I would like to first say that yes, many of these Cubesats projects do a really poor job of providing information about themselves and they have a lot of room for improvement.
Second that amateur bands are used not only for the fact that there are already established ground stations, but because getting licensed on some other piece of spectrum is a substantial investment of time and money, and many of the student projects simply don't have excessive reserves of either. Granted many of them would love to move off amateur bands, find a little open spectrum in the GHz range where they can blast data down at some incredible speed, in which case they could move more data in a few seconds then they could collect in a day, which makes things many design issues much easier. Alas when you tell a student to start filling out paperwork that may get a response before they graduate, and until then there isn't much they can do until they can lock down that parameter, chances are if they are smart they will run off to do something else like build a race car, or a robot and you loose someone else in the next generation of rocket scientist. Thirdly I have been reading the AMSAT-BB's for several months and I can see why there wouldn't be many people working on CubeSats hanging around. In order for anything productive to come of discussions like this, people from the CubeSat community need to be more involved but they aren't going to be inclined to do so when the conversations reads like dialog from "Grumpy Old Men". Nano and Pico Satellites aren't a simple evolution of existing technologies but a large paradigm shift, one which I don't think anyone even now fully understands. When you don't have thoughtful discussions between both sides issues don't get addressed, and everyone's feelings get hurt. I would suggest using cubesat.org as a starting point. Anthony Odenthal KE7OSN President Amateur Radio Club at OSU On Sat, Nov 12, 2011 at 13:34, William Leijenaar <pe1...@yahoo.com> wrote: > Hi Stefan, > > So the answer on my question if my 433MHz toy car, when I put it into > space, can get an OSCAR number is YES! > According to the AMSAT website you mentioned of course... :-P > - My question was not specific if these satellites can or can't get an > OSCAR number. > My intention was more if they should be scheduled as a ham-sat (and with > that using ham frequencies). > > I would recommend you to read the following IARU website! > http://www.iaru.org/satellite/prospective.html > (especially section VI. OPERATIONAL GUIDELINES) > It says the following: > > "Organisations building satellites should compare their mission plans to > the requirements of the amateur-satellite service. Then, they should > determine if it is possible to comply with the requirements of the > amateur-satellite service or if licensing and operation should be in > some other radio service which is more consistent with the nature and > requirements of the mission. > > A. The purposes of an amateur satellite should be: > (1) To provide communication resources for the general amateur radio > community and/or > (2) To conduct technical investigations in all respects consistent with > the Radio Regulations. [See RR S1.56 and RR S1.57.]" > > I have great doubts with many off those CubeSats, if they comply to number > (1).... > The only communication resources they provide is for themselves by a cheap > downlink system, by using hams to receive data for them. This is not for > the general amateur radio community as mentioned in number (1)... > > The option they have is to go to "some other radio service which is more > consistent with the nature and requirements of the mission." > > 73 de PE1RAH, William > > > > > >Would recommend reading the info on AMSAT's website! > > >http://www.amsat.org/amsat/amsat-na/oscar.html > > >Stefan, VE4NSA > _______________________________________________ > Sent via AMSAT-BB@amsat.org. Opinions expressed are those of the author. > Not an AMSAT-NA member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program! > Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb > _______________________________________________ Sent via AMSAT-BB@amsat.org. Opinions expressed are those of the author. Not an AMSAT-NA member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program! Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb
