Episode 250 Bill Brown WB8ELK Transcript
Transcript Funded by: Mike Morgan, N0MPM
Eric, 4Z1UG:
QSO Today Episode 250 Bill Brown, WB8ELK.
This episode of QSO Today is sponsored by Icom America, makers of the finest HF, VHF and UHF transceivers for the radio amateur who are demonstrating the new IC-9700 VHF, UHF 1200 megahertz all mode transceiver this weekend as a Dayton Hamvention. If you're in Dayton, be sure to check it out. More on this later and by QRP Labs, Hans Summers, G0UPL's QRP radio Kit Company Hans has an amazing catalog of radio kits and parts for every budget. QRP Labs and Hans are in Dayton this weekend. When the podcast posts, be sure to find Hans and visit him as well. I want to thank both Icom and QRP Labs for sponsoring the QSO Today Podcast.
Welcome to the QSO Today Podcast. I'm Eric Guth, 4ZIUG your host. I want to take this moment to wish condolences to the family and friends of Joe Everhart N2CX who was my guest in episode 245 of the QSO Today Podcast just five weeks ago. Joe passed away suddenly this week. Joe Was a major contributor and mentor to the amateur radio community. He will be missed, may his memory be for a blessing.
Exploration of the edge of space; first by astronaut Jordan Kittinger in Project High-Man began Bill Brown, WB6ELK, his fascination with and adaptation of amateur radio to high altitude weather balloons and later to smaller pico balloons that Bill tracks around the world using amateur radio beacons that he fabricates himself for his balloon launches with over 600 launches. To his credit, it's easy to say that WB8ELK is an expert in high altitude ballooning and amateur radio, Bill may have the hook to lure youngsters to our hobby and he is my QSO Today.WB8ELK. This is Eric, 4ZIUG, are you there Bill?
Eric, 4Z1UG:
QSO Today Episode 250 Bill Brown, WB8ELK.
This episode of QSO Today is sponsored by Icom America, makers of the finest HF, VHF and UHF transceivers for the radio amateur who are demonstrating the new IC-9700 VHF, UHF 1200 megahertz all mode transceiver this weekend as a Dayton Hamvention. If you're in Dayton, be sure to check it out. More on this later and by QRP Labs, Hans Summers, G0UPL's QRP radio Kit Company Hans has an amazing catalog of radio kits and parts for every budget. QRP Labs and Hans are in Dayton this weekend. When the podcast posts, be sure to find Hans and visit him as well. I want to thank both Icom and QRP Labs for sponsoring the QSO Today Podcast.
Welcome to the QSO Today Podcast. I'm Eric Guth, 4ZIUG your host. I want to take this moment to wish condolences to the family and friends of Joe Everhart N2CX who was my guest in episode 245 of the QSO Today Podcast just five weeks ago. Joe passed away suddenly this week. Joe Was a major contributor and mentor to the amateur radio community. He will be missed, may his memory be for a blessing.
Exploration of the edge of space; first by astronaut Jordan Kittinger in Project High-Man began Bill Brown, WB6ELK, his fascination with and adaptation of amateur radio to high altitude weather balloons and later to smaller pico balloons that Bill tracks around the world using amateur radio beacons that he fabricates himself for his balloon launches with over 600 launches. To his credit, it's easy to say that WB8ELK is an expert in high altitude ballooning and amateur radio, Bill may have the hook to lure youngsters to our hobby and he is my QSO Today.WB8ELK. This is Eric, 4ZIUG, are you there Bill?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yes. Good to talk to you.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Bill. Thanks for joining me on the QSO Today Podcast. Can we start at the beginning of your ham radio story? When and how did it start for you?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, my great uncle W8UM was his call sign] back in the 1950s, I was over visiting him, I was just about four or five years old and he tuned his radio. He had a big massive wall of hammer loans and Hallicrafters radios, and Viking, Johnson Viking large big racks radios, of course is impressive to a four year old. And he tuned his radio and there was this beep, beep, beep sound. And he says, "Did you know what that is?" I had no idea. I said, "That's a spacecraft; that 's Sputnik." So, right away at a very early age, I was inspired for both amateur radio and the space program. So, that was my very earliest memories of what inspired me to go into ham radio and later the space program. So, after that I studied, when I got older and I got my amateur radio license in two days after we landed on the moon.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
So, you got your license in '69 then?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yes.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Two days after the moon landing.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And do you remember when that was? That was July, I think, wasn't it? '69.
Bill, WB8ELK:
July 22nd is when I've got my ham radio license in 1969.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Bill, WB8ELK:
And so this year in July will be my 50th anniversary at amateur radio.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Amazing.
Bill, WB8ELK:
So, I went on to get a Hallicrafters SX-101, I went to the Dayton Hamvention and carry this 60 pound radio back to my car. And then I went back and I got a Johnson Viking 2, which also weighs about 60 pounds. After that, I love Morse Code and did a lot of CW work and I was very avid on the high, high frequency bands.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Oh, where was the hometown?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Findlay, Ohio, Northwest Ohio. And my uncle W8UN was my mentor. He first got his amateur radio license in the early 1920s, and in fact, he started out with spark gap until he started wiping out every radio receiver in town. He finally had to go to regular radio transmissions, but he started out with a spark gap and center.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Was that a novice license you've got that in 1969?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yes. It was WB8ELK Whiskey November eight, echo, Lima, Kilo. And then just a few months later, I went up to get my license. We had to drive to the FCC office, which was in Detroit, Michigan about 120 mile drive. And we had to take a morse code test. And the general and advanced three test, my father who was a radio man in the Navy in World War II took the test with me. But the radio examiner failed him and my dad said, "Why I have perfect coffee? I can go 30 words a minute. And this is only at 13 minute test."
Bill, WB8ELK:
And Examiner says, "You did it. Wherever you have it, where it sort of been a J for you." Well, my dad doesn't cross at the top of the J. It was quite obviously read J's but since he didn't put the little cross bar on the top of the J, the examiner flunked him even though it was perfectly copied. So, he went back a few months later and when ever there was a J he puts this really long line above each J and he told the examiner, "Is that J enough for you?" He finally got his life.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And what was your father's call sign?
Bill, WB8ELK:
WBE8, Mike Sierra, Juliet WB8MSJ and he's 93 years old and still active and ham radio and lives on the farm that I grew up on.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Oh, that's quite amazing.
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's up in Ohio.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay. So, you're active, you've upgraded and so you upgraded to general or advanced at that time when you went to the FCC?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I will add up to advanced class license? Yes.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And now you have the extra?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I do not, I never bothered to get my extra license. I need to do that. So, what I did was, at that point I got very much interested in amateur radio satellites and they did a test of the, 806 and 807 transponders from a private airplane that flew over the Midwest. And so, I participated in that and talk through the transponder and during that test. And that really got me into the amateur satellite ham set group. In addition, I got involved in amateur television, both Slow-scan television and Fast- scan television. And I was very active in both those modes on both on VHF, I mean UHF and VHF.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Right. Slow-scan was an HF mode as I recall in those days.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Right. And one of my mentors, there was one of the pioneers, Slow-scan WSPR, whiskey nine November Tango Papa W9NTP. And, Dawn was Dawn Miller. His name is a very big influence on me in those days. And he lived in the next state over and we would carry on conversations both on amateur television, Fast- scan as well as Slow-scan.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well, that's pretty amazing. Now, when you got your license, were you already through school?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I was in high school at the time when I got my license.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
So, did ham radio then play a part in the choices that you made for your education and career?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, absolutely. Well there was two influence. One was chemistry and one was electrical engineering. So, I went on to get my chemistry degree from Ohio State and then I went on to get a master's in chemistry and a master's in electrical engineering from the University of California Santa Barbara.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Really? When were you Santa Barbara?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I was in Santa Barbara from 1975 through 1980.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I just missed you.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh really?
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah, I graduated from UC Santa Barbara as well, and I started in 1980.
Bill, WB8ELK:
I was still there because I was a teaching assistant in the electronics, the double E department in 1980, up until the summer of 1980 and I still lived in Ohio VISTA, which of course we called oil of VISTA. To view the oil. And I'm a Santa Barbarian. You probably heard that and we called UCSB, UC surfing branch.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
It was indeed and it was amazing time to be a student.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, absolutely.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And it was amazing place to be as a student as well?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh yeah. I went in to see my advisor professor to ask my question and he was dressed in a wet suit holding a Surf board and he says, "Not now Bill Surf's up, come back in about an hour."
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well, you may recall, and this is an aside for the listeners that apparently all the Surfers either had a number that they called or when the Surf was up, whether it was out at the ranch or along the coast, no matter what they were doing, they grabbed their boards and go,
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh yes, yes. He just dropped everything and went surfing
Eric, 4Z1UG:
They drop everything. What did you end up doing for your career after Santa Barbara?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, after Santa Barbara, I lived in Sierra Madre, which is near Pasadena and I worked down there, it was a relatable and then after that, I came back to Santa Barbara and I got my master's in double E electrical engineering and I went up to Berkeley and work for Varian Corporation, the ones that makes the big tubes and I was in Berkeley for several years after that.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. So, you're always following this technical track. Did you ever get involved in the space program? Although it seems to me by this point, I think they were just doing shuttles.
Bill, WB8ELK:
At that point. I was involved in amateur satellites, the AMSAT group. So, I was active in following and participating in amateur satellite work. So, I would observe some of the launches they did at Vandenberg Air Force base, for example, because that was just down the road from Santa Barbara. So, I witnessed several launches there. And, when I lived in Berkeley, I would sometimes come down to see if there's a launch.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And you'll recall when you were in Santa Barbara when the space shuttle was landing, it would come right over Santa Barbara on its way to the high desert.
