[amsat-bb] Re: S band downlink on P3E

[Steve Meuse]

Andrew Glasbrenner expunged (glasbrenner at mindspring.com):

> Everyone knows I'm a big supporter of AMSAT, but I gotta call it as I see 
> it. It makes me think of "bait and switch" to collect money for a project 
> featuring such a popular mode and then drop it.

I'm somewhat glad that AO40 ended up with it's only downlink on S band. It forced me to educate myself on microwaves. Thanks to that unfortunate accident, I'm now active on all bands up to 10Ghz. 

When I saw the latest band layout I was dissapointed. 

I know the builders have a constant struggle between building something that is usable vs. something that advances the state of the art. I just think that the majority of people realized that S band was easy, therefore very usable. CC Rider was a huge step forward for us, even if it wasn't eventually doable. Going back to V/U modes seems to me taking a step backward to me. 

I don't want to seem negative, I really appreciate every ounce of work the builders put in, I just think maybe they need to take a little more input from the active community before the set things in motion. 


-Steve
N1JFU