Millennium Space Systems AQUILA M8 Series Satellite Structure

ARRL Publications Manager and QST Editor Steve Ford, WB8IMY, reports on Amateur Satellite news from the Dayton Hamvention.

The ARRL website reports the launch of the Fox-1 CubeSat has been delayed until October 8, 2015. Fox-1 will carry a 435/145 MHz FM Voice Transponder, see http://www.amsat.org/?page_id=1113

The ARRL story continues: AMSAT Vice President-Engineering Jerry Buxton, N0JY, said that a geosynchronous satellite, planned to launch in 2017, will offer uplinks on 5 GHz and downlinks on 10 GHz.

Buxton explained that the geosynchronous footprint will not be absolutely fixed; some variation may require some up/down movement of the user’s dish at certain times — although not continuously. He said AMSAT is working on this issue in terms of what to recommend for ground stations, but that even in the worst case, a user with a fixed antenna would still be able to enjoy several hours of access each day.

The transponder for the new satellite will be software defined and capable of supporting many different modes, including analog SSB.

AMSAT announced in late April that, if all goes according to plan, an Amateur Radio payload will go into space on a geosynchronous satellite that’s planned for launch in 2017. The satellite’s potential footprint could extend over the US from the Mid-Pacific to Africa. AMSAT has accepted the opportunity to be a “hosted payload” on a spacecraft that Millennium Space Systems (MSS) of El Segundo, California, is under contract to design, launch, and operate for the US government. The Amateur Radio payload must be delivered for testing and integration by next spring.

Source http://www.arrl.org/news/dayton-hamvention-2015-day-1-big-crowd-some-rain-satellite-news

A graphic showing an example of a typical Geosynchronous orbit can be seen at
http://www3.sympatico.ca/n.rieck/docs/sirius.html

 The 2.325 GHz signals from the Sirius satellites in Geosynchronous orbit over North America have been received in the UK.