SUITSAT
actual info by PB2RDF |
20060204-00:00 UTC
At left you can see a gif animation movie, grabbed via Internet from NASA-TV transmission.
Launch of Suitsat was around 23:00 UTC, I did not noticed the exact time. (Exact time 23:02 UTC). Location was
above the Pacific, Southern Hemisfere, Latitude around 30 degrees South,
120 degrees West,
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20060204-23:00 UTC
Info from www.suitsat.org
: Current thinking is
SuitSat is transmitting, but far weaker than expected. Several reliable
reports of short snatches of the voice and SSTV signals have been
reported. It is recommended that you continue to listen during passes
over your area. Please report any positive contact only.
Reports of Reception of SuitSat
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20060205-16:30 UTC
This morning listened to
all passes, nothing heard, its a pity. Only some packet signals, think
they are from ISS, but can't confirm , I was not listening with packet radio.
Perhaps next explanation might be a reason for the operational status of Suitsat:
When Suitsat and ISS are passing my location its early in the morning. Maybe are batteries so
cold that no energy is available.
When Suitsat is in
daylight the batteries are warmed up by the sun and Suitsat is
operational at very low power output. Directional antennes have to
be used to listen to Suitsat.
Maybe in a next Suitsat
there will be a controlled heater to warm the batteries and maybe a few
solar panels. Or else a few logs, a chimney, a few bottles of oxygen and
a stove (HI). Burn, I said, burn that Suitsat !!!
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Some
pictures from NASA-TV (via internet) of the launch of Suitsat
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Recordings of radio
amateurs of Suitsat :
04feb2006
Suitsat by ZS6TW
06feb2006
SuitSat
by JN1GKZ
Both recordings were send to me by
PD0RKC, look also at his website : PD0RKC
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Also a conversation by
NA1SS after the EVA of 03-04feb2006 can be dowloaded. 2feb2006NA1SS_SUITSAT.mp3
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Download
complete transmission of EVA and Suitsatlaunch by NASA-TV at Suitsat-1
movie
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Source : SPACE-TV
International Space Station Status Report: SS06-005
Written by Administrator
Monday, 06 February 2006
International Space Station Status Report: SS06-005
Space station crewmembers released a spacesuit-turned-satellite during the second spacewalk of their mission last
night. Called SuitSat, it faintly transmitted recorded voices of school children to amateur radio operators worldwide for a brief period before it ceased sending
signals.
Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev ventured outside for a
five-hour, 43-minute spacewalk to release SuitSat, conduct preventative maintenance to a cable-cutting
device, retrieve experiments and photograph the station's exterior. Clad in Russian Orlan
spacesuits, McArthur and Tokarev opened the hatch to begin the spacewalk at 5:44
p.m. EST. It was the fourth career spacewalk for McArthur and the second for
Tokarev.
After setting up tools and equipment, they positioned the unneeded Orlan spacesuit on a ladder by the station's Pirs airlock
hatch. The suit reached the end of its operational life for spacewalks in August 2004. It was outfitted by the crew with three
batteries, internal sensors and a radio transmitter for this experiment.
The SuitSat provided recorded greetings in six languages to ham radio operators for about two orbits of the Earth before it stopped
transmitting, perhaps due to its batteries failing in the cold environment of
space, according to amateur radio coordinators affiliated with the station program. The suit will enter the atmosphere and burn up in a few weeks.
Tokarev pushed the suit away toward the aft end of the station as the complex flew 225 miles above the south central Pacific
Ocean. The suit initially drifted away at a rate of about a half meter per
second, slowly floating out of view below the Zvezda Service Module and its attached Progress cargo
craft. The suit is now separating from the station at a rate of about six kilometers every 90
minutes.
McArthur and Tokarev then moved from Pirs to the Zarya module where they removed a hubcap-shaped grapple fixture adapter for the Strela
crane. They moved the adapter to Pressurized Mating Adapter-3 on the Unity module. The Strela fixture was moved to prepare Zarya for the future temporary stowage of debris
shields.
McArthur and Tokarev made their way to the center truss segment of the station, where they tried and failed to securely install a safety bolt in a contingency cutting device for one of two cables that provide power, data and video to the Mobile Transporter rail
car. The transporter moves along the truss to correctly position the Canadarm2 robotic arm for assembly
work. The Trailing Umbilical System cable on the nadir, or Earth-facing side of the transporter was inadvertently severed by its cutter on Dec. 16.
After several attempts to drive the bolt with a high-tech screwdriver, McArthur wire-tied the cable to a handrail
instead. That left the cable out of its cutting mechanism, disabling the Transporter from further movement on the station’s rail system for the time
being. The Transporter is not needed for assembly work until the STS-115 mission to install additional truss
segments.
The severed cable reel mechanism will be replaced during one of the three spacewalks by Discovery crewmembers Piers Sellers and Mike Fossum during the STS-121 space shuttle mission later this
year.
McArthur and Tokarev moved back to Pirs. Once at the Russian airlock, they retrieved an experiment to study the effect of the space environment on
microorganisms.
As their final spacewalk task, the crew photographed the exterior of
Zvezda, including Russian sensors that measure micrometeoroid impacts, handrails, propulsion systems and a ham radio antenna. McArthur and Tokarev then returned to the Pirs airlock and closed the hatch at 11:27
p.m. EST. It was the 64th spacewalk in support of station assembly and
maintenance, the 36th staged from the station, and the 17th conducted from
Pirs. In all, station spacewalkers have accumulated 384 hours and 23 minutes outside the facility since December 1998.
Meanwhile in Russia, final preparations were made this week to ship the next Soyuz spacecraft from Moscow to the Baikonur Cosmodrome launch site in
Kazakhstan. The spacecraft is scheduled to depart Monday and will launch the 13th station crew in late
March.
During the week, the station was maneuvered through a new procedure using guidance and navigation computers in the Destiny laboratory to request firings of the thrusters on the Zvezda module while maintaining overall attitude control through the Control Moment
Gyroscopes.
For information about crew activities, future launch dates and station sighting opportunities on the Web,
visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/station
Last Updated ( Monday, 06 February 2006 )
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SuitSat Status 4 February
(source
: www.amsat.org
)
Paraphrasing Mark
Twain....the
demise of SuitSat-1 is highly exaggerated!!
It is now nearly 24 hours since the successful deployment of the
SuitSat-1 experiment. These past 24 hours have been a wild ride of
emotions...tremendous highs...deep lows when people reported no signals
and said SuitSat-1 was dead and now....some optimism.
It is absolutely clear that SuitSat-1 is alive. It was successfully
turned on by the ISS crew prior to deploy and the timing,
micro-controller functions and audio appear to be operating nominally.
The prime issue appears to be an extremely weak signal.
I have heard several recordings and have monitored two passes today.
When the signal is above the noise level, you can clearly hear partials
of the student voices, the station ID and the SSTV signal. One of the
complicating factors in reception is the very deep fades that occur due
to the spin of SuitSat.
Based on the information we know thus far, one can narrow down the issue
to the antenna, the feedline, the transmitter output power and/or any of
the connections in between. Through your help, we would like to narrow
down the issue further and also gather some internal telemetry from the
Suit.
If the transmitter is running at full power, we would expect the Suit to
end operations in the next few days to a week. If it is not, then it
will operate much longer. Since we do not know how long this experiment
will last, we ask for those with powerful receive stations to listen for
Suitsat---especially during direct overhead passes when the Suit is
closest to your area. If you can record these passes and send the audio
to us, it would be most appreciated. We will continue to be optimistic
that this issue will right itself before the batteries are depleted. So
please KEEP LISTENING!
Based on what we have learned, we would like to provide the following
guidelines to save you time and facilitate gathering information:
1) You need as high a gain antenna as possible with mast mounted
pre-amps. An arrow is the minimal set...it provides very brief snipets
of the communications. HTs and scanners won't cut it.
2) I would not waste your time on passes below 40 degrees elevation.
SuitSat is too far from your station to receive a reliable signal. We
have found that closest approach provides several seconds of SuitSat
communication with 22 element yagis.
3) The "gold" we are looking for right now is the telemetry
information and how long the vehicle stays operational. So if you hear
any of the telemetry, please let us know.
We are also working to get the voice repeater set up on ISS to downlink
SuitSat audio on 437.80 in the event that the ISS Kenwood radio can
receive the SuitSat transmissions. The repeater may be operational as
early as mid-day Sunday. Please do NOT transmit on 145.99, voice or
packet, until we have confirmed that SuitSat is no longer transmitting.
These transmissions interfere with our ability to hear SuitSat.
While the transmission part of the SuitSat experiment has not been
stellar, SuitSat-1 has been tremendously successful in several areas.
Some of these successes include:
- We have captured the imagination of students and the general public
worldwide through this unique experiment.
- The media attention to the SuitSat project represents one of the
biggest ever for amateur radio.
- We have had well over 2 million internet hits on http://www.suitsat.org
today.
