Amateur Radio assistance requested: ISS Plasma Thrust Shadow Experiment

Amateur Radio assistance requested: ISS Plasma Thrust Shadow Experiment

The Central Research Institute of Machine Building (TSNIIMASH) in Russia is conducting a series of space plasma experiments in order to evaluate the shape of previously observed 'dead' zone, or shadowing due to the firing of an onboard arcjet plasma source.

Radio Amateurs are invited to participate in the Space plasma experiment "Shadow" onboard International Space Station (ISS). Integration of Electric Thrust onboard a spacecraft poses a certain set of problems including electromagnetic compatibility of ET. One matter of interest is that highly ionized exhaust plumes of ET may scatter RF-signals producing large "dead" zone for communications.

This plasma screening effect should be thoroughly studied before electric thrusters become standard onboard equipment. The investigation will help designers of future electrically propelled spacecraft to minimize the hazard of communication disruption by ET plasma plumes.

The Central Research Institute has proposed an experiment using the worldwide distribution of radio amateurs to receive the VHF packet downlink (145.825 MHz) from a new plasma space experiment on the
International Space Station.

The amateur packet radio technology in the SpEx "Shadow" as proposed by astronaut Alexander Kalery, will use the AX25 packets transmitted by "Master Stations" and reported by receiving amateur radio ground
stations to track the effect of the plasma shadow.

The SpEx experiment will be enabled on the following schedule:

SpEX Time On
--------------------
November 25 1650 UTC
December 2 1650 UTC

SpEX Time Off
--------------------
November 28 0825 UTC
December 5 0825 UTC

The master beacon stations for Europe, Asia, North America, and
Australia can be found at:
http://tinyurl.com/84nvl72 (knts.tsniimash.ru)

The main web page for the SpEx project can be found at:
http://knts.tsniimash.ru/Shadow/en/Overview.aspx
This page contains a detailed description of the experiment and instructions for submitting your signal reports.

An example of the SpEx packets received by Mike Rupprecht, DK3WN
can be seen at: http://www.dk3wn.info/p/?p=23866

Source: Amsat, TSNIIMASH





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Bad choice of dates

Hi,

It sounds like a cool experiment, but isn't Curiosity leaving for Mars on 25th ?

73

 

You mean there won't be any more curiosity here on earth?

TOM K8ERV Montrose Colo

 

Good project................but the listed URL's failed to respond ! ! !

Leo

 

Yes URL is dead http://knts.tsniimash.ru/Shadow/en/Overview.aspx

 

Lets hope the server gets a reboot Monday morning.

 

Hehe,

At least not nuclear powered one.

73

 

How is this good in anyway for amateur radio. If all satellites are converted to this style of propulsion what will be left of HF communications...nothing. There is nothing neat about this.

 

Didn't the Enterprise track a cloaked Romulan warbird by the plasma disruptions it's engines made?

 

I didn't realize this test requried packet Tx capability -- the initial news article implied just reception of the packet signal. Well anyways, here's what I heard during the pass:

CQ-0 RS0ISS-4 SGATE-0 UI P/F=0 PID = F0 <crc OK="">

>ARISS - International Space Station (BBS/APRS on)


APU25N-0 N0SPB-10 RS0ISS-4 UI P/F=0 PID = F0 <crc OK="">

<igate,msg_cnt=0,loc_cnt=1


CQ-0 RS0ISS-4 SGATE-0 UI P/F=0 PID = F0 <crc OK="">

>ARISS - International Space Station (BBS/APRS on)


CQ-0 RS0ISS-4 SGATE-0 UI P/F=0 PID = F0 <crc OK="">

>ARISS - International Space Station (BBS/APRS on)


APU25N-0 N0SPB-10 RS0ISS-4 UI P/F=0 PID = F0 <crc OK="">

=3954.56N/10448.48W`PHG7240/Brighton SGATE {UIV32N}

</crc></crc></crc></igate,msg_cnt=0,loc_cnt=1
</crc></crc>