Sounds from Amateur Radio Satellites 1976-1985

This section is dedicated to satellites built and operated by Radio Amateurs. Satellites built by AMSAT organizations around the world and were called AMSAT-OSCAR. Those built by Russian Hams and were mostly called Radiosputnik. In order to build and launch the satellites AMSAT needs members and friends to contribute and raise funds. If you are not yet a member of AMSAT please consider to join us and to support the activities. You can find several links to AMSAT on my links page.

My special thanks to Roy W0SL, Jim N4ST, Don KD4APP, Darrel AA7FV, Jim N5JDB, Clive G3CWV, Mike DK3WN, Reinhard DJ1KM +, Michael DG1CMZ, Oliver DG6BCE, Peter DF2JB, Volker DF7IT, Jean-Louis F6AGR, Thomas HB9SKA, Christoph HB9HAL, Claudio IK1SLD, Andreas OE1DMB, Michael PA3BHF, Henk PA3GUO, Darek SP9TTX, Ricardo PY3VHQ, Keith ZS6TW, Don N4UJW, Vladimir RA3DQT, Paulo CT1ETE, John KD2BD, Harald DH8HHA, Maik Hermenau, Ian ZL1AOX, Gerd DL8DR, Michael OH2AUE, Robert G8ATE, Wouter Jan Ubbels PE4WJ, Mark KF6KYI, Al W8KHP, Drew KO4MA, Rolf DK2ZF, Dave WB6LLO, Graham G3VZV, Joe K0VTY, Nils von Storch, Zeljko 9A2EY, Pierre ZS6BB, Bent OZ6BL, Mariano CT1XI, Al GM1SXX, Luc LU1FAM, Matt SQ7DQX, Lance K6GSJ, Chris VK3AML, Bob VE6BLD, Sergej RV3DR, Alex VK5ALX, Rudolf ZS6FX, Dick Daniels W4PUJ/SK , Bob Patterson K5DZE, Jean-Louis Rault F6AGR, Ivano Bonesana, Patrick Hajagos, Luc Leblanc VE2DWE, Mike N1JEZ, John K6YK, Tetsu-san JA0CAW, Marco Bauer, Carl Lindberg SM6NZV, Philip G0ISW, Kuge-san JE1CVL, Pat AA6EG, John M0UKD, Paul Marsh M0EYT, Federico Manzini, Jan PE0SAT, Domenico I8CVS +, Roland Zurmely PY4ZBZ, Rob Hardenberg PE1ITR, Michael Kirkhart KD8QBA, Davide D'Aliesio IW0HLG, Francisco EA7ADI, Kubota-san, Noguchi-san JA5BLZ, Kuge-san JE1CVL, Luciano PY5LF, Wakita-san JE9PEL, Peter ON4EZJ, Enrico IW2AGJ, Jean-Pierre F5YG, Remco PA3FYM, Dave G0CER, Jose Maria EA2JX, Viljo ES5PC, Charly DK3ZL, Bernd DL6IAN, Gustavo LW2DTZ, Juergen DL8SDQ, Gary ZS6YI, Wilhelm DL6DCA, Bence Szabo, Alex KR1ST, Branko 9A3ST, Daniel DL7NDR, Michael Hoerenberg and Igor PU4ELT for kindly contributing to this collection !

Picture

Satellite
#NORAD

Description

Launch Date

AMSAT OSCAR 8
AO-8
Phase-2D
#10703
(1978-026B)

AMSAT-OSCAR 8 was launched as secondary payload with LandSat 3 (ERTS 3) and PIX. This box shaped satellite (38cm x 38cm, 33cm high) had a weight of 27.2 kg and was another cooperative international effort of the United States, Canada, Germany and Japan. Similar store-and-forward service as AO-7. Carried Mode A (145.850-900 MHz uplink and 29.400-500 MHz downlink) and Mode J (145.900-146.000 MHz uplink and 435.100 MHz downlink (inverted)) linear transponders and telemetry beacons on 435.095 MHz and 29.402 MHz. For VHF a circularly polarized canted turnstile antenna was used whereas the UHF antenna was a quarter wave monopole. The antenna system was completed by a half-wave dipole for HF.  AO-8 was operational until the batteries failed on June 24^th 1983.

