SB NEWS @ AMSAT $SPC0109 * SpaceNews 09-Jan-95 * BID: $SPC0109 ========= SpaceNews ========= MONDAY JANUARY 9, 1995 SpaceNews originates at KD2BD in Wall Township, New Jersey, USA. It is published every week and is made available for unlimited free distribution. * NOAA-14 LAUNCHED! * ===================== NOAA -J (NOAA 14) was successfully launched on Friday 30-Dec-94 at 02:02 PST from Vandenberg AFB atop an Atlas-E booster. The burn was nominal for a 870 km near polar orbit inclined 98 degrees. Dallas Remote Imaging Group member Richard Allen, W5SXD, of Houston, Texas provided the following report on NOAA-14: The 1800Z pass of NOAA-14 was heard in Houston. The beacon on 137.770 MHz was heard well and my HRPT system locked on at 1698.0 MHz for the first half of the pass. It appears that the element set that I posted earlier is very good. I manually rocked my antenna around the computer generated position and the signal level dropped in all directions. I got carrier lock and bit-sync but no frame sync. This is what I usually see when NOAA-10 is transmitting LAC downlinks. I did not try to observe the eye pattern but I'll do that on the next orbit. Nothing was heard on either 137.5 or 137.62 APT downlink frequencies. Dave Briggs at NOAA SatOps again verified that the downlink should be 1698/ 137.5. This matches my HRPT observation at least and is in agreement with the odd/even pairing used on NOAA-9, 10, 11, 12, and 13. The following element set was received from NOAA/GFSC for NOAA-14. GCC DEC 30, 1994 12:48:35Z NOAA-14 1 23455U 94 89 A 94364.46369541 -.00000019 00000-0 00000+0 0 17 2 23455 98.8951 303.4851 0010197 320.7071 39.3363 14.11138330 05 [Info via Jeff Wallach] * AO-13 NEWS * ============== QST *** AO-13 TRANSPONDER SCHEDULE *** 1994 Dec 19 - Feb 20 Mode-B : MA 0 to MA 100 | Omnis : MA 230 to MA 25 Mode-BS : MA 100 to MA 130 | Mode-S : MA 130 to MA 132 |<- S beacon only Mode-S : MA 132 to MA 155 |<- S transponder; B trsp. is OFF Mode-S : MA 155 to MA 160 |<- S beacon only Mode-BS : MA 160 to MA 180 | Alon/Alat 180/0 Mode-B : MA 180 to MA 256 | Move to attitude 230/0, Feb 20 [Info via Wayne, WA2N] * RS-15 NEWS * ============== The following data on RS-15's orbit came from Ken Ernandes N2WWD via Ray Soifer W2RS. Based on some AOS, TCA and LOS findings Ken made up a Keplerian element set to match the claimed Boxing Day launch. These have since been 'tweaked' a few times to correct the slight discrepancies found, but the latest set are are still running true within +/- 20 seconds after four days of use. The original state vector from which Ken derived the Keps came from his own modelling assuming a 26th December 1994 03:00 UTC launch time is as follows: Vector format = 10107 Satellite Name: RS-15 Catalog Number: 99915 Epoch MET: 0.04004629630 0/00:57:40.000 MET EFG E: -3698.189817 km F: -4493.256940 km G: -6027.203350 km Edot: 5.466925217 km/s Fdot: 0.509012470 km/s Gdot: -3.733879490 km/s ndot/2 (drag): 0.00000000458 rev/day^2 nddt/6: 0.00000E+00 rev/day^3 Bstar: 1.27563E-05 1/Earth Radii Elset #: 2 Rev @ Epoch: 1.64733102495 The latest recommended working set, which should still hold well for a further ten days (until NASA/NORAD are able to sort out which specific object is being tracked) are: RS-15 (Epoch) (Decay) 1 99915U 94360.16222500 .00000000 00000-0 13414-4 0 26 2 99915 64.5927 174.9040 0173416 233.4418 0.0000 11.27220872 13 (Incl) (RA) (Ecc) (A of P) (MA) (MM) The latest NASA KEPS for the object we believe to be RS-15 (which is not the first that was listed as such) are: RS-15 1 23440U 94361.79150546 -.00000043 00000-0 00000+ 0 26 2 23440 64.8297 172.1572 0188748 292.0126 66.1014 11.27113018 197 This set shows a lag behind the Doppler tracking by some 2.5 minutes, so it's best to keep to the first set given above e.g. 1 99915U for now. The TLM beacon on 29.352 MHz is VERY strong, sending .."MMW14 INW11 ..etc.. RS15". The transponder uplink:downlink translation figure is ca. 116.504, e.g. f uplink - 116.504 = downlink, downlink + 116.504 = uplink. At times the satellite (considering the distance and the inverse square law) is very sensitive, and the noise floor is clearly audible. 10w ERP provided G3IOR a downlink signal that was 6db above the noise. No more than 100w ERP (10w to 8 elements) is needed for uplink. Best and most QSB free downlink resulted by employing vertical polarization at most attitudes, and was even better than RHCP and LHCP, but this may change with time. Horizontal polarization gave by far the weakest signal and deepest fades. RS-15 is tumbling and toppling, showing spin fading at some 1 cps, sounding rather like AO-13 can. Despite RS-15 non-stabilization, this should slowly subside. [Info via G3IOR] * H-II LAUNCH DELAY * ===================== A NASDA press release issued on 27-Dec-94 reported that the launch of the Japanese H-II third vehicle has been postponed because a leakage was detected in a pipe of Reaction Control System (RCS). The Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS), the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) and the National Space Development Agency (NASDA) have been engaged in flight operation of the vehicle toward the launch on Feb. 1, 1995. The new operation schedule would be decided early in January when the repair work would have been finished. [Info via Yoshiro Yamada] * SpaceNews ON-LINE! * ====================== There are several ways of accessing SpaceNews on the Internet. 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