First Light at 21CM, 432 EME to follow

The TIROS Restoration Team would like to announce first light at
21cm for the TLM-18 antenna system. First light occurred on 19
January, 2015 at approximately 17:00 GMT.




The TLM-18 is a 60 foot prime focus parabolic antenna located in
Wall Township, New Jersey, USA. It was first used to support the
TIROS I and TIROS II weather satellites and subsequently, the
MINITRACK program. It was decommissioned in the mid 1970s and
later de-militarized by the US Army prior to transfer of the
property to InfoAge via Wall Township, New Jersey.



The TIROS Restoration Team is composed of volunteers from the
Information Age Learning Center (InfoAge), The Ocean-Monmouth
Amateur Radio Club (OMARC), and Princeton University.



[TABLE="width: 100"]
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[TR]
[TD="align: center"]Signal peak riding on top
of the noise background at 0.4 MHz (actually 1420.4 MHz),
which is the

well-known 21 cm radiation from the Milky Way.[/TD]
[TD="align: center"]TLM-18 Antenna with 21cm
feed in place[/TD]
[TD="align: center"]Post processed drift plot

at 45 degree elevation[/TD]
[/TR]
</tbody>[/TABLE]





Higher resolution images are available upon request, all rights
reserved.



Media Contact: Dan Marlow, K2QM at <a
href="mailto:marlow@princeton.edu">marlow@princeton.edu </a

 

That is freakin awesome!

 

Outstanding effort!!! The Hydrogen 21 cm signal is beautiful. Well done!!!!
Blair Hearth KD2EPA (GSARA, SARA)

 

Can someone translate this into English?

 

Very cool!

 

Sure!

The got a 'honking big' (technical term) dish antenna, that was originally used for the first two weather satellites in the 1960's, working again and were able to detect the rest of the galaxy at 1.4Ghz with it!

 

Well dang. Thats way cool. I want one!

 

My late Uncle, Allen Hodges was part of the original TIROS Team back in the 1960's. He worked out of New Jersey and Alaska.

I have some 35mm film negatives of images of Earth from TIROS IX. Pretty cool stuff!

 

The Hydrogen Alpha 21 cm signal indicates that they have been successful. Hydrogen is a common element in the universe. A reconstructed radio telescope should be able to pick up this faint signal at 21cm when pointed at a celestial "radio source" such as our galaxy. Interestingly, some of the more interesting radio astronomy work being done (many of the scientists are hams, by the way) is now in the VHF 2 meter band, around 150 megahertz.

 

Agreed, a substantial portion of the TIROS Restoration Project Team membership are licensed amateurs.

73 Martin
W2RWJ

 

Well done! Such a valuable asset sat way too long neglected and dormant. Glad you got past all the damage of time and Superstorm Sandy.

Since this antenna is technically "public property" that our tax revenue once was invested into, it would be really cool if it was available for casual use by amateur radio expeditions. I would love to hear it doing EME on weekends!

Kinda like the Titan Missile Museum in Arizona permits with their former military HF discone - drive up mobile, plug & play !!!

http://gvarc.us/GVARCFrames/Titan/Discone/Discone.htm

http://www.titanmissilemuseum.org/

 

John,
While EME is part of the long-term plan, It likely will not be on a drop-in basis. The physical security of the site and the utility costs precludes it.

73 Martin
W2RWJ