Date: May 10th 2010

AMSAT NEWS SERVICE ANS-129

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

Next week is the Dayton Hamvention *
The AMSAT team is preparing For the 2010 Dayton Hamvention and *
AMSAT Booth and activities For the latest information go to: *
http://www amsat org/amsat-new/hamvention/2010/Dayton php *
*
Please be advised that tickets for the AMSAT-TAPR banquet at *
Dayton will not be sold at the booth * All tickets must be purchased at the AMSAT store by Monday, 10 May
Attendees do not have to be a member of AMSAT or TAPR *
http://www amsat-na com/store/item php?id=100158 *

In this edition: * Three Additional Cubesats Aboard the JAXA Planet-C Launch * Power Management Software Operational on AO-51 * Special OPS during Armed Forces Day * UNITEC 1 Latest update * Satellite Shorts * ARISS Status - 3 May 2010

SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-129 01 Three Additional Cubesats Aboard the JAXA Planet-C Launch

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 129 01 From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD May 9, 2010 To All RADIO AMATEURS BID: $ANS-129 01

Three Additional Cubesats Aboard the JAXA Planet-C Launch

In addition to the UNITEC-1 University satellite bound for Venus orbit on May 17 there will also be three additional cubesat class birds aboard These cubesats will be dropped off in low-earth orbit prior to the Planet-C and UNITEC-1 satellites departure for Venus

Three of the CubeSats, Negai*", WASEDA-SAT2, KSAT, being launched by the H-IIA rocket on May 17 will be dropped off into a low earth orbit but UNITEC-1 will continue following the JAXA's Venus Climate Orbiter PLANET-C / AKATSUKI on its journey to Venus

Negai*", Soka University 437 305MHz CW, Packet 1200bps FSK AX 25 http://kuro t soka ac jp/main html

WASEDA-SAT2, Waseda University 437 485MHz CW(FM), PCM-FSK(FM) 9600bps http://www miyashita mmech waseda ac jp/Waseda-Sat2/index htm

KSAT, Kagoshima University Uplink: S-band(2GHz, 10kbps), Downlink: Ku-band(13 275GHz, 10kbps/1Mbps) http://www sci kagoshima-u ac jp/~nishio/download/Ukaren2008Nishio pdf

More information is also available on Mineo Wakita's web page at: http://www ne jp/asahi/hamradio/je9pel/unitec-1 htm

[ANS thanks Mineo Wakita, JE9PEL for the above information]

/EX

SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-129 02 Power Management Software Operational on AO-51

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 129 02 From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD May 9, 2010 To All RADIO AMATEURS BID: $ANS-129 02

Power Management Software Operational on AO-51

AO-51 has now reentered a period of eclipses that will reach almost 20 minutes by July Since the satellite has been in an extended period of continuous illumination and very warm spacecraft temperatures, the Operations Team will spend the next few weeks determining what the batteries capacities are in the new environment

AMSAT-NA VP Operations, Drew Glasbrenner, KO4MA enabled the power management software on AO-51 The 435 300 repeater with the new PL mode is programmed to run at 1 01 watt while in sun, and 290 milli- watts while in eclipse The low power mode will continute after exit- ing eclipse until the solar cells recharge the batteries approximately 7 9 volts

For this summer eclipse season, the eclipsed periods are while AO-51 is over mostly unoccupied Antarctica and surrounding areas This means when the batteries alone are supporting the transmitter there are not likely to be any users The power management software combined with the PL, should mean we can protect the batteries from over-discharge, while still providing the strongest possible downlink

Observations from the southern hemisphere while entering and leaving eclipse are very helpful Post your reports on the AMSAT-BB or e-mail your report to the AO-51 Operations Team at ao51-modes@amsat org AO-51 operators also monitor the Live OSCAR Satellite Status Page (see: http://oscar dcarr org/) Analysis of AO-51's Whole Orbit Data (WOD) files shows the distribution of the satellite's users See: http://tinyurl com/2f83ezk

If the eclipse periods get too long too fast the repeater may shut off due to a low battery voltage watchdog If this happens, please email Drew directly at ko4ma@amsat org

[ANS thanks the AO-51 Control Team for the above information]

/EX

SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-129 03 Special OPS during Armed Forces Day

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 129 03 From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD May 9, 2010 To All RADIO AMATEURS BID: $ANS-129 03

On May 15th & 16, in honor of Armed Forces Day, the Great South Bay ARC will set up portable HF/VHF operations at the Air Power Museum located at Republic Airport in Farmingdale, NY using the call W2GSB/APM, a special QSL card will be sent The club will be on HF from 11 AM until 4 PM each day I will be o n AO-27 on May, 15th, 17:51 UTC using the special call sign, W2GSB/APM, look forward to working many stations, thank you
For more information, www gsbarc org
Ed: Don't forget to listen for AMSAT OPS from Dayton Hamvention

