AMSAT News

Fox-1Cliff Ready for Launch

by

On Monday, September 24th, Jerry Buxton, NØJY, AMSAT Vice-President Engineering, delivered and performed the integration of AMSAT’s Fox-1Cliff CubeSat in preparation for launch.

Fox-1Cliff in the clean room, ready for prep

Unlike AO-85 and AO-91, AMSAT purchased a commercial launch for Fox-1Cliff. Please consider a donation to help replenish the coffers for GOLF and other future AMSAT projects!
https://www.amsat.org/product-category/amsat-general-donations/
https://www.amsat.org/product-category/amsat-membership/
https://www.amsat.org/product-category/amsat-presidents-club-donations/

Uplink:      435.300 MHz FM voice (67.0 Hz CTCSS tone) / 1267.300 MHz FM voice (67.0 Hz CTCSS tone)
Downlink:  145.920 MHz FM voice; AFSK digital data up to 9600 bps
Transmit power: 600 mW nominal

Fox-1Cliff after insertion in the PSL-P deployer

Because only one uplink frequency can be active at a time, the use of the Mode-L uplink will be limited to experimental periods announced in advance.

Fox-1Cliff carries the flight spare of the AO-85 Vanderbilt University Low Energy Proton (LEP) radiation experiment, and the standard Fox-1 Penn State University–Erie gyroscope experiment. Virginia Tech provided a VGA camera which is the same as AO-92 but will provide images at a higher 640 x 480 resolution. These non-SSTV images will be decoded in the FoxTelem software.

Spaceflight Mission Managers and the two CubeSat teams performing integration

Fox-1Cliff, unlike the other three Fox-1 FM spacecraft, does not have an active AFC on the uplinks.

Fox-1Cliff’s Subaudible Telemetry (low-speed telemetry) will be the same as for AO-85, AO-91, and AO-92. It will be supported by the same FoxTelem software already released.

As with AO-92, a high-speed mode will be used to support the Virginia Tech VGA camera experiment.

The Fox-1Cliff Remove Before Flight Pin after its final removal for the mission.

This mode will be active for 40 minutes by ground command before reverting to standard U/v transponder voice operation.

Fox-1Cliff is named in honor of long-time AMSAT member, contributor, and benefactor Cliff Buttschardt, K7RR (SK), who passed away in 2016. Cliff’s contributions to AMSAT and other amateur satellite programs, including serving as an adviser during the initial development of the CubeSat specification at California Polytechnic State University, earned him the Lifetime Achievement Award from Project OSCAR in 2006.

[ANS thanks Jerry Buxton, NØJY, AMSAT Vice-President Engineering for the above information]

 

Spaceflight team along with some team members of the other CubeSats that were integrated Monday

 

 

AMSAT President Joe Spier, K6WAO, to appear on Ham Nation September 26th

by

AMSAT President Joe Spier, K6WAO, will appear on Ham Nation’s September 26, 2018 episode (#369) with Gordon West, WB6NOA. Joe is scheduled to discuss the latest news from AMSAT and ARISS.

Ham Nation records live every Wednesday at 9:00pm Eastern / 6:00pm Pacific / 01:00 (Thu) UTC and can be viewed at  https://twit.tv/shows/ham-nation

AMSAT President Joe Spier, K6WAO

 

2018 AMSAT Board of Directors Election Results

by

As a result of the 2018 Board of Directors Election, Tom Clark,  K3IO; Mark Hammond, N8MH; and Bruce Paige, KK5DO; will serve on  the board for two years.

The First Alternate is Peter Portanova, W2JV. The Second Alternate  is Scott Harvey, KA7FVV. Both will serve for a term of one year.

The results of the voting with 698 ballots cast are as follows:

Tom Clark, K3IO…………574
Mark Hammond, N8MH………507
Scott Harvey, KA7FVV…….176
Bruce Paige, KK5DO………402
Peter Portanova, W2JV……359

Submitted by:
Martha Saragovitz, Manager
Clayton Coleman, W5PFG, Secretary

[ANS thanks Martha Saragovitz, Manager and Clayton Coleman, W5PFG,
Secretary for the above information]

AO-92 to Try Imaging Hurricane Florence September 13-14

by

AMSAT Vice-President of Operations, Drew Glasbrenner, KO4MA says that the camera on AO-92 is planned to be used to try to image Hurricane Florence during North American east coast passes on Thursday, September 13, and Friday, September 14.

AO-92 will not be in its U/V FM voice transponder operation during these passes. Ground stations should standby and not attempt to access AO-92 during this time. Voice operation will be available later during these days.

The high speed image data will be transmitted on the 145.880 MHz downlink.

The image can be captured, decoded, and uploaded to the Fox-1 data warehouse using the FoxTelem v.1.06 software available from AMSAT:
http://amsat.us/FoxTelem/windows
http://amsat.us/FoxTelem/mac
http://amsat.us/FoxTelem/linux

[ANS thanks AMSAT Vice-President of Operations, Drew Glasbrenner, KO4MA for the above information]