Sea Launch Successfully Launches EchoStar IX/Telstar 13 Satellite Into Orbit

[John Corn]

LONG BEACH, Calif., Aug. 8 /PRNewswire/ -- Sea Launch, the world's most reliable launch service provider for heavy commercial communication satellites, today successfully launched the EchoStar IX/Telstar 13 satellite to orbit for EchoStar Communications Corporation and Loral Skynet.

A Zenit-3SL launch vehicle lifted off at 8:31 pm PDT (3:31 GMT) from the Odyssey Launch Platform positioned at 154 degrees West Longitude, on the Equator. All systems performed nominally throughout the flight. The Block DM-SL upper stage inserted the 4,737 kg (10,443 lb) EchoStar IX/Telstar 13 satellite into a high perigee geosynchronous transfer orbit. As planned, the spacecraft's first signal was acquired at 9:46 pm PDT (4:46 GMT), shortly after spacecraft separation, by a ground station in Western Australia. The spacecraft will be located in geostationary orbit at 121 degrees West Longitude.


http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/030808/laf024_1.html

[JohnH]

Could be at 121 by Thursday August 21, 2003.

Currently at about 122.1 and drifting east very slowly.

[JohnH]

I noticed that. I am seeing signal at that orbital location which may be spillover from G10R, although is seems to be quite strong for that possibility.

[JohnH]

EchoStar 9 is alive. Testing, anyway. Test carriers coming from it.

[Darkman]

Thanks..
Continue to keep us posted, John!

[AkShark]

Anyone know what they intend to use this bird for? It shoud be more visable to Alaska then 105...

[gpflepsen]

EchoStar 9 is alive. Testing, anyway. Test carriers coming from it.


John, I'm curious what and how you monitor a satellite like this. What equipment you use and how you use it.

Just curious. Can you see test screens on anything?

[JohnH]

Only Black screens. I use my BUD(Big Ugly Dish) with an analog receiver at this point in the testing. If I see any indication of digital modulation, I will use my Mpeg2/DVB FTA receiver with the same dish.

A 90cm dish with standard Ku-FSS LNBF would likely work very well. You would still need some receiver(other than DISH Network) to see the activity, until digital is uplinked.

[Mike123abc]

Anyone know what they intend to use this bird for? It shoud be more visable to Alaska then 105...


Well the technical chat said they were going to use it for international channels. The Charlie chat said locals and HDTV. But, other people on this board's sources said tech chat was right and it would be international on 121.

But, I wonder if E* knows yet. They are probably doing testing to see which is the better solution. I would personally prefer HD on 121 since it is the more powerful satellite already up (105 sometime next year).

[JohnH]

They are testing with SR 26000 on AMC 2. I don't think they will be able to do that on EchoStar 9 with its 32 Tp layout.

[JohnH]

Me thinks recent receivers are programmable as far as SR is concerned. Case in point is the 6000 went to 21500 without much adue.

[gpflepsen]

SR= ?? :confused:

Signal/Noise?

Sample rate?

Sinusoidal Recovery? :grin:

[JohnH]

Symbol Rate

[gpflepsen]

Symbol Rate

How does that compare with a bit rate? Is it the same thing?

[Mike123abc]

How does that compare with a bit rate? Is it the same thing?

Bit rate depends on how many bits per symbol. 8PSK uses 8 different symbols, so in effect you are recieving 3 bits for each symbol. QPSK uses 4 different symbols (QPSK is the non HDTV on Echostar and all of DirecTV) so in effect 2 bits are represented by each symbol.

8PSK requires more power from the satellite to achieve the same error rate since there are twice as many symbols possible and any noise/interference makes them harder to tell apart compared to the QPSK.

Even slower then QPSK is BPSK or 2 different symbols or 1 bit per symbol.

So you take the symbol rate 21,500,000 multiply it by bits per symbol (8PSK = 3) and you get 64,500,000 bits per second. Then you have to subtract the error correction overhead like 3/4 (i.e. 1/4 of the bits transmitted are for error correction) so you get 48,375,000 then apply the second error correction overhead (188/208) for a total of 43,723,550 or so bits per second. Now of course there is lots of other overhead from the DBS provider... things like program guide, packet headers, etc.

[JohnH]

The SR=21500 transponders are all 8PSK, as far as I can tell, so would that not be handled in the 8PSK module, not the original receiver?

Possibly, but that implies about 2 of everything rather than the 21500 coming out of the 8PSK module into the system decoder.

If they are not programmable, there will be a lot of wasted bandwidth at 105.

[JohnH]

More testing early today, nothing of significance, except it seemed as if Tp 30 came on at the same time as Tp 29.

[wcswett]

More testing early today, nothing of significance, except it seemed as if Tp 30 came on at the same time as Tp 29.

If you see a digital signal on Echo 9, please post. I need at least a test screen to re-aim my Galaxy 10R 90 cm. dish. :)

--- WCS

[Ken_F]

John,

The SR 26000 on AMC 2 wasn't 8-PSK, was it? Have you seen a 8PSK test signal on AMC-2 yet?

[JohnH]

Ken,

The SR 26000 is QPSK. I have not noticed any 8PSK there, but it might not be that apparent if it were there. Someone expressed concern as to whether the power supply on AMC 2 was of a configuration required for 8PSK.

[JohnH]

Yeah. Many Ku Tps have been seen, but the"exact" frequencies are not known, yet. So they are not posted. Probably won't be until digital is up there.

[dlsnyder]

JohnH = J. Hotsenpiller??

You are the MAN!! :icon_bb:

[JohnH]

Once in a while. :)

[Darkman]

Once in a while "John Hotsenpiller" or Once in a while "the MAN"? :)

[JohnH]

There was only one question? :)

[Darkman]

Haha :)
Actually - that's correct... there was only one ;)

still wondering though about who you are at "other times" :D