On Thu, May 30, 2013 at 08:31:10AM -0500, Joe wrote:
http://www.idle-tyme.com On 5/30/2013 12:13 AM, Andy Kellner wrote:
Bit of a shame that the people in charge at NASA decide its worth flying an accoustic guitar to the ISS so some astronaut can have his 5 minutes of fame, but dont spend $ 2000 on a tiny FM repeater which 10.000+ hams worldwide would enjoy in many years to come, let alone the educational impact. As it has been said, if that radio would be turned down to .. lets say 5 W .. the impact on the power budget of the ISS, which currently has a power generating capacity of 84 kW (!), would be completely insignificant.
Oh, don't be so bloody ridiculous. The guitar was flown up about ten years ago!
If you want two grand spent on an FM or for that matter linear transponder, put your hand in your pocket and stop whining. It probably wouldn't even cost as much as that (even allowing for the US dinar being pretty low right now) to build a flight-rated repeater - it's not like it has to live outside, right?