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's correct. And I started a magazine and it was amateur television quarter away long with Henry Ruth, his calls A9XW now. And, he used to be K9FO and it was amateur television quarterly, so we were able to obtain press passes to the shuttle landings. And particularly those that are involved in amateur radio. So, I witnessed several landings at Edwards, were just incredible because you could hear that double sonic boom as the shuttle would go overhead and then just a WSPR quiet landing as it came in on the runway.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Now as I recalled. Did he go out beyond Edwards and then turn around and then come in for the landing?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yeah. So, you would see it zip by and you hear the double sonic boom and then [inaudible 00:12:29]come back in for the landing.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah amazing. In my research I discovered that you were in the amateur radio magazine business for awhile. What was that about?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I used to be the chief editor, 73 magazine.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
How did that start?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I was writing articles for 73 amateur radio today magazine and I always would read the adventures of Wayne Green. W-2 never say die. And always enjoyed reading his editorials and how he fired people up of positivity and negativity. And one day I asked called for the editor at 73 to see the status of my article and he was no longer there. Now I got the assistant associate publisher and so I started working with him. I says, "Well, if you need any help, I'd love to work for you all." He says, "You're hired." So, I ended up working for 73 magazine in 1990 and I worked there for almost three years and I had a ball. It was a great place to work for all kinds of interesting things. I was the managing editor, so I got to choose the front cover and what articles went into every issue. And plus I had a column that I wrote every issue as well. So, it was a very interesting place.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah, it sounds like it was a great magazine. I liked 73 magazine in those days as well.
Bill, WB8ELK:
If you look between 1990 I started... My first issue is June of 1990 toI believe November of 1992 and my August, 1990 issue has got a big how to balloon section on it and you can find archives that have these magazines in them. And then we started a magazine called Radio Fun as part of that when I was there and it was just a newsletter format as newspaper format and it was designed to bring in newcomers to amateur radio and I was chief editor of that as well.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
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Eric, 4Z1UG:
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Eric, 4Z1UG:
Visit Icom's website to enter the drawing stop at their booth. And also by clicking on the Icom 9700 image in this week show notes page, I'm grateful to have Icom as a sponsor of the QSO Today Podcast and appreciate their support. And when you buy your Icom 9700 at the Dayton Hamvention or at any other fine place where they sell Icom products, be sure to tell the Icom dealer that you heard about it here on QSO Today. And now back to our QSO. Who was Joseph Kittinger. And how did he inspire you?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, in the late eighties, I saw a documentary of a Joseph Kittinger, who at the time had the record for the highest parachute jump in history, the jump from 103,000 feet above the earth, as part of Project Man-High, which was a program that was a pre astronaut program to test survivability and early space suit gear in the edge of space, which pretty much simulates an actual space environment. So, I watched a documentary of him stepping out to this little gondola he was riding him 102,000 feet above the earth. You can see even during the broad daylight, you can see the curvature of the earth and the blackness of space. He said a little prayer jumped out and parachuted down. And just following, he exceeded the speed of sound and then he pulled the parachute at about 20,000 feet and came in to a safe landing.
Bill, WB8ELK:
So, I wanted to experience that myself, but I didn't want to risk my life doing it. So, I came up with the thought of using amateur radio equipment and a weather balloon. But I've put together a payload. They consisted of a TV camera, the TV transmitter, and a beacon transmitter that we could track on. At the time, there were no GPS satellites. So, I came up with; observed the weather balloon launches they do to study the winds aloft for a Noah launches these... And the weather service launches, balloons all over the country. Twice a day, I found the site where they did that near my hometown and I observed what they did, I determined what size balloon I would need for the... I had about a two pound package and I let it go. And we had reception on UHF on a one watt TV transmitter out to 300 miles or more.
Bill, WB8ELK:
As you know, propagation on UHF and VHF bands is pretty much long in site. Imagine if you will... If you had a 100,000 foot tall ham radio Antenna not far you would be able to work on the Jeff new HF and that's pretty much what you have. The balloon is the Antenna, so you're up a hundred thousand feet above the earth. You can see the long in site ranges around 400 miles or more. So, we had a fantastic success. Unfortunately the batteries died on the way down and we were unable to locate it unfortunately for that day. But six weeks later I had a backup recovery system on the Paler, my address, phone number and reward sign. So, a farmer, who was harvesting his crops, found it in the middle of this field and gave me a call and it was only a few hundred feet from where we had been searching for it, but it was buried down in the soya meal field, you couldn't see it unless you're right on top of it. And we got it back. I still have that package today.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Did that payload come down with the weather balloon? I mean do you burst the balloon and-
Bill, WB8ELK:
The balloon goes up. And it's a regular latex balloon and it will pop. And then we have a parachute balloon that pops open and it carries it down.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. So, you jettison the balloon so that it won't get tangled up in the parachuting.
Bill, WB8ELK:
It stays attached, but it flops around the balloon parachute. And quite often Most of it will disappear anyways.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Oh, how interesting. May, 2017 QST magazine article described you as the master of high altitude balloon projects. And I think you answered the question why high altitude? Because that's why I asked it. Are all of your balloon projects, high altitude?
Bill, WB8ELK:
No. Not all of them. But the typical way latex where balloon will go up and these are big balloons. They take a 100 to 200 cubic foot of helium or hydrogen. They'll go over a 100,000 feet in altitude, but they've only last about a two hour total flight. Lately I've been getting into pico ballooning, which is on the opposite scale of things because you can fly 12 pounds of payloads on the weather balloons, six pounds max per payload. So, the pico balloons flying on a 36 inch Mylar party one.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Clearly, I like the kind of party balloons you find at the drugstore.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Right. They make a really big one at 36 inch and the silver ones seem to work the best. And I developed a tracker an APRS tracker on the HF on two meter VHF that weighs 12 grams as totally solar powered; uses a guitar string for the independent elements, flexible solar panels. And I used an ultra thin circuit board. So, I designed the circuit in EagleCad, send it to a PC board company. I got the white boards back and then I hand soldered them. And the total weight, solar panels and everything is 12 grams. That's less than half an ounce. And by keeping it under that way, you can successfully float a Mylar Foil party balloon for upwards of three weeks, maybe four, three or four weeks. And it can take during the winter and it floats in the jet stream and floats around 30,000 feet.
Bill, WB8ELK:
And it can take just 14 days to go around the world during the winter, go completely around the world if you had the jet strings right and avoid storms. So, there is a company that makes a little bit bigger balloon that's about three feet wide by seven and a half feet long and it looks like it's made out of a clear plastic, but it's very impervious to leakage. And they are Scientific Balloon Solutions is the name of the company and their model SBS-13 and gets more expensive of course than the Mylar balloons. But these will float around 42,000 feet or so and you're above more storms that way. And a greater success about going around the world. One of the flights I've floated with that balloon and I went around the world for six and a half times in the space of 75 days.
Bill, WB8ELK:
That one was on 20 meters WSPR. I use magnet wire for the Antenna wires and the same circuit board and that I do for the APRS one. And what I do there is developed a system where you can send two frames of WSPR data to send telemetry in the second frame. And then I wrote a python program to grab that data and convert it to an APRS object and send it directly to the APRS servers. So, it shows up just like it was APRS transmission, even though it was the 20 meter WSPR transmission.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Now it's my understanding that there are some air spaces that amateur radio is not allowed like over on the UK for example. So do you-
Bill, WB8ELK:
The UK is one of them, but Yemen and North Korea and I have a geo fencing algorithm and my code, really just a little tiny out now processor the same that they use in the original Arduino boards. In fact, I usually, or doing other development system to program and what you had to do is draw a box around... Larry's if you don't want to transmit in. And when it detects it's within that polygon, it just doesn't transmit. So, you basically draw a box around each area that is the keep out zone because obviously we don't want to transmit over North Korea. We don't want to start world war III.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Right. But it's interesting that Britain, Yemen and North Korea are the three countries that-
Bill, WB8ELK:
They don't seem like they have a lot in common ... But there's a law on the books and Great Britain that prohibits aerial activities with armature radio. So, you can't even fly a kite or hot air balloon or even an airplane in Great Britain with amateur radio on board. And probably some law elder before World War II that they never changed. But I don't know the real reason.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
How do you define high altitude when you're looking at a balloon launches and deciding how you're going to go? Whoa. How has that elevation different from other balloon launches at lower elevations in terms of preparation?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Okay. Well, you're talking about versus a hot air balloon slot?
Eric, 4Z1UG:
No. So, for example, a high altitude is a high... I mean we're talking about a 100,000 feet for example, but what elevation does it become high altitude? I mean the Mylar balloons won't go any higher than 40,000 feet.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well at least, you can still consider that to be high altitude. I would consider high altitude to be anything higher than a hot air balloon typically fly,
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Which is just a couple of thousand feet.
Bill, WB8ELK:
He would still consider a Mylar balloon flight at 30,000 feet to be high altitude.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Okay.
Bill, WB8ELK:
But is not, probably another definition if you.. will is for a light text, whether balloon high altitude, it would be anything in the stratosphere. So, obviously we're not in the stratosphere for the pico balloons, but it's still higher than you would normally be able to fly.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Right. And I guess what's interesting is that with the pico balloons is that they actually get to see how the jet stream works in terms of where it takes the balloon and what the routes are and...-
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, that's the neat thing. Because it's a great tool. I go into a lot of schools and I talk about weather patterns and how to predict where the jet stream will go and we actually go through how to predict where the balloon will travel. And they learn about planning a mini space mission. They feel like they're finding the NASA mission and they really are having a very low, low, low earth orbiting satellites, particularly if it ends up going around the world. And the beauty of it is the students learn about space technology, education and math, science, technology, education and math, as well as learning about amateur radio and how it's used to receive the telemetry.
