[amsat-bb] Russian kocmoc

[Bob DeVarney W1ICW]

just me chiming in again.
     I have kocmoc award number 51-RS and can find no dash number typed on
     mine, but then I have it matted (poorly ) in a frame which might have
     cut it off a bit. Mine is dated Sept 12 1998.
     I also have the ZRO award dated January 1995, only ever got down to
     level 4 on mode B, was working on further shack enhancements when I
     either got married or the satellite died, or maybe a bit of both. Very
     proud of this award, even if my level is somewhat trifling compared to
     level 8
     My prized possession is a Special Event QSL from W5RRR for the Apollo
     11th 25th Anniversary on July 19-22, 1994. I worked them the last pass
     over the US, last couple hours of the pass, and I was the last station
     to work them before the satellite ( AO-21 )switched modes to transmit
     wefax images. I was working it portable, with a Bearcat scanner with
     preamp for reception, a Kenwood TH-78 HT driving the gutted final from a
     Motorola UHF Micor and a 12 element yagi on a camera tripod for the uplink.
     How many others worked this Special Event Station, or remember the
     different modes of AO-21?
     Looking at the dust covered walls here I see I was extremely active in
     sats in the mid to late 1990s; very little since. Some of that I can
     blame on getting married about that time. Some I cannot. It's easy to
     sigh and wish for the "good old days" but I think that memory is always
     sweeter and if we looked more closely the good old days weren't always
     so good.

     I for one would not want to go back to manual tracking and doppler
     correction like I had back then .. I finally upgraded to an AEA ST-1 and
     The Station Program by VP9MU some time around 1997 if I remember. The
     availability of cheap solid state power FETS is pretty darn cool too.. a
     single FET 1200 watt amplifier for two meters really tickles me pink..
     working on one now for my EME station.. So maybe we'll look back on
     THESE as the good old days.

     I have some very well thumbed issues of Orbits magazine, the forerunner
     to AMSAT Journal from when I first got licensed in 1981. I see they were
     pretty excited to be building AO-10 back then, and commemorating the
     third launch anniversary of Oscar-8. Very cool stuff indeed.

     73 all,

     Bob W1ICW