As I said in the previous entry of this blog, a small satellite named ARISSat-1 (and “Kedr” or “Radioskaf-B” by the Russians, as ARISSat-1 is officially a Russian experiment) has been providing me with a lot of fun and satisfactions since August 3rd, when it was released from the ISS, or International Space Station, by the Russian cosmonauts during a spacewalk from the Pirs airlock located in the Russian segment of the station.
As the title for this entry says, yes, after the summer holidays, I’m here again… and with new contents! Although I’m pretty off right now in the RC field, I’ve not only discovered the enjoyment of following ARISSat-1 since it was released from the ISS on 8/3/11 ( ARISSat-1 is an amateur radio satellite which beacons a very special transmission which I can receive with my simple radio scanner), but this weekend I’ve been able to attend the 2011 edition of “Festa al Cel”, our local airshow, and I also have material from today (!) and from my aviation studies which began again for me in September. So I’m back here, and with a lot of new stuff to tell which I’ll drop here as soon as it’s possible to me. Stay tuned!
Almost a month ago, I and the classmates with who I am studying the AMT (Aircraft Maintenance Technician) studies had the opportunity to witness the Lycoming O-360 piston engine we had seen lying stopped in a test stand during the entire year of studies… working at last!
Nearly a week before we had a few attempts at starting it, but, despite a few explosions at the beginning, the engine refused to begin turning. It wasn’t till some days later that, being outside the building where we have the engine among other material, we heard a strange noise coming from it. We went inside… and there was the engine in full performance and operated by our 2nd course colleagues! Being the first time I saw an aviation engine turning it was a really exciting experience, noisy and windy too…!
Some interesting facts are that the engine was turning on only one magneto (thus having half of of the spark plugs, one per cylinder, inoperative). This made the engine want to stop when idling it. Throttling it up again solved the problem . Other fact is that the carburetor used by this engine did not correspond to it, although it worked quite well. The propeller was a wooden, four-bladed Sensenich which prevented the engine from running at excessive RPM’s during the run.
I didn’t have the HD camera with me, but I did record some video of the engine running with a Sony Ericsson k810i cell phone. Ok, not HD quality, but at least I got something acceptable. Enjoy!
Yup! Not only I could see a great nightly and visual pass of both Discovery and the ISS flying together for the last time over the place where I live, in the final days of mission STS-133 (some time after Discovery undocked from the ISS and after it did a flyaround of the station), but some time later, I was able to hear Paolo Nespoli, the Italian ESA astronaut who’s in the station in a long duration mission, talking to some students in Italian schools in two different contacts via the ham radio equipment installed in the Zvezda module in the Russian segment of the station. And the best part of it is that I was using no more than an ICOM IC-R5 radio scanner (the same I use to listen to the local airport comm’s), an old dipole TV antenna, and a pair of homemade adaptors (one for adapting the IEC coaxial connector of the antenna to the SMA one in the scanner, and the other being a mono-stereo adaptor so that I could hear the sound in both ears when using headphones). I discovered I could listen to astronauts speaking from the ISS with my scanner not so much ago and the truth is that I’m enjoying this a lot, although for some days now the folks at the ISS have turned down the radio… not only in voice, but also in packet (data) and SSTV (“Slow Scan Television”, imagery)… hope they activate it again and I can hear something!
Here’s the video of the joint pass of Discovery and the ISS…
…and here’s the one for Nespoli’s radio contacts. The schools contacted were Istituto Comprensivo di Verano Brianza — Scuola Media, in Verano Brianza on 03/23/11 and Istituto Tecnico Industriale Statale “Leonardo da Vinci”, in Pratola Peligna on 04/02/11:
At last! I had ordered it so that it arrived during the Christmas holidays, but some problems with the customs delayed the final delivery and made it happen just when the holidays were over. But at last, and after some kilometers (or miles, whatever you prefer) flown, it is finally at home…
Yup! A small box has just arrived from Hong Kong this morning… but what does it contain? Well, it contains a pair of Futaba compatible receivers I ordered at HobbyKing, a 7-channel Futaba R617FS and a 8-channel OrangeRx which, despite not being a Futaba original, works well with Futaba’s FASST system… or at least in theory.
The R617FS will go to a Multiplex Fox I’m converting to RC, and the OrangeRx will go to the toolbox so that I’ll have a receiver available for future projects.
But that’s not all… I’m also waiting for a package to arrive from California containing upgrades and spare parts for my E-Sky Co-Comanche coaxial electric helicopter, which is currently AOG (Aircraft On Ground)… and well, I hope I’ll be able to return it to the skies!
Stay tuned…
Update 12/25/10:
I’ve opened the package! Fortunately, everything was OK and in good state and the two receivers showed no signs of damage or deterioration.
This is the very first entry in this brand new blog I’ve created. My idea is to make of it a personal space in which I’ll comment stuff on aviation (real, virtual, and RC) and also on spaceflight, because I think that, although it’s not directly related with aviation, it’s somewhat related with flight (and cause I’m a passionate on spaceflight, too! ).
Although my main language is Spanish, I’ll write here in English, which will enable myself to use this blog as a tool to improve my abilities on the language and to arrive not only to the Spanish-speakers, but all over the world!
Nothing more to say, I wish you all a Merry Christmas and… enjoy this blog! ;)
