Category: Satellite

Real-Time decoding of Meteor-M2 on Linux

Recently RTL-SDR.com reader Mark wrote in and wanted to share his modified version of otti-soft’s GNU Radio flowgraph for decoding Meteor-M2 weather satellite images on Linux. The modified version allows for real time decoding, whereas the original version requires several offline decoding steps to be performed after recording the signal.

Mark writes:

I have modified one of otti-soft’s gnuradio flowgraphs so that they work with RTL-SDR and output the demodulated symbols to a TCP socket, from which the new version of LRPT Analizer (from robonuka.ru) can decode the data in real-time.

First, one needs to download and extract the AMIGOS version of the LRPT analyzer from robonuka.ru: ftp://meteor2soft:[email protected]/AMIGOS/AMIGOS2.zip.

(AFAIK, only the AMIGOS version is able to decode the data from a socket, which is required for real-time decoding).

The program is to be run under a 32-bit version of Wine.

When the satellite is overhead, open and run the flowgraph (attached) in gnuradio-companion and leave it running. You might need to adjust the gain.

Then, run the LRPToffLineDecoder.exe executable from the extracted archive.
It should display a constantly-updating constellation diagram. When the data is decoded, the channel images will start to appear in each section of the window.

That’s it, when the image is decoded, one can save it and close the windows of gnuradio-companion and the decoder.

Notes: when running the flowgraph, no other processes (rtl_sdr, rtl_power, gqrx, …) should use the SDR device.

The modified GRC file is available here.

The real-time Meteor M2 GNU Radio script for Linux
The real-time Meteor M2 GNU Radio script for Linux

—–Hz: A New STD-C Inmarsat Decoder

UPDATE: Unfortunately we have been informed that the code base of this software was illegally decompiled and reused in an almost unchanged way from an already available closed source decoder. This means the program itself is illegal and totally unethical.

Please respect the original developers hard work and do not download this software.

A new STD-C Inmarsat decoder called —-Hz has recently been released. The decoder is Windows based and simply listens to the demodulated Inmarsat STD-C audio from a program such as SDR#. This means that it is compatible with the RTL-SDR, and any other SDR that can receive Inmarsat. 

We gave the software a brief test and it ran very well, and managed to decode several SafeteNET messages without issue, maintaining a good lock most of the time. The author writes that he plans to improve on the software in the future by creating a web service based version of the software.

Currently there are two other Inmarsat decoders available. One is called InmarsatDecoder and the other is the Tekmanoid decoder. The InmarsatDecoder is generally regarded as the best, but the Tekmanoid decoder was recently updated for improved performance. The new software appears to be about the same as the Tekmanoid decoder.

Inmarsat STD-C messages are broadcast from geostationary satellites in the L-band at around 1.5 Ghz. They send mostly marine based messages such as the following quoted from the ——Hz website:

  • Safety: high seas, tropical storm warnings, ice accretion…
  • Shipping activity: moving oil rigs, submarine cable deployment and repairs…
  • Distress reports: MOB, ships lost at sea, migrant ship reports…
  • Military exercises (firing practice, no fly zones…)
  • Pirate at sea reports…

If you are interested in learning how to decode STD-C we also have a tutorial available here. 

The b4000Hz Inmarsat STD-C Decoder
The ——Hz Inmarsat STD-C Decoder

Simple NOAA/Meteor Weather Satellite Antenna: A 137 MHz V-Dipole

Over on his blog Adam 9A4QV (seller of various RTL-SDR related goods including the LNA4ALL) has just made a post detailing a build of a high performance super simple NOAA/Meteor M2 weather satellite antenna. Most antenna designs for polar orbiting weather spacecraft are based on circularly polarized turnstile or QFH designs. However, Adams antenna is based on a very simple linearly polarized dipole, which makes construction almost trivial.

The idea is that by arranging a dipole into a horizontal ‘V’ shape, the radiation pattern will be directed skywards in a figure 0 (zero) pattern. This will be optimal for satellites travelling in front, above and behind the antenna. Since polar orbiting satellites always travel North to South or vice versa, we can take advantage of this fact simply by orienting the antenna North/South. 

