Is anyone Hearing or Making any Voice Contacts with ISS?
I have been trying for many ISS passes, over the last few days to make voice contacts on 2 meter 144.490 tx and 145.800 Rx using a 3 element yagi and a kenwood TM-261 with no luck of hearing a transmission or making a contact. I am new to this. Is anyone having any luck? Maybe I am doing something wrong? Are they not just communicating right now? I am using this site for Keps and also HRD, and there seems to be a difference in the time frame of the two models, one being ahead of the other. Any advice as to make these contacts with ISS would be greatly appreciated, i.e. specs etc. or other models/sites
Thanks for any advice or help
W4AJC 73 Andrew
W4AJC – Mon, 2011 – 06 – 20 20:19
STS-135 Days 7 and 9 ...
Looks like Days 7 and 9 of this mission have "free time" scheduled for the U.S. astronauts ...
Clint Bradford, K6LCS
Radios switched off sometimes
Hi Andrew,
One reason you may not have heard any activity from the ISS in recent days is that they have to switch off the amateur radio equipment, whenever another spacecraft is docking or undocking from the Space Station.
There was an undocking yesterday of a freighter for return to Earth.
They sometimes do this well in advance and although on their crew schedule it showed last night (Monday 20th June) that they were scheduled to switch on their amateur radio equipment again, I didn't detect any activity since - so it may still all be off, until rescheduled.
It is switched off for safety reasons.Also new crews take some time to adjust and sometimes don't get on amateur radio for a while.
Hope this helps
73 de Philip G0ISW
http://www.qsl.net/g0isw
received ROISS-3 Atlantis & Nicole head.....
After feeding many squitos, I did get a signal via APRS on a Kenwood D7(G) HT on the 19th over Minnesota. Wrong text? Busy up there unloading supplies I guess.73 All..
Rob
kc0weo-7
Thanks fer the reply
Hey Thanks Phillip, makes me feel a lot better. I have switched my interest in Amateur Radio to All Emergency Power and Equipment, and I am trying to build my own gear from scrape stuff and I am even starting to design some low power Gear to build. I have built my own antennas and I am having great success with everything. Maybe you can give me a better idea too of the satellites that are currently workable on voice especially. I have looked at the different sites that seem to give the lastest stats but hearing it from someone active would be great. Also what is the site where you read that they was suppose to turn the radios back on? I would like to keep up with their daily activity to get a better feel of how they normally operate, maybe for better contact success rates. Any help wouldbe appreciated. I am still working out the kinks on how to decode the stats from the tracking models so I know how to direct my signal, any help with that would be appreciated. Thanks a lot though for the response.
73 Andrew W4AJC
ISS crew schedule amd other things
Hi Andrew,
I am pleased to help.
The ISS crew schedules can be found here:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/timelines/index.html
To find out which satellites are working/status I use this link:
http://www.amsat.org/amsat-new/satellites/status.php
but also it is good to subscribe to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Work-Sat/
On this Yahoo group there is excellent new starter advice about which satellites are easiest to work, the FM voice ones being generally considered to be the easiest. I would have recommended AO-51, but recently it has been in decline so please visit the group for the latest advice.
Some satellites status can change very quickly and this isn't always reflected as fast on websites.
For satellite tracking I would use either
SATPC32 v.12.8a or more recent
or Orbitron 3.71 or more recent
Please also look at my website http://www.qsl.net/g0isw where you will find links to most other things too.
Hope this helps
All the best Philip G0ISW
Thanks fer the reply
Hey Thanks Phillip, makes me feel a lot better. I have switched my interest in Amateur Radio to All Emergency Power and Equipment, and I am trying to build my own gear from scrape stuff and I am even starting to design some low power Gear to build. I have builted my own antennas and are having great success with everything. Maybe you can give me a better idea too of the satellites that are currently workable on voice especially. I have looked at the differentsites that seem to give the lastest stats but hearing it from someone active would be great. Also what is the site where you read that they was suppose to turn the radios back on, I would like to keep up with their daily activity to get a better feel of how they normally operate, maybe for bettersuccess rates. Any help wouldbe appreciated. I am still working out the kinks on how to decode the stats from the tracking models so I know how to direct my signal, any help with that would be appreciated. Thanks a lot though for the response.
73 Andrew W4AJC
Radios switched off sometimes
Hi Andrew,
One reason you may not have heard any activity from the ISS in recent days is that they have to switch off the amateur radio equipment, whenever another spacecraft is docking or undocking from the Space Station.
There was an undocking yesterday of a freighter for return to Earth.
They sometimes do this well in advance and although on their crew schedule it showed last night (Monday 20th June) that they were scheduled to switch on heir amateur radio equipment again, I didn't detect any activity so it may still all be off, until rescheduled.
It is switched off for safety reasons.
Hope this helps
73 de Philip G0ISW
http://www.qsl.net/g0isw
Qso's ISS
Hi Andrew.This is the best place to come for the radio status of the ISS,many SWL's and radio hams post activity as it happens.
As far as satellite tracking www.n2yo.com is one i recommend and if there is any better,then i'd like to know aswel Andrew.
Also Andy just a little trick you could try is dont assume the space station Tx's/Rx over regions like the USA,144.490 etc on the generic channels..ive shouted up on the 437.800 and got a reply.and im in region 1 where the uplink is 145.200..
The following frequencies are currently used for ARISS general QSO's
Voice and Packet Downlink: 145.80 (Worldwide)
Voice Uplink: 144.49 for Regions 2 and 3 (The Americas, and the Pacific)
Voice Uplink: 145.20 for Region 1 (Europe, Central Asia and Africa)
73
Thanks for the reply don't feel alone now,lol
Thanks fer the reply, I figured there were probably times when they may communicate outside the given frequencies thanks again for the the info. I am also using the n2yo along side of this site and HRD with lll the keps
Any other comments would be appreciated by others in hopes of learning and saving myself some time. I believe there is no need in me re inventing the wheel if others have already drawed the plans and it works,lol
73 W4AJC Andrew
Twitter - follow @Astro_Ron
Twitter - follow @Astro_Ron . Ron is very active and does respond to followers. You might inquire about ham radio activity. Best shot outside of Ham Radio to get in.