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Itty bitty radio telescope


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Hi all,

I'm currently thinking about getting in to Radio Astronomy and was thinking of building one of these to get me in to it and to learn the ropes a little bit so to speak I am a bit of a noob when it comes to radio things although I do have a radio scanner that I mess around with from time to time. I think I would most likely go for the SDR route. I was just wondering if anyone has built one of these? Also if you have, can you listen to Jupiter with it at all? I really want to listen to the sun also and start collecting my own data, what else do you think it would do?  :grin:

The design is here,

http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/epo/teachers/ittybitty/procedure.html

Thanks, 

Ozzy.  :smiley:

finished.jpg

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Looks like a very interesting project. Unfortunately for me, your radio skills are way above mine but would be very interested to hear how you get on, quite fancy building one myself and even managed to salvage my sat dish when Sky came out to upgrade me earlier in the year. I'm not sure it's big enough but now you're making me think it might be.....

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Thanks so much for your help! :) Richard & Robin.. I'll let you know how I get on Gaz! :D

Just another quick question if I was to build or buy an antenna to pick up the signal from Graves France From near Bristol... What would I need? 

Thanks again,

Austyn! :)

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Just another quick question if I was to build or buy an antenna to pick up the signal from Graves France From near Bristol... What would I need? 

Thanks again,

Austyn! :)

Hi Austyn,

There's been several threads on this forum (under Radio Astronomy and Spectroscopy) to do with using the GRAVES radar (for detecting meteor trails) you might like to read up on. Rather than picking up the GRAVES signal directly (It will be below the curvature of the Earth) we listen to those moments when the signal reflects off either a meteor or its trail to return the signal to a receiver. It is also possible to detect the passage of satellites and the ISS off the returned signal. There are times when atmospheric conditions allow a signal to reach here directly (tropospheric bending of the original signal). Others have detected the GRAVES signal bounced off the Moon's surface. If you read the posts they will go into detail about the antenna, receiver and software needed.

Cheers,

Steve

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Ozzy,

Go for it, great fun and "quite" simple to do. On the subject of the output just being a visible moving needle..... get a sat finder that has a 5-6 LED signal strength display and a buzzer output. Mine was an ebay job for around a fiver. Gently remove the casing, some investigation often required here, and identify the +ve and -ve pins on the buzzer. Desolder buzzer carefully and attach twin core speaker cable instead. Attach a standard 3.5mm jack plug to the other end..... usually +ve tip connection and you can plug this low voltage output from the signal strength meter into your computer mic input. Download SkyPipe from internet...freebee prog..... and you'll get a visible and saveable display on the computer.

Enjoy this simple and fun introduction to Radio Astronomy.

Les 

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  • 8 months later...

here  how mine works .....from the lnb to  [a 2x3 foot dish]],,,,,to....fm filter....to  diplexer./from the diplexer ...one side to the  finder/meter....one side   to power [12 -18 v  mine is  13]....other side of diplexer....to sat receiver [cheapo],,,from receiver,,,,to wall wart..[5v believe...and to computer....from disconnected buzzer in finder to  microphone at computer.........if  you can make a flow chart from this info you will be good......use skypipe[free] on your computer....most expensive thing is 50 ft of 75 ohm coax from lnb to the house....everything else from ebay....good luck....i hope i got right.......ted

 

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