Posts Tagged ‘skars’
My first RAYNET event
October 7th, 2015 | 
Author: Sunday I took part in my first RAYNET event at the Walk for Parkinson's at Burghley House in Lincolnshire. This was a sponsored walk to raise money for Parkinson's UK a research and support charity working to help find a cure and improve life for those affected by Parkinson’s disease.
Starting at the Burghley House stately home, participants could chose to do either a gentle 3 mile stroll within the grounds or a more challenging 10-mile walk out of the park and through the Barnack Hills and Holes National Nature Reserve.
RAYNET's task was to provide communication support to the organisers with operators situated around the course at various marshalling points to pass messages and if necessary request assistance.
Earlier in the year there was a presentation about the work of RAYNET at the South Kesteven ARS by Jim Wheeldon (M0JHW) and Alan Clarke (M0NLR) after which I'd offered my services for future events, so when Jim called me and asked for some help I was happy to oblige.
My task was quite straightforward, simply manning one of the marshal points along the course directing the walkers and making sure they were happy and injury free, if not I was to call for assistance. Despite being under the weather for the last few days with a bad head cold and a painful sore throat I still turned out and really enjoyed helping.
It was nice to use my radio licence and equipment for something useful, spending a pleasant morning in the sunshine talking to the walkers and some local residents explaining all about amateur radio.
RAYNET was formed back in the 1950s following the East Coast floods to provide a way of organising the valuable resource that Amateur Radio is able to provide to the community. While it is called the Radio Amateurs’ Emergency Network the majority of its work nowadays is to provide support to community events, like the sponsored walk.
However it can still be called up to offer assistance at incidents such as the recent Shoreham Airshow plane crash. The South Sussex RAYNET group, assisted by members of South Kent RAYNET, were already providing communications support for the organisers and the user services at the airshow when the Hawker Hunter aircraft crashed into vehicles on the A27 during a flying display.
It was reported that following the crash the area was in lock down in four hours and it the demand on the local mobile networks by concerned spectators, residents and residents outstripped capacity making normal communication difficult. RAYNET operators were able to provide much needed support in the aftermath.
Starting at the Burghley House stately home, participants could chose to do either a gentle 3 mile stroll within the grounds or a more challenging 10-mile walk out of the park and through the Barnack Hills and Holes National Nature Reserve.
RAYNET's task was to provide communication support to the organisers with operators situated around the course at various marshalling points to pass messages and if necessary request assistance.
Earlier in the year there was a presentation about the work of RAYNET at the South Kesteven ARS by Jim Wheeldon (M0JHW) and Alan Clarke (M0NLR) after which I'd offered my services for future events, so when Jim called me and asked for some help I was happy to oblige.
My task was quite straightforward, simply manning one of the marshal points along the course directing the walkers and making sure they were happy and injury free, if not I was to call for assistance. Despite being under the weather for the last few days with a bad head cold and a painful sore throat I still turned out and really enjoyed helping.
It was nice to use my radio licence and equipment for something useful, spending a pleasant morning in the sunshine talking to the walkers and some local residents explaining all about amateur radio.
RAYNET was formed back in the 1950s following the East Coast floods to provide a way of organising the valuable resource that Amateur Radio is able to provide to the community. While it is called the Radio Amateurs’ Emergency Network the majority of its work nowadays is to provide support to community events, like the sponsored walk.
However it can still be called up to offer assistance at incidents such as the recent Shoreham Airshow plane crash. The South Sussex RAYNET group, assisted by members of South Kent RAYNET, were already providing communications support for the organisers and the user services at the airshow when the Hawker Hunter aircraft crashed into vehicles on the A27 during a flying display.
It was reported that following the crash the area was in lock down in four hours and it the demand on the local mobile networks by concerned spectators, residents and residents outstripped capacity making normal communication difficult. RAYNET operators were able to provide much needed support in the aftermath.
Hamfest Balloon – Some analysis
I contacted some local and national newspapers about the flight but with little response. The Register IT news website did put an article on http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/09/28/pigs_in_spaaaace
I checked out the telemetry statistics on http://habitat.habhub.org/stats/ and was impressed with the number of people who tracked (as can be seen in the pie chart below) I know that several interested parties have since visited the UKHAS wiki and have been asking questions on the IRC channel on how to do a flight and/or develop their own trackers. Naturally I have also been thinking about some possible future flights.