Mar5^th 1978

In enclosed recording, was done by Dietrich Solf, DJ8DT on March 5^th 1978 in SSB. One can hear DF8IU and G8DJW calling CQ. Recording kindly provided by Maik Hermenau.

RS 1
Radio Sputnik 1
#11085
(1978-100B) 

RS 1/2 each had a weight of 40 kg and carried linear transponders receiving at 145 MHz and transmitting from 29.350 to 29.390 MHz with an output power of 1.5W. They also featured a 1.5 W telemetry CW beacon operating at 29.401 MHz. It also had a Codestore unit like OSCAR-6. It used an inverted-V antenna for VHF and a quarter wave whip HF antenna.
Battery failed caused the satellites to fail after a few months.

Oct 26^th 1978

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RS 2
Radio Sputnik 2
#11086
(1978-100C) 

RS 1/2 each had a weight of 40 kg and carried linear transponders receiving at 145 MHz and transmitting from 29.350 to 29.390 MHz with an output power of 1.5W. They also featured a 1.5 W telemetry CW beacon operating at 29.401 MHz. It also had a Codestore unit like OSCAR-6. It used an inverted-V VHF antenna and a quarter wave whip HF antenna.
Battery failed caused the satellites to fail after a few months.

Oct 26^th 1978

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AMSAT Phase-3A
P3A
(launch failed)

AMSAT Phase-3A was the first satellite of the AMSAT Phase 3 program. It was jointly developed by AMSAT Germany and AMSAT North America. This 92.2 kg satellite included a 50 Watt high power Mode-B linear-transponder with 435 MHz uplink and 145 MHz downlink. Phase-3A had an on board Star-13C kick motor which would have boosted it into a highly elliptic Molniya orbit. However the satellite was lost during launch (the first Ariane-1 launch carrying actual payloads). P3A would have been named AMSAT-OSCAR 9. An English report about the launch failure was printed in AMSAT magazine "Orbit" and can be downloaded by clicking on the icon to the right. A collection of German articles of the launch preparation can be downloaded by clicking on the icon to the left.

May 23^rd 1980

Ulli DK4VW, who was in Kourou at the launch site, reported frequently about the preparations of the launch and especially of the launch campaign itself. The recordings below (on HF bands) were kindly provided by DK2ZF and include very interesting and dramatic reports.

In this contact Ulli DK4VW in Kourou is reporting the status of the launch preparations to Karl DK4ZC (in German).

More details of the launch preparation discussed in a contact between the club station FY7KRU operated by Ulli DK4VW and Rolf DK2ZF (in German).

Another update was given on the day before launch by Ulli DK4VW to Rolf DK2ZF (in German).

Contact between Jan WA3NAN in Maryland and Ulli FY7KRU in Kourou (in English).

FY7KRU reports to DK4ZC (in German) and WA3NAN (in English) the interruption of the launch campaign because of an anomaly in the valve of the second stage. The countdown was reset to T-6 minutes.

DJ4ZC Karl asks FY7KRU Ulli about post launch data to calculate Keplerian elements.

A second interruption of the launch campaign was reported by Ulli FY7KRU. The countdown was reset again to T-6 minutes.

The countdown was restarted but shortly after interrupted again for 5 minutes.

The launch window was getting tight now. This recording starts 3 minutes before launch and includes the launch. A few minutes after the launch the CAT receiver signal was noisy, which indicated already a problem.

Soon after, Ulli FY7KRU had to report a loss of the telemetry signals and then the loss of the rocket and satellite. He stated "Wir sind sehr traurig" (we are very sad). This was certainly also the mood of the team which got together in Kourou.

After the failed launch HB90P explained to DK2ZF in amazing details the chain of events which caused the problem (see also last picture left).

ISKRA 1
#19236
(1981-065C)

Iskra-1 (English: spark) was launched on a Soviet Vostok A-1 rocket together with the Meteor 1-31 weather satellite. It featured a transponder with 21 MHz uplink and 28 MHz downlink and a telemetry beacon on 10m. Decayed on Oct 7^th 1981.

