[amsat-bb] Jugnu (JNU) : Thanks and Updates

[Shashank Chintalagiri]

Hello,

I'm the system engineer for the Jugnu nanosatellite project. This is the
nanosatellite which is more generally known on this list as JNU, since that
was the identifier sent along with the TLE. I've been lurking on this list
for the past couple of years, ever since we started working on the
nanosatellite. I did learn a lot from occasionally perusing through the
posts here. Not being a licensed HAM myself, I apologize for intruding into
your space here today.

On behalf of the entire Jugnu team, I'd like to thank all of you for the
beacon reports you've sent our way, both on the list as well as through Mani
(VU2WMY). Its been a long couple of years on the project, but the last few
days have been a much more intense roller coaster ride. The continuous
stream of beacon reports from across the world surpassed all of our
expectations, and were the mainstay of our emotional support while we were
having difficulties recieving the beacon ourselves. If I do get to meet any
of you in person, the beer's on me.

The telemetry gathered by HAMs across the world has been extremely useful in
our analysis of the spacecraft's condition. I hope to be able to release,
atleast partially, the details of the format for the beacon string in a
couple of days. In the meanwhile, we welcome any additional telemetry that
you can send our way. Even information about the AOS/LOS has been very
useful in trying to figure out where exactly the satellite is.

NORAD / celestrak has released 5 TLE's tagged with the PSLV C-18 launch
(2011-058<A-E>). We arent yet sure which one, if any, is Jugnu. We do know
that SRMSat is one of the cluster of 3 objects (B,C,D). We've been able to
recieve our beacon when we attempt to track C, but the signal strength is
low and we generally see it clearly only near AOS. Due to reasons I'm
probably not allowed to discuss in public, we have reason to believe that
Jugnu is moving away from the other objects (SRMSat, VesselSat, and until
later today, MT) at a velocity of approximately 1.5 to 3 meters per second
since separation from LV. We expect this velocity to be tangential to the
orbit. If you're trying to track Jugnu, I would suggest that for the moment,
C is a good starting point, and it may be better to track a little ahead of
it. We will be trying to do the same in some of the later passes ourselves.
In the case of SRMSat, we've had good signals at object B until earlier
today, but we think that C did a better job of it in the last decent pass we
had earlier this evening, about 6 hours ago.

I'd be more than delighted to try and answer any questions you may have
about Jugnu, so please feel free to contact me on or off list if you would
like to know more about it.



Thanks and Regards,

Chintalagiri Shashank


Head, System Integration and Electronic Hardware Design,
Jugnu Nanosatellite Project
Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur

http://blog.chintal.in