Category: Meetings

Deep Space Exploration Society Science Meeting Notes – October 24, 2022

Deep Space Exploration Society Science Meeting Notes – October 24, 2022, 6:30 PM.

By Bill Miller.

Please see the illustrated notes on this PDF file:

Deep Space Exploration Society Science Meeting Notes – October 24, 2022

Note, the most recent meeting videos are available here: DSES most recent Science Meeting video online

DSES Annual All Members Meeting April 19, 2021

Welcome to the DSES Annual All Members Meeting 2021-04-19
Meeting Notes: by Bill Miller


We had 15 participants in the virtual All Members meeting today: We had some problems with a number of the internet connections and am sorry if you tried to join and couldn’t get in or got dropped. Thanks everyone for joining.


Participants: Myron Babcock, Dr. Richard Russel, Gary Agranat, Dan Layne, Bob Haggart, Ted Cline, Bob Sayers, Ray Uberecken, Don Latham, Dan Layne, Edward Currie, Dayton Jones, Jerry , Jim White WDOE, Bill Miller.
See the Zoom Meeting Video at:

https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/J7cMjwB6K6kZxTGYgt-hgCsdyMZqfI7JhcnDIUl2lzH-5LIUClRx6k4ROLy3OcCU.KBMMsM1_5IxRvn0W?startTime=1618876857000

Start Time : April 19th 6:00 PM
Agenda and notes.

