At 04:30 AM 2/22/2009, Art McBride wrote:
I think we need to use lowest frequency for the down link as 6dB of path loss occurs for every octave increase in frequency. 2M to 70cm = (-9dB). This keeps the power budget down on the space craft. It also helps hearing the satellite and causes O/E problems to gravitate to the up link.
Down here, your suggestion would work well. Certainly did for SO-35, when it was operational. The most common "newbie issue" I see is not being able to hear the downlink on U/V birds, which, combined with inexperience can lead to a station unknowingly jamming the bird. Hearing the downlink is the single most important thing to achieve, and that needs to be relatively easy, compared to getting into the bird, to minimise QRM. :)
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