MNI TNX to HAMs!
We proudly report that our satellite has been operating for more than 4 days without any issues.
We have been extremely enthusiastic since we first noticed the endless flow of received packets from all around the world, giving an unbiased proof of the satellite’s operation. We carefully collect and process all reception reports, audio recordings and log files. We would like to note that automatic packet sending is active in the receiver software, despite the “Offline” notation. 🙂
The map on our website shows labels for all receiving stations where the number of receiver packets sent via the client software or e-mail is listed.. The data are updated every day at 01:00 AM UTC.
Frequency waterfalls, videos and reports about receiving Masat-1 are appearing all over the internet. Thank you very much for receiving our satellite, it is a pleasure to experience such attention.
At the ground station
Our team has been present at our primary and secondary ground stations during every single pass of the satellite since launch, ensuring continuous coverage. We are lucky as we are able to track even the passes with really low elevation and short duration, extending our opportunities to receive data and send commands.
The orbital period is approx. 102 minutes with 2-3 available passes in the early morning and 2-3 passes during the afternoon. During these passes, a staff of 2-3 operates the ground station and an additional team of 2-3 carries out on data processing and other tasks. Someone is constantly controlling the radio during the passes, and a second person is dealing with satellite commanding and reception using the ground station software. A third (optional) person is monitoring the orbit of the satellite before and during the pass, and informs the team about the timing of the pass, giving a real sense of time for the staff. This third person is also taking notes of the received signals’ frequency shift, from these notes it was possible to determine which NORAD object is Masat-1. A fourth person has the task of “spotting” the satellite’s current frequency at the beginning of the pass, he operates an individual radio receiver . Fortunately the automatic Doppler correction works well, so this fourth person often has some time to look for the signals of other Vega-launched satellites. The additional support staff of 2-3 records the audio of the passes and also answers questions related to their satellite subsystem if required, assisting the work of those operating reception and telecommands.
First reception at the BME ground station. Euphoria mixed with tension (spot.sch.bme.hu)
After the pass, 10-20 minutes are spent with the discussion of the previous actions, then we get refreshed and start to prepare for the next pass. It is coming every 102 minutes…
Report on the satellite’s status
Thanks to radio amateurs, the continuous packet reception provides a global coverage of telemetry data, enabling the team to concentrate on recording and download of high resolution measurement data. This is the reason why the satellite can often be heard transmitting a continuous packet downlink with 1250 bits/sec above Hungary. The public version of the decoding software is not yet prepared for this high-speed data downlink, it only operates with 625 bits/sec. The next release of the software (published soon) will be capable of decoding these high-speed packets as well.
The high-resolution long term measurements provide a deeper insight to the operation of each subsystem. Now we are examining the thermal equilibrium, the energy balance and the basic parameters of the attitude control system.
As many of you might have noticed, the satellite is in a state of slow rotation, therefore sometimes the antenna is pointing towards the receiving station. This causes the signal to fade and the packet reception to pause. It was not a long time ago when we started to download the file which was recorded by the satellite after the ejection from the P-POD, above the Pacific Ocean. The satellite was in silent mode with closed antenna, recoding some data of itself. From the downloaded data it is clear that the satellite had a rotation speed of 2-3 rpm after ejection. Currently we operate the attitude control system in passive, data collection mode. The verification of specific parts of the control system is made from the data collected. If the data are in line with our expectations, we will turn on the attitude control system. We do not want to hurry with this, as it would mean that we have already reached the last milestone at the very beginning of operation. 🙂
Many functionalities are to be tested in the next period, and we also have measurement data form the first day which is to be downloaded later. It is very easy to “overplan” the data collection, resulting in a huge amount of data. We hope to publish the high-speed capable version of the receiving software as soon as possible, improving downlink efficiency. Besides, it is worth to note that more than 1 MB of data has been downloaded from the satellite so far, due to radio amateur contributions.
That is all for now, we wish you a successful satellite tracking!