[amsat-bb] north korea on ao-40 ... soon

["Bruce Paige" <kk5do@xxxxxxxx>]

i am working with jerry, k5oe, to prepare receive and transmit antennas for 
p5/4l4fn in north korea to use on ao-40. we face several problems. one is that 
it has to be small enough to ship, small enough to work from inside his 
apartment (he has windows on 3 sides) and powerful enough to tx and rx. 

the tx antenna is going to have to be an arrow. don't see any way around that. 
for rx, we have chosen a 2' bbq grill with a high gain down converter. since 
coax runs will be only 10 feet or less, we should have no problem with signal 
loss. a bias-tee is added to provide power to the down converter. 

during testing before we ship everything, if it appears that ed needs more 
punch, we will have to consider a linear. however, with an arrow 70cm antenna, 
i don't think we really want to go over 50 watts on 70cm. we don't want him to 
be nuked by all the stray rf.

the radio ed is using is the icom 706. the proposed plan will be to have ed 
lock the tx on a specified frequency. then he will rx up the band. as he will 
never be able to hear himself because the radio does not have full duplex, this 
will make it very easy for him. for us, just as easy as an hf dxpedition. he 
will simply be listening up from where he is. 

ed is already tracking the satellite with winorbit. so he has that working just 
fine. with the arrow antenna, we might even be able to get him up on ao-10. we 
will test that as well. 

expected shipment of the equipment to him will be mid march. it will go 
overnight federal express (a nice way to spend some big bucks). however, 
overnight to that part of the world means a week or two. it gets there in 2 
days, then you have a week or two to clear customs. so, by the time ao-40 comes 
out of eclipse and is orientated back to normal nadir pointing at apogee, we 
should be ready for ed to work the world from the rarest dxcc country. 

i would think that ed could work the entire satellite community in a couple of 
hours. providing everyone spreads out. if they sit on each other and qrm, then 
it will take him longer. 

more news as we get closer. if you are not on ao-40, now would be an ideal time 
to get your equipment ready. we also must conform to ed's operating time 
schedule (usually 2230z-2330z and possibly 1400z-1500z). don't have any idea 
where the satellite will be during these times, but we have to keep our fingers 
crossed that it will not be perigee. ed might have to make some special 
arrangements to accommodate us at a satellite apogee peak one or two days. but 
we will cross that bridge when we get there. 

73...bruce



Bruce Paige, KK5DO                                      kk5do@arrl.net 
Houston, Texas                                                  
AMSAT VP-User Services & Awards Manager                               
ARRL Awards Manager (WAS, 5BWAS, VUCC), VE                     
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