Re: [amsat-bb] Looking for any info on RS-1

[Dennis Dinga <dennis@xxxxxxxxx>]

>  No, that's not a typo, RS-1. I read in "A Brief History of Amateur 
>Satellites" at http://www.amsat.org/amsat/sats/n7hpr/history.html 
>that "...RS-1 is still giving signals. Its battery open circuited 
>soon after

Radio Sports 1 was a very loud and very sensitive satellite designed 
for hams in the Soviet Union that only had low power transmitters and 
receivers with mediocre sensitivity.  It only took a few watts to get 
S-9 returns.  Most US hams had 100w+ uplink stations which were set 
up for Oscars 6,7 and 8 at the time and when they would attempt to 
access RS-1, they would either desense the entire passband or cause 
it to turn off completely.  It took months to get the word out to the 
worldwide satellite community to run LOW POWER on RS-1.

I remember RS-1 having two beacons and a 40 kHz passband.  My log 
entry showed 29.386 as the nominal beacon frequency, but I could be 
wrong.  I recorded my first QSO with W6CG (deceased) on 27 October 
1978.  There were a few earlier QSO's on previous passes.  I first 
heard the RS-2 beacon on 10 December 1978.

In those days there were no tracking programs for hams because there 
were no PC's.  We used a satellite ground tracking device known as 
the Satellabe.  It required a published list of times in which the 
satellite crossed the equator.  Since the Soviets didn't offer this 
information in the beginning, it was up to  those of us that wanted 
to use the RS's to generate our own "EQX" (equatorial crossings) by 
CONSTANTLY monitoring the Sat beacon and generating the equivlent of 
a spread sheet so that we could modify our Satellabes to predict 
future RS passes.

A good friend of mine W6DOW (deceased) was in a battle with cancer at 
the time.  Karl couldn't sleep, so he stayed up all night recording 
AOS's and LOS's of RS-1.  I would take over for Karl at about 5am.  I 
would record passes during the day and then we would relay our 
findings to the Sunday morning 20 meter Amsat net (pre Internet days).

RS-1 was short lived. I show the last RS-1 entry in my log on orbit 
1001 on 17 Jan 1979, again with W6CG.

The Soviet Union issued an award to anyone who would submit a log 
showing 100 or more QSO's via their first hamsat.  I had made about 
125 Q's and applied for the so called "KOCMOC award".  Worldwide, 
there were six such awards issued which consisted of a certificate 
and a "gold medal". I received the certificate, but the "gold medal" 
was lost along the way. I think that W2RS, W1NU and G3IOR were also 
recipients.

These were exciting times for the Amsat community and I would like to 
thank the Soviet hams who built the RS's for the pleasure they 
brought to us all.

-Dennis N6DD



     /  /  /  /  /      * Dennis Dinga           * dennis@dinga.com
    /--/--/--/--/       * 1024 Twin Canyon       * n6dd@amsat.org
   /  /  /| /  /  N6DD  * Diamond Bar, CA 91765  * Tel: 909-860-1515
          |             * USA                    * Fax: 909-860-3685
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