Tabel-9
Added On: May 22 2011  |   Posted By: kq4tv  |   Relating to: TABEL-9

This Saturday, 5/28 we are planning to launch another high altitude balloon from my house in Mt. Juliet.

The plan is to launch early to try and get a bit greater altitude before solar heat can affect the balloon too much. I recall that someone asked if they could include a small payload on our next flight but I have forgotten who asked. Please let me know offline so we can discuss it.

Below are some particulars about the flight. Landing predictions have been erratic so it will not be known until just before the flight. Some predictions so far have it land just south of Murfreesboro and others just north of Hartsville. This time I hope we get enough gas in the envelope to get closer to a 850fpm ascent rather than the 450fpm ascent we had last time. This should mean a shorter flight and not having to risk a landing in Watts Bar an risk having to deal with DHS or other federal authorities. While I have access to some pretty good models to make predictions it requires input of parameters that we will not have until sometime after launch.



Please join us if you are able and have an interest. If you want to join us just for the launch that is fine. If you want to participate in the chase that is fine too. If you want to participate by sitting in the comfort of your home and watch the action on the internet and help us by running the prediction software as new information comes in and passing on the predicted landing to the chasers that would be great too.



Please feel free to pass this on to others who may be interested.

TABEL-6 Still Images
Added On: Dec 03 2009  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-6

Here are some still images from TABEL-6.

Create your own Google Earth files.
Added On: Oct 08 2008  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-6

I have been working on a little web app that some of you guys might appreciate.


You can upload APRS logs of your balloon flights and it will create a KML file from that data.


It is rather limited in features.


1) Currently it only support Location, GPGGA and Mic-E packets.
2) It only has balloon icons.


I will be adding more icons and the ability to parse more packets as time allows.


I will be releasing the source code to the packet parser soon. It is written in C#


One nice thing is you can download track predictions from Balloon Track Online and create KML files.


This gives you the ability to view the prediction in 3-D.



Here is the URL.
http://www.groovin.net/ke4pjw/balloon/kml.php


Enjoy!
Regards,
Terry Trapp
KE4PJW

TABEL-6: Google Earth
Added On: Sep 06 2008  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-6

I have created a KML file of the flight of TABEL-6. You may need to adjust your "Touring Speed" in Google Earth to help speed the tour of the flight.









Enjoy!

TABEL-6: The Complete Flight
Added On: Sep 04 2008  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-6

An overview of the TABEL-6 flight.

In-Flight Video
Added On: Apr 04 2007  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-3

I have started to upload some of our videos to Google Video.


TABEL-3





TABEL-4 Launch






TABEL-4 Landing

TABEL-3 a near perfect flight.
Added On: Jul 02 2006  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-3

The TABEL-3 flight was near perfect. Though we did not meet many of our goals, problems from previous flights seem to be fixed.

Robin, K4IDC, did a great job of attaching a 10 meter microwatt beacon to the model of the Space Shuttle we were going to drop from the balloon, unfortunately the servo in the release mechanism I built, would turn a little every minute or so. This caused us to not fly the Shuttle model. We suspect RF was causing the servo problem.

We had to move the launch site to Lebanon, Tn. The reason was to keep TABEL-3 from landing in Percy Priest Lake or at Nashville International Airport.

I would like to extend a big thank you to Brian (KE4KVC), Travis (N4TJM), Shane (N4XWC) and everyone (sorry, I'm bad with names) for showing up. It was a real pleasure to have ya'll participate. Also thanks to Greg Williams (K4HSM) for sending his APRS log, Bill Brown (WB8ELK) for his predictions and advice, and George Currey (KG4OZL) for allowing us to launch in his back yard.

Several of us were able to watch TABEL-3 fall right out of the sky only 100 yards away.


Flight Objectives and Statistics can be found HERE.
We will have about half a dozen quicktime movies, taken from a camera on TABEL-3, up on the web RSN.

TABEL-3 Launch date set
Added On: Jun 11 2006  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-3

A launch date of July 1st has been set for TABEL-3.

Launch site: Outside Mt. Juliet in Robin Midgett's (K4IDC) back yard.