Bill, WB8ELK:
And in fact that has generated quite a few amateur radio operators to get their license, primarily to get involved in amateur radio, the linen. So, it's been... And then they go on to experience all the other aspects. Some of these students I've worked with at the college level weren't even aware that there was amateur radio until they've joined up on one of these projects. So, it's a great inspiration for worrying about science and technology as well as amateur radio.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Have you been approached by the ARRL Teachers Institute? They do the summer training and electronics and robotics and amateur radio for classroom teachers in order to allow them to be able to take these concepts back to their classrooms. It seems to me that this should be a part of the ARRL Teachers Institute as a way to kind of spread yourself across the country. Have you been approached by them on this?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I would love to talk to them.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah, it seems to me-
Bill, WB8ELK:
I'm aware of the program.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
It seems like it could be quite infectious and I think nowadays with kids have smart phones or iPads or something they can actually in real time track their balloon.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, I was just going to mention that the way you hook today's students is that you incorporate their smart phones and iPads and tablets. If you can incorporate the smart phone and show them how to track these balloons in real time on their smart phones, you have them hooked. That's exactly right.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well, that's very cool. Well, you're inspiring me to do something here. Let me take a quick break here to tell you about my favorite amateur radio audio podcast, the ham radio workbench podcast with George KG6VU and Jeremy KF7IJZ, where they pursue topics, technology, and projects on their ham radio work benches every two weeks. George and Jeremy document their projects and make circuit boards available for sale to their listeners. They have interesting guests and go in deep, even if you're a seasoned ham radio builder or just getting started.Be sure to join George and Jeremy for the ham radio workbench podcast. Use the link on this week show notes page by clicking on the image and now back to our QSO Today. What are the major challenges of high altitude ballooning and he's balloon launches. And how did you overcome them? In 2017 the article and QST said that you had already launched 500 balloon launches.
Bill, WB8ELK:
I'm close to 600 now. I sat down and watched how the weather bureau who did it observed Joe Kittinger's flights with a man program and it's all about the major components are getting the right amount of lift to get the ascent rate, the size of the parachute to determine your decent rate based on the weight of your payload. But the key is for a regular how to fly. That's going to pop and parachute back there. If you would really like to get your payload back, particularly if you're flying very expensive GoPro cameras or have expensive tracker systems on board or experiments, we set up some school experiments quite a bit.
Bill, WB8ELK:
The kids will come in and bring all kinds of matter experiments to fly. One of them flew a banana and when it came back it was all brown and mushy for examples. So, that was a good experiment. Tough fishing, crickets. One group, students brought in fishing crickets and they had looked up on the Internet that crickets can hold their breath for two hours now on 80 to 80, above about 50 to 60,000 feet you're in their backyard. So, this is a good test of that Internet rumor. And when we got that experiment back, they did survive. So, that particular Internet rumor was true, partially believe everything you read on the Internet, right?
Eric, 4Z1UG:
No you do of course. Would you say that that was the most unusual payload that you've launched?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, we've done a glider paper airplane and we had a tracker on the paper airplane, we leased it from 60,000 feet and watched it spiral back to earth. It was a four foot long paper glider, had a tracker on it and we were able to get both of them back. We launched rockets from balloons. We had a 400 pound rocket and we had the launch that in the Gulf of Mexico. We did one off the coast of North Carolina that actually at the time was the highest amateur rocket ever flown. Because the balloon was the first stage of the rocket and we were in the 2000 Guinness Book of Records for that. So, those are a lot of variety with ranging from a 400 pound rocket payload all the way down to half ounce a pico tracker. So, kind of covered the whole range.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Do you have sponsors for balloon launches? It seems to me that you've got to have quite a budget to pull off 600 balloon launches.
Bill, WB8ELK:
My sponsor is my billfold.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Some people have hobbies of buying sports cars and this is my passion and hobby.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. So pico ballooning is probably reduced the overall cost of your deployments?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, yes and no, as I was explaining with the regular weather balloons, you can do a Lens, a lock prediction based on the ascent rate and the parachute descent. And using the wind forecast models that you can find online, you can actually predict where it's going to land fairly accurately within a couple of miles typically. So, that narrows down our search range. And I like to have triple redundancy on an expensive tailored or I'm flying a lot of cameras in that. I have three trackers and a satellite tracker on board. Quite often you'll land in an area where you're a APRS receiver or [inaudible 00:34:25] so you may not be able to hear it, but the satellite tracker will send a signal directly to the tracker. For example, you've probably heard of the find the spot, use the global star on network. I used one of those and I developed my own satellite tracker using the iridium satellite network.
Bill, WB8ELK:
So, those are nice backup systems for when you fly a big payload. For the pico balloon payloads, you probably aren't going to see them ever again. Although I do have my email address on the solar panels and I have gotten some back. Typically if you're successful, they are probably going to end up coming down eventually in the Atlantic or Pacific Ocean. Or out in the middle of Siberia or the Sahara Desert where no one will ever see them again. So, that's the risk you take with the pico balloons that the goal of course is a long duration mission that lasts days and weeks so the students can follow it each day on their smart phones and they could get to learn about the cultures and the civilizations that they pass over fly over. And so they actually learn a lot about those societies as well.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And they learned that some geography because surprising and there's a surprising number of adults, young adults these days that don't know where... Or know different countries are on the map.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Absolutely.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
So yeah, what a great thing. Now you mentioned that you flown a 400 pound rockets off the coasts in Baha and off the east coast. Do you find that there are special places, best places or places that are better for balloon launches than other places?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, your best location is to fly in a region that has few mountains, lots of flat farmland. So, some of the most ideal curious to fly a tradition, a weather balloon is the American Midwest or any place that there is a lot of farmland. And few forest and few mountains where I first did my first flight in Findlay, Ohio. That was an ideal area because it's just all flat farmland but you can fly anywhere as long as you do a good prediction. I have friends that fly in Idaho and he had to be very precise to land in the valley instead of these really terrible mountains and so you'd have to then choose where your launch site will be to the land where you want it to come down. So, you had that kind of option that you have to look at so you can adjust your launch site for an optimal.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Are there seasons that are better than other seasons for launching balloons?
Bill, WB8ELK:
If you want to have an easy quick recovery, you probably want to launch from springtime the fall because it stays relatively close to you. In the winter time you can go upwards of 200 miles down range so you can fly during the middle of the winter, but to expect that you're going to have a long chase. Whereas there are some times during the June and July, that's when the jet stream tends to die there and that you can actually launch it in the bowl comeback and almost plan on top of you again after you're going up to a hundred thousand feet above the Earth. Spring is a great time and a summer and fall. But you can also launch in the winter and a lot of people do, but just remember the jet stream is typically at its highest have actually seen some balloon payloads going over 200 knots, ground speed in the jet stream.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That's pretty amazing. And what do you like better? I mean you say that you've done both APRS and WSPR seems to me that with WSPR, you might actually find that if it's laying on the ground somewhere?
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's a good question too. WSPR is primarily for doing a(inaudible) that's going to end up going over the Atlantic Ocean or specific far, far away from any possible VHF APRS ground station. So, if you want data during the flight, when you're doing the long duration pico balloon flight and you want to hear it and see its position, the advantage of WSPR, I'm only running 20 milliwatts on the 20 meter band on my WSPR payload. And keep in mind, it's also totally solar powered, so it's only on during the day time. But on the 20 meter band during the day, I can get reception thousands of miles away, whereas only APRS at 30,000 feet, it's about 250 miles to maximum. So, that's the big advantage to our WSPR remote payload. The disadvantage is having a payload, it has a 34 foot long wire on, made out of fragile magnet wire.
Bill, WB8ELK:
It's an [inaudible 00:39:28] magnitude more difficult to launch a than an APRS transmitter. So, for school events, typically I will apply an APRS transmitter because it's so easy to launch. But if the weather is really calm and really good and I will go with the WSPR mode, just because of the worldwide coverage. And yes, you're right. I had one land in the Mojave Desert and it started reporting its position every day. That wire, when it was found, the wire was flat in the sand and both directions and it's being received from over a thousand miles away. However, there is one drawback.
Bill, WB8ELK:
It's a six digit grid square, so you're constrained to a two by three miles search area. That's the closest you're going to be able to get the position report on westward. And so my friend had to drive around in a jeep out in the sands for several hours until he got the biggest second signal strength. And when he stopped it was really strong. And then he saw the balloon, he saw the wire trace the wire back and found the payload underneath his tire. Fortunately he just ran over the solar panel and it the only slightly damaged the payload. It was still working.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Now, I had a conversation with the Hans Summers G0UPL about exactly these micro balloons. I think he was saying to me that if they had modified the WSPR data so that they could actually get the GPS coordinates.
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's right. What I do is I'd send the two telemetry frames. One is your standard WSPR it's just basically your call sign, a four digit grid square and a two digit power level. I send a second frame just like Hans, Hans does and that I incorporate my system is different than his. There are similarities but also differences. I incorporate that the testing six grid square digits into another call sign that begins with a zero or Q, which are invalid call signs in the ITU. So, there's going to be no one else wanted zero or Q call sign. And then since if there's other people flying WSPR balloons, where the number would be in the call sign, that is a channel number assigned to different flights. For example, mine's, I have the seven and eight numbers because I fly a lot of them and so that way we can coexist and had multiple WSPR pico balloon payloads flying and then we can embed in the other characters.
Bill, WB8ELK:
The number of satellites being tracked, the temperature and the solar panel voltage. Ponds also uses the grid square on the second transmission to embed data. And they modified the WSPRnet website because it used to put position reports all over the world when he did that but they've modified it. Now that filter out calls on map the beginning of the zero and the Q, I still keep.. I don't touch the grid square myself because I match that with the first one so that if somebody else is flying a WSPR balloon and I have my channel number, it won't interfere with me because I matched the grid squares between the first transmission and the tournament reframe. And then I use python. I wrote a program to grab that data from the WSPRnet.org web database and I decode the telemetry reformat it into an APRS position report and I send it to the APRS servers.
Bill, WB8ELK:
What Hans does is to decode it in similar manner, but he sends it to their own tracking site and also sends it to a really cool website that the UK high altitude society has designed called tracker dot hub.org that's hotel Alpha Bravo Hotel United Bravo basically stands for high altitude balloon hub. If you want to see every balloon, both WSPR and traditional weather balloons flying in the world in any given moment, you go to that website and it will show you everything that is flying currently in the world.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And I did that today and it looks like there's maybe what 12 balloons up right now, something like that.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yes, yes.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah, it's very cool.
