SkyQuest 2              Bulletin #6                Sunday, 05/30/98




Saturday, May 30 the SkyQuest expendable balloon package flew from
the site of the National Weather Service, Taunton (Boston Forecast
Office) Open House into a deep blue New England sky.  As advertised,
the balloon's signal was heard all across New England, New York, New
Jersey, and Pennsylvania. (examples: Rutland, Vermont; Willow Grove,
Pennsylvania; Sewell, New Jersey [ from WB8IMY log ] )

According to SkyQuest HF Net, the balloon signals were evident
for approximately 2 hours, indicating a healthy peak altitude.
The microcontroller seems to have performed flawlessly even with
some feature creep in the form of time marks added to the
program late in the week.   :)

Also flawless was the superb net control provided by Steve Ford,
WB8IMY, through the facilties of W1AW.  The net had almost 30 check-ins,
and has provided the greatest feedback so far with respect to confirmed
signal reach.  I was able to monitor the last minutes of the HF net, and
found it to be totally enjoyable.  The experience of hearing far flung
(for non-satellite VHF) operators checking in with their signal reports
was as thrilling as hearing the balloon itself.

I'm seeking operators who have extended tapes of the balloon
telemetry signal that they could loan to SkyQuest for analysis.
Please email if you could share that material.  Extended uninterrupted
tapes are required to decode the altimeter data, and need not be
perfect in quality because exact frequencies are not relevant to
altitude measurement.

Look here for a more elaborate account of the event, and some early
analysis such as a computed track of the balloon based on upper
air soundings to be ready by late Sunday.

Hank Riley
SkyQuest