A Beginner's Guide To Ham Radio In Space
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- Опубліковано 19 сер 2024
- The most entertaining look at amateur radio satellites ever. In my almost 10 years in the hobby, I've been intimidated and never tried to work satellites. That's about to change. Join me as I take the mystery out of Ham Radio Satellites. If I can do it, so can you.
My Gear:
Yaesu FT3 Handheld: amzn.to/2Dd5cKR
Arrow Dual Band Yagi: amzn.to/2OhN2hH
SMA Male to BNC Female: amzn.to/2pOFVDU
GoPro Hero 5: amzn.to/2OeYMBy
The App: GOSATWATCH on the app store.
Bob: Great to have been your first contact, reminds me of my first about 4 months ago. I have been totally hooked ever since. FYI, I was using a base baofeng UV5R and the same antenna you used. Hope to catch you again. 73 from DM43 K7VNE
Thank you. I was totally jazzed after that.
@@TheAbyss79 I'm from Ontario too, hopefully taking my test soon even with this COVID thing. Barrie Ontario 73
What's hilarious is that a flat earther should have no trouble believing this because reception in this case depends on line of sight which would be no problem without curvature. But then again ham via satellite would be pointless without the Earth's curvature. So I guess it depends on how "thought out" a flat earther takes the whole thing. Lmao.
Congrats on the sat contact. It took me several tries, with my wife looking out the window laughing at me lol.
It’s really cool when the sat comes into view and you can hear that noise drop when you’ve got the antenna pointed right at it.
Hey to both you guys! Steve from So. Illinois here. I will be taking my Tech test on Dec. 14th.I have watched both of you guys for awhile now and am learning alot. Keep up the good work to further the interest in comms! Old guy here. Always wanted my ham license since my WW2 Dad tought me code in the early 70's. Retired now so I have more time on my hands.73's to you both.
@@stevethecountrycook1227 ... Good luck, Steve! Just the other day, I passed Tech and General. You're going to do great....from one OG to another! 73 :-)
@@normjacques6853 Thanks Norm for the bit of encouragement! I appreciate it. That is pretty cool of you taking tech and general the same day! I have not even looked at the general test yet. I thought I would "mustang" from the start and go from there. You have a great day my friend.
I forgot to mention since it is approaching 50yrs. since I was tought code, I will need to relearn it again if I want to get into cw, lol
@@stevethecountrycook1227 Good luck on test and welcome to the hobby.
For those with Android phones... Heavens above is hard to beat.. ISS Detector is also quite good.
Thanks for the advice!
Congratulations on your first contact, Bob. That’s pretty outstanding the way you got your los. I worked with ku band node centers when, I was in Iraq. But, I never got to manually shoot an los because everything was automated . We networked the entire theatre together with broadband via satellite.
I had many friends when, I went to the triangle to work fire support. I was in charge of the only internet on the fob.
Don't forget the ELK Antenna log periodic. I use this antenna with a 25 yr old Alinco DJ580 (full duplex) running 5 watts with great results! The Elk is also a great terrestrial antenna for all things 2m and 440. No duplexer with a single feed line and about the same cost as the arrow. 73
I am a 25s Satelite Communication operator with the army. You explained it all very well, obviously the mil sat works on different bands but very much the same as the one you contact.
Middle of the night satellite QSO attempt! Congratulations on the satellite contact Bob!
Mike N6IMY
Great job on your contact video. This is yet another fun part of this hobby. This video has inspired me to get back into this. The best part for me is the look my neighbors give me.
Good stuff. I have been working stations through the ISS repeater four the past week or so. I use a UV-5R and a handheld 3el 2m beam. I get out better when I use my mobile rig. I could hear the Doppler early in the pass. You need to go down from .785 to .795 as it approaches on the receive, climb to 800 at max height, then climb up as high as 810-815 as it goes away from you.
Very cool ! I used to work the RS10 - RS12 satellites when I had the bug. Thanks for sharing !
