[amsat-bb] PCsat passes Pre-Ship Review

[Bob Bruninga <bruninga@xxxxxxxx>]

Today, the Naval Academy's PCsat (Personal Communications Satellite)
was presented to the DOD's Space Test Program review and was accepted for
launch on 31 August.  This satellite is a simple UI digipeater just like
ISS, but it has 4 uplinks and 2 downlinks both 1200 and 9600 baud.

Also it has a GPS onboard so that the satellite will report its own
position in a standard NMEA $GPGGA sentence which will be accepted and
plotted on any tracking software and of course APRS and the Kenwood APRS
radios.  As usual for an Amateur satellite, it will be open to all after
initial checkout on orbit.

Now for the one-in-a-million coincidence.  All PCsat needs as a ground
station is just a Kenwood dual band 1200/9600 baud APRS HT.  So I was
using only an HT with a camera/projecter zoomed into the screen so all
in the room could see.  At the point in the review when it was time to
activate PCsat and dsmonstrate an HT-to-HT packet, the instant I turned on
the HT, the first packet that popped on the screen (from the 144.39
network) was an ISS position report from the local APRSdata server.

It showed the ISS to be 574 miles to the Northeast and with a doppler of
only 1 KHz.  This "picture" was worth a thousand words, because that is
exactly the display that PCsat will show on either the THD7 or D700 when
it comes into view.  There is no way I could have planned that occurance
at just that time...

WB4APR@amsat.org, Bob

ISS-APRS FAQ:       http://web.usna.navy.mil/~bruninga/iss-faq.html
PCsat Design        http://web.usna.navy.mil/~bruninga/pcsat.html
CUBESAT Designs     http://web.usna.navy.mil/~bruninga/cubesat.html
APRS LIVE pages     http://web.usna.navy.mil/~bruninga/aprs.html
APRS SATELLITES     http://web.usna.navy.mil/~bruninga/astars.html
MIM/Mic-E/Mic-Lite  http://www.toad.net/~wclement/bruninga/mic-lite.html


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