M0XSD caught a packet from PCSAT-1 earlier today on 144.390 which confused us for a bit. I have over the last couple of days got APRS from the UK into NE North America via PCSAT-1 Stations that received me AA1XD,VA2CMQ,V01BIL and VE2RIN I did suggest to the balloon ops to put a switchable by longitude tracker in future so 144.390, switching to 145.825 mid atlantic and 145.800 when near Europe. But they seem to prefer using things like the Iridium commercial system. Which to my mind is a shame How cool would it have been to have got a transatlantic balloon flight, picked up by the ISS and PCSAT-1 and digipeated
Steve Daniels G6UIM
-----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Bob Bruninga Sent: 13 December 2011 22:58 To: [email protected]; 'TAPR APRS Mailing List' Subject: [amsat-bb] Gibraltar Monitoring for 144.39 balloon
While everyone in Southern Europe and Northern Africa is listening for the Transatlantic Balloon, K6RPT-11 on 144.39, I should also offer that you might hear (during mid-day only) a possible packet from W3ADO-1 too.
PCSAT-1 has a downlink on 144.39 that is usually never heard in the USA due to QRM, but it might possibly be heard in Europe where there should be no other packets on that frequency. But remember, that PCSAT can ONLY be heard during rare alignment of its best solar panel to the sun, and usually around mid-day. All the excitement about K6RPT-11 landfall will be at night, so there will be nothing heard of PCSAT (using the callsign of W3ADO-11) until possibly mid-morning (if at all). If PCSAT does come alive, you will hear attempted occasional packets at both 1200 and 9600 baud, but almost always they are not decodable because there is not enough battery power to complete even the full duration of most 1 second packets..
But I just thought I would keep everyone informed in case a rare packet popped up on 144.39 in a quiet area.
I also put out an object named "max-rng?" where I think will be the maximum receive range of the Azores stations based on the range when the started hearing it. This object is NNW of Funchal.
And I see the track is starting to turn slightly northward, improving our chances of a Portugal reception!
Bob, Wb4APR
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