July 10^th 1981

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UoSAT OSCAR 9
AO-9
UoSAT-1
#12888
(1981-100B)

UoSAT-1 was designed, built and operated by the University of Surrey team. It was the first satellite featuring an on-board computer for IHU (integrated Housekeeping Unit). With downlinks on 2m and 13cm bands it provided multiple beacons. UO-9 also featured a voice synthesizer ("Digitalker") which provided telemetry data. It was transmitted in FM on 145.825 MHz.

Oct 6^th 1981

Enclosed transmission of a CCD image taken by UoSAT-9 was recorded on September 23^rd 1987 by John KD2BD in New Jersey. He also kindly provided the associated demodulated picture.

UO-9 beacon was received and recorded on December 16^th 1987 by OZ6BL.

The Digitalker of UO-9 providing telemetry data was recorded on September 25^th 1988 and kindly provided by John KD2BD.

Digitalker of UO-9 recorded on March 16^th 1989 starting at 8:55 UTC on 145.825 MHz by DD1US.

UO-9 decayed after 8 years on Oct 13^th 1989. Enclosed please find a copy of the last reported reception of its telemetry. It was recorded on Oct 13^th 1989 at 05:29 UTC and kindly provided by Dave Guimont WB6LLO.

In 1981 Graham G8FXB designed a 2m FM receiver to monitor the telemetry downlink of UoSAT OSCAR 9. Enclosed please find a description of his receiver design.

RS 3
Radio-3
#12997
(1981-120A)

RS-3 to RS-8 were jointly launched on one C-1 rocket from the Northern Cosmodrome at Plesetsk to 1600 km altitude.
They were supposedly based on small Strela-1M (arrow) space-frames which were originally designed for Russian Military store/dump communication spacecrafts. Cosmos-3M launchers were used to launch octets of these store/dump satellites into one of three orbital planes to provide excellent global coverage. More than 200 small Strelas each with a weight of 74 - 80 kg were launched between 1970 and 1992.
Fortunately some spare Strela-1M space-frames could be used for the RS 3-8 satellites with adapted payloads developed by students of the University of Moscow. Like RS-1 and RS-2, the six new Radiosputniks each weighed approx. 40 kg and were cylinders 43cm in diameter and 38cm long. At that time, this was the largest clutch of Amateur Radio satellites ever orbited at one time. Many thanks to Al GM1SXX for this background information.

Dec 17^th 1981

RS-3 transmitted telemetry in CW on beacons at 29.321 MHz and on 29.401 MHz. The decoded telemetry is:
182 250 379 436 537 601 hi
182 250 379 436 537 601 hi
182 250 379 436 537 601 hi
Enclosed recording was done by Dietrich Solf, DJ8DT and kindly provided by Maik Hermenau.

RS 4
Radio-4
#12998
(1981-120B)

RS-4 transmitted telemetry in CW on beacons at 29.360 MHz and on 29.403 MHz. The decoded telemetry is:
                                 sg10 su28 ss01 sw01
rs4 ek00 ed74 eo82 eg01 eu01 es28 ew25
rs4 sk00 sd00 so70 sg10 su26 ss00 sw01
rs4
Enclosed recording was done by Dietrich Solf, DJ8DT and kindly provided by Maik Hermenau.

Dec 17^th 1981

RS 5
Radio-5
#12999
(1981-120C)

RS-5 transmitted telemetry in CW on beacons at 29.331 MHz and 29.452 MHz. The decoded telemetry is:
o81 g01 u01 s22 w21
rs5 sk 67
OZ6BL received and recorded the beacon at 29.331 MHz on February 16th 1985.

Dec 17^th 1981

RS-5 also featured a 40 kHz wide Mode-A transponder (145.93 MHz / 29.43 MHz) . Its 1.5 Watt transmitter provided an excellent downlink signal. This is demonstrated by enclosed SSB-QSO of Heinz DJ9AP and Nils SM0MRO which was recorded on February 16^th 1985 at 21:30 UTC by OZ6BL.