Love that you took on this topic. You’re right; it’s very intimidating to get into without knowing the ropes. But activity like the Brazilian pirates on SATCOM in 250MHz is so fascinating.
Brazilian pirates? Vas is das?
He is one of the best teachers in ham radio
I'm all about satellites!! The FM birds are the gateway drugs. You should try the SSB linear birds where there is a passband and plenty of room to have actual QSO's. I have a Yaesu FT-817ND and FT-818ND that I connected together via a special bracket and wear on my chest and use a handheld arrow antenna to talk all over the place via linear birds like FO-29, AO-7, all of the XW2 linear sats, and the CAS-4A/CAS-4B satellites. There are several linear satellites that are orbiting around 900 miles high and you can talk cross country when the satellite is going over the Midwest. The easier FM satellites are in much lower orbits so they have smaller footprints or shorter range and transit the sky much faster. Anything you need to know about satellites, you let me know and check out AMSAT.org. It's a wealth of information. 73's de KI4SIY 🛰️
Worked a few of them in the past but I have way to much antenna gain on 2m uplink... 21dbd means I take over the passband causing issues for others, and that is with the FT-991 set at 5 watts... I computer track and the antennas so their thing on their own so I just need to work the radios(I have 2 FT-991's)
I was expecting to have to put up satellite dish fir best results?
In Australia
I just took my tech exam, and I gotta thank you for this video, one of my first projects will be to make contact from a satellite, and maybe get a moon bounce🤞 but I was worried it would be difficult, but from your experience it seem as easy as everyone's making it out to be!
Congratulations on passing your tech...I got my tech and general back in 2022 and everyone is different but I have more fun working satellites than HF, VHF/ UHF simplex or anything! Its a great hobby, kind of expensive until you get everything bought...If you haven't already been told, the best thing you can do for yourself is use LMR 400 Coax for VHF / UHF, the line loss is very high on RG8-X and similiar Coax....Jeffatech has excellent prices on LMR 400 and its good stuff...If you are going to have to mske sharp bends go with the flex version, it has a stranded center conductor and is much more flexible thsn the solid core....Not trying to be a know it all, just passing on info I wished i would have known when I started out....Good luck snd have fun!!!!
I seen this vid was 4 years old so a quick update for new guys to this hobby...The ISS Repeater is currently operational! Uplink is 145.990 with a PL of 67 the downlink is 437.800..Some start out when the ISS is inbound to your location at 437.810 and back down in 5 kHz increments to compensate for doppler shift.. Your experience may vary but I have found that if you set your radio to wide band receive that 437.800 is fine for receiving, i never have any trouble with RX by just leaving my frequency at 437.800....This may differ from radio to radio so just play around with it and see if it works for you...Also, use your phone or something to record your QSO's, because if your like me you will never remember the call signs of your contacts and trust me that is heartbreaking! !!!
It's been a long time but I worked a local via a satellite pass a few times using my dual band 50 watt ICOM mobile rig. The doppler shift was a cool thing to experience. Seems like 15 seconds was the duration of the pass, but it was years ago. No special antennas, just using the dual band antenna on the roof of my Cherokee.
I sincerely appreciate your normal level irreverence in your videos. However, I am a high school teacher in Sacramento and I'm using amateur radio to teach my students about wireless public safety communications... I am thankful for the toned down level of irreverence in this video because it allowed me to show it in my classroom to 120 teenaged boys and girls. Please consider me when you make future videos! Every so often, make one that's nearly PC haha
Freakin awesome.
Thanks for sharing your devirginization experience with us..!! Really adds to the enthusiasm and excitement ...
You edited part of your exclamation , but my mind filled in the void nicely .. lol
That's awesome. Now I need to figure out how to make one of those antennas.
Great job Bob…Welcome to the wonderful world of satellites. Out of my 57 years of being a ham radio operator, satellites are my MOST favorite aspect even after 30 years of working the birds. There are a multitude of sub niches to explore and challenge you. There are UA-cam videos galore to teach you - but if you have any questions or need help, just let me know. 73 de Robert K3RRR
Can you give some examples of popular niches? I'm getting into sat.
