Posts by DB2OS


    Just received my two additional 0.5ppm NEWGEN RTL-SDR dongles from China.. I want to use them on my RPI 3B+ server and connect via Win10...


    I have re-installed the whole Pothos package with GQRX on Win10.. but still no luck... :(

    pe1chl haha.. sounds very similiar and familiar :) I used my first 6802 homebrew computer to decode the telemetry from UoSAT-1 OSCAR-9 after the launch and sent it to Martin G3YJO. Every weekend they put up the famous UoSAT Bulletin with news about satellites. Meanwhile my brother DD2OJ re-build his Altair8800 and build a new CPU board with Z80, video terminal, floppy disk and so on to run CP/M operating system. It was when OSCAR-10 was launched, he build a hardware demodulator for the 400 Bit/s BPSK telemetry and wrote all the software to decode the signal and telemetry. It was DK2ZF who heard this from my friend Heinz, DL1CF and he knew Karl DJ4ZC. Karl put a special message on OSCAR-10 which was saying "The station in Hannover who can read this... please call me under phone number xxx" - believe it or not, we both were disappointed and thought that there is another station in Hannover capable to read that telemetry from OSCAR-10. But after some more days we finally called Karl and there was nobody else indeed. He invited us to Marburg. Well, not long after that I became command station for OSCAR-10 and got involved in P3-C project and so on.. ;)

    There is much more, but nowadays I wonder where did I found all the time to do such things ;) Endless nights I guess...

    Somewhere I should have some photos too.. if I find them on my backup, from the backup, from the backup... hahaha

    Just wanted to try GQRX under Windows and installed the bundled GQRX with Pothosware (latest release) and followed the instructions on: https://github.com/pothosware/PothosSDR/wiki/GQRX


    When I start GQRX.EXE, nothing happens.. no error message, no logfile, nothing.. :(


    When I try to run PothosFlow I get this error:


    The only tool which runs without problems is CubeSDR :)


    Someone having an idea?


    pe1chl The first computer I played with was an MITS Altair8800 computer which my brother got for little money from someone in Hamburg who bought it from the US as a kit, but never got it working. My brother found the short in the power supply and other bugs quickly.. Just looking like in this youtube video:

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    Since you had to enter the program using the switches on the front panel, you learned to write short Intel 8080 assembler code.

    My next computer I designed and build myself, with Motorola MC6802 CPU in it and the first static CMOS RAMs. I remember I pay a hell of money for the chips, never told my parents how much. Everything was build using this manual wiring technique (Fädeldraht) which became very popular at that time. I used the computer to write code for my first self designed and build VDU controller which was connected via RS232 and had a video controller and 6802 in it. Everything was Assembler indeed. Than I found and bought an BASIC interpreter from US, the same which Bill Gates used in his garage, but he was more clever than me. I got it on tape cassette or I had to type-in the whole code from the book by hand and than store it on tape.. don't remember anymore. Later I had an ATARI 1020ST with GEMDOS and all of that. Than I had several ATARI400/800 because I became involved in AMSAT-DL and Karl Meinzer DJ4ZC developed all the IPS software for the on-board computer from P3-A, OSCAR-10 and so on with these computers. They were originally for gaming, but the hardware architecture was brilliant and Karl put his IPS software developing environment on it. The ATARI800 were used also for the ground and command stations to control and operate the P3 satellites. Well, this is still the best part of the history.. later I also needed to have a PC running MSDOS, first Windows 3.1 (because during my university study I was developing software for a big company, which is actually my employee now). I also worked with Linux, because I did'nt like Windows so much.. Netwinder 275 the first ARM based computer from Canada. But I also could not avoid Windows and never completely switched to Linux.. But I have at least a few Raspberry PI's running Linux ;)

    Some tests in GG77 Resende - Rio de Janeiro.

    120cm dish + LNB Avenger PLL 321 + RTL.


    PY1SAN

    73 !

    Congratulations!!! Looks really nice...

    If I counted correctly, we will have at least 3 operators from Brazil

    PY1SAN, PY2SDR, PY4ZBZ :)

    Meanwhile our JAMSAT friends are supporting RAST Thailand to install a P4-A station at the RAST headquarter at the Bangkok University which they hope to have ready by March.

    Lot's of DX expected-- from Brazil to Thailand.. :)


    Charlie wait for changing weather conditions , and fast temperature changes.

    If the sun comes out behind clouds the LO freq will change rapidly.

    You will clearly see that the drift will be too fast to tune manually.


    I'm already tired to explain that again and again, so this was the last time.

    and this is the wrong threat anyway ;)


    But the good news is, after installing the latest SDR# version V1.0.0.1700 it seems not crashing that often anymore.. but will wait for my other 0.5ppm RTL-SDR's to arrive and put them on my Raspberry Pi where I currently have my Funcube Dongle..