  1. Check In
  2. Myron’s Treasures report: Ck 2469.79 Sav 5742.33 Dues for 3 renewing members outstanding. Website DSES.Science, will auto renew. UPS mailbox is $135/year. Power is nominal $60-$85. Phone and Internet cost $106.50.
  3. Membership Dues are now due for 2021. Please submit check or pay pal payment to Myron or on the link in the website.
  4. BOD Election.
    a. We elected new board members to the three open seats for this year. Those are Floyd Glick, Don Latham, and Ray Uberecken. Bill Miller and Dave Molter are retired from the board.
    b. Other Board Members not turned over this time are Bob Sayers, Bob Haggart, Gary Agranat, and Myron Babcock.
    c. Officers will be selected by the new current board.
  5. DSES Aug. Open House: Plan for on-site open house in August but will watch the CDC for guidance on the Corona Virus guidelines and try to decide in June.
  6. Accomplishments
    a. Pulsars
    b. Moon Bounce 50 contacts in Oct. and Nov.
    c. Full control and Celestial and Moon tracking. Look up, Point and Track Sky Map, Raster Scan.
    d. H1 mapping, Ray and Rich are doing H1 full time on 9 ft dishes. Ted Cline has the data analysis underway to do imaging. Will do some tutorials for SARA website. Full Sky survey data is available.
    e. H1 small Scope in and box is available. SARA cost $290 on web.
    f. 1296MHz Tropospheric Scatter couple a hundred miles.
    g. Skip Crilly’s 1420 SETI observations
  7. The 2020 Virtual DSES Open House Presentation
    https://www.dropbox.com/s/zxpzj879iz7mt77/2020%20DSES%20Virtual%20Open%20House.mp4?dl=0a. Bill gave the presentation to the Front Range 6 Meter Group https://groups.io/g/FrontRange6Meter last month, recorded and posted it to our site.
    b. Everett Curry, W6ABM Assistant Section Manager/Oregon ARRL, asked to present the recorded presentation to the General Interest Amateur Radio Club in North East Oregon Thursday, Feb 18th
    c. The Artic Armature Radio Group of which Myron is a member asked for a live presentation of the Open House on Friday, March 12th.
    d. The Utah DX Amateur group would like the presentation on Wednesday March 17th.
  8. Rich’s projects and presentations:
    a. Has been invited to HAMsci on March 19-20th to develop an interactive poster on the eclipse detection. https://hamsci.org/hamsci2021
    b. https://www.eucara.nl/
    https://www.camras.nl/blog/2021/eucara-2021-webconferentie-oproep/
    The EUCARA presentation is about deciphering the pulsar map on the Pioneer Spacecraft
    c. Sara Western conference April 3.
    d. Call from Jason Outreach who is a documentary film maker that would like to do a film on radio astronomy.
    e. Editor for the SARA journal.
    f. 9 Ft dish in Rich’s yard generated a H1 full sky survey over the last year for H1 mapping.
  9. Science fair prizes and Judging. (Bill Miller, Gary Agranat, Tony Bigbee)
  10. Ham Radio K0PRT contests and contacts. Triband Beam.
  11. Photographers on site.
  12. The 1296MHz feed is now changed out to the 408MHz feed for continuing pulsar work.
    a. Need to learn how to use the B210 receiver. Rich has it set up as best as possible. Would like to have a faster computer to handle the throughput.
    b. Need more dwell time.
    c. Need a 10MHz reference source for B210.
  13. See the Feed Change Schedule on the main website page. This may need updating.
    a. 4GHz feed for aiming.
    b. 1420Mhz is on the table
    c. 1296 for Moon Bounce distance observations and moon orbit calculation.
  14. Need internet for SuperSID and Radio Jove, Magnetometer, Security System, Power monitors, etc.
    a. Phil Gage developed a Geo Pointing SW that points to GeoSync satellites for mount calibration. The scan pattern will hunt the field and log the output of the receiver and make a
    correction offset.
  15. Jon Ayers – Can you send a dual frequency beacon that can be used for range finding on the
    moon. Like a frequency phase comparison range finder.
  16. Bob Haggart has the Radio Jove Dipoles ready to put up back. Ray wants to us his Flex 1500 in the 54MHz band and have it on. See the NASA and Stanford Radio Jove webpage.
  17. Don Latham has purchased a data crunching computer for the data for the H1 and Pulsar data. This should increase the pulsar capability substantially. The machine has latest Ubuntu OS.
  18. Ray has developed a Pulsar Simulator that helps us to debug the pulsar data acquisition and post processing.
  19. Dan Layne using Gaussian fit to analyze the pulsar data. SARA has data on Skynet on Greenbank 20 meter dish and the data. Should look at that data from Greenbank. We should learn and make use of the data sets from our national radio observatories to go deeper. Note that EdX Radio Astronomy course starts March 14 https://www.edx.org/course/radio-sky-1 if you are interested.
  20. Plans for coming year:
    a. Plan on a lot of 1420 work. And do Pulsars and 15Deg from straight up drift scan.
    b. Raster Scan capability will give us RA, Dec 3D signal strength imaging.
    c. Additional 3.8 meter dish for continuous drift scan at any elevation angle and remoted for members to use.
    d. Scope in and Box for students
    e. Outreach opportunities with SARA, ECARA, HAMsci, Student Events. These items get us more donations, equipment, and members to do more interesting work.
  21. Maintenance and Infrastructure Items on Site
    a. Check clean out and fix the Sump Pumps in the underground before spring rains flood the bunker. (Bill talked to Dave Molter and he said they had never been completely mucked out as far as he knew.) (Bill also discussed how the sumps work with Ed Corn.) need to muck them out before spring rains. Don suggested that we get a septic tank cleaner company to come out and pump out the sumps. He would even pay for it.
    b. Last fall Steve Plock and Ed Corn noticed that the bunker was flooded. Bill checked it in December, and it was dry, but the floor was covered in silt and bugs. Need to sweep or vacuum up the dirt and bugs to make it operational. Clean the silt out of the Underground from the flooding damage. Need a pass through vacuum with a long exit hose.
    c. Gary and Bill worked on the Beam Antenna on Saturday, April 10th . The tip down hinge mechanism at the base broke. Bill and Gary let Ed Corn and Steve Plock know about this and they will rework it when they make a site trip in May for Skip Crilly’s SETI project. In the meantime, don’t tip the tower down. Bill called Ed and he said that this had happened before, and he has a plan to weld on additional angle iron supports.
    d. Take down the Beam on the tip over tower and align the 3 elements on the Yagi and reinforce the element attachment on the beam with cross bolts to keep the elements from rotating on the beam.
    e. While working the tower issue we discovered that the HyGain Antenna rotor is not breaking properly and probably needs the gear replaced or the whole rotor replaced and aligned. Myron said he might have access to another rotor.
    f. Cut off the 5 band vertical mounting pole and move the vertical base to ground level and reattach and add more radials and bury them for protection. g. Repair the dish bottom edge damage.
    h. Clean out the tower and the pedestal base. Too much junk and clutter are accumulating there.
    i. Clean out the junk under and around the Comm. Trailer and scrap it.
    j. Align Ray’s HughesNet Satellite internet dish. Call HughesNet for reprogramming and support. Find internet provider alternative. Couldn’t get DISH out to reset the microbeam position. Bill asked the group if someone would donate a hot spot modem for a period of time and DSES will reimburse the plan cost. Now Ed MaCauley may sponsor the internet. See notes above.
    k. Need to remove Tumble weeds have piled up in the ramp. Does anyone have a small yard waste chipper/shredder we could try? Bob Sayers has one at his cabin site that he will lend. We can try it out as a way of quickly dispensing the tumble weeds.
    l. Continue to look for more, higher (8 Ft) chain link fence to mitigate the tumble weeds in the ramp. Bill checking on Craig’s List and FB marketplace.
    m. Nails on Road. Several of Ray’s friends came out on the 10/3 trip and used metal detectors and magnets to clear the site of nail and metal on the road. We’ve all had flat tires and need to continue to clear the road and site of debris as many of us have had tire damage. Bill bought a new magnet roller and left it in the Comm. Trailer. Please walk it up and down the road once whenever you’re on site. Bill did this last Saturday and got two 16 oz cups of metal and nails from the road.
    n. The Ham Radio Equipment in the bunker needs some dust covers or enclosures to keep the dust out of the equipment. Need dimensions of the equipment to sew tarps or by plastic covers online.
    o. Myron secured a Dantron MLA2500 2KW Amp and Yaesu FT736 donations for the site or sale.
    p. Need a program to combine logs for position and time and signal strength from the dish instrumentation.
    q. Need to modify the Trailer heater with sheet metal or plastic covers to provide safety and the bracket needs to be reinstalled. Need 4 2 ½ inch drywall screws to hold the heater bracket to the wall. Bob has this done and only needs to reinstall it. Complete: Bob finished it.
    r. Replace the rear window of the Comm. Trailer. Complete: Bill bought custom window from Kent Glass for $81 and installed it.
    s. Ray has 8 brackets to fix a railing around the scaffold for additional safety. Needs some help to install.
    t. Ettus Research B210 receiver from Don Latham. Rich has it working except for the GPS input. Will work at the site with the GPS. Don says there is a 10MHz source in the electronics he brought down. Ray gave Rich a 10MHz ref source to implement. Rich will need to make an internal modification to convert the 10MHz clock to external.
    u. Retrieve Key for Battery Box from Ed Corn. Bill called Ed and he doesn’t have it. We can replace the lock. Myron will purchase to more Combination locks.
    v. Clean up the DC Bus on the Comm./Operations trailer wall. w. Find the perfect focal point and phase center of the dish. See: Ruze formula. Could we characterize the dish surface for problems and accuracy to determine the loss from damage and weathering? Or, could devise measurement and reference system so we always place the feed in the exact phase center? Ray has a measurement method to find the exact focal point of the dish to phase center the feeds.
    x. Ground the feed to the pedestal ground for lightning and static build up mitigation.
    y. Grounding bulkhead of the trailer. Discussion about lightning mitigation of the site.
    z. Fix old website to link to new one. Call Wayne Green and see who owns it or if he can fix
    it.
    aa. Facebook page link to new website.
    bb. KRCC has a 3.8 Comtech industrial dish that we can get. Dish is good to 12GHz. Need to get a work party to remove and reinstall. Ray and Rich had discussed setting this up as a second dish that could be a training and remoting dish at the site.
    cc. Feeds: Steve’s 1420Feeds for SETI work. Ray will remove the mount for Steve and then when he’s done will put up his 1420 feed for a period and then the 1296 feed again.
  22. Miscellaneous discussion on various topics, see the Zoom recording.
    a. Gary suggested analogy from his museum docent work experience, “When we had visitors at the museum, I would pay attention to what caught their interests and imaginations, and I would try to engage and build from those interests. That enabled them to genuinely feel ownership, and to continue to pursue what interested them, together with all the new things they were learning. And there was natural mutual respect. We can engage our members, especially our new members in a similar way too.” Gary invited our new members to share what was interesting them:
    i. Dan is interested in collecting multiple measurements of the same pulsars
    and do some additional data analysis to capture their differences over time.
    ii. Jim White is interesting in SETI and EME. He comes from the original
    Boulder/Longmont group. Also interested in the new radio mode Q65 for
    tropospheric scatter work on 6 meters for very long distance low power and
    low data rate comm. We could effectively do frequencies above 432MHz.
    Also, Ionospheric sounding work reflecting from Ionosphere to determine
    the strength of the reflection and the timing of the layer change. May need
    to post RF Power limit signs at the site.
    iii. Don mentioned WSPR in which you transmit an autonomous coded
    message and gives signal report to the website from multiple locations.
    Only uses 100MWatt XMTR.
    iv. Rich, Solar radiometer receiver, from Rodney Howe, measures solar flux
    units to measure the number of sunspots. We could be the US site for this.
    Runs on a Python program.
    v. Goal from this year is to do calibrated measurements. Need to do real
    absolute value measurements. We need to calibrate our equipment for
    pointing and signal strength. Don gave us a lock in amplifier that takes data
    from the Dicke switch to get an absolute measurement.
    vi. Ray wants to build a broad band downconverter at the feed to reduce the
    coax loss of the 200 Ft. feedline. At higher frequencies we will need this. IF
    frequency could be in the 200-300MHz range.
    vii. Dual polarization at the feed would improve sensitivity and capture.
    viii. University outreach programs for Educational opportunities and funding.ix. Ray’s feed has dual polarizations on the feeds s we could run dual lines to the receiver and improve the sensitivity.
    x. FRB capture and research.
    xi. How could we respond to Astronomical events like a supernova? If we had
    a plan, we might be able to capture some data.
    xii. Papers for the science meetings. Need some astronomy presentations.
    b. This weekend Saturday the 24th Ray is planning a work trip. We still need to coordinate the trips as work trips and observation trips.
    c. Rich will coordinate the Feed schedule and Observation schedule.
    d. Bill will continue to help coordinate the work trip schedule.
    End of Meeting. See you next week at the science meeting

