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Technical
Report
Since
the first NASA broadcast back in 1989 started by club member Gerry
O'Robko VE3DYY, the Kitchener Waterloo Amateur Radio Club has provided
Short Wave Listeners, School Boards, and Radio Hams, real- time space
shuttle audio during NASA missions. The down link audio was passed over
to Terry Taylor VE3NEJ in 1990, who beamed it to our club repeater
VE3RCK, where it still remains to this day. For years the signal covered
a wide area around the cities of Kitchener, Waterloo, Guelph, Cambridge.
During the current shuttle mission, to install the Canadarm on the new
International Space Station our club has successfully installed
equipment dedicated solely to the NASA broadcast project.
NEW FREQUENCY
Through the generous donation of a commercial Glenayre 100% operating
duty repeater, (ask me no questions, and I'll tell you no lies)
and the purchase of crystals from West Crystal in Vancouver, I have
installed a higher power station broadcasting shuttle communications on
a new, simplex frequency of 147.510 MHz. The transmitter is connected to
a commercial 210C4 VHF antenna at about 125-ft at our Manheim site for
now, but will be moved to our Queen St building which will be the
permanent home. For the Canadarm mission we chose to simulcast on VE3RCK
and the new simplex frequency. I have also placed a voice message on RCK
repeater directing listeners to re tune to the new frequency. After a
few audio bugs that produced too much bass, and some further fine-tuning
planned, we are receiving good signal reports from as far away as
Milton.
VE3NEJ Set Up.
Terry receives
the NASA audio from the GE2 satellite at 80' west longitude, through a
transponder 9 vertical polarization on 3.880 Ghz. The audio is mono
using a sub carrier 6.8 Mhz into a 10 Ft dish with 42.5 dB gain and a
LNA - Drake with a 50 degree Kelvin noise figure. After adjusting
levels, it is then transmitted using a link frequency to Manheim where
it is amplified and broadcast on VHF simplex. Terry activates the link
audio manually for each shuttle mission and has been doing this for the
past 11 years.
If you ever bump into Terry, be sure to commend him on his service of
providing us with NASA audio for so many years.
Future shuttle broadcasts will be exclusively heard on 147.510 MHz only. This will provide superb and dedicated NASA coverage over a large area around K-W that can be received with a basic scanner or your VHF receiver. Repeater VE3RCK and its many options will be available for local ham usage continuously.
Listeners are encouraged to report their reception reports and comments to Ben Sasiela at va3bny@rac.ca
Want to see where the shuttle is now..
http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/tracking/index.html
Space Station Amateur Radio Link
http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/station/reference/radio/index.html
73 everyone
de Ben VA3BNY
Technical Chairman
KWARC