Tag Archives: SM7FWZ

SM7FWZ finally worked via ISS Bounce

July 13th, 2015

While yesterdays try for an ISS Bounce QSO failed by Ronny, SM7FWZ, missing my rogers, we tried again this morning. As this orbit culminated near the zenith for me, I decided to catch up the ISS on the descending part of the pass.

2015-07-13 09_50_40-Satellite Window Finder by DJ5ARSo I could avoid the singularity in the azimuth angle and we heard us right from the beginning with strong signals. As Ronny couldn´t copy any rogers yesterday, we had plenty of them today, as well as 73s!

Ground Track of the ISS versus the direct path between SM7FWZ and DJ5AR

It is remarkable, that Ronnys signal was audible on backscatter off the ISS, even when my elevation became less than 2 degrees. The slantranges to the ISS were about 2100 km for me and 1700 km for Ronny: A total distance of 3800 km!

This is the result of many tests and discussion before. Ronny transmitted and received on 1296.300 MHz during the whole pass and automatic Doppler compensation was done on my side for both of us.

It is funny, that we had a Moon Bounce QSO a couple of days ago, just to compensate some frustrating tests. EME is sooo easy!

Thank you, Ronny, for this fast and efficient QSO and enjoy your very special day!

 

 

 

Welcome Ronny, SM7FWZ, to the ISS Bounce community!

July 12th, 2015

After many previous attempts Ronny, SM7FWZ and Jan, PA3FXB, managed to complete an ISS Bounce QSO on 23 cm today. The rigs used, were a 3 m mesh dish with 375 W on the dutch and a 4 m solid dish with 300 W on the swedish side.

Ground track of the ISS versus the direct path between SM7FWZ and PA3FXB

The window opened from 2015-07-13 08:07 to 08:17 UTC. While the antenna tracking was done automatically by both stations, only Jan could perform Doppler compensation. So they used a kind of mixed mode in tracking the frequencies.

25544 2015-07-12-08-07 SM7FW PA3FXB ISS(ZARYA) (25544) DopplerRonny transmitted on 1296.300 MHz and tried to catch Jans signal manually. So I monitored the frequency, Ronny should be heard on my side. It is nice to see in the video, how Jan appeared on the very left, getting closer and closer to the frequency, Ronny could be heard.

Congratulations to this success!