Monthly Archives: August 2013

Aug 25 2013

Ham Radio Satellites at Tokyo Ham Fair

JAMSAT stand at the Tokyo Ham Fair 2013

JAMSAT stand at the Tokyo Ham Fair 2013

The JARL Ham Fair 2013 was held at Tokyo Big Sight, Ariake, Tokyo on August 24-25. JAMSAT and several amateur radio satellite projects were represented.

The University of Tsukuba CubeSat ITF-1 YUI “Binding” support project was there. The formal name ITF-1 comes from the initial letter of the university slogan “Imagine The Future”.  The satellite also has a popular name YUI which means bond or binding in Japanese, it came from the project’s concept‚ “Creating the Worldwide Human Community”.

The ITF-1 satellite beacon on 437.525 MHz will send telemetry by a Morse Code audio tone on an FM transmitter running 300 milliwats output. It should be possible to receive it using simple equipment such as a handheld transceiver or scanner.

According to the ITF-1 website the “Binding” support project is organized by the student volunteers to support the construction of a consolidated network and expand public relation activities with the aim of encouraging many reception reports when the satellite is launched.  ITF-1 will fly with the primary payload the Global Precipitation Measurement Dual-Frequency Precipitation Radar GPM-DPR satellite in 2014.

ARTSAT stand at the Tokyo Ham Fair

ARTSAT stand at the Tokyo Ham Fair

The ARTSAT stand featured the Invader CubeSat which is being developed by students at Tama Art University. The IARU has coordinated 437.325 MHz and 437.200 MHz for Invader which aims to have a camera for Earth imaging and a Digi-Talker, to transmit voice data using FM. Invader will be on the same launch as ITF-1.

Also at the fair was the SPROUT project. This nano-satellite, built by students from Nihon University, is 20 x 20 x 22 cm with a mass of 6.7 kg. It plans to launch with the L-band (1236.5 MHz/1257.5 MHz/1278.5 MHz) Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellite ALOS-2 in December, 2013.

SPROUT will have a digi-talker and will transmit, using Slow Scan TV (SSTV) and FM packet, pictures of the Earth taken by an on-board camera. It is believed that radio amateurs will be able to make use of the digipeater and possibly even command when pictures are taken.

ITF-1 project in Google English http://tinyurl.com/ITF-1-Yui-Binding-Project
Imagine The Future https://amsat-uk.org/2012/01/19/itf1-cubesat-imagine-the-future/

ARTSAT project in Google English http://tinyurl.com/ARTSAT
A student art satellite https://amsat-uk.org/2012/04/12/invader-cubesat-a-student-art-satellite/

SPROUT project in Google English http://tinyurl.com/Sprout-Satellite
SSTV satellite https://amsat-uk.org/2012/08/24/sprout-amateur-radio-sstv-satellite-to-launch-in-2013/

JARL Ham Fair 2013 in Google English http://tinyurl.com/JARL-Ham-Fair-2013

Reports on previous JARL Ham Fairs http://www.jarl.or.jp/English/4_Library/A-4-6_ham-fair/ham-fair.htm

Tokyo Ham Fair 2013

Tokyo Ham Fair 2013

Aug 24 2013

UK stations wanted for FO-29 contacts with Cuba

Hector CO6CBF working Joe EI5EV on FO-29 2013-04-03 1440z

Hector CO6CBF working Joe EI5EV on FO-29 2013-04-03 1440z

Hector CO6CBF is looking for stations in UK to try contacts on the amateur radio satellite FO-29.

Currently when the satellite in apogee it has a big footprint which covers UK and Cuba for a few minutes.

Anyone wanting to try a contact with Cuba should email Hector on: co6cbf<at>frcuba.co.cu

FO-29 frequency information https://amsat-uk.org/satellites/fuji-oscar-29-jas-2/

Aug 24 2013

Good News for CubeBug-1

CubeBug-1

CubeBug-1

The amateur radio satellite CubeBug-1, also known as El Capitán Beto, launched April 26, 2013, is recovering from the power budget issue that caused the transmitter to be turned off for several days.