March 2021 DSES Engineering and Ops Meeting

2021-3-08 DSES Engineering and Ops Meeting Notes:                                                    by Bill Miller

We had 19 participants in the virtual engineering meeting today:  Thanks everyone for joining.

Participants: Myron Babcock,  Glenn Davis, Dr. Richard Russel, Gary Agranat, Dan Layne, Bob Haggart,  Floyd Glick, Ted Cline,  Jonathon Ayers, Bob Sayers, Phil Coker, Ray Uberecken, Don Latham, Don Savage, Jason Fazio, Dan Layne, Michael Nameika, Edward Currie, Bill Miller

See the Zoom Meeting Video at:  Topic: DSES Engineering and Ops Meeting

Start Time : March 8, 2021 05:30 PM

Meeting Recording: https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/l0GCX7TOgGgV_n3PmbRoQAnhr8vwR3xsQdBpo3lr6yj0l0ucsz6IbJDWn_Z45aZO.Ss4jjTkK7xGK4LBu?startTime=1615249952000

See the Zoom Meeting Chat at:  https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/sdownload/2elha-Q4036MY2M1oScm7Po25AUGFDpa3GeWd9tXZzkf_XwPH-eGYTt0oBjl7Fi4WaX6fioS2MT-0BNI.g29uN2jJhHJoehg5

Agenda and notes.