[ANS thanks Pete, WB2OQQ, for the above information]

/EX

SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-129 04 Current UNITEC Information

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 129 04 From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD May 9, 2010 To All RADIO AMATEURS BID: $ANS-129 04 Amateur Radio Call for Assistance for UNITEC-1 Venus-Bound Satellite

On May 17 Japan's Space Agency JAXA plans to launch its Planet-C Venus Climate Orbiter "AKATSUKI" mission to Venus Also aboard will be UNITEC-1, a 15 kg, 35cm cubed nano-satellite developed by twenty two universities and colleges of UNISEC (University Space Engineering Consortium)

UNITEC-1 be inserted into a Venus encounter trajectory and will become the world first university satellite which goes beyond Lunar orbit The main mission of UNITEC-1 is to perform technological experiments of on-board computers and test long-range, inter-planetary communication using amateur radio frequencies:

Downlink Frequency: 5840 000MHz, band width 20MHz Transmission Power: 4 8W/antenna, 9 6W total Antenna: 2 Microstrip patch antennas Modulation: AFSK/FM 1200bps during LEO flight CW 1bps during Interplanetary flight

Due to development time and funding limitations UNITEC-1 does not have an attitude control system resulting in a tumbling motion in the inter-planetary trajectory It will be impossible to maintain full-time earth pointing of the 5840 MHz patch antennas Consequently, the 1 bps CW signal will detectable intermittently

Tracking of the satellite should also be done using the same weak downlink signal UNISEC cordially invites world-wide AMSAT and other amateur RF engineers to support the interplanetary team by receiving the very weak RF signal, decoding it and enabling tracking during the long journey to Venus In the future they hope to develop a world wide ground station network using the internet to relay your received and decoded signals directly to the UNITEC-1 Mission Operation Center in Japan so that the real-time signal analysis can be performed

In addition to the telemetry content of the beacon the direction of incoming RF signal and the amount of Doppler Shift will also be sent to the Operation Center to continually estimate the satellite traject- ory (position and velocity) This trajectory data will be available to all of the world amateur ground stations fine tune their C-band antenna tracking

As the Earth rotates only the ground stations pointing toward UNITEC's direction can receive the signal This challenge can be overcome by creating a global network of interplanetary-capable amateur radio earth stations

Full information about this exciting mission and amateur radio challenge can be found on-line at: http://www unisec jp/unitec-1/en/top html

[ANS thanks Naomi Kurahara, UNITEC-1 project team member for the above information]

/EX

SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-129 05 Satellite Shorts From All Over

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 129 05 From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD May 9, 2010 To All RADIO AMATEURS BID: $ANS-129 05

Satellite Shorts From All Over

Sebastian, W4AS has had good success at working DX via AO-7 footprint stretching contacts While AO-7 was at about 3 degrees W4AS worked G7BTA on May 2 and May 4 for a distance of 6,975 km On May 4 he worked 2E1EUB for a distance of 7,018 km while AO-7 was at 2 degrees elevation
The Dayton Hamvention AMSAT Booths will be a hot spot with new items and a great place to get first hand questions answered from your elected officials Stop by and renew your membership while meeting them Get the latest information about Satellite ops and up to date information on present projects Remember, the DARA Matching funds offer
Congratulations are in order to George, WA5KBH for working his 50th state via satellite for Worked All States - Satellite when he made a contact with Adrian, AA5UK/KH6, in BL02 via FO-29 on April 3 George says he will apply for the award when he receives the QSL card He commented, "This contact was like the excitement of my first contact as a new novice in the summer of 1964!" Well done!
News received from John, LA2QAA informed ANS that he is now the HO-68 area coordinator for Europe and has requested European satellite oper- ators (via the EU-Amsat list) to state their preferences for a future mode schedules when commissioning is completed John notes the extra- ordinary DX opportunities available on HO-68 For example, on May 5 HO-68's footprint covered Europe, Africa and Asia from Svalbard in the north to The Sudan in the south and from Portugal in the west to Pakistan in the east John's blog will now have a new HO-68 category on his http://www observations biz website where GM1SXX does all the work and LA2QAA takes all the credit John can be reached via his e-mail at la2qaa@amsat org
Call for Papers and Presenters for the 2010 CSVHF Society Conference http://www csvhfs org/conference/presenters html -and- http://www csvhfs org/conference/authors html are the web pages to read if you are interested in being a presenter or author at the Central States VHF Society Conference near St Louis in July, 2010
PowerPoint Slides from the successful CubeSat workshop held in April are now available for download The slides in a 100 meg zip file can be downloaded at http://mstl atl calpoly edu/~jfoley/Spring2010/ Videos of the CubeSat presentations can be seen at http://www ustream tv/channel/CubeSatWorkshop/v3
Matthias DD1US has added a number of recordings to his "Sounds from Space" collection at http://www dd1us de Matthias invites fellow AMSAT members to enjoy listing to the sounds of past and present satellites He is also still looking for some additional record- ings especially from some satellites which are long gone
The ANS News team is looking for a few reliable volunteer editors Additional editors will keep the news flowing in a timely manner and spread important information to our many readers of ANS Please respond To Joanne Maenpa k9jkm@amsat org with questions and offers
The team of Teresina DX Group and Labre - is preparing for the ZW8B DXpedition to the Santa Isabel Island (IOTA SA) and Pedra do Sal Lighthouse on the coast of the state of PiauÃƒÂƒÃ‚Â in northeastern Brazil June 2 - 6, 2010 Their satellite operations include AO-7, FO-29, AO-51, VO-52, SO-50, HO-68, SO-67 if active, and ISS repeater if active The ZW8B team plans to operate on all available orbits QSL via PS8HF
Technical papers are solicited for presentation at the 29th Annual ARRL and TAPR Digital Communications Conference to be held September 24-26, 2010 near Portland, Oregon These papers will also be published in the Conference Proceedings (you do NOT need to attend the conference to have your paper included in the Proceedings) The submission dead- line is July 31, 2010 Please send papers to: Maty Weinberg, ARRL, 225 Main St , Newington, CT 06111 You can make your submission via e-mail to: maty@arrl org Papers will be published exactly as submit- ted and authors will retain all rights