- Our student's creative artwork, signatures and voices have been
carried in space and are on-board the spacesuit---the students are now
space travelers as the Suit rotates and orbits the Earth.
- Carried in the spacesuit CD are pictures of Roy Neal, K6DUE, and
Thomas Kieselbach, DL2MDE, two of our colleagues who have contributed to
the ARISS program and have since passed away.
- We successfully deployed an amateur radio satellite in a Spacesuit
from the ISS, demonstrating to the space agencies that this can be
safely done.
- This ARISS international team was able to fabricate, test and deliver
a safe ham radio system to the ISS team 3 weeks after the international
space agencies agreed to allow SuitSat to happen. This was a tremendous
feat in of itself.
SuitSat-1/Radioskaf is a space pioneering effort. Pioneering efforts are
challenging. Risk is high. But the future payoff is tremendous. As you
have seen, we have not had total success. But we have captured the
imagination of the students and the general public. And we have already
learned a lot from this activity. This will help us and others grow from
this experience.
Keep your spirits up and let's continue to be optimistic. And please
keep monitoring!!
73, Frank H. Bauer, KA3HDO
ARISS International Chairman
AMSAT-NA VP for Human Spaceflight Programs
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SuitSat Status 15 Feb.
(source
: www.amsat.org
)
It is absolutely clear that SuitSat-1 is alive. It was successfully turned on by the ISS crew prior to deploy and the timing, micro-controller functions and audio appear to be operating nominally. The prime issue appears to be an extremely weak signal.
Based on the information we know thus far, one can narrow down the issue to the antenna, the feedline, the transmitter output power and/or any of the connections in between. Through your help, we would like to narrow down the issue further and also gather some internal telemetry from the Suit.
If the transmitter is running at full power, we would expect the Suit to have ended operations after a few days to a week. If it is transmitting at lower power, then it will operate much longer. Telemetry has been received which tells us that the 28 volt battery is now operating in the range of 26.7 volts on Wednesday, February 8 to 26.5 volts on Wednesday, February 15.
Since we do not know how long this experiment will last, we ask for those with powerful receive stations to listen for Suitsat---especially during direct overhead passes when the Suit is closest to your area. If you can record these passes and send the audio to us, it would be most appreciated. We will continue to be optimistic that this issue will right itself before the batteries are depleted. So please KEEP LISTENING!
The SuitSat team plans to provide special recognition to the person that copies the last SuitSat telemetry, specifically the Mission Time and Battery Voltage.
Based on what we have learned, we would like to provide the following guidelines to save you time and facilitate gathering information:
1) You need as high a gain antenna as possible with mast mounted pre-amps. An arrow is the minimal set...it provides very brief snipets of the communications. HTs and scanners won't cut it.
2) I would not waste your time on passes below 40 degrees elevation. SuitSat is too far from your station to receive a reliable signal. We have found that closest approach provides several seconds of SuitSat communication with 22 element yagis.
3) The "gold" we are looking for right now is the telemetry information and how long the vehicle stays operational. So if you hear any of the telemetry, please let us know.
While the transmission part of the SuitSat experiment has not been stellar, SuitSat-1 has been tremendously successful in several areas. Some of these successes include:
* We have had 5 million internet hits on http://www.suitsat.org.
* Our student's creative artwork, signatures and voices have been carried in space and are on-board the spacesuit---the students are now space travelers as the Suit rotates and orbits the Earth.
* Carried in the spacesuit CD are pictures of Roy Neal, K6DUE, and Thomas Kieselbach, DL2MDE, two of our colleagues who have contributed to the ARISS program and have since passed away.
* We successfully deployed an amateur radio satellite in a Spacesuit from the ISS, demonstrating to the space agencies that this can be safely done.
* This ARISS international team was able to fabricate, test and deliver a safe ham radio system to the ISS team 3 weeks after the international space agencies agreed to allow SuitSat to happen. This was a tremendous feat in of itself.
* We have captured the imagination of students and the general public worldwide through this unique experiment.
* The media attention to the SuitSat project represents one of the biggest ever for amateur radio.
SuitSat-1/Radioskaf is a space pioneering effort. Pioneering efforts are challenging. Risk is high. But the future payoff is tremendous. As you have seen, we have not had total success. But we have captured the imagination of the students and the general public. And we have already learned a lot from this activity. This will help us and others grow from this experience.
Keep your spirits up and let's continue to be optimistic. And please keep monitoring!!
73, Frank H. Bauer, KA3HDO
ARISS International Chairman
AMSAT-NA VP for Human Spaceflight Programs
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