Bill, WB8ELK:
And if you see a position report over the middle of the ocean, then that is likely a WSPR balloon. I had one flying with APRS that just went by Japan about three or four days ago, and it is in a storm. It had been up for 14 days, launched from Alabama here. They went across Northern Africa. Well actually I went South of you went across Saudi Arabia. There was only one tracking station in that whole region on APRS and that's a station in Qatar, a 75 GE. Unfortunately whenever it is location during nighttime.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
It wasn't working because there's no battery on board.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Right. So, we didn't get a reception report until it ended up over China. Then the next day it was over Japan and hit a large storm and that was knocked out of the sky after 14 days in this big storm and it was fighting. It went clear down to the freeze level and bounced around there for several hours. And I think it finally got knocked down. I'm not completely certain it's gone. I'm hoping to see if it shows up over [inaudible 00:45:16]day.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And now this message from QRP Labs, QRP Labs, has been a sponsor of the QSO Today Podcast for a few years already. The biggest reason is that I have an affinity for building electronic devices, especially kits that are well designed and delivered ready to build Hans Summers G0UPL QRP Labs, founder, owner and engineering designer creates the most state of the art transmitters, receivers and transceiver kits at a very fair price to allow any ham to get on the air for very little money. Be sure to look for Hans in Dayton at the four days in May event at the Fairborn Ohio Holiday Inn on the Thursday before Hamvention and at the convention itself and building six.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I want to thank Hans for continuing to support the QSO Today Podcast and I want to thank you for always using the link on the show notes page to get to QRP Labs or if you make purchases in person by telling Hams at the convention that you heard about it here on QSO Today. QRP Labs is my favorite kit company. It should be yours too. QRP Labs and now back to my QSO Today. What kind of budget does one have to have?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Your biggest expense will be now your tracking equipment where usually be a onetime expense and go pro camera payloads. People liked to fly those lots to see that you that could (inaudible) of the curvature of the Earth and the blackness of space and those things are well expensive. You can have over a $1000 in your payload. Your trackers range upwards to $200 or more for an APRS tracker or satellite tracker, so you could well have had over a thousand dollars worth of equipment flying underneath your balloon out of the traditional weather we'll end fly then your expendables, you're going to have about $120 in the balloon and probably another $100 in helium to inflate the balloon at current prices unless you go with hydrogen and then it's about half the cost. But I was still planning on probably anywhere from 150 to $200 and the balloon and you won't get that back. The balloon is going to pop and lose the lifting gas.
Bill, WB8ELK:
So, that's a rough estimate of the costs of a latex where they're going to fly. And then you've also... If you want it back you have to plan your expedition and your gas costs to go out and get it and at what it takes to put in your ground station in your car. So, those are all things to consider there. Now, if the pico balloon flight, you're a big expense is going to be in the tracker. I currently offer the APRS sky tracker. I call my board $449, but that is a complete all in one GPS included. It's all on one board, transponder and everything. You just take it outside, tied to balloon and let it go. It's ready to fly. Now the balloon, if you fly the silver Mylar Foil balloons are about $4 a piece and you have maybe a couple of dollars worth the helium in it buy one of these little party balloon tanks for about 20 bucks, $25.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
No, it's my understanding from reading... For me, reading an article, I think that you wrote about this or something online that you don't fill that party balloon completely up with the helium. Right?
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's correct because it's going to go up to... Yeah. If you put too much in it, it'll go up and it will pop. If you put too little in it, then you may not clear the trees and it may not float well. So, there's a very fine balance and that you have to get it probably within a plus or minus a half a gram plus minus a gram. So, I buy this little gram scale from Amazon and use that grant.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
So, essentially it's pulling on the scale and you just put enough helium in it so that it's just slightly more than that.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, I measure the actual list. You're basically, you want to [inaudible 00:49:33] for a successful party, balloon flight.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Bill, WB8ELK:
You want to have about three grams extra lift over the rate of the payload. That's an equitable learn. So, when you're ready to fly, you're going to have three grams of positive lift.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. Okay.
Bill, WB8ELK:
If you are over that the balloon will pop. I think roughly over four grams you probably won't have as successful flight and you probably don't want to go much below two grams. So, between two and four grams. So, but you had to be pretty accurate. Now what I do is I have a little weight bag clip on the balloon inflating it and when it just lifts that off the table, I know it's lifting the right amount and then I double check it with my gram scale. But sometimes I don't even bother with the gram scale if it looks accurate and what we enough, just to watch it lift off the table, with the weights that I pre weighed before the flight could get that exact amount of lift. And I also double check it before it flight by taping a US penny to it, which weighs two and a half grams.
Bill, WB8ELK:
And if it just slightly goes up, I'm good. And then I put a nickel on it, tape it and that's five grams if it goes down. Then I know I'm pretty much in the right range, so I do a little double check before I lift off with a big weather balloon flight. You're talking about lifting towns and material and if you're off a little bit, a pound or two, either way, it's not going to make a lot of difference. The tricky part with the pico balloons is to get it accurate to within about a gram or two plus or minus a gram or less. And that's the trickiest part. You have to weigh everything, the tape, the fishing line, everything that's attached to the balloon.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Wow. Okay. Do you have a YouTube channel?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I do. It's under my calls bind WSPR Bravo 8 Echo Lima Kilo, I also have an email for those who would like to contact me about pico balloons and regular Ohio to blending. And that's wsprbravo8echolimakilo@gmail. So, [email protected]. And my website is wb8elk.com.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay. I'll put all these in the show notes pages for people to be able to... I just go there and if they're driving, they won't get into an accident while they're writing this down.
Bill, WB8ELK:
But I also... I'm offering the sky trackers to those who are interested in both APRS and WSPR mode. So, just call me or email me for particulars on that.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I'm thinking of doing one on myself and actually notifying my community here that I'm doing it so that they'll probably be a nicer to me as I'm putting more Antennas on my house.
Bill, WB8ELK:
There you go.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Is there a community around your launches? I mean, are there people that are following you and are out there available if they want to recover a tracker?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I think there are one of the best resources is there's a chat room of the UK Ohio to society puts together and they have people sign up from all over the world to chat with each other about, how to do ballooning and I have to think of the name of it, but it's web chat to link and it's a towns high altitude.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay. I'll confirm that and put that in the show notes as well. What's the current rig at your QTH?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I actually, I use it in a Funcube dongle for most of my reception because it's a wonderful SDR dongle that has all kinds of free software that you can see the entire bandwidth, what's going on. But for transmit, I have TS-4, a TS-2000 and I have an ATV transceiver and antennas . I live 500 feet up on a mountain. So, even though my antennas are only up about 15 feet on a tripod, it's like I have a 549 floating [inaudible 00:53:42].
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Now. Your ATV or are you doing that on microwave?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, I'm primarily on the 70 centimeter band and the 23 centimeter bands.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Do you still operate satellites?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I still operate satellites, yes. I haven't [inaudible 00:53:57] for that.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And you use the Funcube dongle for the reception and the TS-2000 with the transporters or something for the or does the TS-2000 also work in the UHF?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yeah,a combination of the two, but if I'm just monitoring or are receiving, I have a WSPR station that's always listening. And I typically use the Funcube dongle for that for receiving WSPR. And also, my WSPR transmitter scratch records. They make a great little home station. That’s 25 milliwatts. I put those on the air through little SMA connector and I can get reception on those around the world if the conditions are right. I have one... Yeah, I have one tracker over in the middle of the Atlantic. So, we're talking to magnet wire Typo in a 25 milliwatts transmitter. It was heard in Perth, Australia, exactly on the other side of the world and the copy. So, it's amazing how far WSPR mode can be received.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
It makes you wonder whether the problems with propagation is sun spots or people just listening instead of transmitting.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, it has to do mostly with the weak signal decoding software that can pull signal so far out of the noise level.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah, that's amazing isn't it?
Bill, WB8ELK:
All right. That's a low power can go a long way. And most people in WSPR or calling running a 100 milliwatts up to five watts. There are a few that transmit around 20 middle watts like I do. And it's just amazing how far you can get with even that tiny little bit of power.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
What do you think the greatest challenges to amateur radio now being almost 50 years in?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, the challenge is getting our students fired up about amateur radio and one of the methods that I use is to get them involved in high altitude ballooning because the fact that they can send telemetry very efficiently using Ham radio and use it for cool projects like mini space program that gets them excited a lot. And I think the digital modes are really a great way to bring newcomers into amateur radio.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
So, it'd be fair to say that you're excited by the digital modes now including FT8?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh yes, very definitely.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Is there anything else that really excites you about what's happening in amateur radio besides those modes?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I love 10 meters. Whenever it opens up, I have been 10 10 number for many, many years.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That's a Ten Ten International Club, right?
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's right. That's right. I have a very low number because I joined in 1970.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Is there something else Bill that you're doing that I haven't touched on?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, that's the majority of it. Other than now my job has changed. I'm now I'm working on the SLS rocket at NASA.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Really, what's your current occupation?
Bill, WB8ELK:
System Safety Engineer.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And the reason you were living in Alabama is because you're close to NASA?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Right. Marshall Space Flight Center.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And what are you doing exactly there?
Bill, WB8ELK:
We're making sure that the SLS, the space launch system rocket will be successful and safe.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. But what you're doing there at your acting as an electronic engineer.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Correct.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. Well that sounds really cool. It sounds to me like your life and career has gone full circle from Sputnik to SLS.
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's exactly right.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well that's pretty amazing. Are you anywhere near retiring?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh No. I'll keep working. And feel I'm unable to drive anymore.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well my father tells me who's just 89 that he says, "As soon as they remove the yellow line on the right side of the road, he's finished driving. But until that time, his license is good until he's 96."
