The technical documents and schematics in the other thread were interesting, but the still didn't answer the simple question of what the LO is. I guess we can calculate them since we know the TX and RX frequencies and that the IF is 45 MHz.
I've been thinking about what this high power result might mean. If the output path from the satellite is bad but the input is good, then we should hear a weak downlink even with a normal uplink power. If the input path is bad but the output is good, we should hear a normal downlink when hitting it with a lot of power, and we should hear the beacon, like AO-95. So the fact that we need a lot of power up to get a little down seems to indicate both paths are having a problem. My first guess would then be that the antennas didn't deploy. So what's the gain of a still stowed cubesat antenna vs. open? Maybe someone with a cubesat model can measure it.
Another possibility is that power is not getting to the LNA and TX amplifiers, but we'd have to look at the PC board schematic to see if that makes sense.
-Stephen N8URE