                 Decimal Degrees: 36.19677N 86.45620W
         Degrees/Decimal Minutes: 36 11.806N 086 27.372W
    Degrees/Minutes/Dec. Seconds: 36 11 48.4N 086 27 22.3W
   Universal Transverse Mercator: 16S 0548890 4005910
  Military Grid Reference System: 16S EF 48890 05909
         Maidenhead Grid Locator: EM66se

TNBG member silent key.
Added On: Jun 01 2006  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-1

Terry Lester Trapp, my father, passed away 2006-05-23 due to complications with cancer. He attended our first launch (TABEL-1) and gave advice on the construction of the air-frame we used. He modified the parachute used on our TABEL-2 flight as well as the one on the upcoming TABEL-3 flight.

He retired from Western Electric / AT&T in 1991 where he worked as a repairman for 18 years. Though not a collage graduate, he only needed to complete a single class in English to obtain bachelor's degrees in both Physics and Mathematics from MTSU. He was the person that introduced me to Ohm's law and introduced me to radio with the book "Elements Of Radio" (Copyright 1959, Marcus and Marcus). He taught me about the relationship of space-time when my peers were learning to read clocks.

He was my father, my elmer and my friend. I am going to miss him so terribly much.

Terry Lester Trapp

1937 - 2006

TABEL-2 Recovered
Added On: Apr 26 2006  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-2

I received a phone call yesterday from Shawn Dodd with the Sparta Fire department. He said that someone had left our payload at the fire hall and wanted to know if he should leave it outside for us to pick up. I asked if he could hold on to it and told him about the reward for returning it. Bruce and I drove out and picked it up from Mrs.. Dodd. We were in for a surprise as both of the payloads were there. However, the parachute and other hardware was missing. It was just the payloads. We wanted to know the exact location of the landing however, the Dodd's did not know who brought it to the firehouse. We have a sneaking suspicion that the person looks a lot like this distinguished gentleman.




The payloads did their job and I belive that we have a pretty good understanding of why the backup tracker quit funtioning upon landing. We needed to secure the AA batteries with tape and lock the keypad on the tracker transmitter.



There are some great images recovered from the cameras. Here are a handful of my favorites.



In this shot, in the top left hand corner, you can see the moon out in the darkness of space. This picture was taken around noon.




I believe that this is the storm front that moved in Saturday night/Sunday morning.


Center hill lake.



Robin Midgett's neighborhood. (The launch site)






The images from the horizon camera can be seen here.



The images from the bottom camera can be seen here.



Thanks for everyone's participation in the TABEL-2 flight.



Now is the time to start planning TABEL-3, hopefully we can launch it soon!

TABEL-2 Lost
Added On: Apr 24 2006  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-2

I am sad to announce that the second flight of the Tennessee Balloon Group, TABEL-2.
(Tennessee Area Balloon Experimental Launch #2) is lost.



The last position reported was:

36 02.810N 085 32.910W 9462ft 18mph 171deg. EM76fb



We believe it landed in the vicinity of Burgess Falls Road and Milk Plant Road in White County, Northwest of Sparta, TN.


Decimal Degrees: 36.00713N 85.54033W

Degrees/Decimal Minutes: 36 00.428N 085 32.420W
Degrees/Minutes/Dec. Seconds: 36 00 25.6N 085 32 25.1W
Universal Transverse Mercator: 16S 0631549 3985725


Military Grid Reference System: 16S FE 31549 85724

Maidenhead Grid Locator: EM76fa



At about 79,000 feet there was aperantly a malfunction in the
AA4VU-12 tracker that caused it to continuously transmit a carrier at
5 Watts. This drowned out the <1 watt AA4VU-11 transmitter.
It would seem that something jarred loose on landing as by 1:45 PM CDT everything went quiet.



Because of some conflicting predictions we did not have people in the area to view any part of the descent and because of mistaking the last packet as being 94,000 instead of 9400 feet we searched in areas that were way out of range for possible landings. A search of the area on Saturday afternoon until sundown and for 6 hours on Sunday afternoon.



We have spoken with a few residents of the area and posted a reward poster in a nearby corner Market. We are hoping someone finds it and contacts us.



