I don't see it that way.

Every project is a set of people who have participated in what is at first something technical, then magical. I have never talked with someone who has worked on something going into space that hasn't set back at some point and marveled at it. How many folks have we all done demos for, and heard "Wow......!" ?

With the technology to get things into some kind of orbit coming down, its only reasonable to expect that more and more organizations will make the attempt. Some will get amateur licenses just so they can to telemetry, but there is an interesting effect there, which is that some of them stick around and become hams, as oposed to just being licensed.

I've met two people who were in some project and got licences, and once they attended a Dayton Hamvention, they were hooked. I've seen one of them several times now, at Dayton.

So sure, we offer cheap telemetry but the side effects are priceless.

--STeve Andre' wb8wsf en82

On Friday 25 September 2009 15:56:37 Rocky Jones wrote:

The hamsat bands are slowly being converted into "cheap" telemetry bands...

Robert WB5MZO

...

To: nigel@ngunn.net Date: Fri, 25 Sep 2009 11:31:40 -0800 From: k6yk@juno.com CC: amsat-bb@amsat.org Subject: [amsat-bb] Re: All Satellites

I wonder how many of those 50 are able to handle ham radio 2-way contacts ?

K6YK

On Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:09:43 +0000 Nigel Gunn G8IFF/W8IFF

nigel@ngunn.net writes:

...

Here's a list of all (known to me) satellites still in orbit with some designed in (but not necessarily operational) amateur band functionality.

For those that think nothing has been happening recently, there have been 26 (so far) satellites launched this year, 13 in 2008 and 11 in 2007. Thats 50 birds in less than the past 3 years.