    BTW: We had a lot of changing weather yesterday and today, but I found the stability of my unmodified OSLO good enough for SSB. Do you know how much you have to tune due to Doppler on linear transponder on a LEO? So I have no panic ;) I only noticed that the very strong wind at some stage made some heavy wobbling of the frequency due to mechanical vibration..

    Wir hatten die Diskussion an anderer Stelle schon einmal und Simplex-Betrieb ist generell auf Linear-Transpondern nicht statthaft.


    Siehe auch: Simplex operation


    Man sollte immer das eigene Signal beobachten und seine Sendeleistung ggf. anpassen und reduzieren.. auch würde man die schöne LEILA sonst nicht hören ;)


    Mehr dazu:

    https://amsat-dl.org/p4-a-nb-t…-and-operating-guidelines


    OSCAR-40 war übrigens im Apogäum fast 60.000 km entfernt und an die Laufzeit hat man sich schnell gewöhnt.. hat das Ganze irgendwo auch interessant gemacht.

    Are there any information available compared with the present beacon signals we see ??

    Hi Carsten,

    the ham radio NB and WB transponder will use a complete different beam/antenna compared to these engineering beacons.

    The signals are not comparable..

    However, from what we have seen so far.. the downlink is within our expectations and a 60cm dish should work fine. 80cm is probably optimal and everything above that may not increase Signal-to-Noise ratio.. at least not here in Europe. But it's always a good idea to hear better... ;)

    However, In-Orbit testing is not yet finished.. things may vary.

    We will have to wait for testing from our groundstations in Doha and Bochum before making final conclusions regarding the link budget.

    I made a cross-check, when I moved my antenna to 26°E the signal is much weaker (where I have BADR-4 transponder at maximum). I had my antenna previously around 24.2°E and can rotate it in 0.1° steps.. It might be a few tenth of a degree more east now, but I tend to believe that also the power level was increased..

    Peter, I agree with your considerations but in addition to the keps I'm also checking the signals from the satellite and with my dish fixed at 26 ° I see that, since yesterday, there is a strong increase in the signals on all the frequencies of Es' hail-2.

    If this is the beacon of Es'hail-2 I'd never received it so loud before.

    Well, interestingly I also have maybe 6dB more signal compared to the last several days and I did not move my antenna away from 24.2°E ;)

    It may have been moving all the time.. NORAD data is not real-time and sometimes they just propagate the elements by calculation and not by measurements. So if you see a big Jump in the elements, it may be due to the fact that they have made "real measurements". I remember that Victor Kudielka OE1VKW, James Miller G3RUH in the past found out that sometimes we should not trust Keplerian Elements, because they are only "spot measurements".. Indeed, things might have been improved over the last 10 years.

    But for sure Es'hail-2 will arrive at 26°E somewhere in January.

    .. and keep in mind that what you are seeing has nothing to do with the AMSAT transponder. Even the antenna beam is completely different..


    But still, it's a good training and reference to compare and optimize your downlink antennas and equipment for next year...

    Hallo zusammen,


    ich bin ja noch eine kleine Antwort schuldig, aber erstmal herzlichen Dank für die verschiedenen Vorschläge und Kommentare...


    Am Ende hatte ich mich dann doch für die besagte TA-1 Turnstile Antenne entschieden und noch im November installiert, bevor das Wetter vollkommen unbrauchbar wird.





    Die Antenne kommt in ein paar wenigen Einzelteilen und ist ja wirklich schnell aufgebaut. Man sieht da auch meinen 85cm Spiegel mit Rotor für Es'hail-2. Es ist mir ja peinlich, aber nach AO-40 habe ich alle Antennen abgebaut, weil es seitdem für mich nichts vergleichbarers mehr gab, was mich motiviert hätte.. 8o Aber irgendwann kribbelt es dann doch mal wieder. Zumal ich für P4-A / Es'hail-2 sowieso den Spiegel installieren wollte, warum nicht mal wieder klein anfangen.. Auch wollte ich den AirSpy SDR und meinen Funcube Pro+ Dongle (Seriennummer #0000002 !) endlich mal richtig ausprobieren...


    Ich hatte mich auch deswegen für die TA-1 entschieden, weil ich nach vielen Jahren auch APT-Wettersatelliten empfangen wollte, damals hatte man noch einen "Bildspeicher" als Hardware...hihi

    Die Antenne ist sehr breitbandig, was möglicherweise aber auch ein Nachteil sein könnte. Ich habe einen sehr rauscharmen Vorverstärker von SSB Elektronik, der aber vermutlich zuviel Rauschen und Störsignale anderer Frequenznutzer auffängt und deswegen nicht so den deutlichen Effekt bringt, wie ich es früher mit einer Hochgewinn-Antenne gewohnt war. Bei 137 MHz bringt er sowieso nichts mehr. Ich habe in der Nähe sehr starke Nutzer bei 146/147 MHz, da war dann auch der AirSpy teilweise überfordert, auch ohne Vorverstärker.


