Radioamatersky stratosfericky balon STS-2 – start 15.1.2013
Slovak radio amateurs will again touch the near space.
After the successful flight of the STS-1 balloon, a team of radio amateurs from STSPROJECT.NET in cooperation with the SME newspaper, the second launch of the stratospheric balloon STS-2 is in order (WE ARE in the stratosphere).
Date and place of start:
15.1.2013, 8:30 THIS (7:30 UTC)
Povazany football field
GPS coordinates of the place
The assumed height of STS-2 ascent is 34000m.
The balloon will carry a new load remaining from two new independent modules for tracking location and telemetry, two miniature HD cameras, camera and one USB camera.
1. APRS – position and height of the balloon – CPU ATMEGA328
– 144.8 MHz, 300 mW, under the brand name OM2AMR-11, battery voltage telemetry
2. RTTY – position, height of the balloon, telemetry – CPU ATMEGA328
– 434.650 MHz, 10mW, USB, 7 bit, without parity, 1 stop bit, 300 baud
– use dl-fldigi current version for decoding – instructions in Slovak http://ukhas.org.uk/guides:tracking_guide:slovak
– in dl-fldigi, select flight STS-2 on the start day, payload STS-2, then click Autoconfigure
– telemetry – internal, outside temperature, battery voltage, humidity, barometric pressure, number of visible GPS sats
– after correctly setting the program, you will automatically send the decoded packets to the server, where it will be possible to monitor the position and telemetry from the balloon – http://spacenear.us/tracker
-despite the small power, the signal range is several hundreds of kilometers when using a vertical collinear antenna. At STS-1, we have reported receiving a signal from DL, approx 450 km.
In addition to telemetry and position, STS-2 will also transmit live images captured by a USB camera during the flight. SSDV will be used to transfer these images. Images will be transferred again using RTTY. This is a relatively new way of sending images developed in the UK High Altitude Society (UKHAS). Compared to SSTV, it provides a better quality of transmitted image without sum.
You can find a description of SSDV at http://will be released at a height of about 25 km and will be tested on a new way of transporting cargo from great heights:ssdv .
SSDV will use the following parameters:
– 434.075 MHz, 10 mW, USB, 8 bit, without parity, 2 stop bits, 300 baud
– use dl-fldigi current version for decoding
– in dl-fldigi, select flight STS-2 on the start day, payload STS-2P, then click Autoconfigure
– you can see the decoded images directly in dl-fldigi – select View in the menu – SSDV RX
– each decoded image packet is sent again to the server, where you can see the pictures online – http://tiamat.habitat.org
– the advantage of this way of transferring images is also that, that if someone drops one packet and another amateur receives the missing packet, the complete image is displayed on the server. Therefore, please do not forget to set dl-fldigi correctly when decoding images, to send the decoded packets to the server as well.
The location of the search team will be displayed on both maps. On aprs.fi, the tracking car will be marked OM1AMJ, on spacenear.us the car will be from om2amr_chase.
On the pages of the technical section of the SME daily – http://tech.sme.sk continuous information from the start will be provided, flight and tracking.
On the occasion of the release of amateur radio stratospheric balloons this year, Radim OM2AMR has been assigned an occasion mark – OM13STS. This sign should be active even during the start.
We look forward to your participation with your personal one, or on the pasture.
73!
I am doing OM13STS