Catalog Number Common Name International Designator Comments 1293 OSCAR 3 1965-016F 6236 OSCAR 6 1972-082B 7530 OSCAR 7 1974-089B 10703 OSCAR 8 1978-026B 14129 OSCAR 10 1983-058B 14781 OSCAR 11 (UoSAT 2) 1984-021B 16909 JAS 1 (FUJI 1) 1986-061B 20437 OSCAR 14 (UoSAT 3) 1990-005B 20438 OSCAR 15 (UoSAT 4) 1990-005C 20439 OSCAR 16 (PACSAT) 1990-005D 20440 OSCAR 17 (DOVE) 1990-005E 20441 OSCAR 18 (WEBERSAT) 1990-005F 20442 OSCAR 19 (LUSAT) 1990-005G 20480 JAS 1B (FUJI 2) 1990-013C 21039 SL-12 R/B(1) 1990-116B 21087 INFORMATOR 1 1991-006A 21089 COSMOS 2123 1991-007A 21575 OSCAR 22 (UoSAT 5) 1991-050B 22825 KITSAT B 1993-061C 22826 POSAT 1 1993-061D 22828 ITAMSAT 1993-061F 22829 EYESAT A 1993-061G 23439 RADIO ROSTO 1994-085A 24278 JAS 2 1996-046B 24305 UNAMSAT 1996-052B 25396 TMSAT 1998-043C 25397 TECHSAT 1B 1998-043D 25509 SEDSAT 1 1998-061B 25520 PAN SAT 1998-064B 25544 ISS (ZARYA) 1998-067A 25636 SUNSAT 1999-008C 25693 OSCAR 36 (UoSAT 12) 1999-021A 25756 KITSAT 3 1999-029A 26063 OPAL 2000-004C 26545 SAUDISAT 1A 2000-057A 26548 TIUNGSAT 1 2000-057D 26609 AMSAT OSCAR 40 2000-072B 26931 PCSAT 2001-043C 26932 SAPPHIRE 2001-043D 27605 RUBIN 2 2002-058A 27607 SAUDISAT 1C 2002-058C 27842 DTUSAT 2003-031C 27844 CUTE-1 2003-031E 27845 QUAKESAT 2003-031F 27847 CANX-1 2003-031H 27848 CUBESAT XI-IV 2003-031J 27939 MOZHAYETS 4 2003-042A 28375 AMSAT ECHO 2004-025K 28650 HAMSAT 2005-017B 28890 BEIJING 1 (TSINGHUA) 2005-043A 28891 TOPSAT 2005-043B 28892 UWE-1 2005-043C 28893 SINAH 1 2005-043D 28894 SSETI-EXPRESS 2005-043E 28895 CUBESAT XI-V 2005-043F 28897 SSETI-EXPRESS DEB 2005-043H 28898 MOZ.5/SAFIR/RUBIN 5/SL-8 2005-043G 28941 CUTE 1.7 2006-005C 29252 GENESIS 1 2006-029A 29479 HINODE (SOLAR B) 2006-041A 29655 GENESAT 2006-058C 29712 PEHUENSAT 1 2007-001D 31117 EGYPTSAT 1 2007-012A 31122 CSTB 1 2007-012F 31126 MAST 2007-012K 31128 LIBERTAD 1 2007-012M 31129 CP3 2007-012N 31130 CAPE 1 2007-012P 31132 CP4 2007-012Q 31135 AGILE 2007-013A 31140 NFIRE 2007-014A 31789 GENESIS 2 2007-028A 32781 GIOVE-B 2008-020A 32783 CARTOSAT 2A 2008-021A 32784 CANX-6 2008-021B 32785 CUTE 1.7 & AOD 2 2008-021C 32786 IMS-1 2008-021D 32787 COMPASS 1 2008-021E 32788 AAUSAT CUBESAT 2 2008-021F 32789 DELFI C3 2008-021G 32790 CANX-2 2008-021H 32791 SEEDS 2008-021J 32792 RUBIN 8/PSLV 2008-021K 32794 AMOS 3 2008-022A 32953 YUBILEINY 2008-025A 33492 GOSAT (IBUKI) 2009-002A 33493 PRISM (HITOMI) 2009-002B 33494 SPRITE-SAT (RISING) 2009-002C 33495 KAGAYAKI 2009-002D 33496 SOHLA-1 (MAIDO-1) 2009-002E 33498 STARS (KUKAI) 2009-002G 33499 KKS-1 (KISEKI) 2009-002H 33595 EXPRESS AM-44 2009-007A 34808 ANUSAT 2009-019B 34941 PROTOSTAR 2 2009-027A 35002 PHARMASAT 2009-028B 35003 HAWKSAT 1 2009-028C 35004 CP6 2009-028D 35005 AEROCUBE 3 2009-028E 35008 MERIDIAN 2 2009-029A 35690 DRAGONSAT 2009-038B 35693 ANDE POLLUX SPHERE 2009-038E 35694 ANDE CASTOR SPHERE 2009-038F 35866 OBJECT B 2009-049B 35867 FREGAT/IRIS 2009-049C 35868 OBJECT D 2009-049D 35869 OBJECT E 2009-049E 35870 SUMBANDILA 2009-049F 35871 BLITS 2009-049G 35931 OCEANSAT 2 2009-051A 35932 OBJECT B 2009-051B 35933 OBJECT C 2009-051C 35934 OBJECT D 2009-051D 35935 OBJECT E 2009-051E 35936 RUBIN 9.1/RUBIN 9.2/PSLV 2009-051F

-- Nigel A. Gunn, 1865 El Camino Drive, Xenia, OH 45385-1115, USA. tel +1 937 825 5032 Amateur Radio G8IFF W8IFF (was KC8NHF), e-mail nigel@ngunn.net www http://www.ngunn.net Member of ARRL, GQRP #11396, QRPARCI #11644, SOC #548, Flying Pigs QRP Club International #385, Dayton ARA #2128, AMSAT-NA LM-1691, AMSAT-UK 0182, MKARS, ALC, GCARES, XWARN.

... few of these sats are doing anything even remotely related to amateur radio or even communications in general.

Get a life. Maybe not your very narrowminded view of amateur radio, but you outta open your mind and do a little investigation as to the full depth and breadth of what people do with their amateur radio hobby...

