SOAR Product Announcement! BayCon 2022, the "Secret Squirrel" project.

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Күн бұрын

SOAR: Satellite Optimized Amateur Radio. A radio that's optimized for operating FM satellites. In this video, I talk about the challenges I've had with operating FM satellites, and the product I'm designing and building to address those problems.
You can learn more about SOAR at:
* electronics.halibut.com/SOAR/
* / halibutelec
This presentation was originally given at BayCon 2022: www.bay-net.org/baycon.html

Пікірлер: 39

@JasonRobinsonidaho 2 жыл бұрын

Can't wait. I don't do sat contactings but all the issues you mention here are WHY I haven't tried sat work!

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

Spoiler: Neither have I, and for the same reasons. It's ALMOST as if that were the inspiration for the project! ;-)

@KC2BKM 2 жыл бұрын

Want! Want! Want!

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

Make sure you’re signed up for my groups.IO list, halibut-electronics.groups.io The website is live now, but SOAR is not yet for sale. electronics.halibut.com/

@w8mtb-jacob801 2 жыл бұрын

Awesome! This looks great! Keep up the good work!

@Dave_N8CR 2 жыл бұрын

This is awesome, I remember you talking about this a couple years back. Glad to see it’s finally coming to fruition! I’ll be saving my pennies for when this becomes available!

@radman999 2 жыл бұрын

Awesome work! Wish you all the best with your new business!

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

Thank you! :-)

@RicSpivey 2 жыл бұрын

SO EXCITED! holy cow that's awesome. DEFINITELY going to be paying attention to this. Totally what we need more of in the hobby. Thank you so much!

@philipshuman 2 жыл бұрын

Super excited to see the process on this project. Very cool!

@timpayne621 2 жыл бұрын

Very cool.

@topgunhobbes 2 жыл бұрын

Great idea and presentation as a maker myself it is nice you share the struggles, some of the prototype discussion and future goals. These projects are not simple and I am blown away with what you have accomplished...

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

Right now, I'm asking myself why I decided to start with THE MOST COMPLICATED of the product ideas I had when setting up the business! :-)

@BradSmithBriefer 2 жыл бұрын

Shut up and take my money!

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

Give me a few more months to finish some code, and confirm the hardware design, and I'll be happy to. :-)

@jameski5oeb668 2 жыл бұрын

Been waiting for this for months! PTT could be index finger switch like a MIG gun switch.

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

A friend AK6DM is helping design a 3D printed handle for an Arrow boom (really, anything with a 3/4" square tube boom) that will have a PTT switch embedded in it. We considered doing a pistol grip, but decided that wouldn't give you very good leverage when you need to roll the antenna to adjust for polarization. So we're sticking with an in-line handle.

@k2exe 2 жыл бұрын

This is very cool I just built a sarcnet rotator. Which is almost exactly what you described as a rotator, holds and moves my arrow antenna nicely. I built it for under $100 based on the mk1b design on their website. The protocol is a very simple serial interface over USB.

@dxscotland5901 2 жыл бұрын

This looks amazing!! Gm4zji Chris

@WI9LL 2 жыл бұрын

This is impressive… I could see a fourth “board” which could be a rechargeable battery that is USB chargeable. This is a crazy amount of research and implementation… nicely done!

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

The three board stack is just the prototype that I'm using for development. The final product is a single board in an extruded aluminum case. The current case won't fit batteries in it, but it is my intention to design a battery charging circuit to add to a future version in a slightly thicker case. But for the first release (internal version number v2.2), I punted on power, assuming people can provide their own 7v to 30v DC source into an Anderson Powerpole. Instead, I concentrated on the parts that are actually unique to SOAR. Putting time into a battery charging circuit is not the value-proposition for SOAR.

@WI9LL 2 жыл бұрын

@@SmittyHalibut understood. But USB charging for HTs is a massively wanted feature that only the Chinese rigs are starting to do. Keep it in mind for later development. You pull this off and you’ll have the money to do it 😂.

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

@@WI9LL Ahh, hang on. I missed that detail of your post. I see what you're saying. That's a great idea. Yes, I'll make it support USB charging as well. It'll charge slower, but it'll still charge.

