2014-04-23
Trying to find the Lituanicasat-1
I just noticed: LituanicaSAT-1 FM transponder test - Amsat UK which mentions an upcoming test of the FM transponder on LituanicaSAT-1 tomorrow April 24th between 13:30 UTC and 15:00 UTC. And I may be able to at least listen to one pass in that time period, there is a pass for me between 13:55 and 14:05 UTC with max elevation 47⁰. Would be really nice if the transponder would still be active the next pass since that will be at max elevation 84⁰. After updating gpredict does know about the orbital elements of Lituanicasat-1 but not about the transponder. So I added that myself. The format of the .trsp files isn't very complicated, so I created/home/koos/.config/Gpredict/trsp/39571.trspwith:[Mode V/U FM Voice] DOWN_LOW=435175500 UP_LOW=145950000 MODE=FM, PL 67.0 HzUpdate: .. no signal. I received nothing and heard no response to my CQ. I notified the LituanicaSAT-1 team of my experience. Who quickly answered with the question 'are you tracking the right satellite'.
Which was indeed the problem: Gpredict had the name 'LITUANICASAT-1' for Norad catalog number39571but it is now 39569. I also renamed the transponder file to /home/koos/.config/Gpredict/trsp/39569.trsp. Searching for LituanicaSAT-1 finds a few more places where it is listed with Norad catalog number39571so I guess there has been a change in the listed information. Using strikeout a lot so I hope I won't add to the confusion.