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BALLOONS - PICO BALLOONS



So what is a pico balloon ? (That's pronounced pee-coh, not pye-coh, and refers to the size of the thing: small.) As Brian Basura (N6CVO) explains, a pico balloon is an ultra-lightweight plastic balloon suspending a tiny, lightweight amateur radio transmitter. The envelope is filled with a breath of hydrogen, which is used in place of helium because it leaks less. The balloon has a free lift capacity of about 15 or 16 grams - a little over half an ounce. When launched, it appears to be barely inflated but expands to a larger sphere when it reaches planned stasis altitude of about 40,000 feet. N6CVO explains that the difference between too little inflation and too much is barely a squirt of hydrogen. It's determined by careful weighing on a gram scale.

The electronics package, which dangles under the balloon on a light filament, is called the tracker. It consists of a transmitter, a GPS chip and a small computer with programing instructions. Total weight ? Just under a half ounce, including a light solar array to power the system. The device trails a long dipole antenna made of 0.005-inch fine wire.

Pico balloons communicate through various protocols, but two popular ones are called APRS and WSPR. The Automatic Packet Reporting System is a kind of single-frequency network system that allows any ham to check on local activities in that region. There are numerous APRS nets in the U.S. and many countries have some version of it. In the U.S., it operates on 144.39 MHz in the 2-meter band, but on different frequencies elsewhere in the world so the transmitters have to be smart enough to adapt. The balloon trackers transmit continuously when the sun is up to energize their solar arrays and report position, altitude and other parameters that the bandwidth allows. APRS is integrated with the internet.

So is WSPR or Weak Signal Propagation Reporting, pronounced whisper. It's a software protocol designed for sniffing out very low-powered one-way signals. It has miniscule bandwidth and reports station power and position by grid reference. With WSPR, it takes 110 seconds to transmit 50 characters at 1.46 baud. That might be so 1970s, but it gets the job done with the low-powered transmitters pico balloons have. Some countries don't allow transmissions from balloons, so picos following the rules have to be emissions geo-fenced. And by the way, pico balloons, due to their light weight, are exempt from FAA Regulations for Balloons, 14 CFR 101, that regulates balloons. Picos typically transmit at about 10 milliwatts - 1/50th the power of a Christmas tree light. Still, explains N6CVO, transmit distances of up to 5000 miles have been achieved and 1200 to 2000 miles are routine.

Pilots naturally wonder if pico balloons represent a threat to aircraft. Politics being what they are, the Pentagon thought so and ordered three of what may or may not have been pico or research balloons shot down. The first question to ask, however, is are standard NOAA radiosondes a threat because they're 30 times heavier and far more numerous ? In the conterminous U.S. alone, some 138 are launched daily from 69 sites. The little Styrofoam box containing the hardware weighs about 17 ounces, max. It has a parachute and a return address. Summary of FAA Regulations for Balloons

No crashes have been caused by aircraft/weather balloon collisions in the U.S., but one was recorded in Russia in 1970 when an AN-24 airliner collided with a radiosonde just after takeoff. There were no survivors. The size of the radiosonde doesn't appear in accident reports.

For amazing as pico technology is, just as astonishing is that U.S. radar can find such a thing and an AIM-9X can target it and bring it down.



WB8ELK Send An Amateur Radio Balloon Around The World












Web Site Global Tracking for Amateur Balloons
SONDEHUB








N0NBH
Understanding
Propagation

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Solar-Terrestrial Images and Data on this site are courtesy of:

Data for VHF Conditions is from DXrobot - Gouda , Make More Miles on VHF , and Andy (G7IZU) (all used with permission).

Data for Solar Flare Probability is from University of Bradford (used with permission).

Data for solar data and conditions from NOAA SWPC , solar flux from Space WX Canada , solar images from NASA , and world map/globes/solar system from FOURMILAB (credit given).



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