  1. Check In
  2. Note on Zoom: Per new security guidelines, you cannot change this setting. Please contact your account admin for more information.  Require that all meetings are secured with one security option. Require that all meetings are secured with one of the following security options: a passcode, Waiting Room, or “Only authenticated users can join meetings”. If no security option is enabled, Zoom will secure all meetings with Waiting Room. Learn more
  3. Membership Dues are now due for 2021.  Please submit check or pay pal payment to Myron or on the link in the website. 
  4. If you order on Amazon use the Smile option for Deep Space Exploration Society and we get a rebate.  Gary will post a procedure form Myron on how to do this.
  5. Myron’s Treasures report: Ck 2469.79  Sav 5742.33  Dues for 3 renewing members outstanding.  Website DSES.Science, will auto renew.  UPS mailbox is $135/year. Power is nominal $60-$85.
  6. Photographers Don Savage and Jason Fazio would like to do a Wednesday night photography session on site this week.  Is anyone planning a trip?  Good weather until Thursday PM, then bad weather thru the weekend.  Don will teach any member who wants to come out how to do this nighttime and time lapse photography.
  7. BOD Election.  Where are we with returned ballots?  Need to do one final call and close out election.
    • We will elect or retain 3 seats turning over in 2021.  These seats are  Dave Molter at Large, Floyd Glick- Secretary,  Bill Miller – President,
  8. So far, we have these nominations.
    • Ray Uberecken from Myron. Bill seconded that nomination, 
    • Don Latham nominated by Ray Uberecken and Bill seconded
    • Floyd Glick self-nominated and Bill seconded.
    • Bill Miller self-nominated and Myron seconded.
  9. In keeping with the Bylaws schedule changes voted by the board in 2019 the rough schedule is  as follows;  hold nominations open we will need to modify these dates by the delay. 
    • Open nominations now, January 15th, and close in 20 days, on February 4th.
    • Released the ballot to the members by February 24th.
    • Hold board election in the following 10 days.
    • Decided to send one final notice to the membership and then close the balloting by March 12th.
    • The 4 BOD members not up for election shall count the ballots and make results known to the membership by March 17th.
    • We are a little behind on that schedule but want to give members a chance to vote.
    • Schedule the virtual “all-member annual meeting” in mid to late  March and in that meeting the Board votes for or assigns officers from the elected BOD.  Although we would like to have an in person meeting, because of the Covid-19 and our responsibility to keep our members safe, the all-members meeting will be scheduled and held virtually.
  10. We need to finish and post the new bylaws changes related to the BOD election schedule that was approved last year to our website. Bill sent the Ver 3.1 Bylaws markup to Gary and Floyd for review, incorporation and posting.
  11. April 3rd is  the SARA western conference with papers already submitted.  Deadline for papers for the August conference is the first of June.  The annual SARA conference is Saturday, July 31 to Sun Aug 1 and will be held virtually.  See radio-astronomy.org Pay $25 attending member fee to SARA and attend.
  12. DSES Aug. Open House: Plan for on-site open house in August but will watch the CDC for guidance on the Corona Virus guidelines and try to decide in June.
  13. The last pulsar trip was not too successful. Next pulsar trip?
    1. Need a long dwell time of 4 hr. per pulsar that we haven’t already captured.
    1. Have 13 of the easy ones.
    1. Could do this weekend but weather may be a problem.
  14. Do a moon bounce and EME distance measurement weekend at 1296MHz.  Look for a Moon view window.  Gary says, regarding trying an EME ranging test, on the weekend from next Mar 21 the Moon will be at first quarter.  So, the Moon will be up from about noon to midnight that weekend.
  15. We have 1420, 1296 and 408 MHz feed capability. 
  16. Skip’s 1420 SETI observation is in May and requires Steve’s 1420 Feed.
  17. Compare Scope in a Box Receiver and other receiver tests between now and the open house. Maybe do a runoff of receivers at the open house?  This would be a great Science fair project for a high school student with hooking up and affordable SDR to the big dish and getting actual data.
  18. The 2020 Virtual DSES Open House Presentation https://www.dropbox.com/s/zxpzj879iz7mt77/2020%20DSES%20Virtual%20Open%20House.mp4?dl=0
    1. Bill gave the presentation to the Front Range 6 Meter group https://groups.io/g/FrontRange6Meter last month, recorded and posted it to our site.
    1. Everett Curry, W6ABM Assistant Section Manager/Oregon ARRL, asked to present the recorded presentation to the General Interest Amateur Radio Club in North East Oregon Thursday, Feb 18th
    1. The Artic Armature Radio Group of which Myron is a member asked for a live presentation of  the Open House on Friday, March 12th.
    1. The Utah DX Amateur group would like the presentation on Wednesday March 17th.
  19.  The 1296MHz feed is now changed out to the 408MHz feed for continuing pulsar work.
    1. Need to learn how to use the B210 receiver. Rich has it set up as best as possible.  Would like to have a faster computer to handle the throughput.
    1. Need more dwell time.
    1. Need a 10MHz reference source for B210.
  20. See the Feed Change Schedule on the main website page.  This may need updating.
    1. 4GHz feed for aiming.
    1. 1420Mhz is on the table
  21. The HughesNet dish for internet service may be a dry hole. Ray and Rich had called the service tech to the site, but he showed up at Ray’s residence, so it didn’t get fixed.  We need to look for other alternative Internet providers Myron has started to investigate this.
  22. Don checked on Musk’s Starlink internet connection which is in beta testing and as yet sporadic connectivity.  It costs $500 for a ground station and $99/month for a beta test setup. Too expensive for us.
  23. Need internet for SuperSids and Radio Jove, Magnetometer, Security System, Power monitors, etc.
  24. Rich’s projects and presentations:
    • Call from Jason Outenreath who is a  documentary film maker that would like to do a film on radio astronomy.
    • Editor for the SARA journal.
    • 9 Ft dish in Rich’s yard generated a H1 full sky survey over the last year for H1 mapping.
  25. Jon Ayers discussion on the data reduction and method for reducing and using the H1 data from Rich’s setup. 
  26. Discussion on the Dicke-Switch
  27. Glenn Davis system 1 status
    • Mid to late April scan SW and field of view SW 
    • Phil Gage. Commanding and GUI interface and field of view
    • Lewis Putman working on Python interface for integration and to log the data off the SDR.
    • Glenn working SW interface to connect the system across the network
    • Phil developed a Geo Pointing SW that points to GeoSync satellites for mount calibration.  The scan pattern will hunt the field and log the output of the receiver and make a correction offset.
  28. Jon Ayers – Can you send a dual frequency beacon that can be used for range finding on the moon.  Like a frequency phase comparison range finder.
  29. Bob Haggart has the Radio Jove Dipoles ready to put up back.  Ray wants to us his Flex 1500 in the 54MHz band  and have it on
  30. Ted asks about the H1 data from the 9 Ft dish.  The data needs to be processed.  The Data off the receiver is raw signal strength and normalized and is not square law or power. Ted is ready to plot processed data.  Ted will post on drop box.
  31. Dan Layne using Gaussian fit to analyze the pulsar data.  SARA has data on Skynet on Greenbank 20 meter dish and the data.  Should look at that data from Greenbank.  We should learn and make use of the data sets from our national radio observatories to go deeper.   Note that EdX Radio Astronomy course starts March 14  https://www.edx.org/course/radio-sky-1  if you are interested.
  32. Things to  do
    • Check clean out and fix the Sump Pumps in the underground before spring rains flood the bunker. (Bill talked to Dave Molter and He said they had never been completely mucked out as far as he knew.) need to muck them out before spring rains.  Don suggested that we get a septic tank cleaner to come out and pump out the sumps.  He would even pay for it.
    • Cut off the 5 band vertical mounting pole and move the vertical base to ground level and reattach and add more radials and bury them for protection.
    • Repair the dish edge damage.
    • Clean out the tower and the pedestal base. Too much junk and clutter are accumulating there.
    • Align Ray’s HughesNet Satellite internet dish. Call HughesNet for reprogramming and support.  Find internet provider alternative. Couldn’t get DISH out to reset the microbeam position.  Bill asked the group if someone would donate a hot spot modem for a period of time and DSES will reimburse the plan cost.
    • Need to remove Tumble weeds have piled up in the ramp.  Does anyone have a small yard waste chipper/shredder we could try?  Bob Sayers has one at his cabin site that he will lend.   We can try it out as a way of quickly dispensing the tumble weeds.
    • Continue to look for more, higher (8 Ft) chain link fence to mitigate the tumble weeds in the ramp.
    • Clean the silt out of the Underground from the flooding damage.  Need a pass through vacuum with a long exit hose.
    • Nails on Road.  Several of Ray’s friends came out on the 10/3 trip and used metal detectors and magnets to clear the site of nail and metal on the road.  We’ve all had flat tires and need to continue to clear the road and site of debris as many of us have had tire damage.  Bill bought a new magnet roller and left it in the Comm. Trailer.  Please walk it up and down the road once whenever you’re on site.
    • Take down the Beam on the tip over tower and align the 3 elements on the  Yagi and re-enforce the element attachment on the beam with bolts.
    • The Ham Radio Equipment in the bunker needs some dust covers or enclosures to keep the dust out of the equipment.  Need dimensions of the equipment to sew tarps or by plastic covers online.
    • Need a program to combine logs for position and time and signal strength.
    • Need to modify the heater with sheet metal or plastic covers to provide safety  and the bracket needs to be reinstalled. Need 4  2 ½ inch drywall screws to hold the heater bracket to the wall.  Bob has this done and only needs to reinstall it.
    • Replace the rear window of the Comm. Trailer.  Complete: Bill bought custom window from Kent Glass for $81 and installed it.
    • Ray has 8 brackets to fix a railing around the scaffold for additional safety.  Needs some help to install.
    • Ettus Research B210 receiver from Don Latham. Rich has it working except for the GPS input.  Will work at  the site with the GPS.  Don says there is a 10MHz source in the electronics he brought down.
    • Retrieve Key for Battery Box from Ed Corn.
    • Clean up the DC Bus on the Comm./Operations trailer wall.
    • Find the perfect focal point and phase center of the dish. See: Ruze formula. Could we characterize the dish surface for problems and accuracy to determine the loss from damage and weathering. Or, could devise  measurement and reference system so we always place the feed in the exact phase center?
    • Ground the feed to the pedestal ground for lightning and static build up mitigation.
    • Fix old website to link to new one.
    • Facebook page link to new website.
  33. Miscellaneous discussion on various topics, see the Zoom recording.

