EXTRACT From The ARRL Letter
Vol. 20, No. 32
August 10, 2001

NEW AMATEUR SATELLITE TO LINK REMOTE APRS NODES

A new Amateur Radio tracking and communications satellite called PCSat is scheduled to launch September 1 (0100 UTC) from Alaska.
PCSat will augment the existing Amateur Radio Automatic Position Reporting System (APRS) by providing links to the 90 percent of Earth's
surface not covered by the terrestrial network.

Designed and assembled by midshipmen at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, PCSat's first mission was to provide practical hands-on
experience in support of the students' aerospace curriculum. The midshipmen worked under the guidance of Academy Senior Project Engineer
Bob Bruninga, WB4APR--the acknowledged "father of APRS."

"We hope that PCsat will be a new direction for amateur satellites by serving the communications needs of travelers with only mobile and hand-held
radios anywhere on Earth," Bruninga said. PCSat will be the first satellite to report its exact position directly to users via its onboard GPS. This
means that whenever the bird's in view, users won't need tracking software to determine its position.

According to Bruninga, the satellite will demonstrate vehicle tracking and communication for GPS-equipped remote travelers--including Naval Academy
vessels at sea, cross-country travelers, expeditions or anyone far from the existing APRS terrestrial tracking infrastructure.
<http://web.usna.navy.mil/~bruninga/digis.html>

In addition to its APRS capabilities, the satellite will offer 1200 and 9600-baud packet operation on VHF (145.825 MHz) and UHF (435.250 MHz).
For APRS digipeating, the satellite will use the recognized North American APRS frequency of 144.39 MHz.

Bruninga said that PCsat should make a great classroom tool, since its telemetry can be received by any hand-held packet radio for display to
students on their PCs. "And with the Internet connectivity of ground stations worldwide," he said, "classes are not limited to observing passes
only over their school, but anytime PCSat is in view of any other participating school."

PCSat was deemed spaceworthy last month. Bruninga left this week for Alaska and the launch preparations. PCSat will be one of four satellites in the
Kodiak Star payload, and the only one with Amateur Radio capabilities. The others are Sapphire, Starshine III, and PicoSat.

For more information, visit the PCSat Web site, <http://web.usna.navy.mil/~bruninga/pcsat.html>