As you may know, we participate on a complex project involving the attempt to break the East European Altitude record!
Yeap, we set the new one at 35.300 m a.s.l with the "Stratospherium2011" balloon!
As for our "job", the tracking and the recovery, we manage to have a very accurate image of the trajectory using APRS!
The Tactical I was directed by the Ground Control very close to the landing site, close enough to receive the APRS positioning packets on TM D710 and AVMAP Geosat 6 APRS PNA.
The coordinates sent was at 300m from the real landing place!
The exact place for the Ground Control was choosen by a list of places, expecting a good commanding signal on the Voice net.
Also we expected good signal for APRS tracker and video streaming transmitter from the Launching site!
Therefore, we used RadioMobile software to predict the UHF radio coverage. We use UHF because we have more gain on our antennas... Also, we didn't want voice comms to interfere with APRS signals from the balloon itself.
WE HAVE NOW IMAGES THAT COVER THE STORY!
The place was elevated from the sourroundings, at about 400 m a.s.l. The last voice contact between GC and Tactical I was at more than 100 km, using around 30 W and vertical dual band antennas!The payload was recovered in very good shape. Due to some copyright restrictions we cannot show you the movie and the pictures taken from the payload cameras, but we let you see some images from the launching site and the landing zone, courtesy of YO3IHG.
The APRS tracker used in the mission was a Byonics set at 4 W, the antenna was (as we know) a premiere, a turnstile phased dipoles.
The minimum temperature was around -20 C degrees inside the paylod housing...
73!
The full story, on RadioMagazinYO #12
Some images:
The distance between Taking Off Zone to Ground Control was around 15 km.
Last radio contact with Tactical I team, more than 100 km!
The "goodies" inside... Note the leaflets with the phone number for reporting (upper right)
The payload before launching. Note the APRS antenna.
The YR1X trace as recorded via www.aprs.fi
Tactical I Team - recovery "vehicle"... ARO by YO3IGR, Made in romania!
Uh, the Chevrolete Captiva didn't make it there!
The payload after the impact! All was OK...