A PDF copy of this meeting’s agenda is here: http://dses.science/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/2021-3-08-DSES-Engineering-and-Ops-Meeting.pdf

February 2021 DSES Engineering and Ops Meeting – Minutes and Video

Welcome to the February 2021 DSES Engineering and Ops Meeting

2021-2-08 DSES Engineering and Ops Meeting Notes:                                                    by Bill Miller

We had 16 participants in the virtual engineering meeting today:  Thanks everyone for joining.

Participants: Myron Babcock,  Glenn Davis, Jerry Espada, Dr. Richard Russel, Gary Agranat, Dan Layne, Bob Haggart,  Floyd Glick, Phillip Gage, Ted Cline,  Jonathon Ayers, Bob Sayers, Phil Coker, Ray Uberecken, Don Latham, Bill Miller

See the Zoom Meeting Video at:  Topic: DSES Engineering and Ops Meeting

Start Time : Feb 8, 2021 05:30 PM

Meeting Recording:

https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/sx1UdhzZEdMfq5k5vnjvTTTFt36VEptQcOj7K_edCM6YvzuhpdX-R_F-Bilyerrh.mPzKtAnKn__fnJkB

See the Zoom Meeting Chat at:  https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/sdownload/kY_gXTy5O0ogjIsRjH1elZFw2rkc9NmfVNxPEiXiyebkYrni7ugAMBTq_f8CjMxkzNNE1fx6Ek3LezqY.e46qIxQNO41we6rh (This will send a text file to your Download Folder.)

Agenda and notes;

  1. Check In
  2. Membership Dues are now due for 2021.  Please submit check or pay pal payment to Myron or on the link in the website.  We started 2020 with 62 members and ended  with 52 members. Several members that we normally see at the open house and renew dues then did not do so this year because we did not hold the open house.  Myron has tried to contact them but have not heard anything back yet. 
  3. Latest Treasures Report from Myron Babcock.  The current checking is $2579.20  Savings Is:  $5742.29, Jan 978.25 income and $471.73 expenses. Bob Haggart was reimbursed $360.25,  Electric bill $83.77.
  4. If you order on Amazon use the Smile option for Deep Space Exploration Society and we get a rebate.  Gary will post a procedure form Myron on how to do this. Update: the URL for the Amazon Smiles link is now at the bottom of the DSES homepage after the PayPal link. Use the URL: https://smile.amazon.com/. The site will then guide you. Select “The Deep Space Exploration Society” as the non-profit organization/charity.
  5. Discussion on Phishing EMAIL.  Getting a lot of 1 liner emails.  Don’t open the attachments!
  6. Photographer, Marc Slover, Road Trip Ventures visited the site with Dan Lane, Ray Uberecken and Rich Russel on Jan 23 and took some more time lapse videos while the dish was chasing and tracking pulsars. https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=HLrpsVmBchE&feature=youtu.be
  7. Marc’s Videos from Previous trip
  8. BOD Election.  Need to Nominate 3 BOD members.
    • We elected 4 BOD positions in 2020.  Myron Babcock – Treasurer and  Gary Agranat – Vice President were retained.  Steve Plock – At large, and  Dr. Richard Russel-At large were replaced by Bob Haggart and Bob Sayers. 
    • We will elect or retain 3 seats turning over in 2021.  These are  Dave Molter at Large, Floyd Glick- Secretary,  Bill Miller – President,
  9. So far, we have these nominations.
    • We have received only one nomination for BOD by Email for Ray Uberecken from Myron. Bill Seconded that nomination, 
    • Floyd Glick self-nominated in this meeting and Bill seconded.
    • Ray nominated Don Latham and Bill seconded. 
    • That is Three but to have a little competition we would like to have more and will hold nominations open for a few more days.
  10. In keeping with the Bylaws schedule changes voted by the board in 2019 the rough schedule is  as follows,  To hold nominations open we will need to modify these dates by the delay.
    • Open nominations now, January 15th, and close in 20 days, on February 4th.
    • Release the ballot to the members by February 9th.
    • Hold board election in the following 10 days, completing Feb 20th.
    • The 4 BOD members not up for election shall count the ballots and make results known to the membership by Feb 26th.
    • Schedule the “all-member annual meeting” in early March and in that meeting the Board votes for or assigns officers from the elected BOD.  Although we would like to have an in person meeting, because of the Covid-19 and our responsibility to keep our members safe, the all-members meeting will be scheduled and held virtually.
  11. We need to finish and post the new bylaws changes related to the BOD election schedule that was approved last year to our website. Bill sent the Ver 3.1 Bylaws markup to Gary and Floyd for review, incorporation and posting.
  12. April 3rd is  the SARA western conference with papers already submitted.  Deadline for papers for the August conference is the first of June. 
  13. The SARA Drake’s lounge is on Feb. 21st at Noon.  SARA members should be automatically invited.
  14. Rich wrote a paper for the spring SARA conference. Check out Rich’s SARA paper on “An Arduino Controller for the Yaesu G5500D mount”.
  15. Rich is doing a MAX2870 RF signal generator paper for SARA and will post.  The unit has  a frequency range of 23.5MHz to 6GHz.
  16. Last Pulsar trip was not too successful.  Had some issues of the tracking SW driving into the electrical limit switches.   One failure was caused by a power glitch. The second failure was unplugging the Ethernet Switch and losing communication. Resetting the power, limit switches and manually driving the dish corrected the error but when moving the dish, you should always keep an eye on it with the CCTV monitor or out the window.
  17. To get beyond the 13 pulsars captured so far and find fainter ones, we will need greater dwell times and more bandwidth in the receiver.
  18. Bill to do a DSES Virtual Open House presentation to the Front Range 6 Meter Group on Wednesday Feb. 10th at 7PM.  This was completed and the recording will be linked on the website.   This picked up a couple of new members, Jim White who was part of the original Table Mountain DSES and Paul Sobon the president of the Front Range 6 Meter group.
  19. Late breaking news is that Everett Curry, W6ABM Assistant Section Manager/Oregon ARRL. Would like to present the presentation to the General Interest Amateur Radio Club in North East Oregon Thursday, Feb 18th.
  20. The 1296MHz feed is now changed out to the 408MHz feed for continuing pulsar work.
    • Need to learn how to use the B210 receiver.
    • Need more dwell time.
    • Need a 10MHz reference source for B210.
  21. See the Feed change schedule on the main website page this needs updating.
  22. The HughesNet dish for internet service may be a dry hole. Ray and Rich had called the service tech to the site, but he showed up at Rays residence, so it didn’t get fixed.  We need to look for other alternative Internet providers Myron has started to investigate this.
  23. Need internet for SuperSids and Radio Jove, Magnetometer, Security System, Power monitors, etc.
  24. Things to  do
    • Check clean out and fix the Sump Pumps in the underground before spring rains flood the bunker.
    • Cut off the 5 band vertical mounting pole and move the vertical base to ground level and reattach and add more radials and bury them for protection.
    • Repair the dish edge damage.
    • Clean out the tower and the pedestal base.
    • Align Ray’s HughesNet Satellite internet dish. Call HughesNet for reprogramming and support.  Find internet provider alternative.
    • Need to remove Tumble weeds have piled up in the ramp.
    • Continue to look for more, higher (8 Ft) chain link fence to mitigate.
    • Clean the silt out of the Underground from the flooding damage.
    • Nails on Road.  Several of Ray’s friends came out on the 10/3 trip and used metal detectors and magnets to clear the site of nail and metal on the road.  We’ve all had flat tires and need to continue to clear the road and site of debris as many of us have had tire damage.  Bill bought a new magnet roller and left it in the Comm. Trailer.  Please walk it up and down the road once whenever you’re on site.
    • Align the 3 element Yagi and re-enforce.
    • The Ham Radio Equipment in the bunker needs some dust covers or enclosures to keep the dust out of the equipment. 
    • Need a program to combine logs for position and time and signal strength.
    • Need to modify the heater with sheet metal or plastic covers to provide safety  and the bracket needs to be reinstalled. Need 4  2 ½ inch drywall screws to hold the heater bracket to the wall.
    • Replace the rear window of the Comm. Trailer.  Complete: Bill bought custom window from Kent Glass for $81 and installed it.
    • Ray has 8 brackets to fix a railing around the scaffold for additional safety.
    • Ettus Research B210 receiver from Don Latham. Rich has it working except for the GPS input.  Will work at  the site with the GPS.  Don says there is a 10MHz source in the electronics he brought down.
    • Retrieve Key for Battery Box from Ed Corn.
    • Clean up the DC Bus on the Comm. trailer wall.
    • Find the perfect focal point and phase center of the dish. See: Ruze formula. Could we characterize the dish surface for problems and accuracy to determine the loss from damage and weathering. Or, could devise  measurement and reference system so we always place the feed in the exact phase center?
    • Ground the feed to the pedestal ground for lightning and static build up mitigation.
    • Fix old website to link to new one.
    • Facebook page link to new website.
  25. Miscellaneous discussion on various topics, see the Zoom recording.