Bill, WB8ELK:
I'll keep driving until we have flying cars.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That might fly you automatically. You'll just call it with your smartphone.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Then where we are going, we won't need roads.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah. There you go. Bill, it's been a real pleasure to have you on the QSO Today Podcast. I know it's taken us some time to get it organized, but I'm really delighted that you were able to spend this hour with me and talk about the amateur view of space. So, with that I want to wish you 73 and thank you so much for joining me on the QSO Today Podcast.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yeah, and it has been a real pleasure and 73 to you.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That concludes this episode of QSO Today. I hope that you enjoyed this QSO with Bill. Please be sure to check the show notes that include links and information about the topics that we discussed. Go to www.qsotoday.com and put in WB8ELK in the search box at the right top of the page. My thanks to both Icom America and QRP Labs for their support of the QSO Today Podcast. Please show your support of these fine sponsors by clicking on their links in the show notes pages or when you make your purchases that you say that you heard it here on QSO Today. You may notice that some of the episodes are transcribed into written text. If you'd like to sponsor this or any of the other episodes into written text, please contact me. Support the QSO Today Podcast by first joining the QSO Today email list by pressing the subscribe buttons on the show notes pages.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I will not spam you or share your email address with anyone. Become a listener sponsor monthly or annually by clicking on the sponsor buttons on the show notes page. I am grateful for any way that you show appreciation and support. It makes a big difference. QSO Today is now available on iHeartRadio, Spotify, Libsyn and tune in as well as the iTunes store. If you own an Amazon Echo, you can say, "Alicia, play the QSO Today Podcast from tune in." I still use stitcher to listen to podcasts on my smartphone. The links to all of these services are on the show notes pages on the right side. Until next time. This is Eric 4ZIUG 73.
The QSO Today Podcast is a product of KEG media Inc who is solely responsible for its content.
Yes. Good to talk to you.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Bill. Thanks for joining me on the QSO Today Podcast. Can we start at the beginning of your ham radio story? When and how did it start for you?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, my great uncle W8UM was his call sign] back in the 1950s, I was over visiting him, I was just about four or five years old and he tuned his radio. He had a big massive wall of hammer loans and Hallicrafters radios, and Viking, Johnson Viking large big racks radios, of course is impressive to a four year old. And he tuned his radio and there was this beep, beep, beep sound. And he says, "Did you know what that is?" I had no idea. I said, "That's a spacecraft; that 's Sputnik." So, right away at a very early age, I was inspired for both amateur radio and the space program. So, that was my very earliest memories of what inspired me to go into ham radio and later the space program. So, after that I studied, when I got older and I got my amateur radio license in two days after we landed on the moon.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
So, you got your license in '69 then?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yes.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Two days after the moon landing.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And do you remember when that was? That was July, I think, wasn't it? '69.
Bill, WB8ELK:
July 22nd is when I've got my ham radio license in 1969.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Bill, WB8ELK:
And so this year in July will be my 50th anniversary at amateur radio.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Amazing.
Bill, WB8ELK:
So, I went on to get a Hallicrafters SX-101, I went to the Dayton Hamvention and carry this 60 pound radio back to my car. And then I went back and I got a Johnson Viking 2, which also weighs about 60 pounds. After that, I love Morse Code and did a lot of CW work and I was very avid on the high, high frequency bands.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Oh, where was the hometown?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Findlay, Ohio, Northwest Ohio. And my uncle W8UN was my mentor. He first got his amateur radio license in the early 1920s, and in fact, he started out with spark gap until he started wiping out every radio receiver in town. He finally had to go to regular radio transmissions, but he started out with a spark gap and center.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Was that a novice license you've got that in 1969?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yes. It was WB8ELK Whiskey November eight, echo, Lima, Kilo. And then just a few months later, I went up to get my license. We had to drive to the FCC office, which was in Detroit, Michigan about 120 mile drive. And we had to take a morse code test. And the general and advanced three test, my father who was a radio man in the Navy in World War II took the test with me. But the radio examiner failed him and my dad said, "Why I have perfect coffee? I can go 30 words a minute. And this is only at 13 minute test."
Bill, WB8ELK:
And Examiner says, "You did it. Wherever you have it, where it sort of been a J for you." Well, my dad doesn't cross at the top of the J. It was quite obviously read J's but since he didn't put the little cross bar on the top of the J, the examiner flunked him even though it was perfectly copied. So, he went back a few months later and when ever there was a J he puts this really long line above each J and he told the examiner, "Is that J enough for you?" He finally got his life.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And what was your father's call sign?
Bill, WB8ELK:
WBE8, Mike Sierra, Juliet WB8MSJ and he's 93 years old and still active and ham radio and lives on the farm that I grew up on.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Oh, that's quite amazing.
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's up in Ohio.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay. So, you're active, you've upgraded and so you upgraded to general or advanced at that time when you went to the FCC?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I will add up to advanced class license? Yes.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And now you have the extra?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I do not, I never bothered to get my extra license. I need to do that. So, what I did was, at that point I got very much interested in amateur radio satellites and they did a test of the, 806 and 807 transponders from a private airplane that flew over the Midwest. And so, I participated in that and talk through the transponder and during that test. And that really got me into the amateur satellite ham set group. In addition, I got involved in amateur television, both Slow-scan television and Fast- scan television. And I was very active in both those modes on both on VHF, I mean UHF and VHF.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Right. Slow-scan was an HF mode as I recall in those days.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Right. And one of my mentors, there was one of the pioneers, Slow-scan WSPR, whiskey nine November Tango Papa W9NTP. And, Dawn was Dawn Miller. His name is a very big influence on me in those days. And he lived in the next state over and we would carry on conversations both on amateur television, Fast- scan as well as Slow-scan.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well, that's pretty amazing. Now, when you got your license, were you already through school?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I was in high school at the time when I got my license.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
So, did ham radio then play a part in the choices that you made for your education and career?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, absolutely. Well there was two influence. One was chemistry and one was electrical engineering. So, I went on to get my chemistry degree from Ohio State and then I went on to get a master's in chemistry and a master's in electrical engineering from the University of California Santa Barbara.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Really? When were you Santa Barbara?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I was in Santa Barbara from 1975 through 1980.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I just missed you.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh really?
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah, I graduated from UC Santa Barbara as well, and I started in 1980.
Bill, WB8ELK:
I was still there because I was a teaching assistant in the electronics, the double E department in 1980, up until the summer of 1980 and I still lived in Ohio VISTA, which of course we called oil of VISTA. To view the oil. And I'm a Santa Barbarian. You probably heard that and we called UCSB, UC surfing branch.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
It was indeed and it was amazing time to be a student.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, absolutely.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And it was amazing place to be as a student as well?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh yeah. I went in to see my advisor professor to ask my question and he was dressed in a wet suit holding a Surf board and he says, "Not now Bill Surf's up, come back in about an hour."
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well, you may recall, and this is an aside for the listeners that apparently all the Surfers either had a number that they called or when the Surf was up, whether it was out at the ranch or along the coast, no matter what they were doing, they grabbed their boards and go,
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh yes, yes. He just dropped everything and went surfing
Eric, 4Z1UG:
They drop everything. What did you end up doing for your career after Santa Barbara?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, after Santa Barbara, I lived in Sierra Madre, which is near Pasadena and I worked down there, it was a relatable and then after that, I came back to Santa Barbara and I got my master's in double E electrical engineering and I went up to Berkeley and work for Varian Corporation, the ones that makes the big tubes and I was in Berkeley for several years after that.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. So, you're always following this technical track. Did you ever get involved in the space program? Although it seems to me by this point, I think they were just doing shuttles.
Bill, WB8ELK:
At that point. I was involved in amateur satellites, the AMSAT group. So, I was active in following and participating in amateur satellite work. So, I would observe some of the launches they did at Vandenberg Air Force base, for example, because that was just down the road from Santa Barbara. So, I witnessed several launches there. And, when I lived in Berkeley, I would sometimes come down to see if there's a launch.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And you'll recall when you were in Santa Barbara when the space shuttle was landing, it would come right over Santa Barbara on its way to the high desert.
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's correct. And I started a magazine and it was amateur television quarter away long with Henry Ruth, his calls A9XW now. And, he used to be K9FO and it was amateur television quarterly, so we were able to obtain press passes to the shuttle landings. And particularly those that are involved in amateur radio. So, I witnessed several landings at Edwards, were just incredible because you could hear that double sonic boom as the shuttle would go overhead and then just a WSPR quiet landing as it came in on the runway.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Now as I recalled. Did he go out beyond Edwards and then turn around and then come in for the landing?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yeah. So, you would see it zip by and you hear the double sonic boom and then [inaudible 00:12:29]come back in for the landing.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah amazing. In my research I discovered that you were in the amateur radio magazine business for awhile. What was that about?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I used to be the chief editor, 73 magazine.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
How did that start?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I was writing articles for 73 amateur radio today magazine and I always would read the adventures of Wayne Green. W-2 never say die. And always enjoyed reading his editorials and how he fired people up of positivity and negativity. And one day I asked called for the editor at 73 to see the status of my article and he was no longer there. Now I got the assistant associate publisher and so I started working with him. I says, "Well, if you need any help, I'd love to work for you all." He says, "You're hired." So, I ended up working for 73 magazine in 1990 and I worked there for almost three years and I had a ball. It was a great place to work for all kinds of interesting things. I was the managing editor, so I got to choose the front cover and what articles went into every issue. And plus I had a column that I wrote every issue as well. So, it was a very interesting place.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah, it sounds like it was a great magazine. I liked 73 magazine in those days as well.