While the novelty of flying something into space, be it a toy pig or an egg is satisfying I would like to make any future flight serve some purpose, whether collecting more data or ideally doing some experiment with radio even if it within the constraints of the UK draconian regulations when operating in the air!
One set of data I did extract was the temperature profile during the flight. PINKY had two sensors, one internal to the Styrofoam box, the other external. PIGLET also had a temperature/pressure sensor but it was giving odd readings during the flight so have ignored that.
The graph shows internal/external temperature recorded by PINKY against altitude, there are two plots for each showing the ascent profile and the decent. The lowest temperature recorded by the external temperature was -49.5°C (-57.1°F) and the foam did a good job of insulating the internal electronics, though it drop below 0°C during the decent.
One thing I will do on the next flight (if it happens) is take a lot more photographs, using a 32GB memory card I could have held a lot more images. Also I will look at embedding the GPS coordinates (geotagging) into the image files.
I will also put on board a video camera, I did purchase a cheap dash cam type for £20 one off eBay for the Eggsplorer-1 but didn't use it because of sea-landing, I need to sort out powering it as the internal battery wouldn't last for the duration of the flight.
I have still to investigate the issues with the LoRa as to why it failed. This weekend Dave Akerman is flying three balloons in succession with LoRa tracker modules. They will be set up to work in a mesh, receiving and repeat each others telemetry. Sounds an interesting experiment, I will have to set my LoRa gateway back up and attempt to receive them.
Hamfest Balloon – Some analysis
I contacted some local and national newspapers about the flight but with little response. The Register IT news website did put an article on http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/09/28/pigs_in_spaaaace
I checked out the telemetry statistics on http://habitat.habhub.org/stats/ and was impressed with the number of people who tracked (as can be seen in the pie chart below) I know that several interested parties have since visited the UKHAS wiki and have been asking questions on the IRC channel on how to do a flight and/or develop their own trackers. Naturally I have also been thinking about some possible future flights.
While the novelty of flying something into space, be it a toy pig or an egg is satisfying I would like to make any future flight serve some purpose, whether collecting more data or ideally doing some experiment with radio even if it within the constraints of the UK draconian regulations when operating in the air!
One set of data I did extract was the temperature profile during the flight. PINKY had two sensors, one internal to the Styrofoam box, the other external. PIGLET also had a temperature/pressure sensor but it was giving odd readings during the flight so have ignored that.
The graph shows internal/external temperature recorded by PINKY against altitude, there are two plots for each showing the ascent profile and the decent. The lowest temperature recorded by the external temperature was -49.5°C (-57.1°F) and the foam did a good job of insulating the internal electronics, though it drop below 0°C during the decent.
One thing I will do on the next flight (if it happens) is take a lot more photographs, using a 32GB memory card I could have held a lot more images. Also I will look at embedding the GPS coordinates (geotagging) into the image files.
I will also put on board a video camera, I did purchase a cheap dash cam type for £20 one off eBay for the Eggsplorer-1 but didn't use it because of sea-landing, I need to sort out powering it as the internal battery wouldn't last for the duration of the flight.
I have still to investigate the issues with the LoRa as to why it failed. This weekend Dave Akerman is flying three balloons in succession with LoRa tracker modules. They will be set up to work in a mesh, receiving and repeat each others telemetry. Sounds an interesting experiment, I will have to set my LoRa gateway back up and attempt to receive them.
Hamfest HAB – Pre Launch Update
Not long now! Just three days left till the National Hamfest and hopefully the launch of my second high altitude balloon.
Balloon, parachute and helium have all been purchased and payloads have under gone final testing and have been put to one side ready for the flight which should hopefully be around 12pm on Friday 25th September.
The SSDV payload callsign PINKY will transmit on 434.575MHz USB RTTY 300 baud 880Hz shift ASCII-8 no parity 2 stop bits.
the backup telemetry tracker callsign PIGLET will transmit 434.150MHz USB RTTY 50 baud 380Hz shift ASCII-7 no parity 2 stop bits
They will transmit using the UKHAS telemetry protocol and can be tracked on tracker.habhub.org for information on how to receive and upload data to the tracking system visit the UKHAS wiki some information and useful links have been collated on the AMSAT-UK website
I was hoping to also transmit using the LoRa system, using the callsign PERKY. The transmitter had been successfully tested but a last minute gremlin has struck and it stopped working this weekend, I have been unable to locate the fault and suspect it is the actual module and with time being short have all but given up getting it working. If I do get it working it will be on 434.450MHz in Mode 1
I have already detailed the PIGLET payload in an earlier post. The PINKY/PERKY payload is constructed on strip board and was originally meant to to be a prototype, hence the rubbish layout. I had planned to build a better laid out version but the tight time scale, stresses and demands of work, commitments with the radio club not to mention nursing the wife as she recovers from a major operation scuppered that plan. Being pragmatic I decided it didn't need to be work of art to work! I have secured all the connections with hot glue and it has been drop tested several times.
