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AMSAT NEWS SERVICE
ANS-043
ANS is a free, weekly, news and information service of AMSAT North
America, The Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation. ANS reports on the
activities of a worldwide group of Amateur Radio operators who share an
active interest in designing, building, launching and communicating
through analog and digital Amateur Radio satellites.
Please send any amateur satellite news or reports to:
ans-editor@amsat.org
******************** AMSAT 2006 Space Symposium **************************
The AMSAT web team has posted informational pages on the AMSAT web site.
You can find the announcement with many links at:
http://www.amsat-org/amsat-new/symposium
Future announcements including the Call For Papers, Online Registration and
Online Hotel Registration will be available approximately 1 April 2006.
**************************************************************************
In this edition:
* SuitSat is Still Alive
* AMSAT-UK Announces New Satellite Transponder Project
* AMSAT Awards This Week
* SuitSat Telemetry Requested
* ISS ARISS Packet Digipeater Turned OFF
* Bill Reaches 100+ on DXCC Quest From ISS
* January/February AMSAT Journal Update
* ARISS Status for the Week of February 6, 2006
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-043.01
SuitSat is Still Alive
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 043.01
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 12, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-043.01
Over this past week SuitSat reception reports have been received
from around the world. Everyone is in agreement that SuitSat's
145.990 MHz FM downlink signal is extremely weak. Using AMSAT's
RF Link Budget spreadsheet along with data from well equipped
amateur satellite stations (and a few assumptions to fill in the
gaps) calculations indicate that SuitSat's transmitter power is
in the range of 1-10 milliwatts.
The following are representative of the SuitSat signal reports:
Reception reports from Kenneth, N5VHO and Nick, KC5KBO using the
W5RRR station at the Johnson Space Center in Houston say, "Ident-
ifiable were brief portions of the English voice recording, the CW
id and SSTV. The Telemetry data was just starting to be read when
the signal faded below the noise level."
From Japan Kobayasi, JH0MHE copied SuitSat's signal peaking at
59+20dB on an EME system.
Mak, SV1BSX in Athens, Greece, using a 9 element vertically
polarized Yagi antenna with his VHF All-Mode TRIO TR-9130 radio
reported, "Suitsat SSTV signal heard on a pass over Eastern Europe
at only 13° elevation! The signal was weak (no deflection on my
S-meter) but 100% audible for few seconds in NBFM."
Keith, ZS6TW reported receiving SuitSat on a 50° pass using 2 X F9FT
17 elements yagis with 16dBd gain connected to a Yaesu FT-847. He
copied the Russian language segment of the recorded message.
Stefan, VE4NSA in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada copied SuitSat on a 60°
pass using a HyGain 216SAT 2M antenna with preamp connected to his
Yaesu FT-847. He reported a weak FM signal S1-3, child voice making
an announcement followed by male voice with strong fading.
Ed, N9AWP in Indiana reported hearing SuitSat's CW and SSTV signal
followed by a heterodyne on a 53° elevation pass using an Arrow 3
element antenna connected to his Kenwood THF6A handheld in CW mode.
To listen to SuitSat recordings received around the world go to AJ's
web page at http://www.aj3u.com.
SuitSat has continued to be covered by the popular press this past
week. The Times Union in Albany, New York ran a story:
http://timesunion.com/ss.asp?s=446685&c=&b=
The Times in London:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,13509-2027835,00.html
Gould, WA4SXM has written a PowerPoint presentation suitable for club
talks. It is available on-line at:
http://www.reelfootarc.com/blg/article.php?id_art=31. Follow the blog
article and click the link to the presentation. It is 3MB in size.
[ANS thanks amateur radio operators around the world for the above
information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-043.02
AMSAT-UK Announces New Satellite Transponder Project
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 043.02
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 12, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-043.02
AMSAT-UK is delighted to be able to announce its participation in
the SSETI ESEO satellite project.
