Workshop: How to communicate via satellite QO-100
On 15 October 2019, an Open Day was held at our faculty. On this occasion, we introduced the activities of our radio club OM3KSI to all visitors and potential students and showed them practical examples of satellite tracking.
Toward the end, we prepared a small workshop for radio amateurs from Kosice and the surrounding area, whom we invited on a tour of workplaces, laboratories, simulators and a hangar with aircraft technology, where we wanted to show them communication via the Qatar satellite QO-100, as well as communication via LEO satellites.
We set up two stands in front of the club premises. A portable antenna system for tracking LEO satellites was installed on one of them. Antennas for the 144 and 432 MHz bands were rotated by motors controlled by Arduino and GPredict software running on Linux. We placed an 80 cm dish designed for communication via the QO-100 on the second stand.
The transmitting part consists of a transverter from Hristiyan, LZ5HP, with a YAESU FT857 and a Helix antenna, which was built for this purpose by Dusan, OM3WAK. The receiving part is built from an LNB bought from remoteqth.com, connected to an SDRPlay 1A. We use the latest version of SDR Console (3.0.13) as software.
After a practical demonstration, none of the boys could resist and everyone tried to make a connection via the QO-100. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Stevo, OM0MS, who made all those connections with us.
After saying goodbye on the band, Stevo and I discussed our plans and activities during VHF as well as HF contests over coffee.
The workshop was attended by Peter OM8ACP, Jojo OM3ZAS, Imi OM8KD, Milan OM8MM, Marcel OM8DM, Miro OM8AMF, Pali OM3WBY, Dušan OM3WAK, Miro Šmelko, Janko OM3ZAH a me, Peter OM8WG.
Finally, I include a few photos, for which I would like to thank Jojo, OM3ZAS. I also want to thank all the boys for participation and I believe this wasn’t the last of such joint events. Next time, we will bring some other interesting topic.
