SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-184.01 AMSAT JOURNAL NEEDS FD PHOTOS HR AMSAT NEWS SERVICE BULLETIN 170.01 FROM AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD JUNE 19, 1993 TO ALL RADIO AMATEURS BT BID: $ANS-184.01 WA0PTV Would Like Photos Of Your FD Satellite Station For The AMSAT Journal If you operated a satellite station in conjunction with Field Day, please don't forget to send your entry in for the AMSAT contest. But please don't stop there. WA0PTV would like to put a page of photos of representative satellite Field Day stations in an upcoming the AMSAT Journal and would also like to publish a short section of comments by those who participated. WA0PTV would greatly appreciate if you happened to take any photos of your FD setup to send him a copy of whatever you have available. High contrast photos will appear best in print, but please send in whatever you have. Also, please send in any comments or observations you had about this year's FD exercise. Your comments can also be sent to him via INTERNET at his address of wa0ptv@amsat.org if you wish. However, photos will need to be mailed. WA0PTV's postal address is as follows: John Hansen (WA0PTV) 49 Maple Avenue Fredonia, NY 14063 Here's a chance for your FD group to receive the world wide coverage it deserves. The ARRL receives so many photos that the odds of your's showing up in QST are very remote, but your odds of making the AMSAT Journal are much greater. /EX SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-184.02 NEW AO-13 ZRO LEVEL BROKEN HR AMSAT NEWS SERVICE BULLETIN 170.02 FROM AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD JULY 2, 1993 TO ALL RADIO AMATEURS BT BID: $ANS-184.02 With Digital Signal Processing (DSP) A New ZRO Test Record Has Been Broken Darrel Emerson (AA7FV) has received confirmation as to being the first station to successfully receive the ZRO Level "A" code blocks. Most AO-13 operators are familiar with the ZRO tests which occur a few times per year. These tests assist in determining station receive sensitivity by sending CW blocks in 9 increments, beginning with signal strength equivalent to the AO-13 beacon (ZRO Level 0), and decreasing in 3 dB steps down to Level 9, which is 27 dB below the beacon signal strength. AA7FV was part of an experiment undertaken by Andy MacAllister (WA5ZIB) to see whether a signal at 30 dB below beacon strength (Level A) could be copied. After consider- able digital analysis of the recorded signal, AA7FV successfully determined the content of the code blocks and received confirmation of his copy from WA5ZIB. The equipment used at AA7FV to receive the Mode-B ZRO signals is a slightly worse than the average AO-13 station. The antenna is a 10x10 element circularly polarized yagi, with 30 ft of RG-8 feeder to an ARR preamp in the shack. The 2M receiver is a transverter feeding an FT-102 HF trans- ceiver and using a 250 Hz bandwidth CW filter. Data from the AO-13 ZRO tests were digitized using a cloned Soundblaster card, giving 4000 8-bit samples per second, which were analyzed off-line after the test. The data processing used software written in FORTRAN specifically for the ZRO tests, running mainly on a 386 PC. A variety of DSP algorithms were used, taking many hours of computing time -- this is not real-time processing! In this test, without the software processing, the ZRO signal could barely be copied by ear through the CW filter at Level 7. The software processing gives about a 10 dB improvement in S/N over the human ear alone, enabling accurate copy of the ZRO level "A" data. The next project for AA7FV is to try to make the software more user friendly, and to run in real time. There are obvious applications to EME reception. WA5ZIB notes that by no means must the ZRO test be done in real time. With the proliferation of DSP technology and access to fast computers, the methods for analyzing the ZRO test signals are as unlimited as the user's imagination and any method of extracting the code blocks, eg., using superDSP's and a Cray YM-P for software based analysis of the data, is completely "legal." [The AMSAT News Service (ANS) would like to thank Dave Burnett (WD8KRV) for this bulletin item.] /EX SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-184.03 AMSAT OPS NET SCHEDULE HR AMSAT NEWS SERVICE BULLETIN 170.03 FROM AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD JULY 2, 1993 TO ALL RADIO AMATEURS BT BID: $ANS-184.03 AMSAT Operations Net Schedule AMSAT Operations Nets are planned for the following times. Mode-B Nets are conducted on AO-13 on a downlink frequency of 145.950 MHz. Date UTC Mode Phs NCS Alt NCS 10-Jul-93 1300 B 90 WJ9F