Bill, WB8ELK:
If you look between 1990 I started... My first issue is June of 1990 toI believe November of 1992 and my August, 1990 issue has got a big how to balloon section on it and you can find archives that have these magazines in them. And then we started a magazine called Radio Fun as part of that when I was there and it was just a newsletter format as newspaper format and it was designed to bring in newcomers to amateur radio and I was chief editor of that as well.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
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Eric, 4Z1UG:
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Eric, 4Z1UG:
Visit Icom's website to enter the drawing stop at their booth. And also by clicking on the Icom 9700 image in this week show notes page, I'm grateful to have Icom as a sponsor of the QSO Today Podcast and appreciate their support. And when you buy your Icom 9700 at the Dayton Hamvention or at any other fine place where they sell Icom products, be sure to tell the Icom dealer that you heard about it here on QSO Today. And now back to our QSO. Who was Joseph Kittinger. And how did he inspire you?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, in the late eighties, I saw a documentary of a Joseph Kittinger, who at the time had the record for the highest parachute jump in history, the jump from 103,000 feet above the earth, as part of Project Man-High, which was a program that was a pre astronaut program to test survivability and early space suit gear in the edge of space, which pretty much simulates an actual space environment. So, I watched a documentary of him stepping out to this little gondola he was riding him 102,000 feet above the earth. You can see even during the broad daylight, you can see the curvature of the earth and the blackness of space. He said a little prayer jumped out and parachuted down. And just following, he exceeded the speed of sound and then he pulled the parachute at about 20,000 feet and came in to a safe landing.
Bill, WB8ELK:
So, I wanted to experience that myself, but I didn't want to risk my life doing it. So, I came up with the thought of using amateur radio equipment and a weather balloon. But I've put together a payload. They consisted of a TV camera, the TV transmitter, and a beacon transmitter that we could track on. At the time, there were no GPS satellites. So, I came up with; observed the weather balloon launches they do to study the winds aloft for a Noah launches these... And the weather service launches, balloons all over the country. Twice a day, I found the site where they did that near my hometown and I observed what they did, I determined what size balloon I would need for the... I had about a two pound package and I let it go. And we had reception on UHF on a one watt TV transmitter out to 300 miles or more.
Bill, WB8ELK:
As you know, propagation on UHF and VHF bands is pretty much long in site. Imagine if you will... If you had a 100,000 foot tall ham radio Antenna not far you would be able to work on the Jeff new HF and that's pretty much what you have. The balloon is the Antenna, so you're up a hundred thousand feet above the earth. You can see the long in site ranges around 400 miles or more. So, we had a fantastic success. Unfortunately the batteries died on the way down and we were unable to locate it unfortunately for that day. But six weeks later I had a backup recovery system on the Paler, my address, phone number and reward sign. So, a farmer, who was harvesting his crops, found it in the middle of this field and gave me a call and it was only a few hundred feet from where we had been searching for it, but it was buried down in the soya meal field, you couldn't see it unless you're right on top of it. And we got it back. I still have that package today.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Did that payload come down with the weather balloon? I mean do you burst the balloon and-
Bill, WB8ELK:
The balloon goes up. And it's a regular latex balloon and it will pop. And then we have a parachute balloon that pops open and it carries it down.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. So, you jettison the balloon so that it won't get tangled up in the parachuting.
Bill, WB8ELK:
It stays attached, but it flops around the balloon parachute. And quite often Most of it will disappear anyways.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Oh, how interesting. May, 2017 QST magazine article described you as the master of high altitude balloon projects. And I think you answered the question why high altitude? Because that's why I asked it. Are all of your balloon projects, high altitude?
Bill, WB8ELK:
No. Not all of them. But the typical way latex where balloon will go up and these are big balloons. They take a 100 to 200 cubic foot of helium or hydrogen. They'll go over a 100,000 feet in altitude, but they've only last about a two hour total flight. Lately I've been getting into pico ballooning, which is on the opposite scale of things because you can fly 12 pounds of payloads on the weather balloons, six pounds max per payload. So, the pico balloons flying on a 36 inch Mylar party one.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Clearly, I like the kind of party balloons you find at the drugstore.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Right. They make a really big one at 36 inch and the silver ones seem to work the best. And I developed a tracker an APRS tracker on the HF on two meter VHF that weighs 12 grams as totally solar powered; uses a guitar string for the independent elements, flexible solar panels. And I used an ultra thin circuit board. So, I designed the circuit in EagleCad, send it to a PC board company. I got the white boards back and then I hand soldered them. And the total weight, solar panels and everything is 12 grams. That's less than half an ounce. And by keeping it under that way, you can successfully float a Mylar Foil party balloon for upwards of three weeks, maybe four, three or four weeks. And it can take during the winter and it floats in the jet stream and floats around 30,000 feet.
Bill, WB8ELK:
And it can take just 14 days to go around the world during the winter, go completely around the world if you had the jet strings right and avoid storms. So, there is a company that makes a little bit bigger balloon that's about three feet wide by seven and a half feet long and it looks like it's made out of a clear plastic, but it's very impervious to leakage. And they are Scientific Balloon Solutions is the name of the company and their model SBS-13 and gets more expensive of course than the Mylar balloons. But these will float around 42,000 feet or so and you're above more storms that way. And a greater success about going around the world. One of the flights I've floated with that balloon and I went around the world for six and a half times in the space of 75 days.
Bill, WB8ELK:
That one was on 20 meters WSPR. I use magnet wire for the Antenna wires and the same circuit board and that I do for the APRS one. And what I do there is developed a system where you can send two frames of WSPR data to send telemetry in the second frame. And then I wrote a python program to grab that data and convert it to an APRS object and send it directly to the APRS servers. So, it shows up just like it was APRS transmission, even though it was the 20 meter WSPR transmission.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Now it's my understanding that there are some air spaces that amateur radio is not allowed like over on the UK for example. So do you-
Bill, WB8ELK:
The UK is one of them, but Yemen and North Korea and I have a geo fencing algorithm and my code, really just a little tiny out now processor the same that they use in the original Arduino boards. In fact, I usually, or doing other development system to program and what you had to do is draw a box around... Larry's if you don't want to transmit in. And when it detects it's within that polygon, it just doesn't transmit. So, you basically draw a box around each area that is the keep out zone because obviously we don't want to transmit over North Korea. We don't want to start world war III.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Right. But it's interesting that Britain, Yemen and North Korea are the three countries that-
Bill, WB8ELK:
They don't seem like they have a lot in common ... But there's a law on the books and Great Britain that prohibits aerial activities with armature radio. So, you can't even fly a kite or hot air balloon or even an airplane in Great Britain with amateur radio on board. And probably some law elder before World War II that they never changed. But I don't know the real reason.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
How do you define high altitude when you're looking at a balloon launches and deciding how you're going to go? Whoa. How has that elevation different from other balloon launches at lower elevations in terms of preparation?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Okay. Well, you're talking about versus a hot air balloon slot?
Eric, 4Z1UG:
No. So, for example, a high altitude is a high... I mean we're talking about a 100,000 feet for example, but what elevation does it become high altitude? I mean the Mylar balloons won't go any higher than 40,000 feet.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well at least, you can still consider that to be high altitude. I would consider high altitude to be anything higher than a hot air balloon typically fly,
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Which is just a couple of thousand feet.
Bill, WB8ELK:
He would still consider a Mylar balloon flight at 30,000 feet to be high altitude.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Okay.
Bill, WB8ELK:
But is not, probably another definition if you.. will is for a light text, whether balloon high altitude, it would be anything in the stratosphere. So, obviously we're not in the stratosphere for the pico balloons, but it's still higher than you would normally be able to fly.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Right. And I guess what's interesting is that with the pico balloons is that they actually get to see how the jet stream works in terms of where it takes the balloon and what the routes are and...-
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, that's the neat thing. Because it's a great tool. I go into a lot of schools and I talk about weather patterns and how to predict where the jet stream will go and we actually go through how to predict where the balloon will travel. And they learn about planning a mini space mission. They feel like they're finding the NASA mission and they really are having a very low, low, low earth orbiting satellites, particularly if it ends up going around the world. And the beauty of it is the students learn about space technology, education and math, science, technology, education and math, as well as learning about amateur radio and how it's used to receive the telemetry.
Bill, WB8ELK:
And in fact that has generated quite a few amateur radio operators to get their license, primarily to get involved in amateur radio, the linen. So, it's been... And then they go on to experience all the other aspects. Some of these students I've worked with at the college level weren't even aware that there was amateur radio until they've joined up on one of these projects. So, it's a great inspiration for worrying about science and technology as well as amateur radio.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Have you been approached by the ARRL Teachers Institute? They do the summer training and electronics and robotics and amateur radio for classroom teachers in order to allow them to be able to take these concepts back to their classrooms. It seems to me that this should be a part of the ARRL Teachers Institute as a way to kind of spread yourself across the country. Have you been approached by them on this?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I would love to talk to them.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah, it seems to me-
Bill, WB8ELK:
I'm aware of the program.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
It seems like it could be quite infectious and I think nowadays with kids have smart phones or iPads or something they can actually in real time track their balloon.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, I was just going to mention that the way you hook today's students is that you incorporate their smart phones and iPads and tablets. If you can incorporate the smart phone and show them how to track these balloons in real time on their smart phones, you have them hooked. That's exactly right.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well, that's very cool. Well, you're inspiring me to do something here. Let me take a quick break here to tell you about my favorite amateur radio audio podcast, the ham radio workbench podcast with George KG6VU and Jeremy KF7IJZ, where they pursue topics, technology, and projects on their ham radio work benches every two weeks. George and Jeremy document their projects and make circuit boards available for sale to their listeners. They have interesting guests and go in deep, even if you're a seasoned ham radio builder or just getting started.Be sure to join George and Jeremy for the ham radio workbench podcast. Use the link on this week show notes page by clicking on the image and now back to our QSO Today. What are the major challenges of high altitude ballooning and he's balloon launches. And how did you overcome them? In 2017 the article and QST said that you had already launched 500 balloon launches.
Bill, WB8ELK:
I'm close to 600 now. I sat down and watched how the weather bureau who did it observed Joe Kittinger's flights with a man program and it's all about the major components are getting the right amount of lift to get the ascent rate, the size of the parachute to determine your decent rate based on the weight of your payload. But the key is for a regular how to fly. That's going to pop and parachute back there. If you would really like to get your payload back, particularly if you're flying very expensive GoPro cameras or have expensive tracker systems on board or experiments, we set up some school experiments quite a bit.