I have an Arrow antenna and been meaning to try it, but havnt yet. Thanks for another great video.
I had a blast doing this. I'm hooked. Thanks for supporting the channel brother.
I just started with satellites. Thanks for info. Congratulations on your first contact.
That arrow antenna also works as a great portable yagi to access distant repeaters while out camping. I set mine up on a tripod and aim it and key up repeaters 50 miles away with a old yaesu vx8r.
Thanks! I myself am really well versed in rocket science, and not so well versed in radio comms yet; and I had no idea what equipment I needed to make two way comms with satellites and this clarified such! Time to make an order and study for a technician license.
Congratulations on the first satellite contact! When the space station went over in the video it may not have been active in the voice fm mode and the astronauts were not manning the radio. Aprs probably was active.
A couple of other helpful items are a 2nd radio so you can hear your signal getting in and make sure you are not transmitting over someone else. Second item is a headset or headphones which will ensure you dont get feedback with the other radio. Great job for the first time!
Hey Bob. Great video. Something that can help those who are getting into satellites might keep in mind, sometimes you can hear the audio from your own station on the downlink frequency. Is really a good way to know if you are hitting the satellite well or not. I've made several contacts through the ao-85 satellite and even did them from my Mobile station. It is really great hearing a satellite pop up over the horizon and sometimes being able to work them from just a Mobil station with nothing more than a quarter wave dual band antenna. Thanks for making a video about satellite Communications. Something else to consider as well, the International Space Station periodically will do events where they send slow scanned television images over the radio. They're downlink frequency for this as 145.800. These can even be received with as little as a scanner antenna of some sort or especially with a maze in Tamil. All you need is software on a phone or on a computer and you can monitor as much as you like with a base station radio or scanner. The last event space station had, I received close to 30 images from the space station over the span of a weekend and most were great quality. 73 from Rob Wright, KY4ROB.
Awesome first satellite contact experience caught on video. I am really not sure there is anything here that would be considered a beginner‘s guide though. Great videos, keep up the good work! 73
Awesome video! Very cool to see an HT perform like that.
Fun fact: i used the baofeng's UV-5R with the stock antenna when the iss was passing above and i was able to receive signal and hear people using the iss repeater but the audio wasn't that clear but you could understand what they were saying (also i used the dopple effect with the frequencies which helped a lot)
We've got an Arrow antenna and a big 2m/70cm beast we call "Spiny Norman" on an az-el rotor in the backyard. It hasn't been used in about 10 years and the lawn guys shredded the cables long ago. No idea if the rotor rotes anymore, or if it's now a fancy looking blob of rust and aluminum oxide.
Nailed it . Way to go. I enjoy your real world videos . I have had my butt kicked chasing satellites. Example: leave my th-d74 power at extra low from the dSTAR setting for my hot spot ☹️. Not reaching much on extra low. 🤓
Bob now you can do the satellite report when Greg is not around. Good to hear Bob 2
I still don't know what the hell I'm talking about.
Sweet! Nice 👍🏼 job Bob. Congratulations on your first Sat contact!
There has been a lot of discussion about satellites on the TH-74A FB Group as of late and I am interested and possibly way more confused about how to start. But this helped.
I’m going to start playing iss aprs on my D74. I’ll let you know
Nice work!
Thanks.
Nice Bob, I use most of the same stuff, I mount the Arrow on a tripod and use a Yeasu FT-8900R with battery and diplexer. GoSatwatch is the best. 1 contact on Field Day is good for a 100 point bump. 73
Bob, Easier than you think. (Easier than talking to the ISS) Hi. I'll email you the first Sat QSO that Randy made back about 15 years ago. The video is B&W as it was recorded on my Palm Starting to get smart phone! Congratulations on the contact. You'll have many more. de WF6J
That was fantastic man! Waiting for my call sign, just did my novice exam. 73’s!
Nicely done sir, was good talking to you today. Keep up the great work. 73 de N4EJM
Congrats on your first Satellite QSO Bob!