"Pinky" pig will be the passenger on the day, donning his fetching headset. Getting him in the right position for the camera was tricky.
I am still waiting for the CAA approval, should hopefully get it soon. I have put in a request for both days of the Hamfest just in case, the latest prediction at predict.habhub.org shows if I get the fill right I might just escape a watery landing on Friday, however Saturday looks more promising at the moment - also the forecast for Friday at the moment also has strong gusty surface winds, which could make the launch problematic. I am still planning for Friday since conditions and predictions do change.
I and other members of South Kesteven ARS will be in attendance with a tracker station on the day, so please introduce yourself and perhaps join the club?
Please don't mention anything to do with other pigs in the news..
Balloon, parachute and helium have all been purchased and payloads have under gone final testing and have been put to one side ready for the flight which should hopefully be around 12pm on Friday 25th September.
The SSDV payload callsign PINKY will transmit on 434.575MHz USB RTTY 300 baud 880Hz shift ASCII-8 no parity 2 stop bits.
 |
| SSDV Test image |
They will transmit using the UKHAS telemetry protocol and can be tracked on tracker.habhub.org for information on how to receive and upload data to the tracking system visit the UKHAS wiki some information and useful links have been collated on the AMSAT-UK website
I was hoping to also transmit using the LoRa system, using the callsign PERKY. The transmitter had been successfully tested but a last minute gremlin has struck and it stopped working this weekend, I have been unable to locate the fault and suspect it is the actual module and with time being short have all but given up getting it working. If I do get it working it will be on 434.450MHz in Mode 1
 |
| PERKY seen working on SDR |
 |
| PINKY & PERKY tracker |
"Pinky" pig will be the passenger on the day, donning his fetching headset. Getting him in the right position for the camera was tricky.
I am still waiting for the CAA approval, should hopefully get it soon. I have put in a request for both days of the Hamfest just in case, the latest prediction at predict.habhub.org shows if I get the fill right I might just escape a watery landing on Friday, however Saturday looks more promising at the moment - also the forecast for Friday at the moment also has strong gusty surface winds, which could make the launch problematic. I am still planning for Friday since conditions and predictions do change.
 |
| Friday prediction as of 22/09/2015 |
 |
| Saturday prediction as of 22/09/2015 |
Please don't mention anything to do with other pigs in the news..
Hamfest HAB – Pre Launch Update
Not long now! Just three days left till the National Hamfest and hopefully the launch of my second high altitude balloon.
Balloon, parachute and helium have all been purchased and payloads have under gone final testing and have been put to one side ready for the flight which should hopefully be around 12pm on Friday 25th September.
The SSDV payload callsign PINKY will transmit on 434.575MHz USB RTTY 300 baud 880Hz shift ASCII-8 no parity 2 stop bits.
the backup telemetry tracker callsign PIGLET will transmit 434.150MHz USB RTTY 50 baud 380Hz shift ASCII-7 no parity 2 stop bits
They will transmit using the UKHAS telemetry protocol and can be tracked on tracker.habhub.org for information on how to receive and upload data to the tracking system visit the UKHAS wiki some information and useful links have been collated on the AMSAT-UK website
I was hoping to also transmit using the LoRa system, using the callsign PERKY. The transmitter had been successfully tested but a last minute gremlin has struck and it stopped working this weekend, I have been unable to locate the fault and suspect it is the actual module and with time being short have all but given up getting it working. If I do get it working it will be on 434.450MHz in Mode 1
I have already detailed the PIGLET payload in an earlier post. The PINKY/PERKY payload is constructed on strip board and was originally meant to to be a prototype, hence the rubbish layout. I had planned to build a better laid out version but the tight time scale, stresses and demands of work, commitments with the radio club not to mention nursing the wife as she recovers from a major operation scuppered that plan. Being pragmatic I decided it didn't need to be work of art to work! I have secured all the connections with hot glue and it has been drop tested several times.
"Pinky" pig will be the passenger on the day, donning his fetching headset. Getting him in the right position for the camera was tricky.
