Hi All interested in this topic: My friend Willie Koorts and I will , hopefully within the next week or so, give the address of our web site where you will able to download full details of how to make your own motorized satellite tracking system and provide all the software necessary as freeware. We are currently making some minor changes to the web page and once Willie is happy - he is the author of the critical piece of software, we will make the address available. To wet appetites in the meantime it uses a stepper motor on the azimuth axis and another on the elevation axis. I modified an old MOONWATCH apogee scope mount , and the setup is driven by a computer, running DOS, (Im currently using a 386 for the task as the computer demands are not critical). In the four months it has taken to develop the system I have tracked over 200 different satellites. In my case I am using a 2 inch aperture telephoto lens, working at f/2.8 and a field of about 1.8 by 1.4 degrees. To this lens is attached a low light level ccd surveillance camera ( with just the ccd chip and electronics). The telescope field of view is displayed on a computer monitor so you see everything that the telescope see's, and in the comfort of your armchair in a warm room. The telescope tracks the satellite so that the satellite appears in the centre of the screen- virtually stationary, whilst the stars pass by. Living in Cape Town with a very bright sky naked eye limit of about mag 4.5 I am able to visually see - on the monitor- satellites down to magnitude 7. The images seen are recorded on ordinary video tape and can be analysed later at leisure. There are lots of other features which I sure will interest many of you. The longest single track I have done so far has been about 30 minutes - I got bored with watching the same satellite ! Anyway we will make all the software available as freeware as our way of showing our appreciation for what others have put into this hobby. I can assure you we are in a hurry to make this available but we must first have everything 100%. So dont rush of yet to buy a telescope - you may have all the bits and pieces already - my first one was made from the parts of a pc printer - the electronics and stepper motors. Cheers Greg Roberts ----- Original Message ----- From: Bjoern Gimle <b_gimle@algonet.se> To: <SeeSat-L@blackadder.lmsal.com> Sent: Thursday, June 15, 2000 5:59 AM Subject: Re: Telescope for observing satellites > > > I am in the process of deciding upon which telescope to buy, and > > > would > > > like to get some feedback as to any advantages one might have in > > > attempting to view satellites. I read the VSOHP on telescopic > ... > I too would like to justify the purchase of a telescope. > I currently favour the ETX90 (or 125). I fear that the larger > models, including LX200 which I have tried, have too small fields > of view. The type you want depends on what you want to do: > > To view or videotape satellite shapes you want a small field, and > accurate tracking (LX200 leap-frog with stable scope while the > object passes - or jittering constant tracking?) > > To find objects that may be several minutes (or hours!) early or > late, you need constant computerized re-pointing, for it is very > difficult to memorize lots of reference positions. > > To be able to make more than one positional observation per pass, > you need computer control so you don't lose the object while > making notes, and preferably a computer recording of the > (approximate) position at the time of each observation. > > For small and/or distant satellites you need the larger models. > > > -- b_gimle@algonet.se (home) http://www.algonet.se/~b_gimle -- > -- SeeSat-L / Visual Satellite Observer Home Page found at -- > -- http://www2.satellite.eu.org/satintro.html -- > > > > ----------------------------------------------------------------- > Unsubscribe from SeeSat-L by sending a message with 'unsubscribe' > in the SUBJECT to SeeSat-L-request@lists.satellite.eu.org > http://www2.satellite.eu.org/seesat/seesatindex.html > ----------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe from SeeSat-L by sending a message with 'unsubscribe' in the SUBJECT to SeeSat-L-request@lists.satellite.eu.org http://www2.satellite.eu.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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