ARTSAT2:DESPATCH (FO-81 – JQ1ZNN) QSL card

The ARTSAT2:DESPATCH team have sent a a 3D printed QSL card to Michał Zawada SQ5KTM and the Polish team to confirm their reception of the amateur radio signal from the FO-81 spacecraft at a distance of 2,715,228 km from Earth.

ARTSAT2:DESPATCH signal received by the Polish team on December 9, 2014

Michal writes:

On 9 December 2014, at 9:50:23 p.m. UTC we received signals from the ARTSAT 2: DESPATCH space probe, which was at this time at distance of 2,715,228 km from Earth.

The last signals received by us from ARTSAT 2: DESPATCH were very weak, but clearly stood out on the waterfall diagram of the monitoring program. To avoid misinterpretation we asked for confirmation directly from the creators of the space probe: Tama Art University and The University of Tokyo. The data reported by us were analyzed, compared with the model and successfully authenticated – we have received confirmation with thanks.

Important result of our work are gigabytes of data, which were sent for further analysis to the operators of both space probes.

ARTSAT2 DESPATCH 3D Printed Deep Space Sculpture

This result has been achieved courtesy of PIAP [www.piap.pl] which made it possible for us to use 4.5m diameter parabolic mesh dish antenna, the involvement of PIAP employees, the support of fellow amateurs, and of course the understanding families of all those involved.

In our project of monitoring signals from ARTSAT 2: DESPATCH and Shin-En2 space probes , except the antenna, we used radio amateur equipment (purchased and also of our own design), especially designed and made by us emitter which was set in place of the antenna focus, especially prepared software. Preparations of our ground station took us almost two weeks, including some hours on a roof at freezing weather conditions.

Our station operators during all of seven nights were: Piotr SP5MG, Piotr SP5ULN, Lukasz SQ5RWU and Michał SQ5KTM.
Technical support: SQ7GMO, SQ5DRC, team of a few PIAP Institute employees
Guests invited to our station: SP5XMU, SQ5NWI, SQ5AAG, and some more persons.

Ham radio spacecraft launched into deep space
https://amsat-uk.org/2014/12/03/ham-radio-spacecraft-launched-into-deep-space/

Shin’en2 on left – ARTSAT2:DESPATCH on right

ARTSAT2:DESPATCH Internal Structure

Tama Art University Ground Station has decided to conclude attempts to receive the ARTSAT2:DESPATCH spacecraft, amateur radio callsign JQ1ZNN.

One month has past since Deep Space Sculpture “ARTSAT2:DESPATCH(FO-81)” was put into an Earth-escape orbit as a piggyback payload of H-IIA F26 launched at December 3, 2014 from Tanegashima Space Center, JAXA. It is estimated to have stopped sending radio waves since the battery of DESPATCH already ran out (We predicted that the battery will work for 27 days according to the running time of the transmitter).

Shin’en2 on left – ARTSAT2:DESPATCH on right

Today January 3, 2015, the main control station, Tama Art University Ground Station, decided to conclude the operation of DESPATCH. Many people supported and cooperated us throughout the design and development of DESPATCH. In addition, many excellent many ham radio operator received and reported super weak  radio waves of DESPATCH from deep space. To have this opportunity, I would like once again to thank all of them very much.

Reception reports of DESPATCH are summarized on the following page.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1WP-FzXHe8axAzNy44SGbKpJqIRKWHAcIP9vXnaHMb6g/edit#gid=0

Finally, we had two reception reports at 4.7 million kilo-meters from the Earth  (more than 12 times of the distance to the Moon). They were far beyond what we expected. They are the the longest communication distance in the world between two amateur radio stations.

Orbital elements of DESPATCH is as follows (J2000 heliocentric ecliptic coordinates).

– Semi-major axis a : 1.003881127 [AU]
– Eccentricity e : 0.08741828512
– Inclination  i : 6.796995362 [deg]
– Argument of perihelion w : 96.90057903 [deg]
– Longitude of the ascending node W : 250.5520871 [deg]
– Mean anomaly at epoch  M : 101.6280436 [deg]
– Epoch  : 2457023.50000 [JD]
(Time of perihelion :  2456919.7870655278675 [JD])

cf. Orbital elements of EARTH : http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/factsheet/earthfact.html

Celestial sphere position and orbital trajectory of DESPATCH can be checked anytime on the following web pages.

– Celestial Sphere http://artsat.jp/project/despatch/celestial

– Orbital Position http://artsat.jp/project/despatch/orbit

Transmission of the radio wave from DESPATCH has ended. However, the life of DESPATCH as a sculpture around the sun is almost eternal. We calculated the orbit (the distance from the Earth) of DESPATCH for 500 years from now.

http://artsat.jp/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/500years.png

http://artsat.jp/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/500years_large.png

DESPATCH will continue to orbit around the sun as an artificial asteroid. By examining the calculated results for the local minimum value of the distance between the Earth, DESPATCH will approaches to less than 1 million km from Earth after about 350 years. Possibly it will approach more closer to the Earth due to the interaction with unpredictable other celestial bodies.

We are glad if you think of DESPATCH as the most distant artwork in the world sometimes in the future.

ARTSAT project will continue to the future. We already started the conceptual design of next ARTSAT3. We kindly ask for your continuous support and cooperation for the project.

January 3, 2014
ARTSAT Project

Ham radio spacecraft launched into deep space
https://amsat-uk.org/2014/12/03/ham-radio-spacecraft-launched-into-deep-space/

ARTSAT2-DESPATCH received by Zdenek Samek OK1DFC on December 14, 2014 at 21:18:41 UT

Zdenek Samek OK1DFC and Rob Hardenberg PE1ITR reported receiving the amateur radio beacon from the ARTSAT2:DESPATCH spacecraft on December 14 at a distance of 4,700,000 km.

Congratulations to both radio amateurs on a remarkable achievement.

The amateur radio spacecraft ARTSAT2:DESPATCH JQ1ZNN and Shin’en2 JG6YIG were launched on their journey to deep space at 04:22:04 UT on Wednesday, December 3, 2014. The two spacecraft will have an elliptic orbit around the Sun and travel to a deep space orbit between Venus and Mars. The inclination will be almost zero, which means the spacecraft should stay in the Earth’s equatorial plane. The distance from the Sun will be between 0.7 and 1.3 AU. An Astronomical Unit (AU) is 149,597,871 km.

OK1DFC website http://www.ok1dfc.com/eme/despatch/despatch.htm

See images of the reception of ARTSAT2:DESPATCH by Rob Hardenberg PE1ITR at http://www.pe1itr.com/artsat2despatch/

PE1ITR Shin’en2 reception http://www.pe1itr.com/shinen2/

Shin’en2 on left – ARTSAT2:DESPATCH on right

Tracking utilities for the DESPATCH and Shin’en2 spacecraft are available at
http://ji1izr.air-nifty.com/ham_satellite/in_english/index.html

Shin’en2 437.385 MHz http://www.shin-en2.jp/index_E.html

ARTSAT2:DESPATCH 437.325 MHz CW
Web http://despatch.artsat.jp/en/Main_Page
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/artsat
Twitter https://twitter.com/DESPATCH_ARTSAT

DESPATCH reception reports are summarized at:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1WP-FzXHe8axAzNy44SGbKpJqIRKWHAcIP9vXnaHMb6g/edit#gid=0
http://despatch.artsat.jp/en/Cooperative_Data_Reconstruction

Ham radio spacecraft launched into deep space
https://amsat-uk.org/2014/12/03/ham-radio-spacecraft-launched-into-deep-space/