Bob

Do any of these have potential for Amateur use after their "primary mission" is completed? If they can be repurposed like AO-27, then I don't have any complaints. If, OTOH, all they're good for is sending telemetry for somebody's experiment, then I feel this is an inappropriate use of Amateur frequencies. 73, Jim KQ6EA

--- On Fri, 9/25/09, David - KG4ZLB kg4zlb@googlemail.com wrote:

From: David - KG4ZLB kg4zlb@googlemail.com Subject: [amsat-bb] Re: All Satellites To: amsat-bb@amsat.org Date: Friday, September 25, 2009, 1:10 PM I hate to say it but you may be right

• the sky is now full of

"beep-beep" sats!

David KG4ZLB

Rocky Jones wrote:

...

The hamsat bands are slowly being converted into

"cheap" telemetry bands...

...

Robert WB5MZO

...

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At a SmallSat conference I attended on behalf of AMSAT this summer, I was amused at the casual assumption by a researcher that 50, Five Oh, cubesats could be launched as part of an upper atmosphere project using ham frequencies for the downlinks. (They would have a lifetime of only 3-4 months.) Jan King, W3GEY/VK4GEY, who does coordination of satellite frequencies, gently but firmly brought them down to earth a bit.

On the one hand, we get new hams with interests in space communications from these projects, but on the other we need to prevent the de facto appropriation of needed frequencies. A fine line to walk.

Alan WA4SCA

--- On Fri, 25/9/09, Bill Ress bill@hsmicrowave.com wrote:

While it's likely a real stretch for a 1U CubeSat, in a 3U CubeSat with up to 2U Cubes worth dedicated to ion propulsion, we might have something practical. While many I talk with say it isn't practical, I have no doubt it will happen in the not too distant future. I wonder who will take the lead and be first?

Hi Bill,

You're right, the potential is there for a 3U CubeSat that can achieve an apogee > 1400 km.

We'd need 1U of that to house the linear transponder but as you say the rest could be used for the propulsion system.

As yet, as far as I'm aware, no-one has actually demonstrated a working propulsion mechanism that can fit in 2U but I'm convinced this is possible.

The launch costs for a 3U CubeSat into 700 km LEO are well within the reach of the Amateur community, our challenge is to develop a means of raising the apogee.

73 Trevor M5AKA

I will attempt a reply to both of these responses.

On Fri, Sep 25, 2009 at 9:27 PM, Tony Langdon vk3jed@gmail.com wrote:

At 09:34 AM 9/26/2009, James Craig wrote:

...

Good point. Not everybody is interested in monitoring the one way downlinks on the majority of these more recent birds. Why is it that there is no problem getting large numbers of these types of satellites into orbit, yet good old fashioned two way linear and FM transponder birds are relatively far and few between?

The reason cubesats are being built is because they are seen as an excellent platform for educating space science students at the undergraduate level. The amount of money being spent per launch is pretty doable for many institutions or local granting agencies. These agencies and universities are likely simply not interested in providing you or me with a platform for two-way terrestrial communication if it is going to slow down their project or lower its probability of success.

The cubesat design is quite constrained moreover, typically 10cm^3 and under one kg, even the milk-carton sized 3U format is pretty small for the power needs of a linear or FM transponder of the sort we are typically using. We owe a debt of gratitude to Delfi, which showed that a linear can be put up as a secondary mission, and to William for his 10cm^2 transponder implementation.

Those are very recent developments, and I'd agree that we should jump on them as golden opportunities, noting however, that the result will still be very low altitude orbits and therefore small footprints. Similarly, SDX technology might be able to miniaturize the transponder further and reduce its power needs (while making one circuit a do-everything transponder!), so we're lucky that we're testing that technology in the near future.

Please note that there is no contention for resources here: the opportunities the universities made use of are not available to us. If we want this phenomenon to work to the advantage of those of us who enjoy two-way voice communications, we need to either launch a cubesat ourselves or offer the university projects a reason that adding this capability will *improve* the time-to-launch or probability of success. This might be in the form of a free, tested, reliable communications board that happens to have two-way voice capability integrated into it. It also could be in the form of increased amateur enthusiasm for the transponder-bearing cubesat and the resulting increase in telemetry collection, a bargain which we proved to be good for in Delfi C3.

I for one was never a SWL, so I tend not to follow the one way satellites, unless there's a compelling reason (e.g. for test signals, or telemetry decoding - had fun decoding telemetry on AO-40 when it was first launched).

Nor was I, yet I very much enjoy listening to telemetry from cubesats, along with other activities in this corner of the hobby. I can offer you this reason: when I listen to telemetry, I'm listening to something which is in space and in orbit around the earth, one of the most exotic locales from which you could receive a message. If I talk to you on AO-51, I'm talking to you on earth by means of a space-borne vehicle. It turns out that what's fun about that for me is not necessarily your voice, but the vehicle. Telemetry tells me about those vehicles: how fast they are moving, how they are tumbling and the contents of the telemetry stream: how much power they're collecting and using. Moreover, with some of the cubesats, the decoding of this is very easy if one knows CW.

Two more points in my brief "apologia pro cubesatibus"

1. So-called 'telemetry only' birds are not necessarily that. We had the opportunity to control COMPASS during its crisis last year. The low cost of the mission meant that any one of us was solicited to enter the appropriate codes. I'll never be a control station for a major bird, but I thrilled to do this for COMPASS.

2. Given that you admit above that telemetry collection is necessary for the maintenance of communication satellites, shouldn't you be glad that this steady stream of cubesats has allowed some enthusiasts to continue to hone their skills in this field?

Finally, a truism that probably bears repeating, though not addressing the two comments quoted above: if we call cubesats 'not amateur radio', then we should tar OSCAR 1 with that same brush.

73, Bruce VE9QRP

On Sat, Sep 26, 2009 at 2:03 AM, Rocky Jones orbitjet@hotmail.com wrote:

...

Finally, a truism that probably bears repeating, though not addressing the two comments quoted above: if we call cubesats 'not amateur radio', then we should tar OSCAR 1 with that same brush.

73, Bruce VE9QRP _______________________________________________ Sent via AMSAT-BB@amsat.org. Opinions expressed are those of the author. Not an AMSAT-NA member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program! Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb

Bruce...that is really not fair.

I'm sorry if I'm not being fair. I rather think, though, that there is an important difference of opinion here on what constitutes amateur activity. I'd like to explore it further with your permission.

Oscar 1 (and 2) were "first time" for a lot of things and had at their heart the goal of building amateur radio communications platforms...that is why Oscar "X" (I think that is what they call it...a repeat of Oscar 1 and 2) was shelved in favor of Oscar III a communications platform.

If you are advocating a litmus test for amateur activity, especially in the satellite field, that is based on novelty, then I cannot see how you are not equally opposed to those aspects of P3E that are self-consciously emulating previous satellites (everything other than SDX and CAN-DO?)

In fact, in common practice innovation is too high a bar to set for amateur activity: we don't expect each ham to invent a new modulation scheme before getting on a local repeater for the first time; and I know that when and if a HEO satellite is in orbit again, you will not deprecate my enjoyment of following in the footsteps of many before me who have undertaken linear transponder communications on that platform.

I will meet you half way and say that innovation is a hallmark of amateur satellite operations, though not a requirement. This is why I am very excited by upcoming tests of SDX. It is also, incidentally, why I applaud the achievements of the cubesat groups, whose very form-factor is innovative, and who undertake innovative applications, such as spacecraft stabilization for potential experiments in formation flying, high-quality image capture, new communication modes, physics experiments, etc., a list that reads much like the one you apply to Oscar V below:

Both Oscar 1 and II lasted until their batteries ran out...indeed I think Number 1 lasted until it decayed..Oscar V tested communications technology from spacecraft stabilization to command systems etc. and it lasted until its batteries ran out

I can't tell here: are you suggesting that battery-operated satellites are more in the amateur spirit? Doesn't this contravene your innovation criterion? Were not batteries in Oscar 1-5 faute de mieux? You seem to be implying that the Oscar 1 designers eschewed the solar panels available to them and wisely chose the limited lifetime option. My understanding of the history of technology is somewhat hazy, but as it is, it doesn't fit this picture.

.that is far longer sat life then most of the cubesats have.  which mostly have nothing to do with amateur radio

In your opinion, is short life a knock against cubesats? Maybe it's a good idea to have shorter missions in some cases. Short life is not always true, of course: CO-57, e.g., has been in operation for over six years.

73, Bruce VE9QRP