The use of Hydrogen as a lift gas went well. We had barely enough gas to give us the 3lbs of free lift we were looking for. But Early beacons seemed to confirm we were getting the 1000 fpm ascent rate that we were hoping to achieve.

Balloon Project (TABEL-1)
Added On: Aug 07 2005  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-1

We gave it our best shot and
learned a lot in the process. We had several problems, but over all I am
happy.  We would not have been able to get off the ground or
recover the payload without the help of Bill Brown, WB8ELK. Our tank was
a little slim on Helium so he offered to use one of his parachutes, that
bought us an extra two pounds of lift. We were able to make a couple of
contacts with the AP on the balloon at about 24,000Ft and 3 Miles down
range. I suspect that the payload was swinging like a pendulum. The
patch antenna would swing in our direction and then swing away. That
would correspond with our on and off association with the AP.

 

We also suspect that the AP was interfering with our GPS. We started
receiving erroneous APRS data just after launch. This is where Bill
saved the day (again). He flew his APRS payload futher up the "train" on
an alternate frequency. We were able to track it with his payload.

 

We have confirmed that the balloon reached an altitude of 100,485 feet.
and a speed of 57mph, thanks to Fred Flowers, N4GER.


 

Robin Midgett K4IDC and Jenna Trapp KG4QQK were able to spot the
payload on it's decent. It landed in a tree between the duck river and a
soybean field. It's final resting spot was 30.6 miles due west of the
the launch site, near Centerville, TN.

 

I would like to thank Bill Brown, WB8ELK and David Hoffman, KE4FGW for
helping with the launch and recovery of our little balloon project. You
guys really made all the difference.

Images will be posted soon. The group hopes to fly again
soon, though not with 802.11 on the next flight. However, I have a few
thoughts on how to counteract the affect of the pendulum action on the
antenna radiation pattern and hope to fly another payload like that soon.

Balloon Project (TABEL-1) Announcement
Added On: Aug 03 2005  |   Posted By: ke4pjw  |   Relating to: TABEL-1

This Saturday, Aug 6th, a group from Nashville, TN is launching a
balloon from Springhill, TN. The payload will be a digital camera, an
802.11b access point and an APRS tracker. We hope to launch at 10AM. We
would like as many amateurs as possible to attempt to connect to the
balloon. It will be operating on Channel 5, No WEP and SSID of KE4PJW.
It should provide host configuration VIA DHCP. We will be using
netmeeting at the launch site. Simply connect to the host

“netmeeting.ham” and if we have a good connection we will be able to
video conference. For those that do not have netmeeting capability, we
would like you to start up a web browser and visit http://www.ham The
site should have a place for you to fill out your callsign and a short
message. There may also be an IRC server setup at irc.ham.

Ralph Wallio, W0RPK, sent me this prediction
of coverage from 50kft (inner ragged edge) and 100kft (outer ragged
edge).

Details about the Access Point: We are using a
stock Linksys BEFW11S4 AP/Router. We have diversity enabled. Antennas
are a patch antenna pointed to the ground and one of the stock dipoles
in the vertical position. Operating on Channel 5, No WEP and SSID of
KE4PJW.

Details about the APRS Tracker: The APRS encoder
and transmitter is a Byonics Pocket Tracker. It produces about 150mW of
power and will be using an inverted groundplane as an antenna. It should
beacon with an SSID of AA4VU-11

Details about the Digital Camera: It is a small
Polaroid digital camera that has been modified to take timed images. It
should snap an images every 3 Minutes. Images will be very small.

Details about the group: Just a group of friends
including KE4PJW, K4IDC, KG4QQK, KI4AMX, KD4NMD, KQ4TV and KG4OZL.

Details about the balloon, payload and etc: The
balloon is a Kaymont
KCI 1500. (1500gr) The payload is made from pieces of 2"
polystyrene. The total weight of the payload will be just under 5lbs.
The parachute is a 72" nylon chute.

Details about flight and recovery comms: Launch:445.975
PL107.2 Recovery: To be Announced

Details about Launch Site: Tennessee Children's Home We may be
launching from either the field in front of the School's campus or the
field in the rear of the campus. There will be a film crew
documenting the launch and recovery.

Contact: Terry
Trapp - KE4PJW

Those of you involved with the film crew, we have a
message board located here.