Homebrewed Oscar Array!

Last Updated 6-6-02

Finally! Now that this setup is wired to the ham shack I'm ready to work the satellites. Still in the testing phase, have a lot of ideas for this setup and some more improvements. Testing so far has went as expected, the transmit side works great, the receive side could use a preamp with the longer run of coax cable. Overall the tracking takes some getting use too. Still easy to talk off the satellites with more power than being portable. 

I just added a counterweight on the other side of the boom. The elevation rotor would seep down really bad and it was hard to keep track of it's location during the pass. After adding a few pieces of iron to the other side the rotor no longer seeps and the last pass of UO-14 went very well. I was able to hear the bird the whole pass, unlike previous passes where I spent most of my time trying to keep the antenna's on the satellite. 

Here the radio's I use for talking on the satellites. A Radio Shack 242 for the uplink at 10 to 45 watts and a Kenwood G71 for receiving. Then the two rotor controls, the one on the right is for the azimuth and the one of the left is for the elevation. 

If you would like to find out more about this antenna, just send me an email.