Cut-Rate Satellite

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: Mike Liebhold <mnl () well com>
Date: Thu, 20 Feb 2003 16:58:08 -0800
To: dave <dave () farber net>
Subject: Cut-Rate Satellite

                      Just came across this story below. More technical
details are available at http://web.usna.navy.mil/~bruninga/pcsat.html
<http://web.usna.navy.mil/%7Ebruninga/pcsat.html>

Mike

Mike  Liebhold
10 Durham Road
Woodside,  Ca. 94062
mnl () well com
650 851 4215 fax
650  245 7938 mobile
http://www.starhill.us

----
Cut-Rate Satellite A Steal In Space
> From The Associated Press
Originally Published: January 24, 2002

 
                                   ANNAPOLIS, Md. - Once every 100 minutes,
a bargain basement satellite loops around the earth, sending and receiving
digital messages over antennae made from a metal tape measure.

     A sailor on a solo crossing of the Atlantic bounces signals off the
satellite to stay in touch with his family. New Zealanders on a
cross-country hike use it to communicate with friends back home.

   Any ham radio user with the proper digital packet-transmitting equipment
who is within 2,000 miles of the 25-pound satellite can use it to send
single-line text messages to a public channel.

   After four months in space, the U.S. Naval Academy's ``bird'' is proving
surprisingly resilient, to the delight of the midshipmen and faculty
advisers who designed and built it.

   The so-called Prototype Communications Satellite (PCSat) was the 44th
amateur satellite put in orbit. It is one of more than a dozen built by
university students around the world.

   At a cost of just $50,000 - including plane tickets to the Alaska launch
site - it was constructed using off-the-shelf parts not designed to
withstand the rigors of space. Its life span was only expected to be a few
months. 

   Six students put together the satellite last year after a three-year
research and design project made possible with a grant from Boeing Co. The
Department of Defense Space Test Program approved the project and put it on
a launch list. 

   A tape measure from Home Depot provided the antenna. Power comes from two
dozen AA batteries that are recharged by the solar panels, which are in
sunlight an average of 75 minutes per orbit.

   Midshipmen designed circuit boards, ordering them from an Internet
supplier. Parts rated for use in space, which are built to withstand the
effects of radiation from the sun, would have been too expensive, so the
students went with regular circuit boards.

   Sept. 29 was Launch Day, and there were anxious moments at the academy as
the cube-shaped satellite hitched a ride aboard an Athena rocket that
blasted into space from Kodiak, Alaska.

   Save for the failure of one of the six solar panels, damaged when the
satellite separated from the rocket, there have been no problems.

   On Launch Day, it was nine hours before PCSat made its first pass over
Annapolis and the midshipmen and faculty advisers could see for themselves
that their satellite was working.

   ``I was thrilled. It was one of the most fulfilling experiences of my
life,'' said Steven Lawrence, who helped build the satellite before he
graduated in May. 

   In the following weeks, people in remote areas began to use the satellite
as word about it spread through an international organization of ham radio
operators. 

   Just how long PCSat works depends on how much solar radiation bombards
the satellite and how long the batteries, solar panels and thousands of
transistors withstand the sun's damaging effects.

   ``If we get lucky with radiation, it could last three years,'' said
Darrell Boden, a professor in the aerospace engineering department.


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