There is also another advantage to Adams design. Since the antenna is horizontally polarized, all vertically polarized terrestrial signals will be reduced by 20 dB. Most terrestrial signals are broadcast in vertical polarization, so this can help significantly reduce interference and overloading on your RTL-SDR. Overloading is a big problem for many trying to receive weather satellites as they transmit at 137 MHz, which is close to the very powerful FM broadcast band, air band, pagers and business radio. In contrast a circularly polarized antenna like a QFH or turnstile only reduces vertically polarized terrestrial signals by 3 dB.

As the satellites broadcast in circular polarization there will be a 3 dB loss in Adams design from using a linear polarized antenna. But this can be considered as almost negligible. Adam also argues that the home construction of a QFH can never be perfect, so there will always be at least a ~1dB loss from inaccurate construction of these antennas anyway.

The final advantage to Adams design is that construction is extremely simple. Just connect one element to the center coax conductor, and the other to the shield, and spread apart by 120 degrees.

Adam 9A4QV's V-Dipole for 137 MHz Weather Satellites.
Adam 9A4QV’s V-Dipole for 137 MHz Weather Satellites.

Adam has tested the antenna and has gotten excellent results. If you want more information about the antenna design, Adam has also uploaded a pdf with a more indepth description of the design and his thoughts.

DIY 137 MHz WX sat V-dipole antenna

137 MHz NOAA WX sat reception using V-dipole antenna

Building a DIY Carbon Fibre Yagi Antenna with 3D Printed Parts for 20€

Over on his blog author Manuel a.k.a ‘Tysonpower’ has written about a DIY Carbon Fibre Yagi antenna that he’s built for only 20€. The antenna is very lightweight thanks to a 12mm diameter carbon fibre pipe which is used as the main boom. It also uses 3D printed parts that clamp onto the carbon fibre pipe and hold the metal elements in place. The advantage of the carbon fibre pipe over a PVC one is not only is it lightweight and much easier to hold, but it also stronger, and much less bendy and floppy. The metal elements are welding rods which he found on eBay, and the carbon fibre pipe was sourced cheaply from China with Aliexpress. 

A Yagi is a directional antenna with high gain towards the direction it is pointing. You’ll need to hand point the Yagi in the general direction of the satellite as it passes over, but you can expect much higher SNR readings compared to something like a QFH or Turnstile.

Manuel designed his antenna for 2M satellites (NOAA, Meteor M2, ISS etc), and was able to achieve over 36 dB SNR with an RTL-SDR.com V3 receiver, FM Trap and LNA4ALL on NOAA 18 at a 34° max. pass. He writes that the design is easily modifiable for other frequencies too.

To show off the design, construction and performance of his antenna he’s uploaded two videos to YouTube which we show below. The speech is in German, but even for non-German speakers the video is easily followed

[EN subs] Yagi Antenne aus Carbon bauen (140mhz, 3 Elemente) - DIY

Über 36db SNR!- Test der DIY Yagi aus Carbon

Receiving GOES 16 Weather Satellite Images with the Open Satellite Project

Back in October/November of last year Lucas Teske showed us how to receive weather satellite images from the GOES line of geostationary satellites with an Airspy SDR (and possibly an RTL-SDR too), dish antenna and the decoding software that he created. 

On November 19, 2016 the next generation GOES 16 (aka GOES-R) satellite was launched by NASA. GOES 16 is a little different to the older GOES satellites as it has better sensors and is capable of capturing and transmitting a new image every 15 minutes which is quite fast. Thus a different and higher bandwidth RF transmission protocol called HRIT (High Rate Information Transfer) is used, compared to the LRIT (Low Rate Information Transfer) signal used on the older satellites.

Once the satellite started transmitting in January 2017, Lucas got to work on trying to create a decoder for the new satellite. After noticing some discrepancies between the published HRIT specs and the actual signal, Lucas sent off an email to NOAA and actually received an email back with the full specifications. With this information he was able to update his Open Satellite Project code and start decoding images from GOES 16.

