Build Your Own Satellite Ground Station 179
kavachameleon writes "A site called Hobby Space has this article at which there are instructions on how you can build your own satellite weather station! Something I think all of us have wanted to do at one point or another, this site tells us all how to "hack" into the weather satellites and get back usable pictures using our PCs and an AM antenna. There are more instructions for getting geostationary images."
Cabin Fever (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Cabin Fever (Score:5, Funny)
SuDZ
Re:Cabin Fever (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Cabin Fever (Score:5, Funny)
Oh geez, don't you guys study history? There are several ancient civilizations that had very simple devices for determining the weather without actually having to go outside. All you need is a piece of glass, a rock, a hole in a wall (preferably leading to the exterior of your house), and a piece of glass to fill that hole and prevent everything but light from getting in.
Hang the rock outside of this piece of glass using a string so that it's visible by peering through the hole. Installation's complete!
That rock provides all kinds of scientific data you can use:
- If the rock is bright, it's day.
- If the rock is dark, it's night.
- If the rock is wet, it's raining.
- If the rock is white, it's snowing.
- If the rock is shaking, there's an earthquake.
- If the rock is swinging, it's windy outside.
- If the rock is swinging and wet, it's a hurricane.
- If the rock is gone, don't open the door.
Pff who needs fancy schmancy satellites?
Re:Cabin Fever (Score:2)
Yeah, they were called "slaves".
Came in handy for all sorts of unpleasant things you didn't want to deal with yourself.
'Course if you were the slave your appreciation of the system was probably somewhat lacking.
Re:Cabin Fever (Score:2)
Came in handy for all sorts of unpleasant things you didn't want to deal with yourself.
'Course if you were the slave your appreciation of the system was probably somewhat lacking."
Man, you really sucked the fun out of my light hearted comment. I brought that joke back all the way from the Ozarks!
Re:Cabin Fever (Score:2)
Next time just don't leave any straight lines lying around for me :-) I lack the character to resist them.
Re:Military (Score:2, Funny)
Hacking Satellites? (Score:5, Interesting)
On the other hand it would be pretty cool if you could jury-rig a means of watching the Iraq-US battle via satellite or find a way to make a de facto spy satellite out of it...
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:5, Insightful)
The only way 'hack' applies to this article is that it's kind of neat.
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:2)
Then again, AM would be a form of weak encryption for somebody not familiar with the concept...
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:2)
Yes, really. It's not cracking anything, though. I find it amusing that the Slashdot crowd assumes that "hacking" means "cracking" even given the popular sport of deriding the mainstream press for confusing the two.
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:1)
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:5, Informative)
We use it all the time in Antarctica. I'm sure it is useful other places not covered by weather.com. You have to have line of sight on the sat, it has to have line of sight on the weather, so the range is limited, but good enough. The pixel size is huge, so it's no good for spying.
It does do both IR and visible, so you can get the temp/height of the clouds too.
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:5, Insightful)
> satellite when you can turn on any news station
no, but it's fun.
Dorking around with technology is the entire point of being a geek. If you have to question why these people shouldn't have done this, I question your geektitude.
It's like climbing a mountain.. just do it because it's there.
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:5, Interesting)
Damn straight!
My biggest pet peeve with weather newscasts is that they only show, say, eight hours of cloud movement. (You know, it looks like a frickin' animated .GIF. Blip, reset, blip, reset, blip.)
That's all I need to guess what the weather will be like tomorrow.
For geekitude, I'd like to have a screen saver looping, say, the last year's cloud movement, so I could watch the tropical storms develop over the Atlantic and Pacific, build in power, and dissipate over the coast, or the forest fires lighting up and spreading smoke until late fall.
To do that and to say "Oh, my world weather time-lapse screensaver? Antenna glued to my flagpole, little dongle and A/D converter, and a cron job."
Geekitude to the max.
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:2)
We used to get data from the NOAA and Russian (erm Comet? can't remember) satellites. The NOAA ones were good for temperature and things but the Russian ones gave excellent cloud pictures. They also had a much more obvious clock with a real tick-tock to it where as the NOAA ones just went tick tick tick
We had a 1.5m dish made from chickenwire and an LMB made from a coffee jar, all connected to an HF receiver and
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:5, Funny)
This is just version 1, so it's kinda plain. Version 2 will enable writes, so you can modify the weather through the satellite.
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:2)
Like many hacks, the value is in the hack. Any additional utility value is a bonus.
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:1)
Re:Hacking Satellites? (Score:5, Informative)
Echelon (Score:3, Funny)
Now that you've "hacked" a weather satellite, how long till Ashcroft and Co. deem you an enemy combatant?