Bill, WB8ELK:
The kids will come in and bring all kinds of matter experiments to fly. One of them flew a banana and when it came back it was all brown and mushy for examples. So, that was a good experiment. Tough fishing, crickets. One group, students brought in fishing crickets and they had looked up on the Internet that crickets can hold their breath for two hours now on 80 to 80, above about 50 to 60,000 feet you're in their backyard. So, this is a good test of that Internet rumor. And when we got that experiment back, they did survive. So, that particular Internet rumor was true, partially believe everything you read on the Internet, right?
Eric, 4Z1UG:
No you do of course. Would you say that that was the most unusual payload that you've launched?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, we've done a glider paper airplane and we had a tracker on the paper airplane, we leased it from 60,000 feet and watched it spiral back to earth. It was a four foot long paper glider, had a tracker on it and we were able to get both of them back. We launched rockets from balloons. We had a 400 pound rocket and we had the launch that in the Gulf of Mexico. We did one off the coast of North Carolina that actually at the time was the highest amateur rocket ever flown. Because the balloon was the first stage of the rocket and we were in the 2000 Guinness Book of Records for that. So, those are a lot of variety with ranging from a 400 pound rocket payload all the way down to half ounce a pico tracker. So, kind of covered the whole range.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Do you have sponsors for balloon launches? It seems to me that you've got to have quite a budget to pull off 600 balloon launches.
Bill, WB8ELK:
My sponsor is my billfold.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Some people have hobbies of buying sports cars and this is my passion and hobby.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. So pico ballooning is probably reduced the overall cost of your deployments?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, yes and no, as I was explaining with the regular weather balloons, you can do a Lens, a lock prediction based on the ascent rate and the parachute descent. And using the wind forecast models that you can find online, you can actually predict where it's going to land fairly accurately within a couple of miles typically. So, that narrows down our search range. And I like to have triple redundancy on an expensive tailored or I'm flying a lot of cameras in that. I have three trackers and a satellite tracker on board. Quite often you'll land in an area where you're a APRS receiver or [inaudible 00:34:25] so you may not be able to hear it, but the satellite tracker will send a signal directly to the tracker. For example, you've probably heard of the find the spot, use the global star on network. I used one of those and I developed my own satellite tracker using the iridium satellite network.
Bill, WB8ELK:
So, those are nice backup systems for when you fly a big payload. For the pico balloon payloads, you probably aren't going to see them ever again. Although I do have my email address on the solar panels and I have gotten some back. Typically if you're successful, they are probably going to end up coming down eventually in the Atlantic or Pacific Ocean. Or out in the middle of Siberia or the Sahara Desert where no one will ever see them again. So, that's the risk you take with the pico balloons that the goal of course is a long duration mission that lasts days and weeks so the students can follow it each day on their smart phones and they could get to learn about the cultures and the civilizations that they pass over fly over. And so they actually learn a lot about those societies as well.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And they learned that some geography because surprising and there's a surprising number of adults, young adults these days that don't know where... Or know different countries are on the map.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Absolutely.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
So yeah, what a great thing. Now you mentioned that you flown a 400 pound rockets off the coasts in Baha and off the east coast. Do you find that there are special places, best places or places that are better for balloon launches than other places?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, your best location is to fly in a region that has few mountains, lots of flat farmland. So, some of the most ideal curious to fly a tradition, a weather balloon is the American Midwest or any place that there is a lot of farmland. And few forest and few mountains where I first did my first flight in Findlay, Ohio. That was an ideal area because it's just all flat farmland but you can fly anywhere as long as you do a good prediction. I have friends that fly in Idaho and he had to be very precise to land in the valley instead of these really terrible mountains and so you'd have to then choose where your launch site will be to the land where you want it to come down. So, you had that kind of option that you have to look at so you can adjust your launch site for an optimal.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Are there seasons that are better than other seasons for launching balloons?
Bill, WB8ELK:
If you want to have an easy quick recovery, you probably want to launch from springtime the fall because it stays relatively close to you. In the winter time you can go upwards of 200 miles down range so you can fly during the middle of the winter, but to expect that you're going to have a long chase. Whereas there are some times during the June and July, that's when the jet stream tends to die there and that you can actually launch it in the bowl comeback and almost plan on top of you again after you're going up to a hundred thousand feet above the Earth. Spring is a great time and a summer and fall. But you can also launch in the winter and a lot of people do, but just remember the jet stream is typically at its highest have actually seen some balloon payloads going over 200 knots, ground speed in the jet stream.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That's pretty amazing. And what do you like better? I mean you say that you've done both APRS and WSPR seems to me that with WSPR, you might actually find that if it's laying on the ground somewhere?
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's a good question too. WSPR is primarily for doing a(inaudible) that's going to end up going over the Atlantic Ocean or specific far, far away from any possible VHF APRS ground station. So, if you want data during the flight, when you're doing the long duration pico balloon flight and you want to hear it and see its position, the advantage of WSPR, I'm only running 20 milliwatts on the 20 meter band on my WSPR payload. And keep in mind, it's also totally solar powered, so it's only on during the day time. But on the 20 meter band during the day, I can get reception thousands of miles away, whereas only APRS at 30,000 feet, it's about 250 miles to maximum. So, that's the big advantage to our WSPR remote payload. The disadvantage is having a payload, it has a 34 foot long wire on, made out of fragile magnet wire.
Bill, WB8ELK:
It's an [inaudible 00:39:28] magnitude more difficult to launch a than an APRS transmitter. So, for school events, typically I will apply an APRS transmitter because it's so easy to launch. But if the weather is really calm and really good and I will go with the WSPR mode, just because of the worldwide coverage. And yes, you're right. I had one land in the Mojave Desert and it started reporting its position every day. That wire, when it was found, the wire was flat in the sand and both directions and it's being received from over a thousand miles away. However, there is one drawback.
Bill, WB8ELK:
It's a six digit grid square, so you're constrained to a two by three miles search area. That's the closest you're going to be able to get the position report on westward. And so my friend had to drive around in a jeep out in the sands for several hours until he got the biggest second signal strength. And when he stopped it was really strong. And then he saw the balloon, he saw the wire trace the wire back and found the payload underneath his tire. Fortunately he just ran over the solar panel and it the only slightly damaged the payload. It was still working.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Now, I had a conversation with the Hans Summers G0UPL about exactly these micro balloons. I think he was saying to me that if they had modified the WSPR data so that they could actually get the GPS coordinates.
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's right. What I do is I'd send the two telemetry frames. One is your standard WSPR it's just basically your call sign, a four digit grid square and a two digit power level. I send a second frame just like Hans, Hans does and that I incorporate my system is different than his. There are similarities but also differences. I incorporate that the testing six grid square digits into another call sign that begins with a zero or Q, which are invalid call signs in the ITU. So, there's going to be no one else wanted zero or Q call sign. And then since if there's other people flying WSPR balloons, where the number would be in the call sign, that is a channel number assigned to different flights. For example, mine's, I have the seven and eight numbers because I fly a lot of them and so that way we can coexist and had multiple WSPR pico balloon payloads flying and then we can embed in the other characters.
Bill, WB8ELK:
The number of satellites being tracked, the temperature and the solar panel voltage. Ponds also uses the grid square on the second transmission to embed data. And they modified the WSPRnet website because it used to put position reports all over the world when he did that but they've modified it. Now that filter out calls on map the beginning of the zero and the Q, I still keep.. I don't touch the grid square myself because I match that with the first one so that if somebody else is flying a WSPR balloon and I have my channel number, it won't interfere with me because I matched the grid squares between the first transmission and the tournament reframe. And then I use python. I wrote a program to grab that data from the WSPRnet.org web database and I decode the telemetry reformat it into an APRS position report and I send it to the APRS servers.
Bill, WB8ELK:
What Hans does is to decode it in similar manner, but he sends it to their own tracking site and also sends it to a really cool website that the UK high altitude society has designed called tracker dot hub.org that's hotel Alpha Bravo Hotel United Bravo basically stands for high altitude balloon hub. If you want to see every balloon, both WSPR and traditional weather balloons flying in the world in any given moment, you go to that website and it will show you everything that is flying currently in the world.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And I did that today and it looks like there's maybe what 12 balloons up right now, something like that.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yes, yes.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah, it's very cool.
Bill, WB8ELK:
And if you see a position report over the middle of the ocean, then that is likely a WSPR balloon. I had one flying with APRS that just went by Japan about three or four days ago, and it is in a storm. It had been up for 14 days, launched from Alabama here. They went across Northern Africa. Well actually I went South of you went across Saudi Arabia. There was only one tracking station in that whole region on APRS and that's a station in Qatar, a 75 GE. Unfortunately whenever it is location during nighttime.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
It wasn't working because there's no battery on board.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Right. So, we didn't get a reception report until it ended up over China. Then the next day it was over Japan and hit a large storm and that was knocked out of the sky after 14 days in this big storm and it was fighting. It went clear down to the freeze level and bounced around there for several hours. And I think it finally got knocked down. I'm not completely certain it's gone. I'm hoping to see if it shows up over [inaudible 00:45:16]day.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And now this message from QRP Labs, QRP Labs, has been a sponsor of the QSO Today Podcast for a few years already. The biggest reason is that I have an affinity for building electronic devices, especially kits that are well designed and delivered ready to build Hans Summers G0UPL QRP Labs, founder, owner and engineering designer creates the most state of the art transmitters, receivers and transceiver kits at a very fair price to allow any ham to get on the air for very little money. Be sure to look for Hans in Dayton at the four days in May event at the Fairborn Ohio Holiday Inn on the Thursday before Hamvention and at the convention itself and building six.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I want to thank Hans for continuing to support the QSO Today Podcast and I want to thank you for always using the link on the show notes page to get to QRP Labs or if you make purchases in person by telling Hams at the convention that you heard about it here on QSO Today. QRP Labs is my favorite kit company. It should be yours too. QRP Labs and now back to my QSO Today. What kind of budget does one have to have?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Your biggest expense will be now your tracking equipment where usually be a onetime expense and go pro camera payloads. People liked to fly those lots to see that you that could (inaudible) of the curvature of the Earth and the blackness of space and those things are well expensive. You can have over a $1000 in your payload. Your trackers range upwards to $200 or more for an APRS tracker or satellite tracker, so you could well have had over a thousand dollars worth of equipment flying underneath your balloon out of the traditional weather we'll end fly then your expendables, you're going to have about $120 in the balloon and probably another $100 in helium to inflate the balloon at current prices unless you go with hydrogen and then it's about half the cost. But I was still planning on probably anywhere from 150 to $200 and the balloon and you won't get that back. The balloon is going to pop and lose the lifting gas.
