Yearly Archives: 2013

Jun 28 2013

UK Radio Ham Plans Lunar CubeSat

Pocket Spacecraft

Pocket Spacecraft

UK radio amateur Michael Johnson M0MJJ is raising funds on Kickstarter for a CubeSat that aims to travel to the Moon.

Michael - Founder

Michael – Founder

The Pocket Spacecraft project hopes to raise at least £290,000 ($442,000) to fund a 3U (30x10x10cm) CubeSat. It will carry Pocket Spacecraft known as ‘Scouts’ to the Moon. A ‘Scout’ is a disk with flexible electronics, smaller than a CD, containing a transceiver, antenna and solar cells.

The CubeSat should release a batch of the wafer thin Scout satellites into Earth orbit and deploy another batch of the Scout satellites into Lunar orbit.

Melania - Microgravity Experiment Lead

Melania – Microgravity Experiment Lead

It is understood the mission plans to use the 435 MHz and 2400 MHz bands.

The Kickstarter page says “If you are, or would like to be, a radio amateur, we’ll show you how to communicate directly with your spacecraft in space when it is nearby using inexpensive UHF and S-band equipment. Communication at (cis-)lunar distances is more expensive (typically requiring 5-24m+ steerable dishes), but available to some clubs and enthusiasts.”

Watch the video and read more about the Pocket Spacecraft project at
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1677943140/send-your-own-pocket-spacecraft-on-a-mission-to-th

Pocket Spacecraft is believed to be the first UK satellite project to use Kickstarter. These USA satellite projects have already successfully raised money on Kickstarter:

Radio ham Zac Manchester KD2BHC used Kickstarter to raise $74,586 in donations to fund the development and deployment of 200 amateur radio KickSat sprite satellites expected to take place later this year.

Radio amateurs Jeroen Cappaert KK6BLQ and Joel Spark KK6ANB are on the team of the ham radio satellite project ArduSat. They managed to raise donations of $106,330 in just 30 days.

SkyCube which will transmit on 915 MHz in the 902-928 MHz amateur radio band raised $116,890.

Kickstarter is not just about raising large sums of money, for example Sandy Antunes used Kickstarter to raise $2,780 to buy a ham radio transceiver and antennas to create an amateur radio satellite ground station Calliope.

Jun 27 2013

915-921 MHz to be license exempt in UK

Ofcom-logo-col-tOfcom has published a statement setting out its decision to release the 870-876 MHz and 915-921 MHz spectrum bands on a license exempt basis

This follows a consultation in January 2013. The released spectrum will be used by Short Range Devices (SRDs) and Radio Frequency Identification (RFIDs). A further consultation on the technical details of the license exemption will follow in the autumn.

The adoption of 915-921 MHz by CEPT would create the only license exempt spectrum between 41 and 2400 MHz that is available world-wide. Other license exempt frequency bands for SRDs and RFIDs are only available on a regional or country basis causing problems when equipment produced for one country is sold in another.

The Ofcom statement can be found here
http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/consultations/872_876_mhz/statement/

The SkyCube CubeSat which aims to be deployed from the International Space Station (ISS) at the end of 2013 plans to transmit on 915 MHz.

Naval Postgraduate School CubeSat 915 MHz 57.6 kbps modem http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a556715.pdf

Jun 27 2013

CubeSat Presentation at Radio Club of Paris

AMSAT-Francophone LogoA  CubeSat presentation was given by AMSAT Francophone to a scientific conference held by the Radio Club of Paris F6KVP on May 29, 2013. A video of the presentation has been made available on the web.

AMSAT-Francophone site in Google English http://tinyurl.com/AMSAT-Francophone

Radio Club of Paris F6KVP in Google English http://tinyurl.com/RadioClubParis
F6KVP on Twitter https://twitter.com/F6KVP

Watch Les nanosatellites (Note this video is in French)

Video streaming by Ustream

Jun 26 2013

ESA announce six CubeSats chosen for Phase 1

AAUSAT 4 CubeSat

AAUSAT 4 CubeSat

Six student teams and their supervisors have gathered at ESA’s ESTEC centre in The Netherlands for the kick-off of the new Fly Your Satellite! Programme under the ESA Education Office.

On June 26-28, ESA experts will introduce the objectives and present the activities to be performed during the first phase of the programme.

In January, ESA’s Education Office announced the ‘Fly Your Satellite!’ initiative. This is aimed at offering student teams the opportunity to become familiar with good engineering practice to build and perform satellite testing in order to increase the chances of a successful mission. The 2013 edition of the programme is however only focussing on testing selected university-built satellites that are already at an advanced stage of development.

Launch of Vega VV01

Launch of Vega VV01

‘Fly Your Satellite!’ builds on the success of the ‘CubeSats for the Vega Maiden Flight’ pilot programme. This culminated in 2012 with the launch of seven student-built CubeSats on the first flight of the new ESA Vega launcher.

The focus of the kick-off meeting will consist of coordinating the activity to be performed during the first phase of Fly Your Satellite! enabling the teams to complete the construction of their satellite. This will include extensive satellite testing in ambient conditions under the supervision of ESA specialists who will decide which satellites should participate in the next phase of the programme.

