Hi!
My presentation and demonstration for the ThunderBird Amateur Radio Club (W7TBC) last night was a success. This was the radio club that allowed me to use their special callsign W7W during their hamfest in January, and the club invited me to do a presentation and demonstration at this month's meeting. It was a good presentation with various questions, then the AO-51 demonstration during the pass at 0334-0348 UTC, followed by more questions after the pass.
In my presentation, I had put in a mention that the club members could attempt to listen to the AO-51 pass while I was doing the demonstration. Several did exactly that. A few with HTs and long antennas (duckies or telescoping whips), along with one member who went to his car and used his mobile station, were able to follow along with their own radios. Other than having an extended question-and-answer session after the pass, I finished my presentation in time to go outside. Several members helped me take my equipment outside and set it up.
For the demonstration, I used an Icom IC-2720H mobile radio at 15W (two contacts toward the end of the pass were made at 5W, to show that lower power could work) into an Arrow Antennas handheld 2m/70cm Yagi. Power was from a 12V/20Ah gel-cell battery, and the radio is OK with the battery (4.5A draw when transmitting at 15W on 2m, and about 2.5A draw for 5W TX on 2m). I had a small folding table I put the radio on, and connected three items to one of the IC-2720H's speaker jacks (external speaker for the crowd to listen on, an earphone for me to hear with, and my small Sony digital audio recorder). My location, on the campus of the Thunderbird School of Global Management in Glendale (west-side suburb of Phoenix), was in grid DM33vo.
Within a couple of minutes, Don KD6IRE in northern California was calling me and was the first contact I made with my audience watching and listening. Then Manuel XE2BHL called from Tijuana, followed by my only contact from eastern North America - George WA5KBH in Louisiana. I proceeded to make 6 more contacts after that with stations in California, Washington state, Alberta, British Columbia, and - at the end of the pass - Craig KL4E from Alaska showed up for the 9th and final contact of my demonstration.
The club members were impressed with the fact they could hear the satellite with their own equipment. It was a high pass (67 degrees maximum elevation for us), which helped with that, but still an impressive sight. They were also impressed with how well the satellite sounded as it was going out of range at the end of the pass.
Along with the contacts, we heard two other stations that I was not able to make contact with - N6ADR in California, WA7SDI in Oregon. I tried not to monopolize the pass, especially with George WA5KBH trying to work some of the western stations on this late (for him) pass.
Lots of people need to be thanked for the successes last night. First, Gould WA4SXM - one of the AO-51 command stations - for ensuring the satellite would be in the normal FM repeater configuration last night. The ThunderBird Amateur Radio Club, for inviting me to do this - in particular Bob K7UNL (president) and Roger W9NCQ (treasurer - he invited me to do this event), plus the other members whose names escape me that helped me haul stuff to and from my car for the demo. And the 9 stations in the USA, Canada, and Mexico who made contacts with me (Don KD6IRE, John KD6PAG, James KE7KQA, Craig KL4E, Ron VE6RVT, John VE7CBZ, George WA5KBH, Bob WA7HYD, and Manuel XE2BHL). Being able to make contacts with stations spread out in western North America - plus WA5KBH in Louisiana - helped show that the satellite's footprint covers a large area.
If anyone wishes to see the slideshow I presented before the on-air demonstration, along with copies of flyers I have distributed at the meeting last night plus the recent Phoenix-area hamfests, I have all of them on my web page in PDF format. Follow the link on the home page, and get them there. My web pages are on free web space at Geocities, so there are bandwidth limits enforced. If anyone has problems in downloading those files, please e-mail me directly and I will send them to you. I can also provide an MP3 with the audio from this pass, for anyone that is interested in hearing what we heard last night (MP3 won't be posted on a web page, but available via e-mail).
Thanks again, and 73!
Patrick WD9EWK/VA7EWK - Phoenix, Arizona USA http://www.wd9ewk.net/