VE3RMC Amateur Satellite Communications Ground Station Alex Clay Cushley, BSc, RMC, BEd, OCT Royal Military College of Canada (RMCC), Kingston, ON Introduction Overview Sample Data Characteristics As part of its research program in space mission analysis & design, and proposed CubeSat operations, the Royal Military College of Canada (RMCC) Center for Space Research (CSR) has developed an amateur satellite communication ground station. The ground station has been implemented to support staff and student research, teaching and learning opportunities in communications, and in support of high altitude balloon and CubeSat design, testing, and operations VE3RMC has been composed of relatively low-cost, small scale equipment enabling communications with OSCAR-class satellites in the 2m and 70cm wavelength radio bands. It is hoped the VE3RMC station may support, command, and control future RMCC CubeSats upon their successful launch into orbit. As RMCC does not have an active satellite at this time to downlink data and uplink commands the primary users of the VE3 RMC ground station are students obtaining communications and satellite contact experience. Additionally high altitude balloon communications and navigation (tracking) training may be performed prior to launch using ground station software for Automatic Packet Reporting System (APRS) equipped aircraft. VE3 RMC Characteristics Location RMCC, Kingston, ON Latitude, Longitude, Altitude N44°13’51.9646”, W76°28’02.1068”, 107.50m Transceiver (*GENSO) ICOM 910H UHF/VHF 9600bps Frequency Bands 130/140MHz(2m) @ 100W 430/440 (70cm) @ 75W 1.2GHz(23cm) @ 10W Antennae Yagi-Uda bi-directional with 100W pre-amplifiers Rotators Yaesu CPU Controlled Az./El. Software Open Source Ham Radio Deluxe V5.0-orbit propagation, antenna control, and Doppler frequency-shift correction. CPU Intel DuoCore 2.33GHz, 1.95Gb RAM, 74.5Gb+ network TNC (*GENSO) Kantronics KPC9612+ (2 ports for 1200-38400bps) QSO Card APRS flight tracking, PCSAT Navy Oscar 44, ISS, PRISM, AO-7…… Structure Titan Tower Series T800 mounted on roof of Sawyer Building above Physics Dept Environment 88.1mph wind shear with 1/2” radial ice accumulation Rooftop Antenna Tower PRISM Telemetry Received & Decoded -by Michael A. Earl APRS Signals Received in UIView-32 Configuration Operations Console VE3RMC Schematic HRD Rotator View *GENSO: ICOM computer Control Interface (ICOM CI-V) radios allow multiple radio control simultaneously and are required ground station hardware for participation in the Global Educational Network for Satellite Operations (GENSO). Team Director, Centre for Space Research: Dr. Ron Vincent Project Supervisor: Dr. Jean-Marc Noël Preliminary Design: Maj. Pascal Tremblay (VA3LGM) Assembly Integration & Testing: Mr. Alex Cushley (VA3CUS) Operations: Mr. Alex Cushley, Maj. Richard Van Der Pryt (VE3VDP), Lt-Col. (Ret’d) Philip Somers (VE3HST) Dept. Electronics Technologist: Mr. Dave Watts Dept. Materials Technologist: Mr. Steve Lockridge CubeSat System Link Margin (dB) Based on 1 Watt Power Transmission 2 m 70cm 12.5 cm G_Omni -1.03 -10.73 -25.46 G_yagi 7.97 -1.73 -16.46 G_parabolic 20.27 10.77 -3.96 CubeSat Link Budget