RS 6
Radio-6
#13000
(1981-120D)

RS-6 transmitted telemetry in CW on beacons at 29.411 MHz and 29.453MHz. It also featured a 40 kHz wide Mode-A transponder (145.93 MHz / 29.43 MHz). On July 30^th 1984 at 16:53 UTC Carl SM6NZV had a SSB contact with VE2EUT. He was using a 9 element Yagi antenna and 30 Watts output power for the uplink and a horizontal loop mounted in the attic for the downlink. Recoridng kindly provided by Carl SM6NZV.

Dec 17^th 1981

RS 7
Radio-7
#13001
(1981-120E)

RS-7 transmitted telemetry in CW on beacons at 29.341MHz and 29.501 MHz. It also featured a 40 kHz wide Mode-A transponder (145.98 MHz / 29.48 MHz). In addition is carried ROBOT, an electronic store/dump system collecting robotically stored QSO's and relay them to the ground station in the USSR.

Dec 17^th 1981

The CW telemetry signal on 29.341 MHz from RS-7 was recorded in 1985 by Jim N4ST. The decoded telemetry is:
.s7 mk87 md44 mo02 m...

The RS-7 CW beacon downlink signal was also received and recorded on February 16^th 1985 by OZ6BL. The decoded telemetry is:
.s7 ik00 id00 io45 ig11 iu10 is58 iw01
rs7 ak00 ad90 ao76 ag90 au76 as92 aw76
rs7 mk00 md51

Enclosed recording was done by Dietrich Solf, DJ8DT and kindly provided by Maik Hermenau.

RS 8
Radio-8
#13002
(1981-120F)

RS-8 transmitted telemetry in CW on beacons at 29.461 MHz and 29.502 MHz. It also featured a 40 kHz wide Mode-A transponder (145.98 MHz / 29.48 MHz).
Enclosed recording was done by Dietrich Solf, DJ8DT. One can hear multiple CW and SSB signals including a nice SSB contact between DK2LM and UB5MGW and also DL3BJ calling CQ. Recording kindly provided by Maik Hermenau.

Dec 17^th 1981

This is a recording of the CW telemetry downlink of RS-8 done by Dietrich Solf, DJ8DT. The decoded telemetry is:
rs3 k00 d84 o84 g00 u00 s28 w26
rs3 k00 d84 o84 g00 u00 s28 w26
rs3 k...
Recording kindly provided by Maik Hermenau.

ISKRA 2
#13176
(1982-033C)

ISKRA-2 was built by aeronautical students as an educational exercise. It was launched by hand out of an airlock of the Space Station Salyut-7 by Anatoli Berezovoi and Valentin Lebedev. This spherical satellite was dedicated to the 19^th Congress of the Soviet Komsomol. ISKRA-2 transmitted its telemetry beacon signal on 29.578 MHz well received throughout the world for several months. . The transponder which should convert from 21 MHz to 28 MHz failed to activate due to a controller malfunction.
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May 17^th 1982

ISKRA 3
#13663
(1982-033D)

ISKRA-3 was launched exactly the same way as ISKRA-2.It had the same spherical shape with 60cm in diameter and 28 kg weight as ISKRA-2. Beacon transmitted on 29.593 MHz. Its lifetime was shorter than of ISKRA-2, supposedly due to heating problems.
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Nov 18^th 1982

AMSAT OSCAR 10
AO-10
Phase-3B
#14129
(1983-058B)

AMSAT OSCAR 10 was launched on June 16^th 1983 piggyback with the European test satellite ECS-1 on Ariane 1-06. Due to a collision with part of the launch vehicle after separation the onboard propulsion system was damaged and thus AO-10 did not reach its targeted Molniya type orbit. Nevertheless AO-10 was very successfully used by many radio amateurs worldwide. It featured 2 beacons and a Mode B linear transponder.
General beacon: 145.810 MHz CW/RTTY/PSK
Engineering beacon: 145.987 MHz PSK
Mode U/V (B) linear transponder (inverting):
    Uplink: 435.027 - 435.179 MHz LSB/CW
    Downlink: 145.825 - 145.977 MHz USB/CW
 In December 1986 the onboard computer of AO-10 failed due to radiation damage of the memory chips. Since then the satellite did turn its transponder or beacons randomly on/off. Under normal conditions the transponder is on and the general beacon transmits an unmodulated carrier.

