Category Archives: Satellite

Winter Field Day Underway

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Right on schedule at 14:00 EST, W1SYE was on the air for Winter Field Day from Glen Park in Portsmouth.  Willy W1LY and helpers made short work of the setup, and had two ladder line antennas in the trees, and two tents setup for operation by noon.  There was some concern about HF noise from a new generator, and the noise went away when it was swapped out.  And as you might expect there was a scramble to get the logging computers up and going.

Two tents and two simple multiband antennas

Things were working well later this afternoon.  Reverse Beacon Network spots indicated that the CW tent was putting out a fine signal

The gang is busy on phone during WFD — that’s a new tech (waiting for license) at the mic

 

Bob WB4SON made a satellite (only one allowed) with N1FD who was 4O NH (4 transmitters Outdoors in New Hampshire). The first satellite pass happened 13 minutes after the contest began, and the contact was in the log as soon as the satellite was above the horizon.

Satellite Antenna (crossed 2m/70cm beam)

2m/70cm all-mode radio, laptop to correct Doppler, and 30 AH Battery inside truck (warm)

 

New easy FM Sat in orbit, Fox1-Cliff (AO-95)

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AMSAT launched another Fox FM Cubesat, Fox-1Cliff, on December 3.  It’s downlink is 145.920 MHz (Uplink 435.300 with a 67.0 Hz tone).  The satellite is still being tested and is not available for use yet, but you can easily hear the voice beacon every 2 minutes when it is overhead saying “Fox1-Cliff Safe Mode”.

I understand the best-guess object # is 43774, and it is showing up in various tracking programs as Fox1Cliff, AO-95, or object 43774.  (So many satellites were launched at the same time, 60+, that is too early to tell them apart.)

Check out the tracking program above and you should be able to hear the voice beacon (only on for about 14 seconds every 120 seconds).

Second Hands-On Radio Event, Saturday October 20th

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Our second Hands-on Radio Event will be Saturday October 20th at Glen Park.  We will be operating a satellite station, so this is an opportunity to see one in action and make a contact of your own.

This is going on during our Jamboree On The Air (JOTA) event.  Because we have to wait for satellites to be available to work though, this event is spread out through the day, with activity going on from 10 AM until 8 PM.  Because this is happening over such a long time period, we will not be providing refreshments as we have no way to keep things cool/hot over that period of time, and no registration is required.

Please Note, while mist is OK, if it is raining hard, the satellite station will be off the air (the antenna system is not waterproof).  Too early to be sure, but at this point it looks like rain in the morning, but clear from noon on.  Keep an eye on the weather and plan your trip accordingly.

More details can be found on the Hands-On Radio tab.

The Consortium – May 7th – Amateur Satellites for Beginners

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Jim K1GND and Bob W1YRC host a monthly ham radio tutorial event that they call
“The Consortium“. They meet at the Asia Grille at Lincoln Mall on Rte. 116 in
Lincoln, usually on the first Monday of the month.  Meetings start at 6:30 PM, however, people start arriving after 5:00 PM for dinner before the meeting.

The May 7th Consortium presentation will cover using our repeaters in the sky — Amateur Radio Satellites.  The FM satellites, so called “easy-sats”, are especially simple to use.  All that is required is a dual band HT and simple antennas to have successful contacts.  Online tools or phone applications are then used to track the satellites, letting us know when the satellite will be overhead and where to point the antennas.  The talk will be given by Bob Beatty, WB4SON, who has been using satellites for more than four decades, and who is currently an ARISS Technical Mentor (Amateur Radio aboard the International Space Station).

AO-91 Open for Amateur Use

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AMSAT announced early Thanksgiving morning that AO-91 (RadFxSat/Fox-1B), a 1-unit CubeSat has been officially commissioned and turned over for amateur use.

The first QSOs have already happened, and this is proving to be an amazing bird, much better than Fox-1/AO-85).  Folks have already made QSOs with a HT & 1/4 wave whip.

To receive AO-91, simply tune your HT to 145.960 MHz.  When you are ready to step up to transmitting you will need to set up several memory channels to adjust your 70 cm transmit signal to compensate for Doppler.   The transmitter must also be configured with a 67.0 Hz subaudible tone.

AO-91 Doppler Shift Correction
Memory Your Transmit Frequency(With 67 Hz Tone) Your Receive Frequency
Acquisition of Signal (AOS) 435.240 MHz 145.960 MHz
Approaching 435.245 MHz 145.960 MHz
Time of Closest Approach (TCA) 435.250 MHz 145.960 MHz
Departing 435.255 MHz 145.960 MHz
Loss of Signal (LOS) 435.260 MHz 145.960 MHz

Since AO-91 will take about 12 minutes to pass overhead, you will switch to a new TX frequency every 3 minutes or so.

Of course you will need to locate the satellite based on your position. You can use the AMSAT tool (Select AO-91 from the drop down list of satellites, enter your grid square, FN41 for RI, and press “Calculate Position”, then press “Predict” — Note ttimes are in UTC, so subtract 5 hours since we are not currently in DST). N2YO’s Graphical tool is great too, just don’t forget to set your location in the bottom right of the screen.