    Aber natürlich interessiert mich der 2m-Satellitenbereich mehr, da wir (AMSAT-DL) möglicherweise noch nächstes Jahr ein weiteres Projekt mit 2m/70cm haben. Da ist es auch von Interesse zu sehen, in welcher Liga die Antenne spielen würde..


    Wettersatellitenempfang geht wirklich sehr gut, sehr wenig Rauscheinbrüche. Tatsächlich kann ich auch diverse CubeSat bereits nach dem AOS teilweise sehr stark empfangen. Bei den chinesischen Satelliten ist das Passband-Rauschen nich zu übersehen und die Signale sind echt laut! Der Empfang der FOX-1 (AO-85/91/92/95) geht auch recht gut und und oft sogar rauschfrei.


    Um hier einen besseren Eindruck über die tatsächliche Effizienz meiner Empfangsanlage zu bekommen, habe ich kurzerhand den AMSAT Fox-1 Telemetry Decoder "Fox-in-a-Box" auf meinem Raspberry PI3 B+ installiert. Von der Software bin ich wirklich angetan, da haben AC2CZ und andere eine super Open Source Software für die Satellitengemeinschaft bereitgestellt.

    Eine tolle Funktion ist auch, dass verschiedene Daten zur eigenen Station auf dem Server gespeichert werden. So zum Beispiel Signal-Rauschabstand, sowohl seitens HF, als auch auf Bitebene nach der Demodulation. Das Ganze läßt sich dann auch grafisch in Abhängigkeit von Azimuth und Elevation des jeweiligen Satelitten darstellen. Mit genügend Überflügen, bekommt man dann ein tatsächliches Bild der eigenen Empfangsanlage, sowohl was das Antennendiagramm angeht, als auch mögliche Abschattungen.



    Nebenbei gibt es auch noch eine Statistik über die Anzahl der empfangenen Telemetriepakete und natürlich ein Ranking!


    http://www.amsat.org/tlm/leaderboard.php?id=0&db=FOXDB


    Immerhin ist es mir gelungen mich bei AO-95 (Fox1-Cliff) auf Platz 8 hochzuarbeiten und mich gegen die "big guns" einigermaßen zu behaupten. Für die anderen Satelliten bin ich zu spät um da noch eine Rolle zu spielen.

    Leider geben nur wenige User ihr Equipment vollständig bei FoxTelem an. Aber eine kleine Recherche bei Google hat gezeigt, dass die meisten Big Guns teilweise beinahe EME-Anlagen verwenden. Wenn ich mir dann so meine Ergebnisse ansehe, dann scheint die TA-1 eigentlich überdurchschnittlich zu funktionieren. Echte direkte Vergleichsdaten fehlen mir, vielleicht würde eine Eggbeater oder so ja tatsächlich noch besser funktionieren.. wer weiß. Vielleicht probiere ich das nächstes Jahr mal aus..

    Ich beobachte bei den Fox-Satelliten teilweise ein starkes und tiefes Fading, vermute aber es liegt jeweils an der Satellitenorientierung.

    Noch habe ich nicht genügend Samples von den Überflügen sammeln können, aber in ein paar Monaten ergibt sich vielleicht ein deutlicheres Bild..


    Ich hoffe ich konnte einigen Lesern ein paar Anregungen geben. Natürlich ist eine Richtantenne mit Rotor das "Non plus ultra".. aber zum "Reinhören" gehts auch mit einem optimierten Rundstrahler..


    73s Peter

    Hi Jochen,


    is your antenna pointing at 26°E or to the temporary position at 24.2°E ?


    My system is not really calibrated, I use unmodified Octagon OSLO, 85cm dish and Airspy. But I would suspect you should have a much stronger signal with 1,6m dish..



    Well, I had DualBoot Ubuntu and Windows on my Desktop and Laptop for a long time too, but I never made the switch to Linux.. Basically I do everything under Windows and hate to say it but Win10 works surprisingly good and stable.. Would SDR hardware work with a Virtual Machine running Linux on a WIN10 with i7 DualCore or QuadCore @ 2.67 GHz?


    Update: Actually made a quick Google search..

    https://discourse.myriadrf.org/t/running-limesdr-on-win-10-using-virtualbox-ubuntu-its-possible/

    Is about LimeSDR, but should also be OK with other hardware..


    Let's see what happens when the #P4-A transponders will be available for general usage. I think we will see a lot of interesting SDR based stuff...

    Thanks for all your hints. I think I doing this under Linux is the best option, as most of the SDR tools are developed for it. Raspberry 3+ is cheap, so I guess I will order another one ;)