[aprssig] [amsat-bb] Gibraltar Monitoring for 144.39 balloon

[Steve Daniels]

M0XSD caught a packet from PCSAT-1 earlier today on 144.390 which confused
us for a bit.
I have over the last couple of days got APRS from the UK into NE North
America via PCSAT-1
Stations that received me AA1XD,VA2CMQ,V01BIL and VE2RIN
I did suggest to the balloon ops to put a switchable by longitude tracker in
future so 144.390, switching to 145.825 mid atlantic and 145.800 when near
Europe. But they seem to prefer using things like the Iridium commercial
system.
Which to my mind is a shame
How cool would it have been to have got a transatlantic balloon flight,
picked up by the ISS and PCSAT-1 and digipeated

Steve Daniels
G6UIM

-----Original Message-----
From: amsat-bb-bounces at amsat.org [mailto:amsat-bb-bounces at amsat.org] On
Behalf Of Bob Bruninga
Sent: 13 December 2011 22:58
To: amsat-bb at amsat.org; 'TAPR APRS Mailing List'
Subject: [amsat-bb] Gibraltar Monitoring for 144.39 balloon

While everyone in Southern Europe and Northern Africa is listening for the
Transatlantic Balloon, K6RPT-11 on 144.39, I should also offer that you
might hear (during mid-day only) a possible packet from W3ADO-1 too.

PCSAT-1 has a downlink on 144.39 that is usually never heard in the USA due
to QRM, but it might possibly be heard in Europe where there should be no
other packets on that frequency.  But remember, that PCSAT can ONLY be heard
during rare alignment of its best solar panel to the sun, and usually around
mid-day.  All the excitement about K6RPT-11 landfall will be at night, so
there will be nothing heard of PCSAT (using the callsign of W3ADO-11) until
possibly mid-morning (if at all).  If PCSAT does come alive, you will hear
attempted occasional packets at both 1200 and 9600 baud, but almost always
they are not decodable because there is not enough battery power to complete
even the full duration of most 1 second packets..

But I just thought I would keep everyone informed in case a rare packet
popped up on 144.39 in a quiet area.

I also put out an object named "max-rng?" where I think will be the maximum
receive range of the Azores stations based on the range when the started
hearing it.  This object is NNW of Funchal.

And I see the track is starting to turn slightly northward, improving our
chances of a Portugal reception!

Bob, Wb4APR

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