karn@eagle.UUCP (Phil Karn) (08/08/83)
The Mode B (70cm up, 2m down) transponder was turned on for general use
yesterday as scheduled. The spacecraft is using the omnidirectional
antennas as the attitude is not yet correct for the high gain arrays.
The satellite is performing quite well, despite the expected weak
signals and QSB. Quite a lot of DX has been worked: ZL, PY2, KL7,
H44, etc. The omni is quite "deaf" and best results are being had by
those running on the order of 500 watts out on 70cm. When the satellite
came back down from apogee late last night (and shortly after AOS this
evening) signals were very strong due to the reduced path loss and
favorable antenna angles. KA9Q even made his first SSB contact running
only about 40-50 watts to a KLM 18C antenna. We expect that the
satellite will perform this well at apogee once the high gain antennas
are turned on.
The most interesting phenomenon has been the quarter-second round trip
delay. It makes sending CW tricky; you have to turn up the keyer
sidetone and concentrate on it lest you be fooled by your own delayed
downlink. I've found it hilarious listening to the newcomers on SSB
monitoring their own downlinks ("Hellllloooooooooo Seeeeeeeeeka...
kaaa.... kewwwwwwwwwwww.....") and sounding just like the "drunk" victims
of the old tape-delayed-speech parlor trick!
See you on the satellite!
Phil Karn, KA9Q