You should have just turned to The Weather Channel on digital cable when the site was unavailable.
"I am not a number!" - Number Six, The Prisoner
Re:Echelon (Score:2)
Proper Punctation... (Score:2)
-needs to be-
Now that you've hacked a "weather satellite", how long till Ashcroft and Co. deem you an enemy combatant?
While you're at it... (Score:3, Funny)
Building your own space program on $5k a day (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Building your own space program on $5k a day (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Building your own space program on $5k a day (Score:2)
Should I trust these guys... (Score:1)
(From their flash demo of the Falcon LV Vehicle Explorer, click on Interstage)
"Houses and protects the 2nd stage engine and Falcon 1st stage recovery system during assent."
Re:Should I trust these guys... (Score:2)
Much cooler images... (Score:5, Informative)
Takes a bit more equipment, though.
Re:Much cooler images... (Score:1)
Re:Much cooler images... (Score:2)
Yay for comments that are better than the story!
Live Doppler 7000 (Score:1)
DMCA? (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:DMCA? (Score:1)
This isn't exactly new.... (Score:5, Informative)
I know there have been some old news stories appearing lately, but really now...
Re:This isn't exactly new.... (Score:2, Interesting)
I'll second that. HAMs have been doing this for decades. It's not rocket science. Also, with the easy to find images on the web these days it is at best a way to kill time.
Re:This isn't exactly new.... (Score:1)
Re:This isn't exactly new.... (Score:1)
Re:This isn't exactly new.... (Score:2)
It's called Slow-scan TV, and has been around for ages.
Actually, people have been doing this since 1926 (Score:3, Interesting)
Screw that.. (Score:4, Funny)
Hacking weather satellites is lame. I want to hack the secret Illuminati Weather Machines and Plate Tectonic Control Grid...
Damn... where's my tinfoil hat>
Re:Screw that.. (Score:3, Funny)
OMCL: We know what's on your mind - we put it there!
Among Other Things (Score:5, Funny)
Things I want to do this weekend:
1) Clean the barbeque grill
2) Vacuum the living room
3) Build a weather satellite station
any porn of these satelittes? (Score:2, Funny)
What good is this??? (Score:1)
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/02/20/131825 9&mode=thread&tid=159 [slashdot.org]
OK... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:OK... (Score:4, Informative)
www.amsat.org [amsat.org]
Orbit it is :) (Score:1)
First, we list our obsticles: that damned atmotsphere we need to live, the gravity that holds us to the ground, weight-to-fuel ratio.
The atmostphere is no problem really, just build a rocket with a conic head, besides if you can get anything up to the right speed, the shape won't matter (unless it's an inverted cone or a flat surface...
Re:OK... (Score:3, Interesting)
1)get satalite companent
2) build satalit
3)get large rocket
4)send satalite to space.
5)Profit!!
Re:OK... (Score:2, Funny)
And the obligatory:
In soviet russia, satellites launch YOU!
Other Resources (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Other Resources (Score:1)
I was listening to NPR one day. They did a story on Siberian throat singers. Its terribly popular and has been for generations. I'd never heard of it though. Does that make NPR a stumbler?
post your link, get your karma but keep the bitching in your journal.
Re:Other Resources (Score:2)
Yeah, well there aren't that many articles on the as-yet-undiscovered hobbies around, are there? Smartass.
What good is this?? (Score:3, Funny)
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/02/20/13182
Re:What good is this?? (Score:2)
Re:What good is this?? (Score:3, Funny)
My plan of subtle diversion and subterfuge has been detected. Come Pinky we must prepare for tommorow
What are we doing tomorrow, Brain?
The same thing we do every day Pinky, try to take over the world.
OTOH (Score:2, Informative)
You could just go to NOAA's Geostationary Satellite Server page [noaa.gov] and D/L the damn things.
I guess I have to turn in my geek card now...
Why rely on a satellite that can fall from a sky? (Score:2, Interesting)
Great an all I have to do is learn Swedish!!! (Score:2)
OT: Command line tool for grabbing WX data? (Score:2)
Re:OT: Command line tool for grabbing WX data? (Score:5, Informative)
I ported the wx200d communication code to BSD a year ago. Good software!
Pat
Re:OT: Command line tool for grabbing WX data? (Score:2)
The same is true in the other sites I manage; tenants of large, otherwise sealed buildings.
I'd love to do what you suggest, but it is simply not an option. I'd be just thrilled with the nearest airport temperature data.
Google for "National Weather Service" (Score:2)
Oh wait, they do [noaa.gov]. They even provide you with loads of docs that will tell you more than you ever wanted to know about the format of government weather data.
