--- On Tue, 2/9/10, John Papay john@papays.com wrote:
From: John Papay john@papays.com Subject: [amsat-bb] AO-51 Signal Strength Post Flip To: amsat-bb@amsat.org Received: Tuesday, February 9, 2010, 8:47 AM It has been about a month now since AO-51 was commanded back to its normal orientation. But many are reporting that they are having more trouble hearing it now than they did before the first re-orientation.
It does seem to me that some stations that usually hear very well are not hearing that well now. This morning's pass (9Feb2010 1045z) of AO-51 seemed to bear that out. AF6RF, KB1RVT, KE3LB, WD0X?, KJ4CBC, K5QXJ, WB2IOL and YF6BFE were on the pass and with a few exceptions, all were not able to hear at some point during the pass. There are also a few noisy uplink transmissions as well.
The recording can be downloaded at: http://www.papays.com/AO-51_09Feb2010_104452za.mp3 (there are no signals in the first minute of the recording)
Is anyone else having trouble hearing AO-51 as well as they heard it before the flip experiment?
<snip>
In the past few weeks, I've often had problems hearing AO-51 here in DO33. A year ago, signals of at least S3 on my FT-817ND were common. Now they are weaker.
As well, I get the impression that the signal polarity has changed. Formerly, I could hold my Arrow dual-band Yagi with the 2 m elements nearly horizontal and still hear the satellite. Now, I have to turn it nearly 90 degrees, sometimes changing the orientation more than once during a pass.
Some of that I might attribute to my operating a portable station within a residential area in the city, but I definitely noticed a significant difference between what I hear from AO-51 now and what it was before the satellite was flipped.
73s
Bernhard VA6BMJ @ DO33FL
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