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