SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-167.01 ITAMSAT (IO-26) status on June 1, 1996 HR AMSAT NEWS SERVICE BULLETIN 167.01 FROM AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD, JUNE 15, 1996 TO ALL RADIO AMATEURS BT BID: $ANS-167.01 After about eight months of standby mode (MBL safe mode), command stations in Milano, loaded an improved version of RAM based MBL code and started the upload of the high level control code (IHT 3.1). ITAMSAT (IO-26) was successfully returned to full operations on the 1st June and Whole Orbit Data collection was started to analyze the spacecraft status. ITAMSAT has a spin of about O.5 RPM and is in stable magnetic lock. The wobbling motion has nearly the same amplitude and period of two years ago. Internal temperature variates between 5 and 14 degrees Celsius and the battery voltage cycles around 10.5 V. Voltage measured on each battery cell shows no sign of degradation. Currents produced by the solar arrays have a peak value of 360 mA that indicates no measurable decrease of efficiency. ITAMSAT will collect WOD for the next days and the digipeater is ON. Some European stations already started to digipeat and the reports received are quite good. This month IO-26 will reach 1000 days in orbit and the ITAMSAT Project team wish to thanks all the friends who helped so far. Please contact the ITAMSAT team at the following Internet address:itamsat@micronet.it [ANS thanks Alberto E. Zagni , I2KBD ITAMSAT Mission Director, for this update.] /EX SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-167.02 ARTICLE IN FINANCIAL TIMES HR AMSAT NEWS SERVICE BULLETIN 167.02 FROM AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD, JUNE 15, 1996 TO ALL RADIO AMATEURS BT BID: $ANS-167.02 The U.S. edition of the Financial Times ran the following article under the headline "Radio enthusiasts bank on Ariane 5": By Michael Skapinker, Aerospace Correspondent Among other items the article quoted Ron Broadbent G3AAJ of AMSAT-UK expressing the thoughts of thousands of amateur radio enthusiasts, who fear they may soon be deprived of high quality satellite links with the re- entry of OSCAR 13. Ron went on to talk about Phase 3D and the amount of effort and money that has gone into it and noted that it is scheduled to fly on the second Ariane 5 test launch. Bill Tynan W3XO, in answering a question from Mr. Skapinker regarding insurance for Phase 3D said that with the know-how acquired by the enthusiasts a second satellite could be built for about $500,000 or less. He indicated that this is probably cheaper than purchasing insurance, provided it is available. [ANS thanks Bill Tynan W3XO for this news item.] /EX SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-167.03 Houston AMSAT Net finds new Satellite home. HR AMSAT NEWS SERVICE BULLETIN 167.03 FROM AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD, JUNE 15, 1996 TO ALL RADIO AMATEURS BT BID: $ANS-167.03 After all this time, the Houston AMSAT Net has found a home on a satellite. Like the move towards higher frequency spectrums, the Houston AMSAT Net is also moving from C Band to KU Band. The Houston AMSAT Net will be heard Tuesday evenings at 8pm Central on SBS 6, Transponder 13B Upper It is located at 74 degrees next to Galaxy 6. The video is bingo and this is not a continuous show. So if you look for the satellite during the day to tune up, you will want to first go to Galaxy 6 then go a couple of clicks away. The actually transmit frequency the Houston AMSAT Net is using is 12.019GHz horizontal. During the day you will see feeds from CONUS (news service). This is the W0KIE Network and the Houston AMSAT Net looks forward to being there for many years. The satellite is turned on at 8pm and automatically turned off at 8:50pm so if we run over, we might get chomped They will have their normal net this Sunday, June 16 and then commence with their new net and home on SBS 6 on Tuesday, June 18. The Houston AMSAT Net can also be found during the net on the internet. Look for it on the IRC channel #amsat. Bruce can be sent E-mail during the net at kk5do@amsat.org. The Houston AMSAT Net is also looking to a RealAudio feed on the internet for those that want to listen at different times or from other countries. Look for this feature real soon. [ANS thanks Bruce Page, KK5DO AMSAT Area Coordinator for this good news.] /EX SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-167.04 CALL FOR BEGINNERS' FORUM PRESENTATIONS HR AMSAT NEWS SERVICE BULLETIN 167.04 FROM AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD, JUNE 15 1996 TO ALL RADIO AMATEURS BT BID: $ANS-167.04 The 1996 AMSAT Annual Meeting and Space Symposium will be held on November 8-10, 1996 at the Holiday Inn, City Center in Tucson, AZ. A Beginners' Forum is planned as part of this year's Annual Meeting in addition to the usual presentations. This forum is intended to provide satellite novices with the basic information necessary to operate the entire range of amateur radio satellites. This is a supplemental call for papers and presentations for the Beginners' Forum. As part of the Beginners Forum we are seeking half-hour to one hour presentations on various aspects of operating the amateur radio satellites. Suggested topics include, but are not limited to: Keplerian Elements and Satellite Tracking Operating the "Easy Satellites" SAREX and Mir operations Developing and operating a packet satellite station Operating the Phase 3 satellites (especially P3D) Building a low cost satellite station What is AMSAT: How amateurs build, launch and operate satellites AMSAT Area Coordinators and other volunteers are needed to develop and present these and other relevant topics for the Beginners' Forum. A paper is optional but we would like to include this information in a Beginners' Forum section of the 1996 Space Symposium Proceedings. One method might be including reduced copies of presentations graphics in the Proceedings. To be included in the Proceedings, papers and presentation graphics need to be submitted in final form by August 15th. Anyone having an appropriate presentation, or would be willing to develop one and help other amateurs become active on the satellites, are invited to contact either: Larry Brown, NW7N -or- Dave Burnett, WD8KRV nw7n@amsat.org wd8krv@amsat.org (520) 886-1957 (H) (520) 663-6471 (W) by June 30th with your suggested topic [ANS thanks Dave Burnett, WD8KRV, for this information.] /EX SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-167.05 Press Release From the UAH SEDSAT 1 team HR AMSAT NEWS SERVICE BULLETIN 167.05 FROM AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD, JUNE 15 1996 TO ALL RADIO AMATEURS BT BID: $ANS-167.05 It has been determined that the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center's Small Expendable Deployer System will not be a part of the SEDS/SEDSAT mission on STS 85 slated for launch on July 17, 1997. This is a result of difficulties the Marshall Center was having in assuring the safety of the Shuttle due to the tether during the deployment. The SEDSAT Project Team at UAH remains committed to the launch of SEDSAT on STS 85 and will be working with the Goddard Space Flight Center to assure this result. The satellite is ready to advance to the Phase II safety process at the Johnson Space Flight Center and no technical issues have been raised that would preclude the flight of SEDSAT. This is the recommendation of the Goddard mission manager which we concur with. The unfortunate result of this is that the lifetime of SEDSAT will be reduced from three years to only several months. However, this is preferable to no lifetime at all. All research goals of the satellite not directly related to the tether mission will be accomplished in an abbreviated form due to the reduction in lifetime. We wish to express our appreciation to NASA and NASA MSFC for their continuing support of our student project and look forward to our flight on STS 85 next year. [ANS thanks Dennis Ray Wingo, KD4ETA SEDSAT 1 Project Manager, for this SEDSAT update.] /EX SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-167.06 WEEKLY SATELLITE STATUS HR AMSAT NEWS SERVICE BULLETIN 167.06 FROM AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD, JUNE 15 1996 TO ALL RADIO AMATEURS BT BID: $ANS-167.06 RS-12: Operating normally. RS-10: Operating normally. AO-27: Operating normally. AO-10: Operating normally. AO-13: Operating normally. Due to constraints of seasonal variation in solar angle, AO-13 was scheduled to be reoriented on June 17th, prior to this year's Field Day, to an ALON/ALAT of 220/0. The associated much less favorable squint angle would have necessitated the predominant use of the omni antenna. This would obviously have been sub optimal for AO-13's final Field Day appearance. However, circumstances, for once, have conspired in our favor. The small amount of drag that AO-13 currently experiences at perigee is acting on the spinning satellite to translate the ALAT slowly upward. Coupled with normal changes of precession, the "undisturbed" orientation on Field Day will be ALON/ALAT 187/13. At this orientation, the absolute solar angle is lower (more favorable) than at an orientation of 180/0, and AO-13 can stay in it's current configuration for approximately 10 days longer than originally planned. Therefore, the orientation, antenna schedule and transponder schedule for AO-13 will remain "as is" for the 1996 Field Day. Current plans call for reorientation to 220/0 on approximately June 27th. The process takes several days and, therefore, will commence a few days before that time, with schedule changes activated after the position has been stabilized. Amateurs are encouraged to enjoy what could be the final optimum attitude and schedule of this fine satellite. Reorientation to 180/0 in September is likely to be transient at best, with considerable torquing of ALAT around perigee WEBERSAT-OSCAR-18: Initial operating software was reloaded to WEBERSAT-OSCAR-18, and as of 01:59:06 UTC on Saturday 25-May-96, the satellite was transmitting telemetry and spacecraft status information, and reporting an uptime of one day, five hours, 48 minutes, and 41 seconds. Bob Argyle, KB7KCL is asking that anyone who captured telemetry from WEBERSAT-OSCAR-18 on 21-May-96 between 19:28:31 and 20:29:34 UTC please send it to him either via AO-16, unencode and e-mail at (rargyle@cc.weber.edu), or anonymous FTP upload to 137.190.32.131. He is especially interested in any telemetry gathered over Africa. Bob also reports that when WEBERSAT is successfully reloaded, it will be sending several new telemetry frames: WHO-18 was copied in New Jersey during a pass between 15:40 and 15:50 UTC on 01-Jun-96. The satellite was transmitting AX.25 flags, but no data. The downlink signal strength appeared to be normal ITAMSAT-OSCAR-26 returned to the air on 01-Jun-96. The satellite was copied on Friday 07-Jun-96 at KD2BD in New Jersey transmitting telemetry, WOD, LSTAT, BCRXMT, TIME, and STATUS frames. In addition, the satellite was sending the following text message: IY2SAT-1>AMSAT : ** 5th June 1996 ** IHT 3.1 is running. Digipeater is ON. WOD is underway. 73 de ITAMSAT Command team. The satellite was using its 435.820 MHz downlink transmitter, and digipeating was possible via ITMSAT-1 using any one of its four uplink frequencies (145.875 MHz, 145.900 MHz, 145.925 MHz, or 145.950 MHz). See AMSAT NEWS SERVICE BULLETIN 167.01. [Please send your Satellite reports to bjarts@uslink.net or to wt0n@amsat.org] /EX