I am still waiting for the CAA approval, should hopefully get it soon. I have put in a request for both days of the Hamfest just in case, the latest prediction at predict.habhub.org shows if I get the fill right I might just escape a watery landing on Friday, however Saturday looks more promising at the moment - also the forecast for Friday at the moment also has strong gusty surface winds, which could make the launch problematic. I am still planning for Friday since conditions and predictions do change.
I and other members of South Kesteven ARS will be in attendance with a tracker station on the day, so please introduce yourself and perhaps join the club?
Please don't mention anything to do with other pigs in the news..
Balloon, parachute and helium have all been purchased and payloads have under gone final testing and have been put to one side ready for the flight which should hopefully be around 12pm on Friday 25th September.
The SSDV payload callsign PINKY will transmit on 434.575MHz USB RTTY 300 baud 880Hz shift ASCII-8 no parity 2 stop bits.
|
| SSDV Test image |
They will transmit using the UKHAS telemetry protocol and can be tracked on tracker.habhub.org for information on how to receive and upload data to the tracking system visit the UKHAS wiki some information and useful links have been collated on the AMSAT-UK website
I was hoping to also transmit using the LoRa system, using the callsign PERKY. The transmitter had been successfully tested but a last minute gremlin has struck and it stopped working this weekend, I have been unable to locate the fault and suspect it is the actual module and with time being short have all but given up getting it working. If I do get it working it will be on 434.450MHz in Mode 1
|
| PERKY seen working on SDR |
|
| PINKY & PERKY tracker |
"Pinky" pig will be the passenger on the day, donning his fetching headset. Getting him in the right position for the camera was tricky.
I am still waiting for the CAA approval, should hopefully get it soon. I have put in a request for both days of the Hamfest just in case, the latest prediction at predict.habhub.org shows if I get the fill right I might just escape a watery landing on Friday, however Saturday looks more promising at the moment - also the forecast for Friday at the moment also has strong gusty surface winds, which could make the launch problematic. I am still planning for Friday since conditions and predictions do change.
|
| Friday prediction as of 22/09/2015 |
|
| Saturday prediction as of 22/09/2015 |
Please don't mention anything to do with other pigs in the news..
Hamfest HAB – "Pigs In Space" Preparations
Already a week into September and not long now till the National Hamfest where I and the South Kesteven ARS are launching a high altitude balloon launch subject to CAA approval. The documents have been submitted so just waiting for the nod.
The balloon and parachute have been purchased from Steve Randall (G8KHW) at Random Engineering, using the same size as I did for the Eggsplorer-1
I had joked about sending some "Ham into space" on this flight but following the smelly end to Eggsplorer-1 have opted to play it safe and avoid food! Instead will be sending up a toy pig (well a small squeaky dog toy)
Similar to the Eggsplorer-1 the main tracker will be a Raspberry Pi fitted with a camera and two transmitters.
The tracker is based on the "Pi In The Sky" code base/design by Dave Akerman (M0RPI) and Anthony Stirk (M0UPU) with some modifications since I am building on simple strip board using a different GPS module/interface and omitting any power supply monitoring.
On the Eggsplorer I used an old Pi Model B but was forced to butcher it to reduce the power demand by desoldering the network/usb chip. This time I am using a Model A+ which is smaller/lighter and has a much reduced power demand and with the locking micro-SD card socket will hopefully prevent a repeat of Eggsplorer-1's failure mode.
PINKY & PERKY are progressing well, just waiting delivery of some strip board and they should be completed in the next day or so.
PINKY will be 300-Baud RTTY, sending telemetry along with SSDV image packets using the UKHAS format.
PERKY will be using one of the LoRa modules again sending telemetry and SSDV but with greater resolution and speed, but will require a LoRa receiver/gateway (see Dave Akerman's website).
While the SSDV is attractive to tracker enthusiasts the high speed RTTY is more difficult to receive, so I will be flying a secondary 'backup' tracker. The use of a backup proved invaluable on the Eggsplorer when the main tracker failed.
PIGLET will be a 50-baud RTTY transmission with telemetry and should prove easier to receive.
I finished PIGLET at the weekend
Again built on strip board it is based around the ATMEL ATMega128 micro-controller using the Arduino system with a number of off the shelf modules connected to it.
