----- Original Message -----
At 12:36 PM 9/17/2009, you wrote:
RS10/11 was a wonderful bird, with a high orbit and relatively high transponder power, it was very easy to work and the coverage was quite wide. It was a perfect beginner's satellite and a lot of guys got started in satellite operation with RS-10/11.
I loved RS-10, it was my first bird, and one of the best I've ever worked. ALso, I actually have gear for Mode A SSB/CW, but not the other modes.
So many satellite operators started on RS-10/11, myself included. It was just so workable.
Sunspots were on their way out (it was the end of the previous cycle), and my Yaesu 767GX transceiver had a 2m module pushing a whole 10 watts into a homemade copper pipe J-pole for an uplink. A Radio Shack DX-440 shortwave receiver, connected to a wire strung out to a tree in the back yard, made for a makeshift downlink. I worked stations across the entire continent with this humble station. My first contact (from Northern California) was to Arizona; the second was to New York. How could you not love a satellite like that?
Greg KO6TH
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