Students at the University of Khartoum, Sudan have been eagerly listening for the new amateur radio satellites deployed by the Vega launcher on Monday, Feb 13.
The students are undertaking a CubeSat project KN-SAT1. As part of the project they recently completed the installation of a satellite groundstation at ST2UOK. This was used to track and receive telemetry data from the Vega satellites.
KN-SAT1 is the first CubeSat to be built in Sudan and an aim is to promote space engineering and space science education at other Sudanese educational institutes.
Watch the students receiving packets from Masat-1 14:00 UTC Feb 14, 2012
Andras Gschwindt HA5WH is requesting Radio Amateurs to send reports of telemetry data from the Hungarian student satellite Masat-1 due to be launched on February 13.
Andras HA5WH, head of the student group that made the first Hungarian CubeSat, Masat-1, says:
Masat-1 is a 1U cubesat and its basic mission is a technological experiment. You can find more on our web site: http://cubesat.bme.hu/en/
Masat-1 is onboard the Vega rocket which we hope will launch on February 13. My students at The Technical University of Budapest, are in need of telemetry data especially in the first one to two weeks after launch.
I would like to ask you to help us with the reception of our satellite by sending the received data back to us.
You can load the decoder software from our page but the most important would be the reception of the voltage and temperature from the CW data.
The call sign of Masat-1 is HA5MASAT and the telemetry transmission frequency is 437.345 MHz +/- 10 kHz Doppler shift. (the signal will start at 437.355 MHz and drift down to 437.335 MHz during a 10-15 minute orbital pass)
Watch the Masat-1 Eliptical Orbit video
The Masat-1 Ground Station Client Software was prepared to process the 437.345 MHz GFSK 625/1250 bps transmission received from the satellite Masat-1. The software provides the following functions:
– Audio demodulation
– Packet decoding
– Packet data visualization
– Frequency waterfall plot to aid radio tuning
Masat-1 satellite will use the amateur radio frequency band to downlink telemetry data. The downlink data will not be encrypted, so everyone will be able to receive it, decode and process.
The reason for the Doppler shift is the orbital velocity of 7-8 km/s, as when a transmitter is getting closer to the receiver the received signal’s frequency is shifted upwards, and when the transmitter is getting away from the receiver the received signal’s frequency is shifted downwards.
The satellite’s modulation scheme: (A1A) CW and 2-GFSK with 625 Hz frequency deviation (CW is clocked at 120 characters/minute, which is well-audible by ear).
Data rate of the 2-GFSK digital packets: 625 or 1250 bits/second (a PC with sound card and demodulation SW is required)
Minimum list of devices required for receiving Masat-1
antenna suitable for the 70 cm band (in open air, pointed towards the sky)
tuneable radio receiver with 70 cm SSB USB mode, such as FT-817, FT-897D, TS-2000, etc.
Vega is planned to launch on February 9 from the ESA launch site at Kourou in the Caribbean. It will carry seven amateur radio CubeSats and an amateur radio Microsatellite called ALMASat.
This HD clip shows how one of those CubeSats, Masat-1 (437.345 MHz), is going to orbit around Earth. You can see the satellite establishing contact with the primary ground station at BME, joined by the radio amateurs in Europe and all over the World. The radio contact is possible only if the satellite is above the Horizon at the given location. This is symbolized with thin green lines between the satellite and the ground stations, represented by coloured dots on the Globe.
Everybody is welcome to join in recieving the satellite using the ground station software freely downloadable from the Masat-1 website!
Watch Masat-1 Elliptical Orbit and Pass over European Ground Stations
The Masat-1 Ground Station Client Software was prepared to process the 437.345 MHz GFSK 625/1250 bps transmission received from the satellite Masat-1. The software provides the following functions:
– Audio demodulation
– Packet decoding
– Packet data visualization
– Frequency waterfall plot to aid radio tuning
AMSAT-UK 
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