Tag Archives: Amateur Radio

Nov 30 2013

Introduction to High Altitude Ballooning

Phil Crump M0DNY

Phil Crump M0DNY

In this video Phil Crump M0DNY of the UK High Altitude Society (UKHAS) gives an introduction to High Altitude Ballooning (HAB). The presentation was given to the BATC Convention on October 26, 2013.

Watch Introduction to High Altitude Ballooning

Noel Matthews G8GTZ, Chair of the BATC, has announced the first 11 presentation videos from the CAT13 convention on ATV/DATV, held October 26, 2013, have been put up on the BATC video archive area.

They can be found in the http://batc.tv/ Film Archive by selecting the BATC CAT13 category.

The direct links are available via https://amsat-uk.org/2013/10/29/iss-hamtv-presentation-by-g3vzv/

UK High Altitude Society http://ukhas.org.uk/

To get up-to-date information on balloon flights subscribe to the UKHAS Mailing List by sending a blank email to this address:
ukhas+subscribe@googlegroups.com

Nov 29 2013

PicoDragon team ask for reports

PicoDragon CubeSat - Image credit VNSC

PicoDragon CubeSat – Image credit VNSC

PicoDragon is a 1U CubeSat that was deployed from the International Space Station on November 19.

It was developed by the Việt Nam National Satellite Center (VNSC), University of Tokyo and IHI aerospace.

The satellite, callsign XV9PID, carries a 100mW CW beacon on 437.250 MHz (+/- 10 kHz Doppler shift). It is understood there is also a 1200 bps AFSK 800mW AX.25 telemetry beacon that can operate on 437.365 MHz and a camera for Earth imaging.

PicoDragon was deployed from the ISS with two other CubeSats ArduSat-1 and ArduSat-x

PicoDragon was deployed from the ISS with two other CubeSats ArduSat-1 and ArduSat-x

Nam Dương writes:

I’m member of PicoDragon Project also known as PDG. We found that the PicoDragon is a very weak signal when in darkness (eclipse), and strong signal when in sunlight. If you have a ground station, please help us to recover the 437.250 MHz CW signal of PDG. We want to recover the CW signal both when it is in eclipse and in daylight.

If you have any comment or information for PDG, please send it to my email pdg<at>vnsc.org.vn or post to the PDG Facebook page.

Thank you so much.

Welcome to PicoDragon Project, and welcome to Việt Nam.

Website http://pdg.vnsc.org.vn/

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/pdgproject

Nov 28 2013

Commands for WREN SSTV Released

WREN - Image credit Stadoko

WREN – Image credit Stadoko

It is believed that the SSTV PocketQube WREN is currently in a mode where it beacons on 437.405 MHz for 1.6 seconds then listens for 6 minutes on that frequency for any commands. If none are received it goes to sleep for 2 minutes before transmitting the beacon again.

The WREN team have released the following information on their Facebook page to enable radio amateurs to activate the WREN SSTV transmitter.

BASIC COMMANDS

Commands to WREN are sent by toggling the carrier [of a FM transmitter]:
Carrier on/off: 1=long, 0=short, leave a noticeable silence between the bits.

• Activate/HK: 110011
• wait until answer [should be within 2 seconds]
• Camera ON: 11111
• wait until answer
• Snapshot & Thumbnail receive: 110
• decoder should display thumbnail picture 12*14 pixel can repeat this command until something useable appears
• SSTV send: 110100
• martin-1 SSTV picture comes… in 320×240 pixels color

Wren should answer to the commands within two seconds.
Wait always at least two seconds after having received data before sending to WREN

Notice:
Send the Activate/HK command first, else WREN won´t react to other commands.
When camera is OFF, a snapshot or SSTV command will send WREN into sleep mode. ALWAYS SWITCH CAMERA ON FIRST BEFORE SENDING CAMERA COMMANDS.
WREN´s housekeeping data will show the status of camera power (ON or OFF).

PS: A preliminary commanding software will come soon.
Special wishes for PTT control? VOX, RS232-RTS Pin etc ?

The Telemetry Decoder and an Audio File of the beacon are available at http://we.tl/TkWEuhIlnF

Hope you can catch WREN and have fun commanding it.