The second phase will see the satellites tested in the simulated conditions of outer space and in those the satellites will experience at launch. These will include vibration and thermal-vacuum tests.

ConSat-1 engineering model

ConSat-1 engineering model

The six CubeSats chosen for Phase 1 are:

Robusta-1B from France will validate a radiation test methodology for specific transistor components.

Oufti-1 from Belgium will demonstrate the D-STAR digital communication protocol and validate high-efficiency solar cells.

ConSat-1 from Canada will analyse radiation characteristics in the South-Atlantic Anomaly, and test technology payloads.

e-st@r-II from Italy will test an Active-Attitude Determination Control System.

AAUSAT4 from Denmark will test an improved version of student built AIS (Automated Identification System) receivers.

Politech.1 from Spain will carry a student built C-band communication system, a “GEODEYE” Earth Observation camera for academic purposes, and solar wind experiments.

Read the full ESA article at http://www.esa.int/Education/ESA_and_student_teams_kick-off_Fly_Your_Satellite

Fly Your Satellite! initiative http://www.esa.int/Education/Students_are_you_ready_to_fly_your_satellites_in_space

Jun 26 2013

Two Lithuanian Amateur Radio CubeSats Plan 2013 Launch To ISS

Kibo Robot Arm CubeSat Deployment

Kibo Robot Arm CubeSat Deployment

It is hoped that two Lithuanian satellites will be among the CubeSats sent by Nanoracks LLC to the International Space Station (ISS) on the SpaceX CRS-3 mission in November, 2013. They will be deployed from the ISS by the JEM Small Satellite Orbital Deployer (J-SSOD) of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).

The Kaunas University of Technology is developing LituanicaSAT-1 while the Lithuanian Space Federation is working on LitSat-1.

Vytenis Buzas and Laurynas Mačiulis with LituanicaSAT-1

Vytenis Buzas and Laurynas Mačiulis with LituanicaSAT-1

2013 is the 80th anniversary of the historic flight by Lithuanian pilots Steponas Darius and Stasys Girėnas in the airplane Lituanica. On July 15, 1933, they took off from Floyd Bennett Field in New York and flew across the Atlantic Ocean, covering a distance of 6,411 kilometers without landing, in 37 hours and 11 minutes. Tragically they crashed by the village of Kuhdamm, near Soldin, Germany just 650 km from their destination of Kaunas in Lithuania.

LituanicaSAT-1 plans to carry a VGA camera, GPS receiver, 9k6 AX25 FSK telemetry beacon and a 150 mW V/U FM voice transponder. Links:
• Google English web http://tinyurl.com/KosmonautaiLituanicaSAT-1
• Google English Wiki http://tinyurl.com/WikiLituanicaSAT-1
• Facebook https://www.facebook.com/Lituanicasat1

LituanicaSAT-1

LituanicaSAT-1

LitSat-1 is understood to be planning a U/V linear transponder for SSB/CW communications. Links:
• Lithuanian Space Association in Google English  http://tinyurl.com/LithuanianSpaceAssociation
• Facebook https://www.facebook.com/palydovas
• Google English article http://tinyurl.com/LitSat-1-Article

The IARU coordinated frequencies for the two CubeSats are:

LitSat-1
• SSB Transponder Uplink 435.180 MHz Downlink 145.950 MHz
• AX25 Uplink 437.550 MHz Downlink 145.850 MHz

LituanicaSat-1
• FM Transponder Uplink 145.950 MHz Downlink 435.180 MHz
• AX25 Uplink 145.850 MHz AX25 Downlink 437.550 MHz
• CW Beacon 437.275 MHz

Google English article on the two Lithuanian CubeSats http://tinyurl.com/LithuanianCubeSats

1933 Lituanica flight http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithuanica

Jun 26 2013

Joint Submission to Ofcom 2.4 GHz Consultation

AMSAT-UK_Bevelled_LogoAMSAT-UK, the UK Microwave Group (UKuG), the British Amateur Television Club (BATC) and the Radio Society of Great Britain (RSGB) have responded to the Ofcom 2400 MHz consultation.

The 2400-24500 MHz band is allocated to the Amateur and Amateur-Satellite Services. Ofcom’s consultation ‘Licence Exempt spectrum use in the 2400 MHz band’ calls for input to understanding spectrum use by licence exempt (LE) devices in the 2400 MHz band.

This band is close to radio spectrum in the 2300 MHz band which the Ministry of Defence (MoD) plans to release for new civil uses. These plans are part of a Government commitment to release 500 MHz of spectrum for new civil uses by 2020. This aims to address the increasing demand for spectrum fueled by devices such as smartphones and tablets.

The joint response highlights that careful consideration is required to avoid a significant loss of capacity for both amateurs and the general public.

As well as the Amateur Services the band supports a host of valuable consumer applications such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and ZigBee.

Read the joint response at http://rsgb.org/main/files/2013/06/RSGB_2400LE-reply.pdf

Ofcom consultation page http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/consultations/2400-mhz/