I've been reading up with great enthusiasm about the amateur payloads being carried into space lately and I would definitely like to take advantage of them. The biggest thing that has always kept me from doing anything with the birds full time has been a decent antenna array. At the moment, my sat station consists of a Kenwood TH-D7AG and an arrow handheld antenna. While it works fine, and I have made close to a dozen contacts or so with it, it's a little discouraging to be outside with it in the winter months.
I know this question probably gets asked many times, but what would be the best antenna to work LEO birds like AO-51 and some of the cubesats coming online here soon? Looking at some of the commercial antenna systems available are a little out of my budget, and I absolutely suck at building my own and don't really enjoy that aspect of the hobby anyhow. I'd also like to do something without an AZ/EL rotor, as I can't fit that into particular setup at this point in time.
So I guess in essence what would be the best "bang for the buck" for what I am trying to accomplish here?
73's Stephen N1VLV