Re:OT: Command line tool for grabbing WX data? (Score:2)
Besides, the washers at our building aren't just blue collar, I think they're fresh out of prison or something.
Next week on Slashdot! (Score:2)
Amateur radio satellites even cooler.. (Score:2, Informative)
acient technology, look into the great space
stuff hams are doing..
Two way satellite contacts, contacts with the
space station, hand-held data transmission
via satellite.. pretty neat stuff..
check out AMSAT [amsat.org] and the ISS [nasa.gov] radio page.
bahh, old news (Score:1)
NOAAPORT? (Score:1)
http://205.156.54.206/noaaport/html/noaaport.shtm
Seen similar (Score:3, Insightful)
The software he had was really slick it would even display IR data from some satelites over a photo so as you drug the mouse around, you could see the temperature of the pixel you were pointing to.
Just like in the example given in the article, there were times in which there were no satellites overhead to connect to, but I remember there being a large selection of sattelites that it would listen to including a bunch of foreign weather satelites.
I wish I had more specifics but that's all I can remember right now.
Been doing it for years (Score:1, Interesting)
I'm sure it's gotten even easier now with the advent of the cheap sound card and processors. Most of the digital modes via ham radio can be done with a sound card.
Not hacking (Score:1)
Re:Not hacking (Score:2)
Antic and STart magazine (Score:5, Interesting)
But using computers to do other things besides email and web browsing has always fascinated me. I'm now trying to get the GRASS system working so that I can create maps of my area. No luck so far, but success is imminent (I hope). If anyone knows of other projects that allow computers (running Linux in particular) to map the world, chart the weather, decode satellite images, etc., please let me know.
Re:Antic and STart magazine (Score:1)
One problem... (Score:1)
Dan East
oh, the irony. (Score:5, Funny)
From the article....
Combined with the bad weather of winter and the short days, the images from home were dark and short...
This is great- it doesn't work if the weather's rotten! how useful for a weather-watching satellite receiver....
ebay here they come... (Score:1)
just like the powerbook 280c after that picture frame article [slashdot.org]! =)
Interesting, but... (Score:2, Interesting)
But why play around with that when you tap into the freely-accessible C-band T-1 National Weather Service downlink, NOAAPORT [205.156.54.206] and get all the international surface obs data, text products, rawinsonde (weather balloons), Nexrad doppler radar, and supercomputing forecast model data for free?
Well, okay, this a
I'm in! (Score:5, Funny)
Cool. This site [tvguide.com] tells us all how to "hack" into the TV stations and get back usable video using our televisions and a broad-band antenna.
Welcome to our hobby (Score:1)
question (Score:2)
Re:question (Score:2)
Re:question (Score:2)
Re:question (Score:2)
neat chart including broadcast and standard cable base frequencies here [jneuhaus.com]
Re:question (Score:2)
First of all, no typical AM receiver will tune this high. 137mHz is just a
Nice try (Score:1, Offtopic)
Any Army 31S/29Y people lurking? (Score:2)
I got to see a few hacks like that when I was in the service. The main problem was that the equipment used to downconvert the RF was too godawful expensive! A 19" rack with just a down converter, a patch panel, a HP spectrum analyzer and a custom DEC drawer was over $300K.
Later we found out there was a card you could plug into a normal retail PC that allowed us
Been doing this for years (Score:2, Interesting)
I wish I still had my copy of "The Weather Satellite Handbook".
73 de VE6LSH
HamFax (Score:2, Informative)
http://hamfax.sourceforge.net/
http://www.qsl.
73 de VE6LSH
I never wanted to do that! (Score:2)
You don't need this complicated a setup.... (Score:4, Informative)
It's not hacking...it's called "radio" (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It'snothacking.it's called "radio"-Desktop weat (Score:2)
www.weathergraphics.com - I'd make it a link but it's not coming up right now. Tim Vasquez wrote the popular "Digital Atmospher
AM Antenna? (Score:2)
I believe these are the same antenna's a lot of use for downconverting AO40's 2.4 ghz s2 transponder - which is a passband transponder - usually USB.
Re:Could this be illegal? (Score:1)
Re:Could this be illegal? (Score:3, Interesting)
Yep. They are, in effect, a publis service of the U.S. Government. Anybody who wants to can receive their signals and do what they will with them. The signal format itself is based on the 1960s-era TIROS format, but keeping it simple means that even dirt poor countries can get weather satellite data.
I do my own: have a look at some pretty (if a little stale) pictures [qsl.net] of mine.
Re:Terrorists.. (Score:1)