As the months rolled by since first modding the RAM Stubby cup holder mount, the rubber fins on the mount began to give up on their job of preventing the thing from sliding around. As a result, the mount began to tip over whenever it was in use. This is not optimal so I fixed it!
I had some closed cell foam kicking around and cut two small blocks out of it and wedged them between three of the rubber fins. The blocks are a bit thicker than the gaps between the mount and the cup holder. This is holding everything as it should and is now capable of holding 2 HT’s without falling over while cornering. The added benefit is that I can still move the mount between vehicles if needed as the blocks can be re-positioned or removed if necessary.
I made my first satellite contact during a pass of the AO-27 satellite (EYESAT-1) on December 29, 2021. This was my first attempt at satellite work and was marginally successful. I could hear the traffic on the satellite and was able to hear and be heard by another station (N2FYA), although I did have issues on my end with properly receiving. The audio was very hit or miss which could be from me not being able to match my satellite antenna with the satellites antenna polarity (they do tumble through space), but I believe is mainly from my connection from the radio to my earbuds.
I had my Wouxun KG-UVD1P hooked up as my receive radio mounted to the antenna boom feeding my Olympus voice recorder with a 2.5mm to 3.5mm aux. cable which then had a set of earbuds attached. I’m thinking that the aux. cable being near some of the antenna elements may have allowed RF interference to affect the received signal. I have since added some ferrite beads to the aux. cable in the hopes of reducing any RFI in the future.
Growing tired of having my radios roll around in my vehicle while out and about, I made the decision to get a RAM mount to mount everything to. I didn’t want to drill any holes to install it, mainly due to most locations being inadequate for that method of mounting, so I instead opted for a RAM Stubby cupholder mount base. While this worked in theory, in practice it didn’t work so well.
I chose the long length arm (~5″) to get the radio up high enough combined with the marine electronics mount, which is essentially a 6-1/4″ x 2″ aluminum plate for mounting fishfinders to. It provides a decent mounting platform for handheld radios via their belt clips but does merit some additional tinkering with to make things perfect, but that’s an aside for now.
The Stubby mount is weighted, but with the long arm and plate mount, coupled with the weight of a radio, it’s not a stable mounting option as originally thought. Under normal urban driving conditions, the entire mount assembly tips over. Not ideal.
I decided to take the mount apart and see what could be done with it. The bottom of the mount is held in with 3 clips and can be easily pried apart. The base also has a screw in the center which secures a steel weight. This weight does not extend the full length of the interior of the base which is the reason for its tippiness (autocorrect tells me that’s not a proper word, but whatever).
I weighed everything and determined that the base weighs in at 490g, while the steel slug alone weighs 378g. I went to my local outdoor store and picked up some BB’s to add further weight to the base. I filled the space between the top of the base and the top of the slug and then filled the gaps between the slug and the wall of the base. This added an extra 395g of weight bringing the new base weight up to 886g. With this modification, the problems with tip over have been removed. Now I just need to find a way to keep the radios from sliding off the plate mount on top. Another project for another day.
Stock Stubby base weightThe steel slug395g of copper coated BB’s, the container weighs 66gReassembled Stubby base weight
The International Space Station held another SSTV event during the Winter 2021 break and I was determined to catch all of the images that they would broadcast this time around. They were to be all related to lunar exploration, past, present and future. I had dabbled with receiving SSTV images from the ISS previously, but never really planned for it properly. I did my research and found that all the suitable passes for this event were all early morning passes for each day (ranging from 1 AM to 9 AM).
Armed with my trusty Arrow II satellite antenna, a radio and my smartphone, I headed out morning after morning to collect the 12 images that would be broadcast.
Out of those 12 images, I managed to snag 10 (I missed images 10 & 11). Much better than my two prior attempts and the quality of the images was much better as well. The Arrow II was definitely worth the investment. If you go here you can type my callsign into the search box (see the image on the Amateur Radio page for my callsign) to see all of the images I captured.