ESEO - The European Student Earth Orbiter is a satellite planned
for launch in late 2008 into a Geo-stationary transfer orbit similar
to the initial orbit of AO40 and to those planned for Eagle and P3E.
In December 2005 two AMSAT-UK members were invited to attend a SSETI
Workshop at the European Space Agencies ESTEC facility in the Nether-
lands. This workshop, which lasted a week, had over eighty students
in attendance from more than twenty universities around Europe.
The involvement of the AMSAT-UK team with the project was confirmed
at the Workshop and the team were elected as "Honorary Members" of
the SSETI Association in appreciation of their work supporting the
previous SSETI Express project.
The prime communications system for ESEO is being developed by the
University of Wroclaw in Poland and will operate on "commercial"
S-Band space frequencies. It will provide all the usual telecommand
and telemetry facilities and use standard ESA CCSDS packet communi-
cation techniques.
ESEO also has a need for a redundant communications system - one
that can operate in the event of a primary system failure but can
also function satisfactorily if and when the spacecraft is not in
its intended earth-pointing mode. This is where AMSAT is planning
to assist.
The current project calls for a unit that can receive telecommands
from earth on UHF (435MHz), transfer those to the OBC via a CAN bus.
Additionally, it must transmit telemetry and mission data to the ground
on S-BAND (2.4GHz). We are planning to use omni-directional antenna
systems so the data rate will necessarily be quite low although output
power will be approximately 9 watts.
When in orbit, it is likely that the student experiments will be
completed within a few weeks to months from launch after which time
it will become available as a linear U/S mode transponder.
The ESEO spacecraft will have a rectangular structure and a mass of
120kg. The solar panels will be deployable and steerable while the
propulsion system will use Nitrogen gas. The 50kHz wide mode U/S
transponder will be switchable from a conventional linear design to
a fully digital design based on DSP techniques using the G6LVB STELLA
firmware. Two UHF canted monopoles on opposite ends of the spacecraft
will be used to receive signals on U band. The S Band output of 9 Watts
will feed two turnstiles or quadrilifar helixes. As well as the trans-
ponder, the unit will also provide 400 bps BPSK telemetry in AO40 format.
Obviously we cannot expect the transponded signals on the ground to be
as strong as we enjoyed from AO40 but they should provide worldwide
communication similar to the earlier AO-13 project.
The AMSAT-UK team includes G4DDK, G7OCD, G6LVB, G0MRF, & G3VZV who were
responsible for the S-Band transmitter on SSETI Express.
This new opportunity to participate in this exciting venture is very much a
result of the impressive support that the amateur fraternity around the
world gave to the SSETI Express project - so thank you and congratulations!
We can also report the good news that a student team from the Technical
University of Budapest has been added to the SSETI programme to work on the
on-board Electrical Power System. This team, under the leadership of Dr.
Andras (Bandi) Gschwindt, HA5WH, has masterminded similar systems on AO10,
AO13 and AO40 all of which have proven to be extremely successful.
More news will be published as soon as it becomes available through the
usual channels. At the time of writing the SSETI ESEO webpages are not
up-to-date but new information is being added regularly, so please check
http://www.sseti.org
[ANS thanks Graham, G3VZV for the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-043.03
AMSAT Awards This Week
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 043.03
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 12, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-043.03
Bruce, KK5DO, AMSAT Director Contests and Awards reports this week
congratulations go out to all of the following.
John Choo VE7JRX Satellite Communicators Club Award
Bill Greene VE7WFG Satellite Communicators Club Award
Zachary Schrempp KE7EYQ Satellite Communicators Club Award
Masahiro Myoga N3LQ Satellite Communicators Club Award
Jack Burris K6JEB Satellite Communicators Club Award
Bill Ward GM0ICF Satellite Communications Achievement Award #428
Eric Christensen KF4OTN Satellite Communications Achievement Award #429
Zachary Schrempp KE7EYQ South Africa Communication Achievement Award #US93
Robert Fairfield K7RQN South Africa Communication Achievement Award #US94
Shigekazu Yoshikawa JE2TLZ 51 on 51 Award #61
Andrzej Laczmanski SP1WSR 51 on 51 Award #62
To see all the awards visit http://www.amsat.org.