Flat Earfers will say this was all faked. *lol*
Of course they will.
Maybe we will, maybe we won't. lol
I will be testing next weekend.....I plan on trying this soon.
It’s possible on a flat plane
Outstanding! I bought that antenna a couple of months ago and have yet to put it to the test, looks like I should get busy because it looks like a blast!
P.S. Congratulations on your first contact on the birds!
Satellites? Gee, I'm still trying to figure out the easy stuff.
😂
Congratulations on your 1st SAT QSO. Reminds me of my first. 73's Jim KB4FLC
Nice to see you get your first QSO, I'm yet to get my first, just purchased my arrow antenna, so set to get out there
Well Done Old Mate and Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family. I will have to give it a run down here in vk2. As I also have never work a satellite Have a good one Bob and thanks for all your time and effort you put into these videos, it is greatly appreciated Regards. Richard vk2ual
Congratz on your first contact! It gets pretty addictive. 73
I think we spoke over C4FM. The ISS app is fantastic.73 From KD2TJH
How friggin' cool is *that?* As soon as my new (Tech and General in one sitting!) callsign makes it to the FCC database, I've gotta try that! Nicely done, Bob! 73 :-)
I can't wait to give this a try, I just passed my Tech Saturday. (3/7/20) I'm still waiting for my call sign. Congrats on your first contact!!! 73. I'll have to use my GMRS call sign it's all I have. WRFF270 Clear.
I just bought that antenna. Awesome.
Great job!
I worked k6uda and k6vne on the sats recently, very cool !!
Awesome
Best 73 from 7X2YM Qth Algiers, Op Yacine
I've been struggling to access satellites. I'm determined to get a QSO eventually!
Fun to see a ham make his first sat contact, I've been active on sats since the 60's, now days I'm more involved with mirosats and telemetry. The hardest part for beginners who don't understand navigation and the difference between magnetic north and true north and how to find their local magnetic variation makes it difficult to understanding where to point your antenna becouse the tracking software uses true north, another issue is elevation, few people know what 30 degrees of elevation looks like so most of the newbees are pointing their antennas in the wrong direction and forgetting to rotate them to compensate for the circular polarization created by the satellite.
Nice !! May have to give it a shot .
When I tried the ISS I managed to hear people but there was a huge pileup and they couldn't hear me. I was using an HT with a whip antenna. I do NOT have a yagi so that may have been the issue.
Thanks for showing your first attempts and great to see your first successful satellite QSO. I'm about to give it a try myself. I'm sure I'll be as excited as you were. Working satellites seems like it will be a lot of fun. BTW, what logging program was that you showed in the video?
I’m curious about the logging software as well
I was just thinking about this last night. Thanks for the video de AI7N
hey, would it be possible for you to make a video on actually setting up the FT3D for this ? im struggling to set it up, I am sure im not the only one, :)
I agree I can’t get exact frequencies needed
Worked the first Oscar satellites ,first contact from michigan to alaska
In the early 90's I was ZP6XD in Paraguay and had a nice complete station and was a member of AMSAT-US and AMSAT-UK, went to AMSAT conventions in Orlando, FL, and Arizona, worked KO-23 and KO-25 digital mode satellites, did EME, and many other things. Those were the good days! Now I live in Chile, and I wondering if there is anything new in Amateur Satellite technology that is worth getting into? Like high speed digital modes, or high resolution earth imaging with downloading, or possibly direct laser link communications between ground stations and satellites? What is new?
Congratulations on your first Sat contact. Good demonstration video.
Stay safe everyone
de KB3KGA
Great job Bob!
Congrats on your 1st sat comm!
73 - John - N7GHZ
In the beginning of your videos, you snap your fingers and a beauty appears on your knees. I've tried many times but... nothing. Could you tel me your trick? Maybe a different capacitors value or a different type of transistors?
;-) Nice video. I bought the arrow antenna some years ago, awesome. 73 de in3ade.
Practice practice practice.
