my receiving capacity, but it only allows me up to 0.002.

Since the service is managed by an external provider, they might have run out of coins on the testnet. Give me a couple of minutes and I will test it.

Is there any other way I can increase my receiving capacity in Electrum?

You can simply spend some coins or use some other swap service. I don't think that many of them support the testnet, though.

[BlackHatCoiner]

You can simply spend some coins or use some other swap service. I don't think that many of them support the testnet, though.

I want to spend between my wallets and not to lose the coins. What kind of swap services do you have in mind? Is there a website?

[Rath_]

What kind of swap services do you have in mind? Is there a website?

Here are the ones that I would consider using on the mainnet: Boltz, Lightning Conductor, ZigZag. Unfortunately, none of them supports testnet swaps directly from their website.

What node did you open your channel to?

[BlackHatCoiner]

What node did you open your channel to?

https://1ml.com/testnet/node/038863cf8ab91046230f561cd5b386cbff8309fa02e3f0c3ed161a3aeb64a643b9