It has one of the GY-GPS6MV2 GPS modules I blogged about last year feeding into the UART. The NTX-2B transmitter (frequency agile version from Hab Supplies) and a I2C BMP180 pressure/sensor module (not visible as mounted to measure external conditions) It also has a small boost converter to supply 5V and extract all the available power it can from the 3-AA lithium battery pack.
One change compared to the EGG1 tracker is to use a PWM output from the Arduino to generate the RTTY tones rather than a register voltage divider (guide here) which seems to give a cleaner signal.
The antenna is simply copper wire making a 1/4 wave ground plane. The 'box' are some layers of styrofoam glued together with UHU-Por with duct tape, some straws and beads for safety. Just needs the batteries fitting and the lid fixing with more duct tape and PIGLET is ready to fly.
Full details of frequencies will be posted nearer the time.
The balloon and parachute have been purchased from Steve Randall (G8KHW) at Random Engineering, using the same size as I did for the Eggsplorer-1
I had joked about sending some "Ham into space" on this flight but following the smelly end to Eggsplorer-1 have opted to play it safe and avoid food! Instead will be sending up a toy pig (well a small squeaky dog toy)
Similar to the Eggsplorer-1 the main tracker will be a Raspberry Pi fitted with a camera and two transmitters.
The tracker is based on the "Pi In The Sky" code base/design by Dave Akerman (M0RPI) and Anthony Stirk (M0UPU) with some modifications since I am building on simple strip board using a different GPS module/interface and omitting any power supply monitoring.
On the Eggsplorer I used an old Pi Model B but was forced to butcher it to reduce the power demand by desoldering the network/usb chip. This time I am using a Model A+ which is smaller/lighter and has a much reduced power demand and with the locking micro-SD card socket will hopefully prevent a repeat of Eggsplorer-1's failure mode.
PINKY & PERKY are progressing well, just waiting delivery of some strip board and they should be completed in the next day or so.
PINKY will be 300-Baud RTTY, sending telemetry along with SSDV image packets using the UKHAS format.
PERKY will be using one of the LoRa modules again sending telemetry and SSDV but with greater resolution and speed, but will require a LoRa receiver/gateway (see Dave Akerman's website).
While the SSDV is attractive to tracker enthusiasts the high speed RTTY is more difficult to receive, so I will be flying a secondary 'backup' tracker. The use of a backup proved invaluable on the Eggsplorer when the main tracker failed.
PIGLET will be a 50-baud RTTY transmission with telemetry and should prove easier to receive.
I finished PIGLET at the weekend
Again built on strip board it is based around the ATMEL ATMega128 micro-controller using the Arduino system with a number of off the shelf modules connected to it.
It has one of the GY-GPS6MV2 GPS modules I blogged about last year feeding into the UART. The NTX-2B transmitter (frequency agile version from Hab Supplies) and a I2C BMP180 pressure/sensor module (not visible as mounted to measure external conditions) It also has a small boost converter to supply 5V and extract all the available power it can from the 3-AA lithium battery pack.
One change compared to the EGG1 tracker is to use a PWM output from the Arduino to generate the RTTY tones rather than a register voltage divider (guide here) which seems to give a cleaner signal.
The antenna is simply copper wire making a 1/4 wave ground plane. The 'box' are some layers of styrofoam glued together with UHU-Por with duct tape, some straws and beads for safety. Just needs the batteries fitting and the lid fixing with more duct tape and PIGLET is ready to fly.
Full details of frequencies will be posted nearer the time.
Hamfest HAB – "Pigs In Space" Preparations
Already a week into September and not long now till the National Hamfest where I and the South Kesteven ARS are launching a high altitude balloon launch subject to CAA approval. The documents have been submitted so just waiting for the nod.
The balloon and parachute have been purchased from Steve Randall (G8KHW) at Random Engineering, using the same size as I did for the Eggsplorer-1
I had joked about sending some "Ham into space" on this flight but following the smelly end to Eggsplorer-1 have opted to play it safe and avoid food! Instead will be sending up a toy pig (well a small squeaky dog toy)
Similar to the Eggsplorer-1 the main tracker will be a Raspberry Pi fitted with a camera and two transmitters.
The tracker is based on the "Pi In The Sky" code base/design by Dave Akerman (M0RPI) and Anthony Stirk (M0UPU) with some modifications since I am building on simple strip board using a different GPS module/interface and omitting any power supply monitoring.
On the Eggsplorer I used an old Pi Model B but was forced to butcher it to reduce the power demand by desoldering the network/usb chip. This time I am using a Model A+ which is smaller/lighter and has a much reduced power demand and with the locking micro-SD card socket will hopefully prevent a repeat of Eggsplorer-1's failure mode.
