UK Meteor Radar Project

I'm retired from Leicester University Space Research Group where I designed cooled CCD cameras for X-ray astronomy.
I'm a radio amateur (G3OVH) near Leicester, UK.
Been a member of BAA-RAG for many years. and played with reception of Graves pings etc using various receivers and Spectrum Lab.
I hope this new beacon puts the UK firmly on the map for meteor science.
I have an all-sky camera so it would be great to catch meteors on it and the pings on my receiver.

Hi all,

I'm Dave, callsign G0DJA and I live in Bolsover, not far from Chesterfield in Derbyshire. Locator IO93IF.

Interested in most modes of propagation above 30MHz and dabble with MSK144 on 4M and 6M.

Dave (G0DJA)

Hi, Mainly interested in 2m communications but a 6m beacon should help! Looking forward to being able to monitor the beacon via a web based system especially during the major showers. I'm usually around during the major showers trying to break the 2000km distance barrier which is generally accepted to be the benchmark. However the beacon should be useful for those times of the year when it is down to random meteors to supply the appropriate conduit. Thanks to all. Peter G4URT locator IO82pu

Hi everyone, Andy ( G4XKC) here at the Astronomy Centre, West Yorkshire. 6 mtr 3 element yagi at ~40 degrees Elevation pointing Sherwood way.
Does the beacon have any modulation? i.e. on / off / morse ident? I can hear 2 weak carriers very near the frequency...knowing the beacon modulation would help in identification or spurious emissions.
Thanks

Andy

We don't seem to be getting much interest on this website at the moment. I thought I would stir things up a bit by posting an idea:

As I am too near the beacon I get a lot of direct carrier, which makes meteor detection much more difficult. I showed this in the image I posted after my vertical Moxon build:



I have been looking at noise suppression on 6m which I need for my amateur radio activities, but I just realised I could probably use the same phase cancellation techniques with input from a second antenna - probably a yagi pointing at the beacon. I will let you know the results soon.

Tony

andyjss wrote: ↑Sat Jul 23, 2022 3:01 pm Hi everyone, Andy ( G4XKC) here at the Astronomy Centre, West Yorkshire. 6 mtr 3 element yagi at ~40 degrees Elevation pointing Sherwood way.
Does the beacon have any modulation? i.e. on / off / morse ident? I can hear 2 weak carriers very near the frequency...knowing the beacon modulation would help in identification or spurious emissions.
Thanks

Andy

Hi

The beacon identifies in A1A Morse keying every 7 or 8 minutes ( not precision timed ). It meets the OFCOM requirements with as little interruption / modulation as possible as this is required by us to enable precision measurements of Doppler shift which is required if we are to make trajectory and location calculations.

Kind Regards
John B

Hi All

Newbie here. I have, for a few years, been monitoring meteors using the Graves beacon with various amounts of success, using a SRD Play RSP2pro and dedicated 143,050 MHz Aerial. Finding this site hopefully gives me another source of detection...
I've made an aerial to the specification shown on the site, but thus far, I have not had any recognisable blips from any of the transient meteors I'm seeing from above France ( Graves ). Maybe once we get into a recognisable (main) shower I'll be able to refine my equipment and setup, to start monitoring properly.
Special thanks to John B for his patients helping me get started on this forum..

Hello,

My name is John (G4NSB) and I live between Solihull and Redditch.
I am putting together a system to take a look at meteor echoes from the beacon and I am using a 1/2 wave dipole connected to an RSP1B SDR. Controlling this with SRDUno.

I thought the beacon carrier would be well above the noise at my location but I am having trouble receiving it at times. And, so far, no plane aeroplane echoes or (or meteors).

I think the next step may be to get a preamp. I would welcome any advice to comments.

Thanks

John

Hi, I have a radio license M0ACF but have no TX/RX and the QTH is 12 miles west of Cambridge, UK.
I an also a Solar imager.
I have a RSP1B SDR and really intrested in the GB3MBA project. I have constructed a 1/2 wave dipole from ali tube and seem to be recieving the beacon OK.
With the dipole end on to Mansfield (100km line of sight)I can null out the carrier wave, but then on occasions two carriers appear on the waterfall.
I have seen aircaft trails and the odd beeb (very low audio level) which I think is a meteor.
With the persiads shower upon us I will be 'listening' and imaging. I'll come back with my results.
Hugh

Well I Seem to have it working, but why two carriers? I can null then out by haveing the dipole end on to GB3MBA. I have put a couple of images in 'Spectogram' of possible meteors pings. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks HughP.