Looks fun. Now try for the ISS. I was hollering at it the other night when it flew right over So.CA. Nothing, but I'll keep trying.
Thanx for this, I’ve got the Arrow antenna, it’s great 👍
nice work!
You did IT.🎉
K6UDA Bob VK3ZDK Kevin from Australia waving a hand. Great Video mate. Thanks for sharing 73,s from the land down under
Hello, good video, very informative. Did you use a duplexer? Thank you from Ernie KC1LKb. 73's.
Great Video. I'm using a Baofeng UV5R and image that I downloaded from the web. How do you alternate between the frequencies? I turned on the radio and I see the listed ISS downlink frequency. I'm pressing the A\B and VFO buttons and the asterik just goes up and down. All the parameters are there in the image. Can you help? Ernest Bazzinotti KC1LKB
The problem with the UV5R is that when your working one vfo the other is disabled. You can still tune VFO a to the uplink frequency and VFO B to the downlink frequency. When you unkey, VFO B can receive.
The Elk VHF/UHF Satellite log periodic for FM and SSB birds have all elements in the same plane and works as well as the Arrow II dual Yagi which have its VHF elements 90 degrees from the UHF elements. The Arrow II has build in 10W Diplexer which is not required by the Elk. Why does the Yagi require 90 deg phase polarization difference yet the Elk LPDA does not?
Already spaced out Bob! 73
Nice! Inspirational!
Thanks.
Very good and informative video Bob. I just built a 3 element 2 meter yagi out of stock I bought at a local building supply and intend to add 70 centimeters to it soon to try satellites. It looks remarkably like your Arrow antenna. Thanks for your video's that give us entertainment and information in the days of the CCP Virus. KD9OAM
That was cool...Thanks
The iss doesn't run a reapeater if I recall correctly and you also need to receive on 145.8Mhz is someone's talking
Hey, thanks for the video, really informative. I was curious to know about what you say when you make contact. I think you were saying alpha-numeric words? How do I learn this?
What I'm saying is my callsign and my grid square. As you listen to it you'll pick up the lingo.
Congrats. Nice contact 73
Very cool!
thanks, Bob great video 73 from kb2uew
bobo great video ay something?
Very cool.
Don't you need a radio that supports full duplex capability such as the TH-D72?
Working the satellite at night allows you to visually track it! You don't need and stinking app! ;-)
and it justifies my purchase of a fresh set of night vision. Thanks Randy.
That was cool!!!
We're you using the Arrow antenna with the duplexer? I want to start trying to make satellite contacts and I already own a FT3DR, thanks to your videos on it.
Yes, it’s the one with the duplexer
Super neat
I can't work the sats with my antenna system... to much gain with it being an eme array. I would flood the entire passband... I have 21dbd gain on 2m just from the antennas...
First world problems.
That antenna should be more than adequate for an EME bounce (Earth Moon Earth) Perhaps you could give a demo sometime? :D
I might have to study for that exam.
@@K6UDAToday the Moon! Tomorrow VENUS! LoL
Congrats on the first SAT contact. I gotta try to work one in the near future. 73 KI5HII
Great video, I've worked the FM satellites with a Yaesu VX7 so far, have you or someone else operated the Anytone 7x7?
vy 73 Andy DO6DOC
SO-50 is not so easy to work, you have more doppler shift on the downlink, always make sure that you can hear the satellite before you transmit to it.
Hey Bob. Great video. I am just starting to dabble in the Ham Radio hobby. Towards the end of the video there is a gray screen shot with a lot of info in it. Is that a website or some software. I would like to start using that if you could tell me where to find it.
Very good 👍 73
Great video, Bob. What satellite were you pointed to when making that first contact? I might have missed it in the video
I don’t remember.
how do i connect the Yagi antenna to a Wouxan KG-905G GMRS 2-way radio and what connectors and cables will I need?
Nice boat! Hahaha. Congrats on your first SAT QSO. de KC3PO
Thanks. We’re getting ready to set sail around the world in it.