Post by Anthony~KD3Y on Aug 15, 2022 1:20:16 GMT -5
For those of you who are not aware, the International Space Station hosts a 2-meter/70-CM cross-band repeater for use by us Hams trapped down here on the planet.
It's a fun thing to try, and you can get some good DX with a simple setup, butcha gotta be fast. The ISS travels about 17,000 miles per hour, and when it passes overhead you have about 9 minutes "talk time" before it continues on over the horizon. Awhile back, I made a contact with a station in Mexico via the ISS repeater. The dude spoke poor English but I was able to understand he lived near Coahuila. When is the last time you had a 1,500 mile QSO on 2-meters?
I found, for some reason, I had the clearest signal when the ISS was on either side of my horizon rather than directly overhead (dopler effect maybe??). If anyone is interested, the AMSAT website has a nifty tool to predict when the ISS is overhead here.
For the Morehead City and surrounding areas, if you don't know your GPS cords and are too lazy to go find them (like me), the grid for this area is: FM14ns. Just plug that into the box that says "Calculate Latitude and Longitude from Gridsquare" and click the "Calculate Position" button, then click the "Predict" button at the bottom. You'll get a return that will tell you the date, time, bearing, and minutes overhead for the number of passes you specify, among other things. As I'm writing this, the ISS is ISS is over West Africa according to AMSAT.
The cross-band repeater settings for the International Space Station repeater for North America are:
UPLINK (transmit) (2-meters): 145.990
DOWNLINK (receive) (70-cm): 437.800
PL Tone: 67 Hz
If you are really lucky, you may be able to get a QSO with an astronaut on the ISS Ham radio. The call sign for the American astronaut is NA1SS. If you speak Russian, the call sign for the Russian Cosmonaut is RS0ISS and if you speak European, the call for the European Space Agency astronauts are DP0ISS, OR4ISS, IR0ISS. As I understand, the ISS has several Ham radios onboard. The Kenwood TM-D710GA radio is located in the ISS Columbus Module and supports 2 meter & 70 cm operation. This radio is restricted to a maximum of 25 Watts in ISS operation and supports FM and packet operations.
The Kenwood TM-D710E radio is located in the ISS Zvezda Service Module and supports 2 meter and 70 cm operation. This radio supports FM and SSTV operations and allows nearly horizon-to-horizon signal reception. The crew switches between frequencies; scanning is not used. If a crew member begins a QSO over the USA, they can track US stations until they get over the Atlantic and then they will quickly lose US stations. They can then switch over to the other frequency and pick up stations in Europe or Africa.
For those who have SSTV capability, the Russians have installed a Kenwood D710 radio located in the Service Module to provide support of imaging experiments using various SSTV formats. When it is active, it transmitts one JPG image every 3 minutes. See the how-to video here to learn how to capture the SSTV signal from the ISS.
If you do hapen to be lucky enough to contact NA1SS, you can request a QSL card from:
Bruce Hunter, W6WW
ARISS USA QSL Manager
13436 Lakota Road
Apple Valley CA 92308
By sending a self-addressed, stamped envelope with proper postage, with your request noting the date, time in UTC, frequency, and mode of your QSL.
Let us know how you do!
It's a fun thing to try, and you can get some good DX with a simple setup, butcha gotta be fast. The ISS travels about 17,000 miles per hour, and when it passes overhead you have about 9 minutes "talk time" before it continues on over the horizon. Awhile back, I made a contact with a station in Mexico via the ISS repeater. The dude spoke poor English but I was able to understand he lived near Coahuila. When is the last time you had a 1,500 mile QSO on 2-meters?
I found, for some reason, I had the clearest signal when the ISS was on either side of my horizon rather than directly overhead (dopler effect maybe??). If anyone is interested, the AMSAT website has a nifty tool to predict when the ISS is overhead here.
For the Morehead City and surrounding areas, if you don't know your GPS cords and are too lazy to go find them (like me), the grid for this area is: FM14ns. Just plug that into the box that says "Calculate Latitude and Longitude from Gridsquare" and click the "Calculate Position" button, then click the "Predict" button at the bottom. You'll get a return that will tell you the date, time, bearing, and minutes overhead for the number of passes you specify, among other things. As I'm writing this, the ISS is ISS is over West Africa according to AMSAT.
The cross-band repeater settings for the International Space Station repeater for North America are:
UPLINK (transmit) (2-meters): 145.990
DOWNLINK (receive) (70-cm): 437.800
PL Tone: 67 Hz
If you are really lucky, you may be able to get a QSO with an astronaut on the ISS Ham radio. The call sign for the American astronaut is NA1SS. If you speak Russian, the call sign for the Russian Cosmonaut is RS0ISS and if you speak European, the call for the European Space Agency astronauts are DP0ISS, OR4ISS, IR0ISS. As I understand, the ISS has several Ham radios onboard. The Kenwood TM-D710GA radio is located in the ISS Columbus Module and supports 2 meter & 70 cm operation. This radio is restricted to a maximum of 25 Watts in ISS operation and supports FM and packet operations.
The Kenwood TM-D710E radio is located in the ISS Zvezda Service Module and supports 2 meter and 70 cm operation. This radio supports FM and SSTV operations and allows nearly horizon-to-horizon signal reception. The crew switches between frequencies; scanning is not used. If a crew member begins a QSO over the USA, they can track US stations until they get over the Atlantic and then they will quickly lose US stations. They can then switch over to the other frequency and pick up stations in Europe or Africa.
For those who have SSTV capability, the Russians have installed a Kenwood D710 radio located in the Service Module to provide support of imaging experiments using various SSTV formats. When it is active, it transmitts one JPG image every 3 minutes. See the how-to video here to learn how to capture the SSTV signal from the ISS.
If you do hapen to be lucky enough to contact NA1SS, you can request a QSL card from:
Bruce Hunter, W6WW
ARISS USA QSL Manager
13436 Lakota Road
Apple Valley CA 92308
By sending a self-addressed, stamped envelope with proper postage, with your request noting the date, time in UTC, frequency, and mode of your QSL.
Let us know how you do!