PINKY & PERKY are progressing well, just waiting delivery of some strip board and they should be completed in the next day or so.
PINKY will be 300-Baud RTTY, sending telemetry along with SSDV image packets using the UKHAS format.
PERKY will be using one of the LoRa modules again sending telemetry and SSDV but with greater resolution and speed, but will require a LoRa receiver/gateway (see Dave Akerman's website).
While the SSDV is attractive to tracker enthusiasts the high speed RTTY is more difficult to receive, so I will be flying a secondary 'backup' tracker. The use of a backup proved invaluable on the Eggsplorer when the main tracker failed.
PIGLET will be a 50-baud RTTY transmission with telemetry and should prove easier to receive.
I finished PIGLET at the weekend
Again built on strip board it is based around the ATMEL ATMega128 micro-controller using the Arduino system with a number of off the shelf modules connected to it.
It has one of the GY-GPS6MV2 GPS modules I blogged about last year feeding into the UART. The NTX-2B transmitter (frequency agile version from Hab Supplies) and a I2C BMP180 pressure/sensor module (not visible as mounted to measure external conditions) It also has a small boost converter to supply 5V and extract all the available power it can from the 3-AA lithium battery pack.
One change compared to the EGG1 tracker is to use a PWM output from the Arduino to generate the RTTY tones rather than a register voltage divider (guide here) which seems to give a cleaner signal.
The antenna is simply copper wire making a 1/4 wave ground plane. The 'box' are some layers of styrofoam glued together with UHU-Por with duct tape, some straws and beads for safety. Just needs the batteries fitting and the lid fixing with more duct tape and PIGLET is ready to fly.
Full details of frequencies will be posted nearer the time.
The balloon and parachute have been purchased from Steve Randall (G8KHW) at Random Engineering, using the same size as I did for the Eggsplorer-1
I had joked about sending some "Ham into space" on this flight but following the smelly end to Eggsplorer-1 have opted to play it safe and avoid food! Instead will be sending up a toy pig (well a small squeaky dog toy)
Similar to the Eggsplorer-1 the main tracker will be a Raspberry Pi fitted with a camera and two transmitters.
The tracker is based on the "Pi In The Sky" code base/design by Dave Akerman (M0RPI) and Anthony Stirk (M0UPU) with some modifications since I am building on simple strip board using a different GPS module/interface and omitting any power supply monitoring.
On the Eggsplorer I used an old Pi Model B but was forced to butcher it to reduce the power demand by desoldering the network/usb chip. This time I am using a Model A+ which is smaller/lighter and has a much reduced power demand and with the locking micro-SD card socket will hopefully prevent a repeat of Eggsplorer-1's failure mode.
PINKY & PERKY are progressing well, just waiting delivery of some strip board and they should be completed in the next day or so.
PINKY will be 300-Baud RTTY, sending telemetry along with SSDV image packets using the UKHAS format.
PERKY will be using one of the LoRa modules again sending telemetry and SSDV but with greater resolution and speed, but will require a LoRa receiver/gateway (see Dave Akerman's website).
While the SSDV is attractive to tracker enthusiasts the high speed RTTY is more difficult to receive, so I will be flying a secondary 'backup' tracker. The use of a backup proved invaluable on the Eggsplorer when the main tracker failed.
PIGLET will be a 50-baud RTTY transmission with telemetry and should prove easier to receive.
I finished PIGLET at the weekend
Again built on strip board it is based around the ATMEL ATMega128 micro-controller using the Arduino system with a number of off the shelf modules connected to it.
It has one of the GY-GPS6MV2 GPS modules I blogged about last year feeding into the UART. The NTX-2B transmitter (frequency agile version from Hab Supplies) and a I2C BMP180 pressure/sensor module (not visible as mounted to measure external conditions) It also has a small boost converter to supply 5V and extract all the available power it can from the 3-AA lithium battery pack.
One change compared to the EGG1 tracker is to use a PWM output from the Arduino to generate the RTTY tones rather than a register voltage divider (guide here) which seems to give a cleaner signal.
The antenna is simply copper wire making a 1/4 wave ground plane. The 'box' are some layers of styrofoam glued together with UHU-Por with duct tape, some straws and beads for safety. Just needs the batteries fitting and the lid fixing with more duct tape and PIGLET is ready to fly.
Full details of frequencies will be posted nearer the time.
