In mid-August, on the night of August 12-13, during the peak of the Perseid meteor shower, the technical team of the Slovak Space Activities (SOSA) launched from the airport in Partizánské the JuloX stratospheric probe.
Among other things, the stratospheric balloon carried the communication module of the first Slovak satellite skCUBE, with which amateur radio experiments were carried out. A stratospheric balloon flight is ideal for testing satellite components because the conditions in the stratosphere are very similar to those in space, such as low pressure, temperature and increased radiation.
The first amateur radio experiment was two-way communication in the 70cm amateur radio band. The transceiver worked in the digital repeater (digipeater) mode, that is, after receiving the AX.25 frame, it decoded the call sign and replied to sleep. The digipeater cycled with a CW beacon transmitting basic telemetry. The skCUBE transceiver transmitted with a power of 1W – AX.25 and 100mW – CW to the dipole antenna. 7-el was located at the ground station yagi antenna that was pointed at the balloon probe thanks to Rob's OM1LD tracking platform.
The second experiment was CW reception in the 2.4GHz band. The transmitter worked with a power of 250mW and was connected to a patch antenna developed by us with a gain of 6dB.
You can read more about the JuloX flight and details at svetelektro.com