A few months back I had purchased a new enclosure to hold the guts of the solar box. The original plastic ammo can was beginning to show fatigue at the bottom from lifting the box with the battery installed within. This wasn’t going to be good for a permanent field deployment of this box in the future, so I decided to upgrade to a Nanuk 905 to house everything. This upgrade benefits the project in two ways: Firstly, the thing is waterproof and extremely durable. Secondly, it allows for the installation of a secondary battery in parallel with the one already installed (as mentioned in a prior post).
Two issues with the new enclosure were how to charge the batteries without running the cables through an open lid and how to prevent the batteries from smashing all over the place when the box is being carried (the handle is on the side when laying on the ground vs. the ammo can having the handle on top of the lid).
I solved the first issue by drilling a 1″ hole through the side of the case and installing a weatherproof surface mount SAE socket with the included 4 screws and some black RTV sealant to retain some level of waterproofness.
The second issue was corrected by fabricating an aluminum frame to fit within the case. I was going to make it fit the full interior dimensions of the case, but the interior isn’t flat. The batteries sit side-by-side in the frame and are secured to it with 1″ wide Velcro straps. The edges are all curved inside. The finished product isn’t perfectly square, but it’s fairly close (and dare I say, not too bad for a first attempt at something like this). The only issue with not being fully square is that that the batteries are wedged together on one end. Not a deal breaker, but won’t be optimal when the warmer weather rolls around again.
Just a wee bit on the janky side of things.
I decided to instead make a frame that fit the dimensions of the outer part of the foam insert. This should allow for some slight shock resistance to anything inside and also some slight insulation to boot.
Fits beautifully.
I added a standoff to prevent everything from sliding towards the lid when carried by the handle which seems to be working well so far, but it looks like a second one will need to be added on the side closest to the lid hinge. If carried at a normal walking pace by the handle, there is minimal movement of the battery/frame combination as is.
Frame with standoff added. A small piece of close-cell foam was added afterwards to the standoff to protect the lid.
Further steps for this project include beefing up the battery section of the frame with some aluminum bar stock so that the batteries can be strapped down independent of one another which should be good if only one battery is needed for operation (most likely during the summer months where less power is needed). I’m also planning on mounting the charge controller to the inside of the lid using a piece of aluminum bar stock to keep it out of the way when the repeater and radio are installed later on. Another hole will also need to be drilled to run the antenna feedline out of the box, but I’m still researching how that will be done (possibly using a cable gland and sealed with RTV sealant).
At the very least, it looks a whole lot sexier now.
I finally got around to flying the Flying Monkey 03 in sport mode for the first time this past Tuesday. Everything was going well. Did a fast pass down the length of the canal then stopped and turned around to come back. Got everything lined up and pushed up on the stick to accelerate. Only one small issue: the wind was gusting a bit that day ahead of a massive storm front that was rolling in and, not thinking about it all, that was the direction that I was flying back in.
Everything was going smoothly until I glanced over to check where some people were walking by. I looked back at the video feed and saw this:
Final shot.
As soon as I saw that I knew it was in the drink. A split second later, the feed died. I tried to use the locate feature built into the app, but it was already underwater when I tried, no luck there. I searched the area on both sides of the canal for the next hour in the hopes that what was left of the airframe might still be buoyant enough to wash ashore. No luck there either. Dismayed, I got in my car and drove away with no idea of what had happened.
Upon checking the DJI Fly app later that night, I discovered that the app records all incoming video feeds and flight telemetry in real-time, so I have some semblance of what happened. It appears that while going down the canal on the first pass (approximately 5 meters up), everything was fine. Part way back down the canal it suddenly began to lose altitude. A split-second before the final pic above, the aircraft canted to the left a bit. I believe that it was hit by a strong burst of wind and that with it being angled forward in flight, that the wind pushed the aircraft downward. The final turn to the left was probably the ground detection sensors detecting the water as the aircraft had also begun to slow down at that point.
The aircraft has been deemed destroyed, along with the flight battery and micro SD card holding 2 flights worth of imagery (always back up your data between outings).
A replacement drone is on its way and should arrive within the next few days. The flight battery and micro SD card have already been replaced.
A hard lesson learned. Always test out new flight modes/options at altitude and never above water. Replacing a busted arm or two is always cheaper than replacing an entire drone.
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