[ANS thanks Bruce, KK5DO for the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-043.04
SuitSat Telemetry Requested
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 043.04
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 12, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-043.04
The exact cause of SuitSat's transmitter power loss remains unknown.
The transmitter and controller are still working. The voice messages,
Telemetry and SSTV image is still being sent every 9 minutes on a
repeating cycle.
While the downlink seems too weak for most stations to copy, if you
have a tracking antenna system then the SuitSat team would like to hear
from you when you are able to get some reliable telemetry information.
Specifically what we need is the following:
Temperature: Every few minutes the voice will speak the temperature
Battery Voltage: Its on a 28 volt scale.
Date and time UTC you heard this data.
Location: where you are when you head this data.
At the beginning of each 9 minute cycle, SuitSat-1 will ID and then
speak the Mission time, Temperature and voltage. Richard, N2SPI was
among the first to hear and record the complete telemetry message.
Richard reports he copied the telemetry woman saying, "...(Mission) time
is 006607 minutes, the temperature is 12 degrees celsius, the battery
voltage is 26.(?) ... (volts)". This audio file is available on-line
at the http://www.aj3u.com site.
If you hear CW, get ready to decode SSTV. The order will be a DTMF tone,
followed by the CW ID and then SSTV. This is also a good time to listen
for the System Telemetry. The Telemetry comes right after the SSTV image.
Then the whole process repeats.
Lou, W5DID, one of SuitSat's builders, told ANS, "The estimate is Suitsat
will run 9 days 9 hours. That will cover the weekend of February 11-12.
We need telemetry! This is even more important as the mission nears it's
end."
Frank, KA3HDO, AMSAT-VP for Human Spaceflight Programs, and also is the
ARISS International Chairman, said, "Now, more than ever, we need to see
how long SuitSat will stay in operation. The SuitSat team plans to provide
special recognition to the person that copies the last SuitSat telemetry,
specifically the Mission Time and Battery Voltage."
Please send telemetry reports to suitsat@comcast.net.
[ANS thanks the ARISS team for the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-043.05
ISS ARISS Packet Digipeater Turned OFF
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 043.05
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 12, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-043.05
Reminder: The ARISS packet mode aboard the ISS has been turned OFF for
the duration of SuitSat project. Please do not transmit any packet or
voice data on the 145.990 MHz SuitSat downlink frequency.
[ANS thanks the ARISS team for the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-043.06
Bill Reaches 100+ on DXCC Quest From ISS
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 043.06
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 12, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-043.06
Bill was able to work a few more stations prior to and just after the
space walk which deployed SuitSat-1 and now has exceeded the 100 mark.
The entities worked since the last report are Brunei (V8), Chagos Is.
(VQ9), Falkland Is. (VP8), Malaysia, E. (9M6), Reunion (FR), Tajikistan
(EY) and Trinidad & Tobago (9Y-9Z). The complete list of DXCC entities
worked now stands at 102 countries worked from space.
This past week also had three school contacts on Cmdr. Bill McArthur's
schedule. By the end of the last contact, Bill had made his 24th successful
contact. That contact breaks the previous record of 23 set by Leroy Chiao
during Expedition 10.
The contact record for an expedition was also broken this week and stands at
25 since Valery Tokarev also had a school contact with students in Russia
earlier in the expedition.
With several weeks still left for Expedition 12, the final records have yet
to be established.
Congratulations Bill and keep it up!
[ANS thanks Kenneth, N5VHO for the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-043.07
January/February AMSAT Journal Update
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 043.07
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 12, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-043.07
Ed, WA4SWJ, Editor of The AMSAT Journal sends this update:
The January/February 2006 issue of The AMSAT Journal is completed.