[ANS thanks everyone for the above information]

/EX

SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-129 06 ARISS Status - 3 May 2010

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 129 06 From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD May 9, 2010 To All RADIO AMATEURS BID: $ANS-129 06

Upcoming School Contacts

An Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact was scheduled for Nippon Boy Scout Amateur Radio Club in Mitaka-shi, Japan on Tuesday, May 4 at 15:09 UTC The Japan Boy Scouts have an amateur radio club, JA1YSS and study amateur radio station operations
The boys enjoyed speaking with Soichi Noguchi, a former Boy Scout

The Smithsonian Institution National Air and Space Museum (NASM) in Washington, D C was scheduled for an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact on Space Day, Saturday, May 8 at 17:01 UTC via VK4KHZ in Australia The Education Division of NASM recruited the young people who participated in the contact Generally, Boy Scouts and other groups are involved with this activity
The Museum drew approximately 30,000 on this Saturday in May

Komoro Higashi Junior High School in Komoro, Nagano, Japan has been scheduled for an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact on Friday, May 14 at 11:16 UTC The students have become especially interested in space due to Koichi Wakata, the first long term Japanese astronaut on the ISS Many children chose to take a space themed course under their general education requirement As part of their studies, they visited Nobeyama Radio Observatory and worked on radio kits A JAXA representative visited the school and gave a presentation on space and the ISS Through these activities, students enhanced their knowledge of space, the ISS and communication using ham radio

ARISS Contact Held at IARU Exhibition/European Parliament

Students from European School Brussels II were invited to the European Parliament in Brussels, Belgium on April 27 to participate in an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact with on-orbit astronaut Timothy Creamer, KC5WKI Other students remaining at the school listened in to the contact via teleconference Telebridge station LU1CGB in Argentina provided the connection The ISS hook-up was the highlight of the ESA/IARU (International Amateur Radio Union) Region 1 exhibition, ÃƒÂ‚Ã‚Â“European Amateur Radio Benefiting Society ÃƒÂ‚Ã‚Â” Afterwards, astronauts Frank De Winne and Robert Thirsk as well as cosmonaut Roman Romanenko visited the exhibition and met with a group of 40 students to answer questions about their space missions Several Members of the European Parliament and assistants attended the event

The American Radio Relay League (ARRL) and the Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation (AMSAT) posted articles on this event

For the ARRL story, see: http://www arrl org/news/amateur-radio-exhibition-reflects-unity-in-europe-e uropean-radio-societies-exhibit-in-european-parli

For AMSAT coverage, see: http://www amsat org/amsat-new/index php

Astronaut Training Status

On Monday, April 26, astronauts Ron Garan (Expedition 27) and Kevin Ford (Expedition TBD) successfully passed their FCC amateur radio licensing exams Callsigns should be posted to the FCC database in about a week

Soichi Noguchi Contacts Showa Base

On April 29, on-orbit astronaut Soichi Noguchi, KD5TVP used ARISS radio equipment and contacted Yuusuke Otani and Sakae Kudouh at Showa Base in Antarctica This was the first contact ever made between the ISS and Showa Base, 8J1RL Noguchi remarked on the event, ÃƒÂ‚Ã‚Â“One small chat for man, a giant leap for ARISS!ÃƒÂ‚Ã‚Â”

[ANS thanks Carol, KB3LKI, for the above information ] /EX

73, This week's ANS Editor, Dee Interdonato, NB2F nb2f at amsat dot org

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