Jun 16^th 1983

Due to the collision also the antennae were damaged. Therefore you can hear a strong spinning sound of the transponder (this file is 2.7MB large).

W0SL testing via AO-10. You can hear the long propagation delay due to the highly elliptical orbit. Recorded by W0SL.

On August 6^th 1983 OZ6BL recorded the CW downlink signal of AO-10. This is the decoded signal:
"sat oscar 10 at 21:30:00 utc orbit 111 ma 240/256 tlm:
ubat 14.4 v tbat 5.4 c iarray 0.5 a sa 0.0 dg spin 345rpm
satellite status: mode b continues with omni antenna resulting in weak signals and qsb higain antennas will be switched on around aug 11
transponder is off 4 hours around perigee because of continuing attitude change amsat oscar 1"

The linear transponder of AO-10 allowed also the use of RTTY. This recording was done on Feb 17^th 1985 by OZ6BL.

Rudolf ZR6JRN (now ZS6FX) in KG33HD had a SSB contact via AO-10 with I8CVS + in JN70ES. Recording provided by ZS6FX.

DG1MDN near Ingolstadt/Germany and ZR6JRN (now ZS6FX) had a SSB contact via AO-10. Recorded and kindly provided by Rudolf ZS6FX.

Rudolf ZR6JRN (now ZS6FX) in KG33HD had a nice SSB contact with I8CVS + in JN70ES. Recording provided by ZS6FX.

This recording of a SSB contact via AO10 betweeen LU8MB and ZR6JRN was kindly provided by Rudolf ZS6FX.

UoSAT OSCAR 11
UO-11
UoSAT-2
#14781
(1984-021B)

UoSAT OSCAR 11 (UO-11) was built in only 6 month at the University of Surrey / UK. The 70kg satellite was launched on a Delta-F rocket. It featured transmitters at 145.825 MHz, 435.025 MHz and 2401.5 MHz. It was the first satellite supporting store-and-forward capabilities for digital messages.

Mar 1^st 1984

UO-11 featured a voice synthesizer called Digitalker which was recorded on February 17^th 1985 by OZ6LB.

UO-11 also had a 1200bd AFSK ASCII telemetry downlink. It was recorded on November 23^rd 1987 by OZ6BL.

End of 1987 UoSAT-2 transmitted short Christmas greetings to all listeners. The audio file was kindly provided by John KD2BD.

Digitalker transmitting the latest known position of the polar expedition "Ski-Track" on March 24^th 1988 on the 2m FM downlink. The Digitalker text is:
NUMBER 18   -   PRIORITY 0 0 0   -   DATE 24TH OF MARCH   -
TIME 12 HOURS AND 52 MINUTES GMT   -   YOU ARE AT 84 DEGREES 25 POINT 6 MINUTES N AND 95 DEGREES 58.2 MINUTES E   -   73S
File provided by Michael Meermann PA3BHF (www.meerman.fsnet.co.uk/NorthPole).

UO-11 ASCII telemetry recorded on March 16^th 1989 starting at 10:05 UTC by DD1US.

S-Band beacon downlink recorded by Jim N5JDB.

This is another recording of the S-Band downlink of UO-11 . The signal was received on August 31^st 2002 on 2401.500 MHz by Rob PE1ITR. Audio recording and spectrum plot, showing nicely the sideband carriers, kindly provided by Rob Hardenberg PE1ITR.

ASCII Telemetry of the 2m downlink recorded on Feb 14^th 1998 by Clive G3CWV.

UO-11 1200bd AFSK telemetry signal received on 145.825 MHz by Mark KF6KYI on January 23^rd 2008 at 04:27UTC.

End of August 2010 the telemetry beacon of UO-11 came again back to  live. Enclosed recording was done on August 4^th 2010 on 145.825 MHz in FM by DD1US.

On January 6^th 2015 at 11:53 UTC Francisco EA7ADI received the beacon signal of UO-11. Recording kindly provided by Francisco EA7ADI.

Picture

Satellite
#NORAD

Description

Launch Date

If you have further recordings from space objects please let me know. I will be happy to add them to my homepage. Many thanks in advance.

Vy 55 & 73 de Matthias DD1US