DSES Science Meeting Nov 23, 2020

Welcome to the DSES Science meeting 11/23/2020

2020-11-23 DSES Science Meeting Notes, by Bill Miller

We had 16 participants in the virtual science meeting today:  Thanks everyone for joining.

Participants: Dr. Rich Russel,  Ray Uberecken, Lewis Putman, Bob Haggart, Don Latham, Floyd Glick, Gary Agranat, Glenn Davis, Jay Wilson, Jon Ayers, Lauren Libby, Myron Babcock, Robert Sayers, Ted Cline. Jerry Espada, Bill Miller

Agenda and notes;

Also see the Zoom Video Recording for more detail:

https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/3mwT_OSBrUV6KMi8GTTrcFaiG77Jmuuke72Jk1zmmUDpSrO2nAY3jFx49_muRz5I.7GK8PFSy5Vs-kL4R?startTime=1606177717000

Agenda and notes:

  1. Myron’s Treasure’s Report Checking $1774.28. Savings $5742.15. We have 49 paid members.
  2. Science Fair: 
    • Bill spoke with Carol Bach the coordinator,  she replied, “The Pikes Peak Regional Science and Engineering Fair will be held virtually on February 20, 2021.  We are hoping that the Deep Space Exploration Society will again sponsor a special award or awards at the fair.  In addition, we are hoping you or another member of your group will consider being a special awards judge.  We will send you a code to unlock a showcase with digital displays that you can view.  Virtual judging will take place between February 18-20, 2021.”
    • Bill to send board DSES Special awards criteria for approval.
    • “Please respond by December 2, 2020 to this email and confirm that your organization is planning to participate. Also, please let us know the name and contact email for future communications.”
  3. Planet Walk:
    • Bill will write an endorsement letter and have the DSES Board modify and approve for Planet Walk Colorado Springs. See https://www.planetwalkcs.org/
  4. Arecibo Failure:
    • See Bob Haggard’s repost on the Arecibo Radio Telescope status.
  5. Rich presented the DSES Science part of the Meeting:  See all notes in the DSES Science Meeting Power Point. http://dses.science/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/DSES-Science-Meeting-11-23-20.pdf
  6. Ray
    • Problem with the 1296 feed last trip.  Took down the Feed amplifier and found that the unit was stuck in the transmit configuration again due to a failed FET in the Relay driver.  Fixed this and added more gate protection circuitry to solve the problem. 
    • Also had a bad diode and a bad cable that had to be corrected.
    • The FT-736R Keyer connection failed on last trip but Ray fixed it.
    • Tried CW EME but couldn’t hear the echo.
    • Did receive Rays Home Based beacon bounced off Pikes Peak and verified pointing so the receiver chain is working.
  7. Gary Underground K0PRT  bunker station summary report.
    • FT8,  PSK Reporter website showed our station was received on 40 meters during afternoon in CA and TX.
    • 15M operation was hot
    • Our rare grid square (DM88) attracted many Japanese stations
    • Vertical working well on 15 and 40 meters. 10 meters was tried and at least had good SWR, but band was dead.
    • Yagi was also working well to Japan
    • PSK reporter showed good coverage on 15 meters all around the Pacific Rim.
    • See more in Rich’s slides above
  8. Glenn says that Phil is working on an elevation tracking update that will need some onsite testing when ready.
  9. Much discussion about the SDR receivers, GNU SW and the computer power needed to run them.  See the meeting recording for too much detail to capture here.

DSES Science Meeting, August 24, 2020

These are the slides from our online Science meeting, on August 24, 2020. The meeting was hosted by our DSES Science Lead, Rich Russel,

http://dses.science/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/DSES-Science-Meeting-8-24-20.pdf

You can watch the video of our meeting:

https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/x_1UIpbw2DNLQ8_q4xvyY4MhD4f1T6a81igfrqAPmk86FwFaBdR2MHJzIJSeeaTR?startTime=1598312047000

2020 Society of Amateur Radio Astronomers Eastern Conference Videos

Videos of all of the presentations at the 2020 Society of Amateur Radio Astronomers Eastern Conference are now available online at the SARA website. The conference was held on August 1 & 2, 2020.

The SARA page is organized so that you can reach each presentation individually. The videos are carried on YouTube.

https://www.radio-astronomy.org/node/331

Nominally the Eastern Conference is held each year at the Green Bank Observatory in West Virginia. This year the conference was carried completely online using Zoom. The coordinator for this conference was our own DSES Science Lead, Richard Russel. Over 93 SARA members participated, including several DSES members. DSES members Ray Uberecken, Skip Crilly, and Rich Russel gave talk presentations. Rich also was elected as Vice President of SARA.