It is in for final proofreading. After comments are received and
any corrections made, it will be shipped off to the printer and
then into your hands. Thank you to all the contributors to this
issue.
I also want to specifically thank Bill Hook, W3QBC, for his outstanding
editing help. He is one of the most thorough guys I've ever known and
he helps make the Journal significantly better.
Now is a great time to think about writing articles of your own
for the next Journal. I always need content and actively seek it. I
will help you get it into publishable form. Please contact me if you
have something to place in the Journal.
The deadline for the next issue for editing is March 10th. This is a
slightly earlier deadline than before. I would like to get the Journal
out a little earlier in the two-month cycle. So get those keyboards
heated up and send those articles in! The Journal's e-mail address
is journal@amsat.org
[ANS thanks Ed, WA4SWJ for the above information]
/EX
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-043.08
ARISS Status for the Week of February 6, 2006
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 043.08
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
February 12, 2006
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-043.08
1. SuitSat Deployed
SuitSat was successfully activated and deployed during the February 3
EVA at 06:03 pm ET. The timing, micro-controller functions and audio
have operated as expected; however, the signal from SuitSat is extremely
weak. Ground stations with minimal equipment monitoring the satellite
have had limited success in hearing the satellite’s transmissions, al-
though some operators have picked up partial messages including the
station identification RS0RS, one of the Russian greetings, and some
SSTV image information. Stations are encouraged to continue listening
to obtain any information and telemetry that might be helpful with this
and any future projects of this type.
2. Media Coverage of SuitSat
It is clear that SuitSat has captured the imagination of students and
the general public worldwide. The number of hits the SuitSat website
http://www.suitsat.org received over the first 5 days of February app-
roached 5 million, having been accessed either directly or from over
2000 referring sites. The international media coverage has been exten-
sive. SuitSat articles have been translated into German, Polish, Italian,
French, Japanese, Portuguese and others. ARISS, ARRL and AMSAT members
gave interviews to The Houston Chronicle, the Canadian Broadcasting
Corporation, the Associated Press, CBS, The Herald Times News, Florida
Today, the Washington Post, the Washington Times, National Geographic
News, the Discovery Channel and National Public Radio. Reports were
given by these and other media including MSNBC, CNN and Aljazeera.
NASA television covered the deployment live. Links to some of the
on-line articles from the past week follow.
Pre-Deployment
From Playfuls.com (Targu Mures,Romania)
“Used Space Suits, The Latest Trend In Satellitesö
http://www.playfuls.com/news_0958_Used_Space_Suits_The_Latest_Trend_In_Satel
lites.html
The Discovery Channel
“Spacesuit Set To Become Satelliteö
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/briefs/20060130/suitsat_spa.html
NPR
Interview with ARISS Chairman, Frank Bauer
“Space Suit to Orbit Earthö (Includes audio)
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5183146
A Polish translation of the SuitSat paper resulted in an article published
for the general public at AstroNet, the most popular astro-portal in Poland.
http://news.astronet.pl/news.cgi?5236
Another article was posted for ham operators at the Polish Amateur Radio
Union.
http://pzk.org.pl/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=1019&mod
e=thread&order=0&thold=0
ARRL
“Countdown is On for ‘SuitSat-1’ Deployment from ISSö
http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2006/02/01/2/?nc=1
CBS News
http://www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/space_place/framesource_recent.html
CNN
“One small step for trash is giant leap for ham-kindö
http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/space/02/02/recycled.spacesuit.reut/index.html
Post Deployment - SuitSat Activated
ARRL
“‘SuitSat-1’ Launched from ISSö
http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2006/02/03/103/?nc=1
MSNBC
“Spacesuit floats off to become a satelliteö
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11162380/
Aljazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/AF1CA663-BD6D-4C81-8A9A-0623C50220D9.
htm
AMSAT
http://www.amsat.org/amsat-new/index.php
Yahoo.com
“Spacesuit Still Alive, Giving Weak Signalö
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060205/ap_on_sc/space_station
Spaceflight Now
“Castaway spacesuit radio experiment still aliveö
http://www.spaceflightnow.com/station/exp12/060204suitsat.html
3. SuitSat-1 is AMSAT-OSCAR-54
SuitSat-1 has been given an Orbiting Satellites Carrying Amateur Radio
(OSCAR) number. It has been denoted AMSAT-OSCAR-54.