Cheers, Paul

WREN on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/StaDoKo

WREN a Ham Radio Slow Scan TV PocketQube Satellite
https://amsat-uk.org/2013/10/24/wren-a-ham-radio-sstv-pocketqube/

Dnepr Yasny launch https://amsat-uk.org/satellites/dnepr-november-2013/

Nov 28 2013

FUNcube-1 Command Success

FUNcube-1 Monitoring Station at the NRC Bletchley Park

FUNcube-1 Monitoring Station at the NRC Bletchley Park

GB2RS have released a video of the moment the first command to FUNcube-1 was sent by Wouter Weggelaar PA3WEG.

Watch AMSAT FUNcube-1 command success at RSGB National Radio Centre

BBC TV visit FUNcube station at RSGB National Radio Centre
https://amsat-uk.org/2013/11/22/bbc-visit-funcube-station-at-rsgb-national-radio-centre/

FUNcube-1 Deployed !!! https://amsat-uk.org/2013/11/21/funcube-1-deployed/

First Transponder Test https://amsat-uk.org/2013/11/22/funcube-1-ao-73-transponder-tested/

First Fitter Message Uploaded https://amsat-uk.org/2013/11/21/ao-73-first-fitter-message-uploaded/

Nov 27 2013

Delfi-n3Xt 2400 bps BPSK decoded in Japan

Delfi-n3Xt Satellite

Delfi-n3Xt Satellite

Decoding the Delfi-n3Xt 2400 bps BPSK beacon on 145.870 MHz has proved to be very challenging but Tetsurou Satou JA0CAW in Japan has succeeded in decoding some frames.

He decoded three frames of telemetry in two passes on November 27.

In a recent update Jasper PC4JB from the Delfi-n3Xt team said:

We have noticed however that the DUDe telemetry client does not properly indicate the frequency offset and it is very difficult to get a lock on the signal.

Also our ICOM910 receivers have too limited bandwidth to receive a 2400 bit/s BPSK signal properly (although we had a few packets decoded with this, so it is just on the edge of what is possible). We now use only AR5000 in combination with an SDR to record a wide spectrum in IQ files. This way we can replay the files and retune the signal again and have been able to decode more packets than before. This morning at our second pass we were lucky to have a real time lock on the signal and retrieve many packets, so it is possible to have it right at once. But of course we would like to get the ‘luck-factor’ out of it.

A few people will look into the Costas PLL inside DUDe to see if we can improve its performance.  Meanwhile, you can regard Delfi-n3Xt as a real challenging game to decode packets…

JA0CAW website in Google English http://tinyurl.com/JA0CAW

Delfi-n3Xt telemetry reception http://www.delfispace.nl/operations/delfi-n3xt-telemetry-reception

Delfi-n3Xt http://www.delfispace.nl/operations/radio-amateurs

Dnepr Yasny launch https://amsat-uk.org/satellites/dnepr-november-2013/

Nov 27 2013

WREN heard on 437.405 MHz

UB4UAD screenshot of WREN signal received Nov 26, 2013 at 06:47:13 UT

UB4UAD screenshot of WREN signal received Nov 26, 2013 at 06:47:13 UT

Dmitry Pashkov UB4UAD may have received the first signal from the WREN PocketQube on 437.405 MHz (+/- 10 kHz Doppler).

The WREN team would welcome any further reports. The length of the AFSK-modulated beacon is 1.6 seconds.

The Telemetry Decoder and an Audio File of the beacon are available at http://we.tl/TkWEuhIlnF

Dmitry was using these TLEs:

WREN
1 99922U 13066G 13326.48861818 -.00000055 00000-0 00000+0 0 75
2 99922 097.8066 039.1177 0023760 211.9046 148.0730 14.86334042 151

Source: Dmitry Pashkov UB4UAD http://ub4uad.ru/?p=2917

UB4UAD site in Google English http://tinyurl.com/UB4UAD

WREN on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/StaDoKo

WREN a Ham Radio Slow Scan TV PocketQube Satellite
https://amsat-uk.org/2013/10/24/wren-a-ham-radio-sstv-pocketqube/

Dnepr Yasny launch https://amsat-uk.org/satellites/dnepr-november-2013/