2020-07-27 DSES Science Meeting Notes

Welcome to the July DSES Science meeting 7/27/2020

2020-07-27 DSES Science Meeting Notes:                                                            by Bill Miller

We had 14 participants in the virtual science meeting today:  Thanks everyone for joining.

Participants: Dr. Rich Russel,  Ray Uberecken, Ted Cline, Jonathan Ayers, Ed Corn, Gary Agranat, Glenn Davis, Jim Madsen, Bob Haggart, Jon Richardson, Dave Schick, Don Latham, Tony Bigbee, Bill Miller

Agenda and notes; See the Zoom Recording for more detail: https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/u50vfrXt12hJbKf341OCGbJmA8fIaaa80ylL-

  1. Discussion of needed policy on site installs and changes 
    1. We have had a number of site conflicts of late.  These have resulted in a lot of waisted installation and observation time and frustration as well as hard feelings between members and damage to the dish, and operations center.
    2. General Proposal:  I have often said that if you see something that needs improvement and you have the skill to do it, take it on and just do it.  We need to qualify that with a little more process. In order to improve the site, equipment and observation capability and move the organization forward we often need to make changes.  The Engineering meeting is where we coordinate and plan for these changes.  If not previously planned and you are on site and need to make a change to a significant system you must call the person who installed or last modified that system and discuss it with them prior to removing, modifying or replacing it. 
    3. Use the Engineering Meeting for what it was intended.
    4. Be considerate and helpful to each other.
    5. Communication and coordination of equipment changes should not be a problem and further conflicts will have to be dealt with.
    6. We will need to repair the damage.
    7. We all have a common goal to improve the facility and equipment.  Let’s not have these issues.  When in doubt, Ask.
  2. We will potentially have photographers on site Thursday or Saturday for comet picture opportunity.  Would like to have a member on site to give access and keep the photographers out of trouble. Any volunteers?
    1. Don Savage don.savage54 (at) gmail.com is coordinating 4 or 5 night sky photographers.
    2. We will have them sign a Liability Waver
  3. July-August Events:
    1. The SARA virtual Eastern Conference will be held on Saturday and Sunday the 1st and 2nd of August.   See the SARA web site for info and payment.
    2. Comet C/2020 F3 (NEOWISE) is currently in the constellation of Ursa Major. The current Right Ascension is 11h 45m 40s and the Declination is +36° 12’ 10”
    3. Additional pulsar observations. Please post planned dates and attendance
    4. Additional SETI Observations. Please post planned dates and attendance.
    5. Open house is cancelled for CoVid19, but we may do a small member camp out if some members would be interested in that.
    6. We will also assemble a virtual Open House presentation for various usage such as public outreach, education, fundraising and general interest.
    7. The Perseids will peak on Aug 11-12. On these nights, the moon will be 47% full.
    8. The next dark sky moon phase is Aug 13th through Aug 21.
  4. Glenn gave an overview of what was done recently on the System 1 Automatic Tracking HW and SW.  New features include:
    1. Automatic Tracking
    2. RA and Dec track automatically
    3. Az/El position command
    4. Track Moon Command
    5. Stow command

Tracking stayed within the bore site during the whole 5 hr. evening session.

Need to do more training, Glenn and his wife will go to the site tomorrow and draw up a training presentation and checklist.

Needs:

  1.  Sun exclusion track but there is a pop up on the screen that you are in the sun exclusion area.
  2. It would be nice to have a Raster Scan capability to map Object Hi Emissions and to help pointing accuracy.
  3. Rich provided his presentation on Pulsar, Fast Radio Burst and other experiments and observation we can do.

5. Rich gave high praise and kudos to the System 1 team to get a very high quality tracking and control complete. Very clean system design and implementation from Glenn Davis, Lewis Putnam and Phil Gage.  Much praise.

Discussion/presentation on Pulsar and other science topics from Dr. Richard Russel

See the attached presentation: http://dses.science/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/DSES-Science-Meeting-7-27-20.pdf

See the Zoom recording for more detail.

https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/u50vfrXt12hJbKf341OCGbJmA8fIaaa80ylL-aUKzx2QbQXjO1w8ndJvEt-SL86-

2020-07-13 DSES Engineering and Ops Meeting Notes

Welcome to the July DSES Engineering and Ops meeting

2020-07-13 DSES Engineering and Ops Meeting Notes:                                                  by Bill Miller

We had x participants in the virtual engineering meeting today:  Thanks everyone for joining.

Participants: Dr. Rich Russel,  Wallace A. Ritchie (WU1Y, Deland, FL), Ray Uberecken, Ted Cline, Mike Otte, Tony Bigbee,  Bob Sayers, Jonathan Ayers, Fred Brandeberry, Ed Corn, Gary Agranat, Bob Haggart, Jon Richardson, Phil Gage, Don Latham, Bill Miller

Agenda and notes;

  1. Check In
  2. Latest Treasures Report from Myron Babcock.  The current checking is $1707.69;  Savings:  $5741.95.  
  3. Discussion of policy on site installs and changes.  Problems and conflicts.
    1. Communicate
    1. Engineering Meeting
    1. Discuss with Original Party
  4. Latest  observing trip summary
Deep Space Exploration Society 3rd pulsar observed on Saturday July 11, 2020
  • System 1 Status from Glenn Davis

Hi Bill,

I won’t be able to make it to this evening’s meeting; I have a late afternoon appointment. Anyway … I just wanted to give you some System 1 development status. Phil and I have completed software development for this version of the automatic tracking software. Phil has completed the software which allows the movement of the limit hardware. Lewis has completed integration of the automatic tracking hardware and has returned the hardware to me for some final testing (See Attached Photos). I’m currently testing the tracking software with the integrated hardware. I should have this finished by the end of the week. Lewis and my plans are to go down to Haswell sometime mid-week next week to check out the new hardware and software and to see if we can actually automatically track an object. We will be going down in separate cars and will be wearing masks when we’re working in the trailer. Our plans are to test the new system, then return the site to it’s original configuration. It should be exciting to see if the new System 1 hardware/software works …

Glenn

Last site work trip summary.

http://dses.science/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Plishner-site-trip-summary-of-6-20-20.pdf

Zoom Meeting Recording: Start Time : Jul 13, 2020 05:30 PM  My apologies for missing the first 10 minutes of the recording on Zoom.  The above notes cover that missing recording

https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/utFlfpXq10ZOXtbE-BzYHYUoAtzqX6a8gSgZqPBczsIYGf1yxl1-OIHywlNVDlQ

Access Password: DSES_ENG_7/13/20

May 11, 2020 DSES Engineering and Operations Meeting Notes

by Bill Miller 5/11/2020

We had 17 participants in the virtual engineering meeting today:  Most ever! Thanks everyone for joining.

