John,

The "new" radio is actually a Kenwood D710 which is located in the Russian Service module. The Service Module is where the ARISS team performed most of its contacts in the past as it was near the table where all the crew had dinner. Since the first contacts with ARISS in 2000, the ISS has significantly expanded, both in size and in crew size. ARISS has expanded too, with an additional station location in the Columbus module, which is on the other end of ISS (about football field in length). This is where the US, Europe, Japan and Canada conducts most of its experiments and where they spend most of their time. Right now we are using a lower power radio, an Ericsson handheld, in the Columbus module, as it was already on-board ISS (launched in 2000). Our near term plans is to upgrade the Columbus station to a higher power radio (mobile radio class). Keep an eye out for these plans to mature.

Note that we are unable to move radios from the Russian segment (Service Module) to the US segment (where the Columbus module is located) as the power systems are different (28V vs 120 V) and certification for the Kenwood radios was only performed for the Russian segment. At the last ARISS International meeting, the delegates agreed with a plan to make sure all future equipment is interoperable and certified across the ISS. This will cost more money and take more time, but should provide more equipment flexibility for ARISS.

For now, APRS is using the lower power radio in the Columbus module.

I hope this helps explain things.

73, Frank Bauer, KA3HDO ARISS International Chair & AMSAT-NA V.P. for Human Spaceflight Programs

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Message: 1 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2014 21:32:00 -0600 From: John Fickes kc0bmf@gmail.com To: amsat-bb amsat-bb@amsat.org Subject: Re: [amsat-bb] ISS audio Message-ID: CAG-+cOaWcWPnR6uMLwQcf+h6-WNRNexGxQ6Lf=3WDNsoynhBHA@mail.gmail.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8

So what is to become of the new D 700, Is everything moving back to it or is APRS going to stay with the backup radio? Really like what I hear so far from the new Kenwood.

73 John KC0BMF

On Sat, Dec 20, 2014 at 2:39 PM, andy thomas andythomasmail@yahoo.co.uk wrote:

The voice-over from the tracking program is no longer present, and RS0ISS is transmitted in fast CW in between the pictures. 73 de andy g0sfj _______________________________________________ Sent via AMSAT-BB@amsat.org. AMSAT-NA makes this open forum available to all interested persons worldwide without requiring membership. Opinions expressed are solely those of the author, and do not reflect the official views of AMSAT-NA. Not an AMSAT-NA member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program! Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb