RAC Bulletin 2010-025E - SHARP-1 Launch
2010-10-20

VIA Derek Hay, VE4HAY

Hi:

All is still GO for a launch on Friday, October 22 at 10 AM. The
hardware all looks good except for the camera which is giving us
trouble after the kids attempted some firmware and hardware mods.
April is going to try and replace it tonight with a similar unit.

The cut down circuit works great. We are still doing some last minute
fabrication of the bits and pieces (running kite string/balloon line
through NiCr wire inside glass tubing etc. - Alan knows this). We will
probably finish this tomorrow evening in Elkhorn. We are bringing (I
hope) every conceivable piece of gear with us. The flight radios will
transmit at 29 and 31 second intervals as VE4SHS-14 (Garmin GPS 16x
LVS) and VE4SHS-11 (Garmin GPS 18x LVS). -11 will show a balloon icon
on the map. The former will give about 6 m resolution for the lat and
long. The chase car is VE4SHS-10. I'm
the driver. All together there are five vehicles with 5 staff and 20
students.

Today Bruce Feaver predicted the winds to be light and from the west
with some northerly component (I sure hope so) on Friday. Alan will
e-mail us all his flight predictions using Balloon Track and will be
monitoring things from Portage la Prairie. It looks like our payload
may be a little over weight but not too much - say 1100 grams instead
of the ideal 1050. We will adjust weights accordingly but this may
lower our burst altitude somewhat. We do not have much going for us in
terms of maps. McNally Robison gets the new edition of Backroad Maps -
Manitoba on Friday - too bad for us. I have some decent road maps but
not down to section roads like Alan's UI View maps. Bruce Feaver will
file the NOTAM and we will give him the time and
position (DMS) of the landing which he will pass on to NavCanada.

We have cell phones. My number will be 995-2767 (my wife's cell - I
barely know how to turn it on so if a kid answers you know why). All
the other staff have phones and we will e-mail all those details
Thursday evening from the resort in Elkhorn. We also have a couple of
2 meter transceivers (ICOM IC-V80). I'm VE4SHS and Bohyun Lee (grade
12 student) is VE4BHL. I've programmed in the WPG repeater as well as
Starbuck and Bruxelles. Hopefully that will get us on the repeater
system. We have some crazy neon colours to wear while searching so
hopefully none of us attract hunters.

We are not nearly as prepared as I would have liked but we are at a
point where we just have to go for it. It has been a lot of work in a
short time and we are all starting from scratch. I've been very sick
and unproductive the last few weeks but others (especially, April,
Bruce, Craig, Alan, Adrian, Mike and Jeff) have really been a big help
as we approach launch time. Even if we don't retrieve our package, it
will have been a tremendous learning experience and we will just fund
raise and start over.

Finally; if the winds do not cooperate, we may try a tracking
exercise. One car could take the beaconing cube and drive off. After a
twenty minute head start the rest of will try to follow. I'm not sure
this would actually work as we will be on the ground and the APRS
repeaters/gateways are far and few but we will try to come up with
something. I don't like to think it won't happen after all the time
and money spent but it could get scrubbed. This is the only time I
wish I lived in Saskatchewan.

Keep your fingers crossed and if you can, follow us online at aprs.fi

73

Mike: Please forward this to our SHARP grads.


Thanks

Robert Striemer
Teacher | Shaftesbury High School
2240 Grant Avenue
Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada
R3P 0P7
tel: 204.888.5898 | fax: 204.896.5492

http://www.pembinatrails.ca/shaftesbury/
http://www.members.shaw.ca/rjstriemer

--

* * * *

Vernon Erle Ikeda - VE2MBS/VE2QQ
Dollard des Ormeaux, Quebec
RAC E-News/Web News Bulletin Editor



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