This was achieved after one of the AMSAT-LU stations in coordination and in conjunction with Satellogic team, send a command to reconfigure onboard software to turn off attitude control circuits feeding magnetorquers this last weekend .

Telemetry text mode command taken before change can be seen at
http://www.amsat.org.ar/images/cubebug130818.txt

CubeBug - command sent shown top and satellite response below

CubeBug – command sent shown top and satellite response below

Operation was with a RTL SDR dongle, connected directly to antenna, using HDSDR recording software as IF mode only, that helped not to record big amount of data from Orbitron connected to DDE, also automatically compensating Doppler.

After reset, Cubebug-1 went to ‘mission state’, batteries showing adequate level of charge.

Good reports were received from several amateurs from different parts of the globe.

This activity is performed as part of the agreement of mutual collaboration that Satellogic and AMSAT-LU signed on July 2013.

The satellite transmits 1200 bps AFSK, on 437.438 MHz, packets are sent every 30 seconds. The signal is at a low level and a directional antenna and preamp are needed for adequate reception.

Cubebug-1 telemetry information at http://1.cubebug.org/coms/telemetry

73, LU7AA, AMSAT-LU
email: info at amsat.org.ar/
http://www.cetra.org.ar/
http://www.amsat.org.ar/
http://facebook.com/AMSAT.LU

CubeBug-1 carries a packet radio digipeater which it is hoped will be activated for amateur radio use when the primary mission has been completed. Further information at https://amsat-uk.org/satellites/cubebug-1/

Aug 23 2013

APRS destination address for ham radio satellites

APRS LogoAPRS has standardized an ID series for amateur radio OSCAR spacecraft – APOxxx

At the request of Juan Carlos, LU9DO, AMSAT-LU wanted a series of APRS designators for uniquely identifying AMSAT APRS applications.  He suggested those beginning with the letter O for OSCARS.

ALL APRS applications include this identifier in their packets so that the source of APRS data can be known.  See the list at

http://aprs.org/aprs11/tocalls.txt

Bob, WB4APR

APRS UK Yahoo Group http://groups.yahoo.com/group/APRSUK

Aug 23 2013

IARU-R1 release new VHF Handbook

IARU_Region_1_logoIARU Region 1 have released edition 6.12 of the free VHF Managers Handbook.

The handbook has chapters on Band Planning, Contests, Propagation Research, Operating Procedures and Satellites. It even defines a standard for the use of circular polarization defining which way helical beam antennas should be threaded.

Download the handbook – VHF_Handbook_V6_12.

Aug 22 2013

Successful Dnepr launch from Yasny – amateur radio satellite launch to follow

Dnepr_rocket_lift-off

A DNEPR Lift-Off

On Thursday, August 22, 2013 at 14:39 UT Korea’s satellite KOMPSAT-5 launched on a Dnepr from Dombarovsky near Yasny. This marked the first flight of the Dnepr launcher since August 2011.

This successful Dnepr launch should clear the way for the launch in November of another Dnepr from Yasny believed to be carrying up to 23 satellites from 13 nations.

Most of the satellites will carry amateur radio payloads and it should be the largest single deployment of amateur radio satellites since the ill-fated Dnepr launch of July 26, 2006. http://www.southgatearc.org/news/july2006/dnepr_failure.htm

The launch had originally been planned for September 2012 but was postponed while the future of the Dnepr launch program was discussed.

ZACUBE-1 ready to be shipped to the Netherlands and from there to Yasny

ZACUBE-1 ready to be shipped to the Netherlands and from there to Yasny

Among the satellites carrying payloads operating in amateur radio bands that may be on the November launch are:
• UniSat-5 microsat which will deploy Eagle-1, Eagle-2, QB-Scout, Wren and PUCP-SAT-1 which it turn should release a further satellite Pocket-PUCP
• Delfi-n3Xt
• Triton-1
• Triton-2
• GOMX-1
• FUNcube-1
• UWE-3
• CubeBug-2
• BRITE-PL1
• Humsat-D
• CPUT ZAcube-1
• HinCube
• BeakerSat
• NEE-02 KRYSAOR (980 MHz)