[amsat-bb] SATTV dish with AO-40 SUCCESS!!!

["Radioman" <radioman@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Well, I woke up this morning and turned the radio on, not really expecting
to
hear the S band beacon on AO-40, as logsat told me the range was 55,000km. I
thought, what the hell, and panned my c band dish, which is set up for the
Clarke belt. To my amazement, the telemetry beacon came booming in, S-5 on
my
FT736. I connected up the audio to my sound card, and this is what I got....

### AO-40 IHU-1 Telemetry Display - OE1KIB, OE1VKW - F1HDD - XTOPHE ###
A  HI, THIS IS AMSAT OSCAR-40       2001-05-06  22:04:59  #0139
+--------------------------------------------------------------+
| ALON/ALAT=30/5, EXPERIMENTAL U/L1->S2, MA 136-240, AVOID MB! |
+--------------------------------------------------------------+
________________________ Orbit data ____________________________
AMSAT day 08526  Time 22:04:59.08 UTC  Orbit No 00237  Phase 163
________________________ Status ________________________________
RX: U(10.1dB S2/Ku) L1(0.6dB S2/Ku) L2(-0.3dB)
TX: S2(0x58W U L1 MB)
Beacons: GB(PSK;) MB(EB source; S2/Ku)
Ant/Pre-amps: V-Rx=hi V-Tx=om U-Rx=hi U-Tx=om L-hi+preamp
Experiments: RUDAK Cedex-ctrl Cedex-pwr
Main battery on; Memory soft error count: 3
________________________ Temperatures [°C] _____________________
 SolPan1   -5.1  SolPan2   16.0  SolPan3   16.0  SolPan4   16.0
 SolPan5   15.3  SolPan6   -3.8
 BCR1       2.1  BCR2       5.4  BCR3       3.4
 MainBatB2 -3.1  MainBatB4 98.3  MainBatB6 -5.1
 AuxBatB1  -0.5  AuxBatB5   9.4
 V-TX       4.1  U-Excit    4.8  U-Amp      2.1  S1-TX      7.4
 S2-TX     10.0  X-TX      84.8  X-TX TWT  86.5
 U&V-RX     9.4  L1-RX      9.4  L2-RX     12.0  S1-HF RX   4.1
 S2-C RX    5.4  IHU       -1.2  SEU       -3.8  EPU        3.4
 HP1+X-Y    2.1  HP2+X+Y    2.8  HP2+X-Y    3.4  HP2-X     98.3
 HP3+X      6.1  HP3-X      6.7  HP4+X+Y    7.4
 NH3 B2    -1.8  MMH B3     4.1  N2O4-X-Y  98.3  N2O4+X+Y   4.8
 He Tank   98.3
 Top       98.3  Bottom    98.3  Back      98.3  Side2Pan  10.0
 Side4Pan  10.0  S ant     11.4
________________________ Voltages [V] __________________________
 Main-Bat  29.6  Aux-Bat   21.0
 BCR1-In   25.6  BCR2-In   22.4    BCR3-In    6.6
 28V Bus   29.5  10V-C1BCR2  10.6  10V-C2BCR3  10.6
________________________ Currents [mA] _________________________
 SP1-BCR1 16021  SP4-BCR2 15920  SP2-BCR3 16123
 SP6-BCR1 16021  SP5-BCR2 16021  SP3-BCR3 16021
 10V-C1BCR2  1988  10V-C2BCR3  1988  28V-SSEU 0xa7
 28V-Bat    291  28VU1EPU    -1  28VU2Bus  3004
 28VU3-S    517  28V-BCR   3136
 28VS-PA/M 6617  10VS-PA/M 0xa4  X-Helix      3 K-Tx      0xa3
________________________ Sun/Earth Sensors _____________________
Sensor mode: spin
 SS1 PLL: locked  SS2 count: 5  SpinRate[rpm]   5.2
 SS Z-25    -4°  SS Y-25   -32°  SS Up-X    32°  SS Up-Y    25°
 SS Z-45   -55°  SS Y-45   -13°  SS Dwn-X   25°  SS Dwn-Y   24°
###### AO-40 IHU-1 Telemetry Display --- End of A/E Block ######

 CRC VALID

The time I turned on was 22:06 UTC, and I received it till it set at
23:55UTC.
The downconverter is just a stock standard MDS tv downconverter we use here
in OZ
with integrated linear feed, cable tied next to my C band lnb. The IF
frequency by
the way is 450.2895 +/- doppler. The dish is a mesh 2.4 m. I also heard a
couple of
CW and one SSB station when I tuned around a bit.
(There is a mod you can do to the FT736 to enable extended rx in PMS mode)
The next thing I need to do is cut the linear feed off, and build a small CP
helix feed.
Can anyone point me in the right direction as to the polarization (LHCP or
RHCP?),
Any help would be appreciated. The spark is back!!!!

Cheers

John de VK4JWT

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