Dear Amsat Members,

On 4th Dec 2019 I successfully gave Live Amateur Radio Satellite (AO91) Demo amongst 50 final year B.Sc (Physics) Students.

A special Hands on workshop of Applied Physics was organised by School of Science RK University Rajkot India from 2nd to 6th Dec 2019.

Myself Rajesh Vagadia VU2EXP (Regional Coordinator, AMSAT-INDIA) was invited to conduct presentation on Amateur Radio & it's Application along with Live Satellite Demo.

I carried out detailed presentation on ham radio topics ranging from CW to Satellites! Many doubts & queries were resolved. Also displayed Radio stuff, antenna, accessories, CubeSat model, SDR Dongle, Keyer & Paddle, QSL Cards, ARISS Awards etc. for better understanding for students.

AMSAT functioning & it's motto was explained in detailed. Few amateur satellites were bring into notice made/supported by various AMSAT organisations.

'ARISS student outreach program' highlights were also given & played original audio conversation happened between 13 year Student (Sakshi Vagadia) and female Astronaut Sunita William aboard ISS, particular ARISS event was carried out on 14th Nov 2012 at Science City Ahmedabad Gujarat by we few hams. Below is the link to enjoy conversation:

https://tinyurl.com/sakshi-talks-sunita

Students surprised to see scientific capabilities of ham radio reaches upto ISS Astronauts & even further to moon with EME experiments! For our final Live Satellite Demo (AO91) we all incl. group of students & faculties assembled to terrace. It was good pass with 44° max elevation. AOS was at 1247 (IST) & LOS at 1259 (IST)

I made students familiar with important Satellite terms such as AOS, TCA, LOS, Uplink Freq, Downlink Freq, Doppler shift, Tracking with apps etc. I used IOio dual band antenna with two separate HTs. Necessary frequency & tx ctcss tone was set & tested before pass. For Tx Speaker Mic was used for convenience, and for Rx small PA was connected to HT so whole group can listen to our possible two way QSO. I was prepared aiming IOio antenna at 180° (South), on AOS time at 1247 (IST) I gave few Sat calls... De VU2EXP on AO91 Satellite... repeat... soon heard a station replying me!!! Cheers!!! It was VU3PENfrom Hyderabad (MK97em) 955 Kms from us. Students can't stop their excitement and started cheering up!!!

Thereafter we were able to contact with VU3BXS (MM80pd) 1083 Kms, A65BP from UAE (LL75qj) 1602 Kms, VU2DGR (MJ89gg) 1576 Kms. Very near to LOS we heard R9LR but couldn't exchange report.

Students as well as faculties were very excited to learn on ham radio & just thrilled to witness this live SatDemo.

I thanks to all hams for their valuable support for my demo.

Also thanks to Prof. Harshal Desai, Dr. Savan Katba, Dr. Ashish Tanna & RK University to give me wonderful platform to conduct this Ham Session.

Best 73's

Rajesh Vagadia VU2EXP Rajkot - Gujarat Regional Coordinator West India Zone AMSAT-INDIA M: 9898283916 E: [email protected] www.qrz.com/db/vu2exp