PS-18 PICO balloon is scheduled for release on Sunday 24/8/2014 at 8am.
Party balloon, 10mW TX
APRS on 145.175Mhz, callsign VK3YT-12
http://aprs.fi/#!mt=roadmap&z=9&call=a%2FVK3YT-12
Olivia 8/250 on 434.650Mhz, tracked on SNUS as PS.
http://spacenear.us/tracker/?filter=PS
Prediction shows the balloon will loop over Tas, VIC and NSW over several days.
PS-16 was released from Melbourne on 23/8/2014 at 8am
10mW TX, APRS only on 145.175Mhz, callsign VK3YT-11
Prediction:
Update #1: Last TX received at 7:18pm AEST
Prediction:
PS-16 was released from Melbourne on 12/8/2014, and took a different path from other PS flights: towards Adelaide, South Australia.
Details:
10mW TX, APRS on 145.175Mhz, callsign VK3YT-12
Olivia on 434.650Mhz, tracked on spacenear.us as PS.
As of 5:30pm the balloon was travelling very slowly towards Ararat.
Update #1:
Wow that was the first PS trip to Adelaide from Melbourne, and the furthest west a PS Pico balloon has travelled. It is not very common to see such unusual wind pattern.
Update #2:
PS-16 went in range Thurs afternoon
Prediction for the next few days:
Update #3: 7:30am Fri 15/8
PS-16 has done second pass of Adelaide and now will be heading back to Victoria
Updated prediction:
Update #4: 10:30am Sat 16/8
Looks like there were some changes in the wind pattern, the balloon did another loop around Adelaide
Update #5: 5:30pm Sat 16/8
The balloon landed and was picked up by Bob VK5FO and Ray VK5RR.
The payload was on the wet grass which killed APRS transmissions, but they did a great job with locating and retrieving the payload, using a combination of DF and software decoding to track the UHF signal. Thanks guys!
Final decoded packet:
PS-15 is a last minute release from Melbourne, with predicted path to NZ.
This is a non-solar payload, and APRS only.
10mW TX, APRS on 145.175Mhz, callsign VK3YT-9
Will switchover to NZ APRS frequency 144.575Mhz when payload is close to NZ.
Update #1, 6pm AEST
PS-15 went out of range at 4:56pm AEST.
Prediction shows the balloon will arrive around 6:30am local time tomorrow.
Update #1, 4:30am AEST
PS-15 arrived in NZ, first packet was received at 6:07:49am local time, 100km from the shoreline at Westport, NZ.
Range to first iGate ZL2SUN-3 was 200km, after the balloon cleared the Kahurangi national park
Update #2: Last packet was received at 8:24:03am local time (6:24:03 AEST) 142km from Christchurch.
Temperature was -42 degree Celsius before Sunrise, and climbed to -12 after Sunrise.
This was the fastest PS balloon trip to NZ so far, from Melbourne to NZ in 19H.
Total travelled distance 2998km
Average speed 157kph
PS-14 is planned to be released on Sunday 27 July 2014 from Melbourne.
Expected path is MEL-SYDNEY then the Pacific.
Solar powered party balloon, 10mW TX
APRS on 145.175Mhz, callsign: VK3YT-11
OLIVIA 8/250 with RSID on 434.650Mhz, tracked as PS on spacenear.us
Update #1 Dawn release (7am)
Update #2
That was a quick trip, the balloon went out of range at 4:11pm this afternoon, 240km east of Newcastle:
PS-13 was released on Sunday 13 July 2014 at 8:25am AEST
Details:
Solar powered party balloon, 10mW TX
APRS on 145.175Mhz, callsign: VK3YT-8
THOR8 and OLIVIA 8/250 with RSID on 434.500Mhz
Prediction: MEL-SYD
Update #1 6:16pm: Balloon passing Sydney in the evening
Update #2: Balloon left Australia at Gold Coast at 1:51am
Update #3: 8:30pm 21/7/2014 AEST
PS-13 made it to South America
Prediction:
Actual:
Total flying time so far: 8 days and 12 hours.
Total distance travelled: 16274km (and still going :))
Last prediction shows the balloon has left Brazil coast early this morning.
Next destination: Unknown!
PS-12 was heading towards NZ on Friday 11/7/2014 but the rain brought it down near Melbourne.
Attempt to re-launch was cancelled due to bad weather
PS-11 PICO balloon release is planned for Sunday morning 6/7/2014
Solar powered party balloon, 10mW TX
APRS on 145.175Mhz, callsign: VK3YT-12
THOR8 and OLIVIA 8/250 with RSID on 434.500Mhz
Prediction: MEL-SYD
Update: Balloon developed a leak and landed in Strathbogie VIC
PS-10 PICO balloon release planned for 7am Saturday 21/6/2014.
Expected to travel MEL-SYD
Party balloon, solar powered, 10mW TX
Miniature Digital camera.
APRS on 145.175Mhz, callsign: VK3YT-10
SSDV imaging payload with RTTY300_8_N_1 on 434.500Mhz
SSDV frames can be received by dl-fldigi as RTTY data
http://ukhas.org.uk/guides:ssdv
Payload at 10.6g excluding solar panels
Update #1
The balloon went out of range 160km off Byron Bay at 1:26am
Total distance travelled was 1496km in 17.5h – average 85kph.
PS-9 is planned to be released Monday 9th June 2014 from Melbourne.
Details:
Party foil balloon. Solar powered payload 10mW, 12g weight.
APRS 145.175Mhz, callsign VK3YT-11.
THOR16 and RTTY100_8_1_N_600Hz: 434.500Mhz with RSID, every 6 minutes, call sign is PS on spacenear.us flight PS-9
Prediction:
Update #1: Released at 8:30am, perfect day for a launch!
Update #2: 4:05pm 9/6/14
Balloon is still going north, currently at 8385m altitude past Griffith.
We don’t have any manual tracker in the footprint coverage, but APRS should be available until Bourke.
Update #3: 6:00pm 9/6/14
Balloon has gone out of reception range. Updated predictions show it will be in range around tomorrow morning
Update #4: 7:09am 10/6/14
It appears that battery was low overnight and the tracker shut itself down.
Sunrise at 6:40am, the battery was charged up and first packet was received at 7:09am
Revised prediction based on latest position:
Update #5: 3:40pm 10/6/14
PS-9 exited Australia via Rainbow Beach, heading East.
Entire path so far:
Ron VK4KLC and Doug VK4ADC recorded a WAVE file of the audio from the tracker and it was the most recent position.
