Lately, I've been trying other FM satellites besides SO-50. I have made contacts on AO-92, but I can't get anything from AO-85.
On AO-85 I can hear the voice ID of the satellite plain as day, but I never hear any other hams trying to make contacts and I can't seem to get into the satellite.
My set up is two Baofeng handhelds and an Arrow antenna. This set up works fine on SO-50 and AO-92 so I know that it works.
For AO-85 I'm using 435.170 for the uplink and 145.980 for the downlink. I have the uplink sending the 67.0 Hz tone.
So, what am I missing? Constructive tips would be very much appreciated.
Steve AI9IN
AO-85 is a little deaf, so it's harder to get into than the other FM birds. As a result, it gets less traffic. It is workable with an HT and handheld beam, just not as easily.
The VHF and UHF antennas on the Fox-1 series aren't orthogonal, so with the Arrow you often will get better results by twisting the antenna 90 degrees between transmitting and receiving. The other FM birds aren't nearly as sensitive to polarization mismatch.
I find that AO-85's AFC is less forgiving than AO-91 or AO-92, which makes good Doppler correction timing--relative to the nominal uplink frequency of 435.172, not .170--more important for best results. I also find a PL tone of 69.3 to be more reliable than 67.0, particularly on the second half of the pass; I got that tip from Patrick WD9EWK.
73, Ryan AI6DO
On Monday, October 29, 2018, 7:19:36 AM PDT, skristof@etczone.com skristof@etczone.com wrote:
Lately, I've been trying other FM satellites besides SO-50. I have made contacts on AO-92, but I can't get anything from AO-85.
On AO-85 I can hear the voice ID of the satellite plain as day, but I never hear any other hams trying to make contacts and I can't seem to get into the satellite.
My set up is two Baofeng handhelds and an Arrow antenna. This set up works fine on SO-50 and AO-92 so I know that it works.
For AO-85 I'm using 435.170 for the uplink and 145.980 for the downlink. I have the uplink sending the 67.0 Hz tone.
So, what am I missing? Constructive tips would be very much appreciated.
Steve AI9IN
Steve, AO-85 can be a bit harder to work with an HT but it's doable. I started making QSOs with a UV-5R half duplex and an Arrow antenna. IMHO the best chances are on descending passes or after the first quarter of an ascending pass. Passes above 20° work the best.
My longest distance on AO-85 was 5282 km with FG8OJ in Guadeloupe using a UV-B5 to transmit and a FT-817 as the receiver. I was using the Arrow during that 2° pass.
Try twisting the antenna to match the satellite RX polarization. Figuratively speaking, of course :-)
Best of luck!
Fernando NP4JV
On Mon, Oct 29, 2018, 7:19 AM <skristof@etczone.com wrote:
Lately, I've been trying other FM satellites besides SO-50. I have made contacts on AO-92, but I can't get anything from AO-85.
On AO-85 I can hear the voice ID of the satellite plain as day, but I never hear any other hams trying to make contacts and I can't seem to get into the satellite.
My set up is two Baofeng handhelds and an Arrow antenna. This set up works fine on SO-50 and AO-92 so I know that it works.
For AO-85 I'm using 435.170 for the uplink and 145.980 for the downlink. I have the uplink sending the 67.0 Hz tone.
So, what am I missing? Constructive tips would be very much appreciated.
Steve AI9IN _______________________________________________ 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://www.amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb
I forgot about the PL tone frequency. The filter on that is not all that sharp, and the detection DSP code was improved for at least AO-91 (can't remember without checking if AO-92 and Cliff got that fix too).
But yes, if the bird does not receive you strong enough it will not hear the tone either and will not switch on. That said, there is a lot of traffic on it in the northeast US. The number of telemetry frames I get is kind of proportional to how busy it is, and 85 is the one I get the most from. I see you are in IN. You might try passes when it is east of you and thus within range of more stations along the Atlantic coast.
On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 12:47 AM Fernando Ramirez framirezferrer@gmail.com wrote:
Steve, AO-85 can be a bit harder to work with an HT but it's doable. I started making QSOs with a UV-5R half duplex and an Arrow antenna. IMHO the best chances are on descending passes or after the first quarter of an ascending pass. Passes above 20° work the best.
My longest distance on AO-85 was 5282 km with FG8OJ in Guadeloupe using a UV-B5 to transmit and a FT-817 as the receiver. I was using the Arrow during that 2° pass.
Try twisting the antenna to match the satellite RX polarization. Figuratively speaking, of course :-)
Best of luck!
Fernando NP4JV
On Mon, Oct 29, 2018, 7:19 AM <skristof@etczone.com wrote:
Lately, I've been trying other FM satellites besides SO-50. I have made contacts on AO-92, but I can't get anything from AO-85.
On AO-85 I can hear the voice ID of the satellite plain as day, but I never hear any other hams trying to make contacts and I can't seem to get into the satellite.
My set up is two Baofeng handhelds and an Arrow antenna. This set up works fine on SO-50 and AO-92 so I know that it works.
For AO-85 I'm using 435.170 for the uplink and 145.980 for the downlink. I have the uplink sending the 67.0 Hz tone.
So, what am I missing? Constructive tips would be very much appreciated.
Steve AI9IN _______________________________________________ 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://www.amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb
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://www.amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb
Thanks to all who responded to my AO-85 question. Sorry to hear that the satellite is a bit finicky, but glad to know that it's not all me!
73
Steve AI9IN
participants (4)
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Burns Fisher -
Fernando Ramirez -
Ryan Noguchi -
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