The ARG will begin our weekly Monday Evening meetings at the Sports Pavilion – weather permitting – starting June 1, 2020 at 6:30 PM. We will be practicing Social Distancing as outlined in CDC recommendations. All are excited to resume our Summer Schedule and we look forward to seeing each other again.
We look forward to having a great 2020 – come and join us if you’re interested in learning about the latest technologies and activities of Ham Radio.
This year’s Field Day was quite different than all past Field Days. Like most Clubs and Groups across the Country, we chose to participate from our homes due to Covid-19 health concerns. Despite the lack of camaraderie and pizza, it was fun and productive. Five of our members made contacts from their home base. A variety of modes, bands and power sources were employed. CW and phone were the main modes and Commercial and Battery power were utilized.
We recorded 143 contacts in 15 different States and 25 different Sections. Two rookie members, Paul KN6DRM and Dan KN6DRN, participating in their first Field Day, recorded a combined contact list of 69 stations. Well done! This was a Field Day to remember with unique circumstances. We look forward to a more traditional event next year when we can all be together.
After recently learning the the Association has not approved the Sports Pavilion area open for Club activities, we have decided to participate in Field Day from our individual homes. The ARRL has approved this manner of logging contacts and submitting them under the Club’s name for aggregate credit. We hope everyone stays safe and has fun making as many contacts as possible. Further information can be found by clicking on the below link.
The Western Placer Amateur Radio Club has scheduled its Annual Ham Fest for Saturday September 19, 2020. Details to follow.
For those interested in upgrading their license Class, or, perhaps for those new and interested in ham radio, here is the link to the latest NCVEC Question List. Even for those who hold existing Technician, General or Extra Class licenses, there is always new information and things to learn from the newly released Question Pool. Take a look and enjoy! http://www.ncvec.org
The LHARG will once again be at the Annual Lifestyle Expo in Orchard Creek Lodge on February 25, 2020 between 10:00 AM and 1:00 PM. Come over and meet us and we’ll be happy to show you some of the “ins and outs” of our fantastic hobby.
The Group has been approved to use the Sports Pavillon for the ARRL Field Day June 27-28, 2020! Get your gear “tuned up” over the winter and we’ll have another great event in 2020, writes President Stuart Gallant.
Note: The download links in the text are not working. Use the link below and open the PDF on Github for the download links. The software and documentation are on github: https://github.com/esa/gr-opssat/blob/master/docs/os-uhf-specs.pdf
ESA OPS-SAT Community Platform with Link to Software Download
by Staff Writers Space Dailey
Paris (ESA) Dec 16, 2019
 Ops-Sat will be a catalyst for change in space operations. |
Calling all radio amateurs! ESA is challenging anyone with amateur radio equipment to catch the first signals from OPS-SAT, ESA’s brand new space software laboratory.
On 17 December, OPS-SAT will be launched into low-Earth orbit on a Soyuz rocket from Kourou, French Guiana, together with ESA’s Cheops exoplanet-tracker.
Once launched, the satellite will deploy its solar panels and ultra-high frequency antenna, and then start to send signals back home.
Could you be the first on Earth to catch them? ESA’s mission control team in Darmstadt are asking for your help to find the fledgling CubeSat.
In-space laboratory
OPS-SAT is a first-of-its-kind CubeSat dedicated purely to experimentation. It carries a wide variety of advanced payloads allowing ‘Experimenters’ to deploy and test their software and apps in space.
Anyone can apply to be an Experimenter! Find out more about the mission, and how to apply, here.
The nitty gritty
Lift-off is scheduled for 08:54:20 UTC on 17 December. Deployment will begin 15044.6 seconds later (T+15044.6 seconds), expected to be at 13:05:04 UTC.
OPS-SAT will begin transmitting 15 minutes after satellite deployment and after ultra-high frequency (UHF) antenna and solar array deployment have been confirmed. The first two passes over Europe are expected on the same evening.
To track OPS-SAT, a preliminary launch TLE is available here, and will be updated as soon as new orbital information is available.
Set up your own mission control
The OPS-SAT flight control team has developed open source software which allows anyone to receive the UHF beacon of OPS-SAT and decode it. A set of ‘GnuRadio’ applications have been developed and are available here.
You can use a wide range of ‘software-defined radios’ (SDR’s) supported by GNURadio to receive the UHF signal. The application toolkit consists of a receiver and demodulator flowgraph as well as a GUI telemetry desktop, decoding data packets coming from space in real-time.
The first three radio amateurs to receive at least five correctly decoded frames and submit them to ESA get an exclusive invite to the OPS-SAT Experimenter day in March 2020, as well as a tour of the control facilities and ground stations at ESA in Darmstadt, and of course a certificate.
OPS-SAT link: https://www.esa.int/Enabling_Support/Operations/OPS-SAT
Link to YouTube Video; https://youtu.be/_uEvGfipmAw
A new year brings some new changes for the Amateur Radio Group. Stuart Gallant ( K3RZB ), a 59 year veteran of amateur radio, was elected President of our Group. He is taking over from Jim Darby ( K6GYM ), who graciously gave up his chair after many years of dedication. John Griffin ( NQ6Q ) has volunteered to take over the Repeater Trustee duties from Doug Thom ( N6OYU ). He accepted the position with the assurance that we would all help maintain the repeater site when there were chores to be done.
Stuart is a bio-engineer who developed medical devices for the management of multiple medical conditions. He retired from Apple in 2017 and moved to Lincoln Hills. Stuart is a ham radio operator with an Extra Class License and is fully engaged on multiple bands and modes. He has plans for the ARG to become more active and engaged in 2020, introducing a list of activities for consideration and discussion at our last meeting.
Come to one of our Monday night meetings and meet Stuart.
