Tag Archives: Amateur Radio

Apr 23 2013

16 year-old UK student to work on KickSat Sprite

KickSat 437 MHz Sprite Satellite

KickSat 437 MHz Sprite Satellite

The Yorkshire Post reports that Luke Bussell, who is a Year 11 student at Bootham School and a member of the school’s astronomy group, got more than he bargained for when he started doing his research for the annual Society for the History of Astronomy essay prize.

Choosing to write about the history of unmanned exploration of Mars, he contacted the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) to quiz their experts in this fascinating field.

They were so impressed with the depth of Luke’s IT skills that they have recruited him as a software engineer to work on the amateur radio KickSat project, which will the see the design, building and testing of very small spacecraft called Sprites.

Luke, who lives near York, said:

“I did not realise that I would be working on something that might be going into space.”

“It’s very exciting.”

“It’s good as I am only sixteen. I think that my family are quite proud,” he added.

Read the full Yorkshire Post story at
http://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/at-a-glance/general-news/video-star-pupil-is-hired-for-space-project-1-5605332

The KickSat Sprites from both the BIS and London Hackspace are planned to launch on the SpaceX Falcon 9 ELaNa 5 / CRS 3 mission early in 2014.

British Interplanetary Society KickSat Sprite programming and planning day
https://amsat-uk.org/2013/03/25/bis-kicksat-programming-planning-day/

KickSat Sprite Technical Summary
http://www.bis-space.com/2013/03/09/9301/kicksat-technical-summary

KickSat to deploy 128 Sprite satellites
https://amsat-uk.org/2012/09/21/kicksat-to-deploy-200-sprite-satellites/

Apr 23 2013

Warwick University Satellite Team (WUSAT) Radio Interview

WUSAT Team with CubeSat ready to launch - Image credit Warwick University

WUSAT Team with CubeSat ready to launch – Image credit Warwick University

The team behind the WUSAT CubeSat project will be interviewed on Radio Warwick – RaW 1251AM – the show will also be available world-wide on the web.

The team have already flown a CubeSat to an altitude of 30 km and aim to send their WUSAT CubeSat into Low Earth Orbit.

The interview takes place on Wednesday, April 24 between 4 and 5 pm BST (1500-1600 GMT) in the RaW News Insight show. You can listen to it live at http://player.radio.warwick.ac.uk/

Radio Warwick http://www.radio.warwick.ac.uk/

Twitter https://twitter.com/WUSAT_Team

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

WUSAT – UK Students Fly CubeSat to 30km https://amsat-uk.org/2013/04/10/uk-students-fly-cubesat-to-30km/

WUSAT featured in Hawin Connector post
http://www.electropages.com/2013/04/harwin-hi-rel-connector-families-complete-successful-cubesat-prototype-flight-stratosphere/

Apr 23 2013

TURKSAT-3SAT on Facebook

TURKSAT-3USAT Satellite Fun ClubA Facebook page has been created for the TURKSAT-3USAT V/U (Mode J) linear transponder CubeSat.

TURKSAT-3USAT and Deployment Pod

TURKSAT-3USAT and Deployment Pod

TURKSAT-3USAT is expected to launch on April 26, 2013 at 0413 UT on a CZ-2D rocket from the Jiuquan Space Center into a 680 km Low Earth Orbit (LEO).

The Satellite Fun Club Facebook page is at https://www.facebook.com/pages/Turksat3usat-Fun-Club/484648341591111

Twitter https://twitter.com/tamsat_tr

Information on TURKSAT-3USAT https://amsat-uk.org/satellites/turksat-3usat/

Apr 23 2013

Dead CubeSat Comes Alive

Jugnu CubeSatWhat was given up as dead, turned out to be alive!

The one that sprang a recent surprise was India’s first IIT-made student satellite, Jugnu, a product of the students and staff of IIT-Kanpur.

The Times of India reports that the three-kg student satellite was launched on October 12, 2011, along with SRMSat of SRM University in Chennai and VesselSat-1 of Luxembourg. The main satellite was the Indo-French Megha-Tropiques

Speaking to TOI from Kanpur on Friday chief co-ordinator of Jugnu, NS Vyas, said that the mission life of the satellite was one year. “We had stopped tracking it. But when we came to know from the Nitte Amateur Satellite Tracking Centre in Bengaluru that it was after all still alive we were thrilled,” he said.

Vyas said that while its signals, on 437.275 MHz, were still strong, some of its internal functions had, however, weakened.

Read the full Times of India article
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Dead-satellite-comes-alive/articleshow/19642509.cms

Our thanks to Ganesh VU2TS for spotting this item

Apr 22 2013

RAX-2 CubeSat Transmissions Cease

RAX-2 CubeSat

RAX-2 CubeSat

The RAX-2 beacon stopped transmitting on Saturday, April 20 and is not responsive to normal commands.

The cessation in normal operations happened mid-day on Saturday and the cause of the issue is currently under investigation. Over the next few days, the team will be recording the spectrum during passes and sending up some custom commands in an attempt to determine the cause.

RAX-2 has been operating on-orbit for 540 days, has completed its scientific goals, and has surpassed it’s planned one-year scientific mission. The RAX-2 team will be posting updates on the status as they investigate over the next few weeks.

Source http://rax.engin.umich.edu/

Apr 22 2013

Vega’s three-satellite payload is integrated and ready for launch

Vega April 2013ESA report the payload “stack” for Vega’s second mission from  has been completed and is ready for the planned launch from Kourou on May 2.

After its deployment by Vega on the upcoming flight, Proba-V will begin the satellite’s mission of mapping land cover and vegetation growth across the Earth every two days. The miniaturized ESA satellite is to provide data for the instrument’s worldwide scientific user community and service providers once its in-orbit commissioning is completed.

Proba-V was produced by prime contractor QinetiQ Space Belgium and carries a new, advanced version of the Vegetation instrument – the latest in a series already deployed on France’s full-sized Spot-4 and Spot-5 satellites, which have been observing the planet since 1998 after their launches by Arianespace.

The Astrium-built VNREDSat-1 will support the Vietnamese government’s initiative to create an infrastructure enabling better studies of climate change effects, improving predictions for natural disasters and optimizing the country’s natural resource management.  It was built on behalf of the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology.

ESTCube-1 is to test electric solar wind sail technologies and help establish an Estonian infrastructure for future space projects. This satellite was produced in a collaboration of students from Tartu University, Estonian Aviation Academy, Tallinn University of Technology and University of Life Sciences – and developed in conjunction with the Finnish Meteorological Institute and the German Space Center (DLR).

Once in orbit, ESTCube-1 will deploy a small conductive tether which is to be electrically charged to 500 Volts using electron guns contained within the 10 x 10 x 10-cm. cubesat.

ESTCube-1 frequencies:
437.250 MHz – CW beacon, callsign ES5E/S
437.505 MHz – 9600 bps AX.25 telemetry, callsign ES5E-11

Read the full ESA story at http://www.arianespace.com/news-mission-update/2013/1031.asp