Bill, WB8ELK:
So, that's a rough estimate of the costs of a latex where they're going to fly. And then you've also... If you want it back you have to plan your expedition and your gas costs to go out and get it and at what it takes to put in your ground station in your car. So, those are all things to consider there. Now, if the pico balloon flight, you're a big expense is going to be in the tracker. I currently offer the APRS sky tracker. I call my board $449, but that is a complete all in one GPS included. It's all on one board, transponder and everything. You just take it outside, tied to balloon and let it go. It's ready to fly. Now the balloon, if you fly the silver Mylar Foil balloons are about $4 a piece and you have maybe a couple of dollars worth the helium in it buy one of these little party balloon tanks for about 20 bucks, $25.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
No, it's my understanding from reading... For me, reading an article, I think that you wrote about this or something online that you don't fill that party balloon completely up with the helium. Right?
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's correct because it's going to go up to... Yeah. If you put too much in it, it'll go up and it will pop. If you put too little in it, then you may not clear the trees and it may not float well. So, there's a very fine balance and that you have to get it probably within a plus or minus a half a gram plus minus a gram. So, I buy this little gram scale from Amazon and use that grant.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
So, essentially it's pulling on the scale and you just put enough helium in it so that it's just slightly more than that.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, I measure the actual list. You're basically, you want to [inaudible 00:49:33] for a successful party, balloon flight.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Bill, WB8ELK:
You want to have about three grams extra lift over the rate of the payload. That's an equitable learn. So, when you're ready to fly, you're going to have three grams of positive lift.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. Okay.
Bill, WB8ELK:
If you are over that the balloon will pop. I think roughly over four grams you probably won't have as successful flight and you probably don't want to go much below two grams. So, between two and four grams. So, but you had to be pretty accurate. Now what I do is I have a little weight bag clip on the balloon inflating it and when it just lifts that off the table, I know it's lifting the right amount and then I double check it with my gram scale. But sometimes I don't even bother with the gram scale if it looks accurate and what we enough, just to watch it lift off the table, with the weights that I pre weighed before the flight could get that exact amount of lift. And I also double check it before it flight by taping a US penny to it, which weighs two and a half grams.
Bill, WB8ELK:
And if it just slightly goes up, I'm good. And then I put a nickel on it, tape it and that's five grams if it goes down. Then I know I'm pretty much in the right range, so I do a little double check before I lift off with a big weather balloon flight. You're talking about lifting towns and material and if you're off a little bit, a pound or two, either way, it's not going to make a lot of difference. The tricky part with the pico balloons is to get it accurate to within about a gram or two plus or minus a gram or less. And that's the trickiest part. You have to weigh everything, the tape, the fishing line, everything that's attached to the balloon.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Wow. Okay. Do you have a YouTube channel?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I do. It's under my calls bind WSPR Bravo 8 Echo Lima Kilo, I also have an email for those who would like to contact me about pico balloons and regular Ohio to blending. And that's wsprbravo8echolimakilo@gmail. So, [email protected]. And my website is wb8elk.com.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay. I'll put all these in the show notes pages for people to be able to... I just go there and if they're driving, they won't get into an accident while they're writing this down.
Bill, WB8ELK:
But I also... I'm offering the sky trackers to those who are interested in both APRS and WSPR mode. So, just call me or email me for particulars on that.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I'm thinking of doing one on myself and actually notifying my community here that I'm doing it so that they'll probably be a nicer to me as I'm putting more Antennas on my house.
Bill, WB8ELK:
There you go.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Is there a community around your launches? I mean, are there people that are following you and are out there available if they want to recover a tracker?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I think there are one of the best resources is there's a chat room of the UK Ohio to society puts together and they have people sign up from all over the world to chat with each other about, how to do ballooning and I have to think of the name of it, but it's web chat to link and it's a towns high altitude.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay. I'll confirm that and put that in the show notes as well. What's the current rig at your QTH?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I actually, I use it in a Funcube dongle for most of my reception because it's a wonderful SDR dongle that has all kinds of free software that you can see the entire bandwidth, what's going on. But for transmit, I have TS-4, a TS-2000 and I have an ATV transceiver and antennas . I live 500 feet up on a mountain. So, even though my antennas are only up about 15 feet on a tripod, it's like I have a 549 floating [inaudible 00:53:42].
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Now. Your ATV or are you doing that on microwave?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, I'm primarily on the 70 centimeter band and the 23 centimeter bands.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Do you still operate satellites?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I still operate satellites, yes. I haven't [inaudible 00:53:57] for that.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And you use the Funcube dongle for the reception and the TS-2000 with the transporters or something for the or does the TS-2000 also work in the UHF?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yeah,a combination of the two, but if I'm just monitoring or are receiving, I have a WSPR station that's always listening. And I typically use the Funcube dongle for that for receiving WSPR. And also, my WSPR transmitter scratch records. They make a great little home station. That’s 25 milliwatts. I put those on the air through little SMA connector and I can get reception on those around the world if the conditions are right. I have one... Yeah, I have one tracker over in the middle of the Atlantic. So, we're talking to magnet wire Typo in a 25 milliwatts transmitter. It was heard in Perth, Australia, exactly on the other side of the world and the copy. So, it's amazing how far WSPR mode can be received.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
It makes you wonder whether the problems with propagation is sun spots or people just listening instead of transmitting.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Well, it has to do mostly with the weak signal decoding software that can pull signal so far out of the noise level.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah, that's amazing isn't it?
Bill, WB8ELK:
All right. That's a low power can go a long way. And most people in WSPR or calling running a 100 milliwatts up to five watts. There are a few that transmit around 20 middle watts like I do. And it's just amazing how far you can get with even that tiny little bit of power.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
What do you think the greatest challenges to amateur radio now being almost 50 years in?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, the challenge is getting our students fired up about amateur radio and one of the methods that I use is to get them involved in high altitude ballooning because the fact that they can send telemetry very efficiently using Ham radio and use it for cool projects like mini space program that gets them excited a lot. And I think the digital modes are really a great way to bring newcomers into amateur radio.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
So, it'd be fair to say that you're excited by the digital modes now including FT8?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh yes, very definitely.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Is there anything else that really excites you about what's happening in amateur radio besides those modes?
Bill, WB8ELK:
I love 10 meters. Whenever it opens up, I have been 10 10 number for many, many years.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That's a Ten Ten International Club, right?
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's right. That's right. I have a very low number because I joined in 1970.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Is there something else Bill that you're doing that I haven't touched on?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh, that's the majority of it. Other than now my job has changed. I'm now I'm working on the SLS rocket at NASA.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Really, what's your current occupation?
Bill, WB8ELK:
System Safety Engineer.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And the reason you were living in Alabama is because you're close to NASA?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Right. Marshall Space Flight Center.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And what are you doing exactly there?
Bill, WB8ELK:
We're making sure that the SLS, the space launch system rocket will be successful and safe.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. But what you're doing there at your acting as an electronic engineer.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Correct.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I see. Well that sounds really cool. It sounds to me like your life and career has gone full circle from Sputnik to SLS.
Bill, WB8ELK:
That's exactly right.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well that's pretty amazing. Are you anywhere near retiring?
Bill, WB8ELK:
Oh No. I'll keep working. And feel I'm unable to drive anymore.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well my father tells me who's just 89 that he says, "As soon as they remove the yellow line on the right side of the road, he's finished driving. But until that time, his license is good until he's 96."
Bill, WB8ELK:
I'll keep driving until we have flying cars.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That might fly you automatically. You'll just call it with your smartphone.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Then where we are going, we won't need roads.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah. There you go. Bill, it's been a real pleasure to have you on the QSO Today Podcast. I know it's taken us some time to get it organized, but I'm really delighted that you were able to spend this hour with me and talk about the amateur view of space. So, with that I want to wish you 73 and thank you so much for joining me on the QSO Today Podcast.
Bill, WB8ELK:
Yeah, and it has been a real pleasure and 73 to you.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That concludes this episode of QSO Today. I hope that you enjoyed this QSO with Bill. Please be sure to check the show notes that include links and information about the topics that we discussed. Go to www.qsotoday.com and put in WB8ELK in the search box at the right top of the page. My thanks to both Icom America and QRP Labs for their support of the QSO Today Podcast. Please show your support of these fine sponsors by clicking on their links in the show notes pages or when you make your purchases that you say that you heard it here on QSO Today. You may notice that some of the episodes are transcribed into written text. If you'd like to sponsor this or any of the other episodes into written text, please contact me. Support the QSO Today Podcast by first joining the QSO Today email list by pressing the subscribe buttons on the show notes pages.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I will not spam you or share your email address with anyone. Become a listener sponsor monthly or annually by clicking on the sponsor buttons on the show notes page. I am grateful for any way that you show appreciation and support. It makes a big difference. QSO Today is now available on iHeartRadio, Spotify, Libsyn and tune in as well as the iTunes store. If you own an Amazon Echo, you can say, "Alicia, play the QSO Today Podcast from tune in." I still use stitcher to listen to podcasts on my smartphone. The links to all of these services are on the show notes pages on the right side. Until next time. This is Eric 4ZIUG 73.
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