Posts by pe1itr

Christophe,

No, the QO-100 Challenge will no longer be organized from 2023 onwards. Everyone is welcome to take over as far as I'm concerned.

73 Rob

Hi David,

The cabrillo format for a qso record of the QO100-CHALLENGE is:

QSO: [Band] [Mode] [Date] [Time] [Own callsign] [RST sent] [Serial sent] [Callsign] [RST Received] [ Serial Received] [Received locator]

Al fields have to be in this order and separated by one or more spaces. Just like DL2GMI example above.

Below another example:

QSO:  2.3G PH 2022-02-19 1850 PE1ITR        59  022  G0MRF         59  019  IO91

73 Rob PE1ITR

Here are some additional photos of the 2m transmitter.

It's very storming here at the moment, but when the storm has passed I'll rebuild my 2m small eme array to listen. And I will also ask my moonbounce friends.
What is the NORAD number of the object?

Whenever there is anything to receive it is to be expected that it will be carrier only. I remember the JT65b signal deteriorating towards the end of the mission. The timing of the JT65b sequence was already out of sync in 2014.

I found these pictures of the LX0OHB transmitter on my laptop. Might be fun to share here.

I received this probe in 2014. Attached is a print screen of my receipt then. I thought the transmitter was mostly battery powered. But in the pictures I also see solar cells I will post them here. My receiver was then 2x 9el yagi at 2m.

Calendar 2022

1 2022-02-19 QO-100 SSB Challenge From 18:00UTC to 24:00UTC

2 2022-05-21 QO-100 CW Challenge From 18:00UTC to 24:00UTC

3 2022-08-20 QO-100 SSB Challenge From 18:00UTC to 24:00UTC

4 2022-11-19 QO-100 CW Challenge From 18:00UTC to 24:00UTC

This year's first QO100 SSB Challenge will take place next Saturday, February 19, 2022 at 18:00 UTC. Note the changed duration of 6 hours per contest.

This is the first in a series of 4 QO100 SSB/CW Challenges. More information at https://contestrobot.pe1itr.com/qo100_challenge/

Note the new rules for 2022: https://contestrobot.pe1itr.co…-challenge-rules-2022.pdf

Everyone is invited to participate. You can participate by uploading the log in the relevant cabrillo file format to the contest robot. Have fun collecting as many grids and callsign pre-fixes as possible.

73 Rob PE1ITR & Remco PA3FYM

Hi,

You can upload the log in Cabrillo format to the website and the score is automatically calculated from the supplied QSO records and your own location. You don't have to keep score yourself.

Below an example of the log file:

START-OF-LOG: 3.0
LOCATION: JO21
CALLSIGN: PE1ITR
CONTEST: QO100-CHALLENGE
CATEGORY-OPERATOR: SINGLE-OP
CATEGORY-ASSISTED: ASSISTED
CATEGORY-BAND: 2.3G
CATEGORY-MODE: SSB
CATEGORY-POWER: QRP
OPERATORS: PE1ITR
SOAPBOX: Nice contest and good activity
NAME: Rob
EMAIL: example@somewhere.com
CREATED-BY: N1MM Logger+ 1.0.8869.0
QSO:  2.3G PH 2021-01-05 1754 PE1ITR        59  001  PA3FYM        59  007  JO22 
QSO:  2.3G PH 2021-01-05 1754 PE1ITR        59  002  PD0LJX        59  006  JO21 
QSO:  2.3G PH 2021-01-05 1806 PE1ITR        59  003  DK0SB         59  003  JO31 
QSO:  2.3G PH 2021-01-05 2201 PE1ITR        59  004  PD2CWM        59  004  JO21 
END-OF-LOG:

Lay out QSO Record

QSO:  2.3G PH 2021-02-20 1817 PE1ITR        59  001  PA3FYM         59  015  JO22
QSO: ***** ** yyyy-mm-dd nnnn ************* nnn nnnn ************** nnn nnnn ****
QSO: band  mo date       time sent call     rst txnr rcvd call      rst rxnr grid
QSO: 0000000001111111111222222222233333333334444444444555555555566666666667777777
QSO: 1234567890123456789012345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890123456 

Now with the new band plan, the FT8 / FT4 activity will also have to move.

I set: FT8 / FT4 = .540 "Dail Freq"

I made over 65 qso's in FT8/FT4 mode so far on QO-100 and I enjoyed every qso.

It appears that FT4 is better because quite some stations shift in frequency during the transmission, making FT8 difficult to decode. Signals are not weak and that extra weak signal sensitivity is not necessary.

73 Rob PE1ITR

I am using my swiss army knife for satellite work: Nova for Windows.

https://www.nlsa.com/

It is free. Also runs on Linux under wine..

The sun is a standard object and the kepler elements of Es-hail2 can we loaded from https://www.celestrak.com/.

With this program I can view the conjuction of Sun and QO-100 live by putting both objects in the current view. And make a planning.

I think that the transponder noise at the March equinox was much higher and therefore the increase of sun

noise less noticeable. In the meantime the transponder noise is set much lower, the effect would be more noticeable.

I just calculated: When I use a 1meter dish and a pre-amp of 0.8db Nf. The VK3UM EME Performance Calculator gives a noise increase of 7.6 db.

With a 0.8m dish -> 6.1 db noise increase.

For my location the equinox is 09:55 UTC

Assuming a beamwidth of 2 degrees (-3db points) the noise increase will start 09:51 UTC and ends 10:02 UTC. So 9 minutes or less.

I'm curious now.

I have in my notes that 2019-10-12 around 09:55UTC there will be a Eshail-2 Sun Equinox. Is there more info what we could experiencing?

We will be on QO-100 as PE6SBW/J ( Scouting Burgemeester Welschen Meerhoven ) locator JO21RK on the NB and WB transponder.

CU 73 Rob

Mike tnx qso. Here is a screenshot of the last part of our qso. GW8OGI called me also.

Not me. But I will be qrv in one hour or so with FT8 on .600 (Dail Freq).

Ok Agreed. I set:

FT8 = .600 "Dail Freq"

Other NB MGM = .610 spreading upwards

According to the transponder "band plan", the Narrow Band digital mode runs from .600 - .620. We can best place FT8 on the edge such as .600 dail freq or .617 dail freq. The rest is then free with .610 as the center of digital mode activity for JT65c or whatever mode. OK?

I also received multiple decodes in FT8. The decode of the main signal and of the jitter artefacts.