[amsat-bb] RS-12 Mode A - Wow!

[Rip Smith <rip.smith@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Greetings,

I wanted to share my fun with the group - I just made my first satellite 
contacts in many years on RS-12 Mode A.

I received the 10-meter downlink on a dipole in the attic, and used a 
dual-band Diamond X-50 vertical for the uplink - also in the attic.

The first surprise was that the beacon on 29.408 was right there within a 
minute of when Instant Track said it would be. Other satellites I have 
listened to here usually have to be well above the horizon before I can 
hear them at all.

The second surprise was when I could clearly hear my CW signal on the 
downlink by the time the bird was up about 10 or 12 degrees.

Anyway, two passes later I had worked 7 stations - two on SSB, and one of 
those also had indoor antennas!

I know that it's not as glamorous as a high orbit bird with a big antenna 
system that tracks automatically by computer, but I'm excited!

I'll be working up some improved antennas for portable operation when the 
weather gets warmer and in the meantime, I will be talking it up at my 
radio club and encouraging people to give it a try.

It's the kind of excitement that will bring new people into the satellite 
community and will bring people like me back into it after a long period of 
inactivity.

I'm also looking forward to taking a crack at some of the other birds, and 
eventually AO-40, but for pure fun, I hope RS-12 stays healthy in mode A 
for a long time.

73 de K3XO
Rip

----
Via the amsat-bb mailing list at AMSAT.ORG courtesy of AMSAT-NA.
To unsubscribe, send "unsubscribe amsat-bb" to Majordomo@amsat.org