@WI9LL 2 жыл бұрын

@@SmittyHalibut plug it in the car when you get to work then go hunt Sats when you get off 😍

@alanbiddle 2 жыл бұрын

While you are planning, please consider the ability to handle "9600 baud," by which I mean the bandwidth and flat frequency passband needed for G3RUH/GMSK modes. There are satellites such as FalconSAT-3 which do actual 9600 baud packet, but there are other telemetry and digital image modes which also use that range of audio frequencies, though not packet modulation. Some of the FOX satellites did this for high speed telemetry and images. Sadly even the majors are no longer including that. The IC-9700 and IC-705 are cases in point. This is probably of minimal use in the field, but would be great in the shack. Some of us keep around relative antiques to retain this capability.

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

I really like this idea. However, there’s only so much I can do since I’m using a 3rd party RF module. I’m going to move this discussion to the groups.io email list that I see Alan is already on. If anyone else would like to follow along, you can subscribe here: electronics.halibut.com/

@Soupie62 2 жыл бұрын

This sounds great. Can I ask for an option during "Pass Playback"? I often monitor weather satellites (and SSTV). Decoding audio to generate images is typically a function you do later on a PC - it sure would be nice to see that on a radio. Doesn't need to be the whole image, just a few lines so you can see the image is being decoded (and saved to SD)

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

On-device SSTV decoding is definitely something that’s possible given the hardware capabilities. It won’t be a launch feature, but it’s on the back-log of features to add over time.

@59wingnut 2 жыл бұрын

looks very promising. too bad servocity stopped making their pan tilt head, looked like it would be real close to what you could use to point the antenna. Bosch makes a nice 9-dof sensor that could work, might be a bit pricey though. bet you could find something like it that does not have extra functions you may not need.

@JosephVE3GKT 2 жыл бұрын

This is a fantastic idea, Mark! I'd love to get my hands on one when you have them for sale! Perhaps you could integrate the targeting system into the same device, and the whole radio could just be mounted to the boom of the antenna! Best of luck and I'm looking forward to trying one of these out! 73 de VE3GKT

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

I've thought about that. There are some pros and cons to that. For the immediate term, SOAR will be separate from the antenna.

@rickkowalewski664 2 жыл бұрын

The Wouxun KG-UV9D PLUS is full duplex handheld and works great for FM satellites. Still available to buy new.

@Michael-nd7gh 2 жыл бұрын

For SOME FM satellites. Per Patrick WD9WEK: "Just like the original KG-UV9D, along with many other HTs that have come on the ham equipment market over the years, the KG-UV9D (Plus) just can't keep the 2m transmitter from desensing the 70cm receiver when working a V/U FM satellite like SO-50."

@sracing1 2 жыл бұрын

Yep. Good video production. Really sounds neat. Although working FM sats is not quite as difficult as you make it seem, this would be a great "appliance" . My concern is other than this video, I can't find anything on it's availability. Fifteen video minutes on the base product, 15 minutes on possible future enhancements and no real product yet ? I will keep watching, but won't be holding my breath.

@SmittyHalibut 2 жыл бұрын

That is a very fair concern. SOAR is in active development. I tweet occasionally about the work at @HalibutElec, but I post a lot more often to the halibut-electronics@groups.io mailing list. If you'd like to see my progress, that's where to go. Availability hasn't been announced because the truth is I don't know. I will say that I'm HOPING to have a batch of hardware ready to sell at Hamvention in May 2022, that's my goal. You didn't ask about price, which is the other question I get a lot. I haven't said anything about that either because, again, I don't know. I know what my Bill of Materials cost is, but I haven't finalized the assembly cost yet. Once I have that nailed down, I'll be able to announce a price tag. I have been saying: It's more than $100, and less than $1000. And not just "$999.95" less than $1000. I know that's a wide range, but it's what I've got for now. Thanks for your interest! I appreciate your skepticism, and I hope I can meet your expectations. :-)

@junimalakai 9 ай бұрын

Hello Mr. Smith, is there a way for me to contact you personally? I'm a final year degree student and is doing my final year project regarding the Cross Dipole Antenna and would very much appreciate if I can ask you a few question to deepen my understanding and get the general ideas on how to execute this project. Thanks.