Participants: Dr. Rich Russel, Ray Uberecken, Myron Babcock, Ted Cline, Bob Sayers, Jonathan Ayers, Xander Duvall, Tony Bigbee, Ed Corn, Gary Agranat, Skip Crilly Don Latham, Glenn Davis, Floyd Glick, Matt Mathews, Bob Haggart, Bill Miller

Agenda and notes:

  1. Check in. How is everyone doing with the stay at home/safer at home situation.  Is anyone experienced or known someone experiencing the virus? Anything we can do for them?
    • We have had one core member contract and recover from the virus that we know of.
    • We cancelled in person meetings in March and went to virtual meetings to protect members.
  2. Myron’s Treasure’s update:
    • Checking $2440.40 
    • Savings $5741.85
    • Upcoming Insurance $290 to $310 
    • Board to approve reimburse to Steve for New Mexico mileage to set up the Ettus pulsar receiver with Joe Martin.
    • Membership
      1. 30 Voting members including 5 lifers  and 12 nonvoting. Myron checking with others as yet unpaid.
  3. Pulsar detection congratulations to Team and further work from Rich Russel
    • On the attempt on Feb 15th,  the gains were set too high and saturating the Ettus Research SDR receiver. Need to tune this front end gain into proper range for the input of the SDR.
    • Last Week on May 2, B0329 +54 pulsar got it on the fourth try for a ½ hour run with manual tracking.
    • This week on May 9 , got the B0329 +54 pulsar on 420Mhz+/-5 Mhz. which is the  second brightest pulsar and tried three others and didn’t see them.  All the others were low in the horizon. Joe Martin took 12 hours to get one of them at his site but the DSES team didn’t get any of the others yet.
    • Would like to be able to do the Crab Nebula Pulsar.
  4. Additional engineering needed for pulsar work.
    • Automatic tracking
    • Intermittent a/b switches on the encoders is causing a problem. Rich wants to take them out. Bill says they are not inherently intermittent but dirty.  Ray said that exercising them solved the immediate problem but if taking them out will improve the process, Bill’s OKAY with that.
    • Pulsar software used is Presto. Scott Ransom in Charlottesville is author and Skip can connect you if having issues or feedback.
    • Tony sites “Murmur SW is a predictive program to help set up for Pulsar observation.
    • Ray added 20dB amp in the comm trailer.  Steve has a preamp with better noise figure that can be added at the feed.
    • Each pulsar will take a minimum of about an hour of collection time.
    • Steve and Paul Berge need to reset the electric azimuth drive stops so that the system will track the circumpolar pulsars continuously without wrapping back around. Currently can only go 15 degrees past north and need to be set up for 90 degrees from north.
    • Tropospheric observations need a different stop.
    • Ray says the pulsars observed lately are circumpolar, near the north star so need to be able to go to the 90 degree mark on either side.  Paul Berge could do the adjustment on the limit switches.
    • Manual tracking  is boring and automatic tracking would be better. 
  5. Ray: Feed work and change out capability
    • Ray has another 1420 MHz feed that we would like to try
    • Steve located his electronics box in the same spot where Ray was planning for his box so need to reconcile this positioning with Steve.
    • Ray has a 1296 MHz feed available to do moon bounce and tropospheric scatter work.
    • Ray has installed rotating swivel joints in the coax.
    • The coaxes pull up through the center when moving the elevation to the horizon.  Currently the coax swivels are only a few feet below the tube and one broke when moving the elevation to 90 degrees so Ray will mitigate that with some extra flexible coax.
    • Skip asks about the bandwidth of the 1420 MHz feed.  Skip used 1390 – 1460 Mhz and this is the same specification  of the preamp that Ray used.
  6. SETI project with Skip. 
    • Skip will not be able to go to Greenbank with travel restrictions but will be able to do observation from his New Hampshire observatory. 
    • Skip’s dish is running 24/7 with 6 computers. Doing a lot of post processing of the data he is collecting.
    • Skip says there is no real urgency for simultaneous observations because of this and not to risk anything for his sake at this time.
  7. Tracking System 1 update;
    • System 1. Lewis Putman completed the HW design and will connect with Jones plug in the back of the rack. 
    • The control SW is updated, and Glenn will do some testing and give it to Lewis.
    • Glenn will set up a design review with Lewis, Dave, Bill and Ray to discuss the electrical interface plans.
  8. Summer site work?
    • Bunker bunk room.
    • AC up to feed point needs conduit
    • Water heater in the
    • Two 30 Amp 240 volt outlets in generator shed.
    • Top door for the doghouse. Need steel 32 inch door.
  9. Ham radio
    • Looks good
    • Need some cross bolts in the Yagi beam.
    • Addition antennas?
  10. Eastern SARA August Conference, August 2-5, 2020 Green Bank Observatory WV.
  11. Open House? 
    • Need to wait till late June for a decision on announcement due to uncertainty of the virus situation.
    • Gary and Bill will check for best calendar dates considering the Moon, other events and Ham activities.

Open Floor

  1. Bob Haggart, 
    • The back door of the trailer opened up a little crack and allowed the dirt to blow in.
    • Sealed up the AC units and other openings but must clean out the dirt.
    • The back air conditioner needs replacing. Bill has one he will donate.
    • The Heater was removed to make room for the back workbench
    • Bob working on the battery room as a storage room.  The tower inverter power is running off the railroad batteries in the comm. trailer so Bill doesn’t see any reason to replace the old wet cell batteries in the battery shack and we should recycle them.
  2. Gary Agranat
    • Gary has an upcoming MIT class reunion that has been moved to a virtual reunion. 
    • He has been asked by the class committee to make a class presentation on the Plishner Observatory and what we are doing in a Ted talk format.
    • This will be a great networking and familiarization opportunity with the 1985 MIT class.

Bill recorded the meeting on Zoom. It is in two parts, due to a gap in Internet coverage:

  1. https://www.dropbox.com/sh/1ms0ngdjrrsehhk/AABn9w_NLjV8hEoB9VRas37_a/2020-05-11%20DSES%20Eng%20Meeting%20Zoom%20Part%201.mp4?dl=0
  2. https://www.dropbox.com/sh/1ms0ngdjrrsehhk/AADRvLawoJnZl4RlvW90N6Ora/2020-05-11%20DSES%20Eng%20Meeting%20Zoom%20Part%202.mp4?dl=0