* Astronomy

Blobrana · L

RE: SuitSat

Blobrana · L

Blobrana · L

Depressurisation under way... about 20 minutes behind schedule

Blobrana · L

T minus five minutes
Preparations going well, release still on schedule

Blobrana · L

T minus 2 hours

On Friday 3 February, at 23:20 Central European Time the ISS Crew of Valery Tokarev and William McArthur are due to start an EVA from the Pirs airlock of the Russian section of the ISS wearing Russian Orlan space suits. However, a third Orlan spacesuit will be on the spacewalk with them, one that is nearing the end of its useful life. The plan is literally to throw the extra spacesuit overboard. This may not present an obvious link to radio stations but this suit is fitted with amateur radio equipment, which will transmit messages in many different languages during its time in orbit.

Current Position, as well as the 5 and 10 minute future positions.

The spacesuit with equipment is called Suitsat-1 (also called Radio Sputnik or Radioskaf in Russian). SuitSat is a project sponsored by ARISS (Amateur Radio on the ISS) an international working group of volunteers from national amateur radio organisations. ARISS has been used as an integral part of education activities within ESA Human Spaceflight missions with the aim of developing children’s interest in space and science in general.

Those who pick up the transmissions from Suitsat can enter their data on the SuitSat website, http://www.suitsat.org so that participants around the world can track the satellite.

-- Edited by Blobrana at 20:21, 2006-02-03

Blobrana · L

Deployment at 22:20 GMT (5:20 pm EST)

Blobrana · L

Space station flight engineer Valery Tokarev will release the SuitSat during the crew's spacewalk.

The crew will also lock a cable cutter that inadvertently severed one of two sets of power, data and video lines in the station's mobile transporter.
The suit will drift away from the station and begin transmitting its signal.

Blobrana · L

Inside the SuitSat is an amateur radio that will broadcast status messages at 145.990 MHz which anyone on Earth can pick up with a radio scanner.
The Orlan spacesuit batteries will power SuitSat's transmissions for 2 -7 days.
It will transmit a pre-recorded colour picture via Slow Scan TV, which ham operators can receive and decode with software.

Blobrana · L

New launch date: February 3rd 2006, from the International Space Station.

Blobrana · L

The launch of the novel "SuitSat" satellite has been delayed.
SuitSat will not be deployed from the International Space Station until sometime in January or February.

The Russian EVA that will deploy SuitSat, originally planned for December 8, has been delayed to late January/early February.

SuitSat consists of a surplus Russian Orlan space suit converted into a transmit-only satellite with an FM downlink frequency of 145.99 MHz using the call sign RS0RS. It will contain equipment to transmit voice messages, telemetry and an SSTV image on a nine-minute cycle as it orbits Earth.
The batteries powering the satellite are expected to last about a week after deployment, and SuitSat's free-floating, decaying orbit is expected to cause it to re-enter Earth's atmosphere after some six weeks in space.

SuitSat after suit modifications

The SuitSat signal should be strong enough to hear using a VHF transceiver or scanner and a simple antenna--thus making it an ideal project for students to monitor and track. SuitSat's payload also will also include a CD with hundreds of school pictures, artwork, poems, and student signatures.

The ARISS-Russia team headed by Sergei Samburov, RV3DR, first came up with the idea for SuitSat, and the concept came in for extensive discussion during the October 2004 joint AMSAT Symposium/ARISS International Team meeting. Called Radioskaf or Radio Sputnik, the project was led by Project Manager A. P. Alexandrov and Deputy Project Manager A. Poleshuk from RSC Energia.

On the US side, AMSAT Board member Lou McFadin, W5DID, oversaw hardware development for SuitSat. The electronics were built and tested in Phoenix, Arizona, by a team lead by Steve Bible, N7HPR. A Progress rocket supply flight transported the SuitSat hardware to the ISS in September for installation by the space station crew.

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