| Currently this is an active project by myself, Nicholas Janzen (nj@obsd.com) and a couple other team members. Others are welcome to contact me and possibly join in or create their own projects. It is my goal to create a group of like minded hobbists in the Calgary Area. |
This website is designed to provide information about my project to others who are interested as well as a forum for other like minded people to work together on projects. On this website you will see regulations specific for Canada and information on mine and other projects payloads and flights.
Ever since I was a child I have had an interest in lauching a object into space. I dreamed about launching small satellites into orbit, long before the technology existed to launch something useful like this into space. See CubeSat or other micro satellites. I then looked into model rockets and built a few and launched them, but before i could include electronics in it, I got busy with other things and left that project on the sidelines. Later on in life i got my amateur radio licence (Advanced in 2003) and got into packet radio, I have experimented with different tracking systems including APRS and Spot (commercial). In 2006 I recieved my recreational pilots licence and purchased a Cessna 150. My interest in tracking continued and have done several tracking procedures including (APRS, Spot and other GPS logging). Finally in 2012 I got seriously interested in high altitude balloons and enbarked on this project. This is my entry into space (poor mans space program). I have always been interested in montoring of science instruments and analysis of this data.
High altitude balloons is a hobby in which you can launch a payload containing radio equipment, cameras and/or other science instruments up above 60,000 feet, often getting above 100,000 feet. At this altitude you are so high you can see black "space" and the atmosphere of earth, then of course the earths surface. Radio signals can travel very far at these high altitudes and can be heard by people over great distances. Some people launch radio signal repeaters as their payloads.
This is a balloon launch i did for the weather network, you can see their episode here: