Hi.
Last night, the @AMSAT Twitter account apparently retweeted a notice from
Drew Glasbrenner KO4MA, AMSAT's Vice President of Operations, that the
normally-scheduled AO-92 mode change would not take place until this
morning. I did not see this. Even though Drew's initial AO-92 announcement
was retweeted by the @AMSAT Twitter account, I was not able to view it
because Drew blocked my @WD9EWK Twitter account from seeing anything
originating from his @glasbrenner account. Drew did this as a result of my
encouraging AMSAT and ARRL to do more about the DMR hotspot interference
that AMSAT reported last August, and Drew's initial weak response (only
encouraging everyone to contact the hotspot operators). Drew changed his
tune a couple of weeks later, encouraging everyone to contact him about
DMR hotspot interference to our satellites, when he appeared on Amateur
Radio Newsline:
https://www.arnewsline.org/news/2018/9/6/amateur-radio-newsline
-report-2132-for-friday-september-7th-2018
The script for that edition of Newsline is at:
https://www.arnewsline.org/s/nsln2132.txt
Despite this change of tune, my Twitter account remains blocked from
viewing tweets from the @glasbrenner account for the past 6 or 7
months.
This was not the first time Drew has chosen to have the @AMSAT Twitter
account retweet something from his personal Twitter account, instead
of using the @AMSAT Twitter account to make this sort of announcement.
Drew has done this on two other occasions in the past 3 weeks for
announcements on AO-92 mode changes. There have been other occasions
where the @AMSAT account retweeted the AO-92 mode-change announcements
from Mark Hammond N8MH. I am able to see those, but that doesn't change
my opinion on how AMSAT should handle these notifications.
I know I can always go to the AMSAT web site and look at the status page
for AO-92 to see the status of the satellite, including whether or not
the L-band uplink is active. If AMSAT is only going to use its Twitter
account to make these announcements, and not post them on the AMSAT-BB
list or the AMSAT web site, these tweets from AMSAT really need to
originate from the @AMSAT Twitter account. This was done earlier last
week, when the @AMSAT Twitter account announced new pricing on the 2018
Getting Started books:
https://twitter.com/AMSAT/status/1108171995697606656
and the one-day sale on AMSAT T-shirts:
https://twitter.com/AMSAT/status/1108368893914030081
What Drew does with his personal Twitter account is Drew's business. It
becomes an AMSAT issue when he is using his personal Twitter account to
make announcements on behalf of the organization, and not everyone has
access to those announcements. I have tried to address issues related to
how Drew manages the @AMSAT Twitter account over the past few months with
a few AMSAT officers and Board members, and have either been greeted with
silence to my inquiries, contempt for daring to question AMSAT, or
outright dismissal in one case. I don't have a problem with AMSAT using
its Twitter account for these announcements, as long as AMSAT makes the
announcements so *everyone* can see them. Otherwise, the AMSAT-BB list
or the AMSAT web site may be better avenues to make announcements about
the status of AMSAT's satellites that all can see.
Thank you.
Patrick Stoddard, WD9EWK/VA7EWK
Scottsdale, Arizona
Upcoming ARISS Contact Schedule as of 2019-03-25 16:00 UTC
Quick list of scheduled contacts and events:
Khabarovsk University, Khabarovsk, Russia, direct via TBD
The ISS callsign is presently scheduled to be RSØISS
The scheduled astronaut is Oleg Konenenko
Contact is a go for 2019-03-26 10:45 UTC
Ulluriaq School, Kangiqsualujjuaq, QC, Canada, via LU8YY
The ISS callsign is presently scheduled to be NA1SS
The scheduled astronaut is David St-Jacques KG5FYI
Contact is go for: Thu 2019-03-28 16:14:54 UTC 47 deg
58th Hamilton Scout Group, Stoney Creek, Ontario, Canada, direct via VE3DC (***)
The ISS callsign is presently scheduled to be NA1SS
The scheduled astronaut is David St-Jacques KG5FYI
Contact is go for: Sat 2019-04-06 18:31:06 UTC 38 deg (***)
ARISS Contact Applications (United States)
The ARISS-US program’s education proposal window should go open in the spring of 2019.
The ARISS webpage is at http://www.ariss.org/
Note that there are links to other ARISS websites from this site.
ARISS Contact Applications (Europe, Africa and the Middle East)
Schools and Youth organizations in Europe, Africa and the Middle East interested in setting up an ARISS radio contact with an astronaut on board the International Space Station are invited to submit an application from September to October and from February to April.
Please refer to details and the application form at www.ariss-eu.org/school-contacts. Applications should be addressed by email to: school.selection.manager(a)ariss-eu.org
ARISS Contact Applications (Canada, Central and South America, Asia and Australia and Russia)
Organizations outside the United States can apply for an ARISS contact by filling out an application. Please direct questions to the appropriate regional representative listed below. If your country is not specifically listed, send your questions to the nearest ARISS Region listed. If you are unsure which address to use, please send your question to the ARISS-Canada representative; they will forward your question to the appropriate coordinator.
For the application, go to: http://www.ariss.org/ariss-application.html.
ARISS-Canada and the Americas, except USA: Steve McFarlane, VE3TBD email to: ve3tbd(a)gmail.com
ARISS-Japan, Asia, Pacific and Australia: Satoshi Yasuda, 7M3TJZ email to: ariss(a)iaru-r3.org, Japan Amateur Radio League (JARL) http://www.jarl.org/ (***)
ARISS-Russia: Soyuz Radioljubitelei Rossii (SRR) http://www.jarl.org/
******************************************************************************
ARISS is always glad to receive listener reports for the above contacts. ARISS thanks everyone in advance for their assistance. Feel free to send your reports to aj9n(a)amsat.org or aj9n(a)aol.com.
Listen for the ISS on the downlink of 145.8Ø MHz.
*******************************************************************************
All ARISS contacts are made via the Kenwood radio unless otherwise noted.
*******************************************************************************
Several of you have sent me emails asking about the RAC ARISS website and
not being able to get in. That has now been changed to
http://www.ariss.org/
Note that there are links to other ARISS websites from this site.
****************************************************************************
Looking for something new to do? How about receiving DATV from the ISS?
If interested, then please go to the ARISS-EU website for complete
details. Look for the buttons indicating Ham Video.
http://www.ariss-eu.org/
If you need some assistance, ARISS mentor Kerry N6IZW, might be able to provide some insight. Contact Kerry at kbanke(a)sbcglobal.net
****************************************************************************
ARISS congratulations the following mentors who have now mentored over 100
schools:
Satoshi 7M3TJZ with 135
Francesco IKØWGF with 132
Gaston ON4WF with 123
Sergey RV3DR with 112
****************************************************************************
The webpages listed below were all reviewed for accuracy. Out of date
webpages were removed, and new ones have been added. If there are additional
ARISS websites I need to know about, please let me know.
Note, all times are approximate. It is recommended that you do your own
orbital prediction or start listening about 10 minutes before the listed
time.
All dates and times listed follow International Standard ISO 8601 date and
time format YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS
The complete schedule page has been updated as of 2019-03-25 16:00 UTC. (***)
Here you will find a listing of all scheduled school contacts, and
questions, other ISS related websites, IRLP and Echolink websites, and
instructions for any contact that may be streamed live.
http://www.amsat.org/amsat/ariss/news/arissnews.rtfhttp://www.amsat.org/amsat/ariss/news/arissnews.txt
Total number of ARISS ISS to earth school events is 1294.
Each school counts as 1 event.
Total number of ARISS ISS to earth school contacts is 1237.
Each contact may have multiple schools sharing the same time slot.
Total number of ARISS supported terrestrial contacts is 47.
A complete year by year breakdown of the contacts may be found in the
file.
http://www.amsat.org/amsat/ariss/news/arissnews.rtf
Please feel free to contact me if more detailed statistics are needed.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The following US states and entities have never had an ARISS contact:
South Dakota, Wyoming, American Samoa, Guam, Northern Marianas Islands, and the Virgin Islands.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
QSL information may be found at:
http://www.ariss.org/qsl-cards.html
ISS callsigns: DPØISS, IRØISS, NA1SS, OR4ISS, RSØISS
****************************************************************************
The successful school list has been updated as of 2019-03-21 03:00 UTC.
http://www.amsat.org/amsat/ariss/news/Successful_ARISS_schools.rtf
Frequency chart for packet, voice, and crossband repeater modes showing
Doppler correction as of 2005-07-29 04:00 UTC
http://www.amsat.org/amsat/ariss/news/ISS_frequencies_and_Doppler_correction
.rtf
Listing of ARISS related magazine articles as of 2006-07-10 03:30 UTC.
http://www.amsat.org/amsat/ariss/news/ARISS_magazine_articles.rtf
Check out the Zoho reports of the ARISS contacts
https://reports.zoho.com/ZDBDataSheetView.cc?DBID=412218000000020415
****************************************************************************
Exp. 58 on orbit
Oleg Konenenko
David St-Jacques KG5FYI
Anne McClain
Exp. 59 on orbit
Christina Koch
Aleksey Ovchinin
Nick Hague KG5TMV
****************************************************************************
73,
Charlie Sufana AJ9N
One of the ARISS operation team mentors
Hi to all,
I'm Pavel CO7WT, I was off-air from quite long time, mainly because
haven't radio for 70cm...
I'm glad to inform you that I have now a Wouxun KG-UV8E and it's capable
of full duplex in U/V mode, that means all fox satellites!
This past weekend I made some attempts in AO-92 and reception in SO-50,
that resulted in failure (can't hear my signal coming trough the bird,
nor the 70cm downlink of SO-50)
I'm using a homebrew cross yagui with 3el in 2m and 7 el in 70cm... I
have located and fixed the failure: a open condenser in the UHF part of
the VHF/UHF (homebrewed) diplexer, almost two years of storage +
used/rescued parts have consequences.
Sadly it was to late for Sunday noon passes, I made some test with my
laptop and a RTL-SDR and the diplexer is working now, I have seen/heard
some beacons from digi satellites in the 70cm band, but this night is
raining, so no joy for today; AO-91 is passing NOW but heavy rain keep
me inside.
I will be working as time permit on week days, mainly night passes
beyond 1800 local (-4GMT) and weekends... be kind with me I'm rusted on
sat operation...
cu on the birds!
PS: I have not yet figured the "record" part of the wiring, full duplex
with a handy needs a headphone and mike to control, so I will be asking
here for partial calls from time to time until I figure it out, ideas
are welcomed.
73 CO7WT Pavel.
Got my SAT-VUCC #235, Oct 31, 2012
Was lazy and never got around to applying before that - HIHI.
(VUCC for SAT is for QSOs dated 1/1/83 and later)
First SAT QSO was 10/16/77 with W1ECH on AO-7 CW 2M/10M.
73, Bob K8BL (AMSAT #6593, since 1979)
P.S. When did others have their First SAT QSO & details?
--------------------------------------------
On Fri, 3/22/19, Glenn Miller - AA5PK <aa5pk(a)suddenlink.net> wrote:
Subject: Re: [amsat-bb] Thank you
To: "Andrew Glasbrenner" <glasbrenner(a)mindspring.com>, amsat-bb(a)amsat.org
Date: Friday, March 22, 2019, 9:04 PM
#188, November 19, 2009
73
Glenn
AA5PK
-----Original
Message-----
From: Andrew Glasbrenner
Sent: Friday, March 22, 2019 5:55 PM
To: amsat-bb(a)amsat.org
Subject: Re: [amsat-bb] Thank you
#123, November 22, 2002
73, Drew KO4MA
-----Original Message-----
From: AMSAT-BB <amsat-bb-bounces(a)amsat.org>
On Behalf Of Gerald R Brown via
AMSAT-BB
Sent: Friday, March 22, 2019 6:29 PM
To: n1jez(a)burlingtontelecom.net;
amsat-bb(a)amsat.org
Subject: Re: [amsat-bb] Thank you
Mike,
Were you
just lucky to get #73 or did you pay somebody for that
honor???
73,
Jerry, K5OE
#88 in 1998
ps: 95% of my contacts were
confirmed by Bruce (below)
-----Original Message-----
From: AMSAT-BB <amsat-bb-bounces(a)amsat.org>
On Behalf Of Mike Seguin
Sent: Friday, March
22, 2019 2:50 PM
To: amsat-bb(a)amsat.org
Subject: Re: [amsat-bb] Thank you
#73 in 1997 here....
On 3/22/2019 3:17 PM, Bruce
wrote:
> Oh, my..... I am showing my age
now. I became a ham in 1993 and
>
immediately went into satellite operations. My VUCC in late
1993 is #17.
> For at least a dozen years
after that they increased very rarely.
>
> I am glad to see all the activity on
the satellites and enough
> satellites
for everyone to have fun with.
>
> 73...bruce
>
> On 3/22/2019 1:54 PM, Paul Stoetzer
wrote:
>> Congrats!
>>
>> On another
note, the fact that we're at #427 in VUCCs issued is a
>> testament to the increase in
popularity of satellite ops and grid
>> chasing over the past few years. VUCC
Satellite has been around since
>>
either the late 1980s or early 1990s. I received #248 in
March 2014.
>> So, in about 5 years,
about 42% of all satellite VUCCs issued in
>> about
>> 30
years have been awarded.
>>
>> 73,
>>
>> Paul, N8HM
>>
>> On Fri, Mar 22, 2019 at 2:50 PM johnv(a)frontier.com
>> <johnv(a)frontier.com>
wrote:
>>> I just got number VUCC
#427 certificate in the mail this morning.
>>>
>>> Thank
you to all those who helped me with it. It will be on
the
>>> wall Monday after I show
it off tomorrow at the Snohomish County
>>> Hams Club.
>>> JohnN7AME
>>>
_______________________________________________
As reported by a number of users, the transponder on AO73/FUNcube-1
appears to be being affected by its many months in continuous sunlight.
The transponder is presently not working as intended and will therefore
not be activated again for the time being.
We believe that the problem has occurred due to the higher than
anticipated on-board temperatures. We anticipate that the situation may
be resolved when the spacecraft starts to experience eclipses again at
the end of April.
The spacecraft will therefore remain in education mode until that time
with the usual high-power telemetry downlink active.
In addition to the telemetry, Fitter messages also remain available. Any
schools or colleges that would like to have their message transmitted
from space should contact operations(a)funcube.org.uk
<mailto:[email protected]> with their request, giving at least
two weeks’ notice.
73
Graham G3VZV
I have for sale a Ten-Tec "Model 2510 Mode B Satellite Station".
This is a mid-1980s vintage SSB/CW transmitter and receive converter.
It has 10 watts output for uplink in the 435.0 to 435.5 portion of the 70
cm band and use an external receiver in the 29 Mhz portion of the 10 meter
band to receive the 2 meter signal.
It is in good condition. I used it to make a some satellite contacts a
few years ago.
I am asking $95 or best offer, plus shipping in the continental USA. To
estimate the shipping cost it weighs 6 pounds and HWD is 4 1/2" x 7 9/16" x
11".
Photos, PDF version of the manual and a copy of the October 1985 review in
QST are available upon request.
73
Rolf NR0T
EN34
Sorry for all the confusion and the thread.
I created these three 50th Anniversary Awards back in September, last
year to try and allow hams all over the world to celebrate with us.
Some, like the 50th Anniversary Communication Achievement Award follow
the rules of the current award with a date qualification.
Others like the 50th Anniversary Friends of 50 award were simply
designed to allow everyone worldwide the opportunity to participate and
earn a certificate. It was not designed as a contest nor something
difficult to achieve, thus the work 50 hams on 50 different days was
simple and attainable by all worldwide.
It has seemed to have morphed into more and that was due to me
responding to one question on the -BB and then my new AMSAT-VP of User
Services also responding with an interpretation. The posted rules did
not mention anything about unique call signs. Thus, if you said, "Hi" to
your friend every day for 50 days on SO-50, you would be able to earn
the award. If you were friendlier and said, "Hi to 50 different hams on
SO-50" every day for 50 days you too would earn the award.
The HF award, I have been asked if you can work the same station on
different bands and different modes. Why of course. How many unique call
signs might we get on HF from satellite operators when we might see a
majority of them with only a 2m/70cm HT's and never have seen an HF rig
except in a magazine or a store.
73...bruce
On 3/23/2019 10:19 PM, Bob wrote:
> Hi
>
> One of the AMSAT VPs stated on the BB that the 50th Anniversary AMSAT
> Satellite Friends of 50 Award requires 50 UNIQUE callsign signs in
> addition to the one per day limit.
>
> I originally thought the goal was at least one contact on each of 50
> days.
>
> The unique requirement on 50 unique days within a year may well be
> impossible. I’ve only worked about 250 unique calls in 45 years on the
> birds. I would also hate to have to dupe check each entry if I were in
> your shoes.
>
> Can you clarify, please fingers crossed the VP misunderstands.
>
> 73, Bob, WB4SON
>
>
--
Bruce Paige, KK5DO
AMSAT Director Contests and Awards
AMSAT Board Member 2016-2020
ARRL Awards Field Checker (WAS, 5BWAS, VUCC), VE
Houston AMSAT Net - Wed 0100z on Echolink - Conference *AMSAT*
Also live streaming MP3 athttp://www.amsatnet.com
Podcast athttp://www.amsatnet.com/podcast.xml or iTunes
Latest satellite news on the ARRL Audio News
http://www.arrl.org
AMSAT on Twitterhttp://www.twitter.com/amsat