4. Florida School Contact Successful
On Thursday, February 2, Bill McArthur, KC5ACR, answered 13 questions
posed to him by 13 Timber Creek High School students in Orlando,
Florida. Sarah Longino, longtime friend of McArthur’s, was the coordi-
nating teacher for the contact. Approximately 100 students, teachers,
and parents gathered for the event. John Winn, Commissioner of Education
for the state of Florida, was also present. Among the media covering
the event were the Orlando Sentinel, CBS affiliate WKMG, Orange County
Public Schools Public Relations office, East Orlando Sun, and the
Timber Creek newspaper and television station. The Orlando Sentinel
article, “Biology students connect with space station,ö may be viewed
on their website:
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/custom/space/orl-spacestation0306feb03,0
,4677459.story?coll=orl-home-headlines
Echolink and IRLP were both used for the event. Echolink had 32 con-
nections from the following 9 countries: USA, Japan, Germany, Australia,
Korea, Russia, Thailand, Turkey, and the UK. IRLP had 10 connecting
nodes from the U.K., U.S.A., Canada, Japan, and Australia.
Dale High School in Dale, Oklahoma completed an ARISS contact on Tuesday,
February 7 at 14:56 UTC.
E.L. DeGolyer Elementary School in Dallas, Texas completed an ARISS
contact on Tuesday, February 7 at 16:32 UTC.
Children at Pine Ridge Middle School in Naples, Florida completed
an ARISS contact on February 8 at 15:24 UTC. The contact included students
from neighboring Immokalee Middle School.
5. Upcoming School Contacts
Cosmos Centre Charleville in Charleville, Australia has been approved
for an ARISS contact. It is planned for Friday, February 17 at 07:34
UTC via the telebridge station WH6PN in Hawaii. The audio from this
contact will be available on the EchoLink AMSAT (node 101 377) and
the JK1ZEW (node 277 208) conference rooms. It is expected to be fed
into the 9010 IRLP Discovery Reflector as well. The event will be webcast.
To join the event:
URL: https://e-meetings.mci.com
CONFERENCE NUMBER: 1642340
PASSCODE: SPACE STATIO
The Discover Engineering Family Day event, which will be held at the
National Building Museum in Washington, D.C. on Saturday, February 18,
has been scheduled for a contact at 16:04 UTC. The telebridge station
WH6PN in Hawaii will assist in the contact. The audio will be available
on the EchoLink AMSAT (node 101 377) and the JK1ZEW (node 277 208)
conference rooms. It is also expected to be fed into the 9010 IRLP
Discovery Reflector. The event will be webcast.
To join the event:
URL: https://e-meetings.mci.com
CONFERENCE NUMBER: 1642601
PASSCODE: SPACE STATIO
6. ARISS International Meeting Held
The monthly ARISS International Team meeting was held on January 24.
SuitSat, training of the next taxi flight crew member, Marcos Pontes
and the Columbus Module were discussed. Minutes have been posted to
the ARISS website. See: http://www.rac.ca/ariss/arisstel23.htm.
[ANS thanks Carol, KB3LKI, for the above information]
/EX
In addition to regular membership, AMSAT offers membership in the
President's Club. Members of the President's Club, as sustaining donors
to AMSAT Project Funds, will be eligible to receive additional benefits.
Application forms are available from the AMSAT Office.
73,
This week's ANS Editor,
JoAnne Maenpaa, WB9JEJ
WB9JEJ at amsat dot org
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