Project Horus High altitude balloon project

7Jul/104

Launch of Horus 3

After a long hiatus, it's time to launch Horus 3!

Horus 3 will be a re-fly of Horus 2, and will be launched on Thursday the 8th of July, around 12:00 ACST.

Predicted landing site is approx 100km east from launch:

Horus III predicted flight path

Being winter predicting a suitable launch date can be tricky so I do apologise about the lack of prior notice.

As with the last launch both myself and Adrian VK5ZSN will be tracking the balloon in separate cars and keeping in contact using the 2m repeater, likely VK5RMB. If you are tracking the balloon online we would love to hear from you with any updates as we may not have internet access the whole time.

As with the previous flights, the balloon flight & chase cars can be tracked online at http://www.spacenear.us/tracker/.

I don't feel that my new boards are quite well tested enough to fly- so Horus 3 will be flying with the original flight computer used on Horus 2 - I'm hoping to fly my new boards in future launches.

The purpose of this launch is to test higher baud rate communications - the payload will be increasing it's baud rate as it ascends:

0 m - 10,000 m = 50 baud
10,001 m - 13,000 m = 100 baud
13,001 m - 16,000 m = 150 baud
16,001 m - 19,000 m = 200 baud
19,001 m - 21,000 m = 300 baud
> 21,000m = 50 baud.

Once the payload begins to descend, it will revert to 50 baud for recovery. If you're tracking the payload, you'll need to manually change the baud rate in dl-fldigi as the payload passes these altitudes.

Changing the baud rate

Select the new baud rate, then click save

If there are any last minute developments I'll update the blog. If you are tracking and on the repeater we look forward to hearing from you!

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  1. best of luck terry!

  2. Best of luck guys,

    I only have a Yaesu VR500 scanner and a whip, but I will attempt some tracking.

  3. Thanks guys!

    Andrew, if you have any queries or get stuck, feel free to give us a call on the radio or ask in #highaltitude on the freenode IRC network. :)

  4. What a fantastic effort!

    We were following the track on the web site. Once the payload was on the way down it was great to see the cars stop for a while and then take off as the landing zone became clearer.

    Congratulations to all concerned you certainly enhanced my afternoon!


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