I really hate to sound like Major Obvious, but the subject is very interesting and very relevant to ham radio. The fact that the referenced website is not specifically dedicated to ham radio is irrelevant. I think it is a very interesting post, a very "newsworthy" item. I just think it should have been easier to find the downlink frequency, bandwidth, type of modulation, and data rate.
Huh? The links--and the links contained in them-- provide the specifics. Happy to see they were posted: I would have dug them out otherwise, and posted them. We should be thrilled that SPACE.COM thinks what we do is important enough to be a front page piece of news.... that was the point of this 'NEWS' story. 73 Chip W1YW
Exactly. The important info was contained in a link that was contained within another link......you should have dug them out and posted them so others didn't have to do it. It wasn't exactly easy to find, IMO, and I'm not the only one who had difficulty finding the frequency and other info that would be necessary to listen for the signal. The link that is in my post that you quoted takes you DIRECTLY to the most important info with one click, you don't have to read through various pages and click on multiple links to find the info that is most relevant to this news story. I tried to make it easy for other interested hams to find the necessary info to pursue the main objective of the article, which is to monitor the cubesat's transmissions. Yes, I am thrilled that space.com thinks that amateur radio is important enough to make the article a piece of front page news. As I stated in another post on this thread, "I think it is a very interesting post, a very 'newsworthy' item". I didn't mean to sound harsh or critical, I just thought that the most important info should have been out in the open instead of buried in a link within a link. 73, Dennis
From the QRZ page of KR3DX: "Don't be a lid. Practice good manners, don't be selfish and rude." 73, Peter - HB9PJT
Hi Chip, I don't believe that I was, nor did I ever intend to be, "ungrateful". I was only trying to make it easy for others to appreciate what you posted. If you look through previous posts here on the 'zed, you'll see that we have agreed on many things in the past, I'm afraid that we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one. I don't post news stories because I'm not as intelligent, educated, or industrious as those who do. 73
Hello Peter, Are you advocating that we should be ill-mannered, selfish, and rude? I don't see the relevance of your post.
Dennis, You do things I can never do. I think that is really cool Your confusion lies in what was 'news' versus content in the 'news' story. The fact that the ESA and SPACE.COM pursued hams was the 'news' story. The details for transmission were not the 'news' story. As I said, since there was actual interest HERE to get the specifics, I was ready to post them--but they had already been posted. Peter thought you were being a bit harsh on me. Nah Unfortunately most younger hams don't know that there was an historical event when SPUTNIK went up in 1957--hams were the heroes that heard and tracked it(s signal) , just below 15m. Heck Dennis, you may have been one of them! This established ham radio, in the public eye, as a 'space age' activity. Lots of folks got licenses in that era, indirectly because of SPUTNIK. I was one You and I remember this--(SPUTNIK was my first memory!)-- but the younger folks don't get it. ESA is saying that we still have worth 73 and a very HNY to you! Chip W1YW
Hi Chip, I guess I missed the point entirely. I thought that receiving the signal would be of interest to the majority of hams because that was my main interest and it seemed to be the main point to a few other hams that posted on this thread before I did. Some people may have taken my comments to be harsh, but that was not my intent, I even opened my first comment with "Normally, Chip is very thorough and precise". I certainly didn't intend that to be harsh, and I hope you didn't take it that way. Anyway, it certainly is a very interesting topic and I hope to receive the signal from the Cubesat. Regarding Sputnik and the other early satellites, I remember seeing the Echo satellites pass overhead in the late '50s. I didn't have a shortwave receiver until 1962, and I listened for the sats just above 20MHz, but I can't remember hearing anything there. I also remember listening for the planet Jupiter's emissions somewhere in the upper HF spectrum. I do remember receiving a few satellites around 150MHz sometime in the early '70s. I hope that you had a good holiday, and HNY to you also! 73, Dennis
Great memories Dennis! The Jovian DAM emission is what got me into radio astronomy. If you had a beam while Jupiter was rising above the horizon, it was (is)pretty easy to hear--if you used a wide bandwidth, such as an AM setting. In fact, with propagation so poor on 12 and 10m, conditions are ideal for listening to Jupiter nowadays. There are prediction times which correlate with the orbital position of Io, but I haven't looked for these on the 'net in a while. Again, looking forward to Zedding you in 2020! 73 Chip W1YW
If you are interested in the official demodulation and decoding specs, declassified info can be found at the following link: https://github.com/esa/gr-opssat/blob/master/docs/os-uhf-specs.pdf Marty KN6FDP
I also remember "optically" tracking Echo at night as a youngster. If I recall correctly, it was a space reflector, kind of like a high altitude weather balloon covered in tin foil. I also remember the rare "live from Europe" stories on the evening network news via Echo breaking up as the object moved out of 'viewability' on one or both ends of the link.
