On Sun, 21 Oct 2007 18:15:48 GMT, "Jerry Martes"
wrote:


"Dave Typinski" wrote in message
.. .
On Sun, 21 Oct 2007 16:48:28 GMT, "Jerry Martes"
wrote:


"Dave Typinski" wrote in message
...
Anyone have any ideas about what one might do with a television
receive-only (TVRO) antenna? The thing is 10' diameter and it's mine
for the price of dismantling it and hauling it out of the present
owner's back yard.

I'm thinking radio astronomy. Might be nice to make my own radio map
of the galaxy. I'm guessing that this would work okay somewhere
between 1 and 10 GHz... which means making a feed horn... which is
easy enough to do.

What else could I do with this antenna? Other than covering it in
polyethylene sheet to make a really big bird bath...
--
Dave Typinski
AJ4CO

Hi Dave

NOAAPORT uses a satellite over the Equator, South of Texas to transmit
satellite images in near Real Time. You can easily build a station for
displaying good images of the Florida as seen from space.

Jerry

Now /that/ would be a cool project! Thanks, Jerry.
--
Dave Typinski
AJ4CO

Hi Dave

If you do build a system for receiving the NOAAPORT images, please keep me
informed about your progress.
I too got my dish free. The PCI card TV receiver was low cost. The rest
is computer and software. eBay is a good source of very good antenna parts
at low cost.
I am presently stuck due to my poor Linux skills, and Linux is used by the
guys who write the software (free).

Jerry

I briefly went over the NOAAPORT web site. Looks like they have a
Windows flavor for the software, or maybe that's just a port to a
version that runs under a Windows emulator for Linux. Dunno. The
site wasn't too user-friendly - which just makes me want to build the
thing even more.

If you have any other online references handy for this project, I'd be
much obliged if you'd post them. For instance, in my review of the
site, I didn't notice anything about having to use a video capture /
TV tuner card - although I do have a USB version of one of those.

I shall post my progress, if and when. It's a project that's not at
the top of the list. First up is launching a weather balloon to
100,000 feet with a camera and a few sensors.

Thanks, Jerry.
--
Dave Typinski
AJ4CO