VE2LVC 17-Jul-93 1800 B 119 VE2LVC W9ODI 24-Jul-93 1930 B 70 N7NQM W5IU 31-Jul-93 1300 B 98 WB6LLO WA5ZIB Any stations with information on current events would be most welcomed. Also, those interested in discussing technical issues or who have questions about any particular aspect of OSCAR statellite operations are encouraged to join the OPS Nets. In the unlikely event that either the Net Control Station (NCS) or the alternate do not call on frequency, any participant is invited to act as the NCS. ************************************** Slow Scan Television on AO-13 SSTV sessions will be held on immediately after the OPS Nets a downlink on a Mode-B downlink frequency 145.960 MHz. /EX SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-184.04 WEEKLY OSCAR STATUS REPORTS HR AMSAT NEWS SERVICE BULLETIN 170.04 FROM AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD JULY 2, 1993 TO ALL RADIO AMATEURS BT BID: $ANS-184.04 Weekly OSCAR Status Reports: 03-JUL-93 AO-13: Current Transponder Operating Schedule: L QST *** AO-13 TRANSPONDER SCHEDULE *** 1993 Jun 27-Jul 10 Mode-B : MA 0 to MA 20 ! Mode-S : MA 20 to MA 30 !<- S transponder; B trsp. is OFF Mode-B : MA 30 to MA 256 ! Attitudes: Mode- : MA ! Jul 03 135/0 Mode- : MA ! Jul 10 140/0 Omnis : MA 170 to MA 10 ! Jul 17 145/0 Please don't uplink to Mode-B during MA 20-30 because it will interfere with Mode-S operations. [G3RUH/DB2OS/VK5AGR] MIR: A Soyuz TM-17 blasted off from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan this past Thursday with two Russians and a Frenchman aboard. The cosmo- nauts -- Vasily Tsiblyev (R3MIR) and Alexander Srebrov (R4MIR) of Russia and Jean-Pierre Haignere of France -- will join Gennadi Manakov (U9MIR) and Alexander Poleshchuk (R2MIR) who both have been aboard MIR for 161 days. The docking operations which were completed by 16:24 UTC on Thursday and were broadcasted live by television and also received at the Paris head- quarters of the French space agency, CNES. After conducting experiments aboard MIR for 18 days, U9MIR and R2MIR will return to Earth on 22-JUL-93 along with Haignere. R3MIR and R4MIR will remain in the space station until the end of the year. In other news about MIR operations, UA3CR reports that the cosmonauts are "sticking" with the standard MIR downlink frequency of 145.550 FM simplex and will no longer make use 145.850 MHz. While the cosmonauts had been experimenting for a short time with using 145.850 MHz, they quickly realized they were creating a great deal of QRM to many OSCAR satellite users on this frequency with their QSOs. There- fore, they will only use 145.550 MHz only. [LW2DTZ/UA3CR/N1MDZ] AO-16: Operating normally. [WH6I] UO-22: Operating normally. [WH6I] KO-23: Operating normally. [WH6I] FO-20: The transponder schedule will return to its usual modes of operation now that Field Day weekend has passed. Wednesdays will be the analog mode (JA) and the digital mode (JD) will be at all other times. N0NBH reminds all FO-20 users to PLEASE DISCONNECT BEFORE THE END OF THE PASS! He says that you should always make a "clean" disconnect before FO-20 travels over the horizon from your QTH. If you fail to disconnect, the FO-20 BBS will perform the disconnect itself after about 15 minutes of no activity from your station. However, during this time the BBS will not let anyone else log in until the disconnect has been performed. Thus, you will be limiting FO-20's operational capabilities for all users. Please remember to dis- connect before LOS. [N0NBH] AO-21: KD8PH notes that AO-21 is quite busy on the early morning passes. He also notes that when AO-21 does becomes highly congested there is no "gentlmanly" protocol agreed upon by AO-21 users to handle this problem. If you have suggestions about how such a protocol should be implemented, please send them KD8PH @ N9AZZ so that they can be discussed and published in the AMSAT News Service (ANS) bulletins. The resulting lack of a pro- tocol on AO-21 is causing a reduction in operating pleasure for all users of AO-21. [KD8PH] The AMSAT NEWS Service (ANS) is looking for volunteers to contribute weekly OSCAR status reports. If you have a favorite OSCAR which you work on a regular basis and would like to contribute to this bulletin, please send your observations to WD0HHU at his CompuServe address of 70524,2272, on INTERNET at wd0hhu@amsat.org, or to his local packet BBS in the Denver, CO area, WD0HHU @ W0LJF.#NECO.CO.USA.NOAM. Also, if you find that the current set of orbital elements are not generating the correct AOS/LOS times at your QTH, PLEASE INCLUDE THAT INFORMATION AS WELL. The information you provide will be of value to all OSCAR enthusiasts. /EX