Hello Mak, I appreciate your support and am very glad somebody else noticed the discrepancy ... and while I have the pen ... (keyboard) ... congratuations on your fine signal on the old girl yesterday, the first time we've worked on AO-7.

Since we're both completely blocked by mountains in our respective take-off directions we did OK Makis.

I told !!! you the EU-Amsat reflector would be a success didn't I ... we did good Mak.

73 John. la2qaa@amsat.org AO-7 Resource Page Admin:

..........................................................................................................

From: SV1BSX sv1bsx@yahoo.gr Reply-To: eu-amsat@yahoogroups.com To: eu-amsat@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [eu-amsat] Re: [amsat-bb] Re: AO-7 report.- Band switching Date: Mon, 6 Aug 2007 12:03:43 -0700 (PDT)

Hi John & group,

personally I agree 100% with you John. AO-7 this summer working like a "single" Mode-B Satellite ! This is very unusual comparing with previous years, where during the summer-months it was mainly "ON" in Mode-A. And I know that very well, as a "fan" of Mode-A.

But definitely, this summer-period something is

different on satellite's behavior .

I wondering before several weeks, why the Satellite was not "ON" on Mode-A, but nothing more. John LA2QAA has an "eagle eye", so not just he noticed that but he wrote it, wondering also about the possible ralationship with "Timer's" operation , when the AO-7 will going out of eclipse the next months. Good one John.

So, I can't understand why all this "noise" from some others friends. If somebody watching the "old grand lady", it's obvious that something is changed.

73, Mak SV1BSX

--- John Hackett archie.hackett@hotmail.com wrote:

...

Hello Roger, Here's a link to the estimated eclipse times through to 2008.

http://www.planetemily.com/ao7/Eclipse.php

Also, the seasonal statistics of AO-7.

http://www.planetemily.com/ao7/stats2.php

If you backpeddle you'll see that mode-B becomes more predominet as the years go by ... the main parameter being sunlight.

checkig this against the estimated eclipse times will land you in the same part of the ballpark I took my original estimations from ... but please do !!! remember, it's all "logical' speculation.

There are so many variables. Even some clown with too much power could upset the voltage threshhold ... they might even succeed in turning the old girl off altogether !!! ... hence the enforced tight-lippedness re: power and commands etc.

I can tell you though, I know what you mean about mode-A.

Though I'm a so-called "experienced" ... (note the hyphens !!!) ...operator, I truly miss the challenge of chasing RS-10 across the sky while manually adjusting for doppler. It had an excellent !! receiver, an acceptible transmitter, the Robot was novel and there was plenty of SSB and plenty of SSB and plenty of CW to keep everybody happy.

It rather surprised me that after P3D Amsat chose to promote an FM satellite in LEO, thereby limiting the the number of users per pass dramatically ... but that debate has been driven into the ground already.

The Europeans and Americans have differing views on this as seen by the mass exodus of members from Amsat-UK when it became known that Amsat-UK would provide substantial funding for an FM satellite.

Many years ago, when my good friend Russel Tillman was editor of The Amsat Journal he explained the policy making ... "we have to keep the constructors happy" etc ... so as a mere operator, whether you help to fund things or not, you get what you are given, take it or leave it.

You may ... (or may not) ... find this link amusing ...

<http://www.observations.biz/Joint_Observations/the_thirteen_commandments.htm

...

73 John.

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