Hi Bob,
You Wrote:
Regarding the newest GEO. Once the GEO bird is in position and functioning, we just fix our antennas to one spot, no doppler, no hunting the satellite down, no planning for the next access time, or direction, no experimenting with hardware or various antenna systems, no ongoing challenge. I got into satellites many years ago because of the hunting, because of the difficulty and challenge. This is the ultimate “easy sat”. If one wants the easy sat this is your baby. Yes once established one can “work” lots of dx somewhat analogous to a phone call. A highly elliptical orbit (AO40 sob sob) makes one actually work, learn, experiment, and yes have fun. My opinion will no doubt be different from others. No flames please, just a discussion.
Oh I think I can assure you that there will be plenty of experimentation going on - I have a number of things that I intend to try such as:
1) Ranging Experiments - Yes, a spacecraft in GEO *does* move - It does a figure of eight around it's orbital slot. Can we track and measure that ? (no you won't need to move your dish).
2) Techniques to track the beacons to then adjust your up/downlink frequency should folks not have highly accurate LNBs and GPSDO's
3) How small a system will still successfully uplink on each transponder ?
4) The EMCOMMS side of things has massive implications, both from a coverage perspective, and getting pictures/video
5) New mode and protocol research becomes much easier, as you can develop the RX part as well as the TX part over a realistic RF path without needing other like minded amateurs within Terrestrial RF range
73s
Iain