The images being sent right now seem to just be relays of other similar satellites like Himawari-8 and Meteosat, as it seems that they are still testing the satellite. The relayed images received via GOES 16 received by Lucas can be seen on the Open Satellite Project twitter feed and on Lucas’ personal twitter feed.

Full disk image received via GOES 16, relayed from the Himawari-8 satellite.
Full disk image received via GOES 16, relayed from the Himawari-8 satellite.
Weather data received via GOES 16.
Weather data received via GOES 16.

Receiving GOES Weather Satellite Images with a Small Grid Antenna and an Airspy Mini

GOES is an L-band geosynchronous weather satellite service that can be received typically with a satellite dish. It produces very nice full disk images of the earth. In the past we’ve posted about Lucas Teske’s work in building a GOES receiving system from scratch (including the software decoder for Airspy and RTL-SDR receivers), devnullings post about receiving GOES and also this talk by @usa_satcom on decoding GOES and similar satellites.

Over on Twitter @usa_satcom has been tweeting about his experiments where he has been successfully receiving GOES L-Band weather satellite images with a small grid antenna and an Airspy Mini. In a Tweet he writes that the antenna is an $85 USD Hyperlink 1.9 GHz 22 dBi Grid Antenna made by L-com. A grid antenna may be more suitable for outdoor mounting for many people as they are typically lighter, smaller and more suitable for windy and snowy conditions. As the GOES satellite is in geosynchronous orbit, no tracking motor or tracking mount is required.


Testing a Prototype of the SDRx: A Custom Outernet L-Band RTL-SDR

Recently the Outernet team sent us a prototype of their L-Band tuned RTL-SDR which is called the SDRx for testing. This is an RTL-SDR with RTL2832U and R820T2 chips together with an L-band LNA and filter on the same PCB. It is designed for their Outernet system which transmits from geostationary L-Band satellites. 

Outernet is an L-band satellite service that hopes to be a library in the sky. Currently it is broadcasting down about 20 MB of data a day, with data like weather updates, books, pictures, wikipedia pages, APRS repeats and more.

For their DIY Outernet kit they have been using E4000 or our RTL-SDR V3 dongles, so we speculate that this SDRx is going to be used in the “Lantern” which will be their fully assembled Outernet receiver product. The Lantern looks like it will be a single unit, with patch antenna, battery pack, solar panel, RTL-SDR radio and CHIP built into a plastic enclosure.

The upcoming RTL-SDR base Lantern Outernet Receiver.
The upcoming RTL-SDR base Lantern Outernet Receiver.

The SDRx connects to the computer via a micro USB port. It also has a USB repeater and two USB expansion ports on board. This is useful as Outernet is designed to be used with the CHIP portable computer which only has one USB port. The expansion USB ports can be used for plugging in a portable hard drive which can be used as the storage for downloaded Outernet files.

We’ve been running a version of the SDRx prototype on an Outernet receiver for a number of weeks without issue. The SNR on Outernet signals is about identical to the V3 dongles combined with the external Outernet LNA and no L-band heat problems are observed.

The SDRx Prototype
The SDRx Prototype
Under the shield. SAW Filter, R820T2. LNA top left.
Under the shield. SAW Filter, R820T2. LNA top left.

Outernet Patch Antenna Pan-Tilt Servo

Over on YouTube user Tomi Simola has uploaded a video showing his servo based Outernet satellite antenna tracker. Outernet uses L-band geostationary satellites which means that they are at a fixed position in the sky. Optimal reception of the Outernet and other L-Band satellite signals can be obtained by pointing the patch antenna towards the satellite.

Tomi wanted an easy way to remotely switch the antenna to point at one of two geostationary satellites, Alphasat at 25E which has the Outernet signal and Inmarsat at 64E which has more services like AERO and STD-C. Another potential use of his tracker might be for tracking L-Band satellite while in a moving vehicle such as a car or boat. 

To automatically point the Outernet L-band patch antenna Tomi used a commonly found Pan-Tilt servo mounted inside an waterproof enclosure. On the servo is a 3D printed mount which the patch antenna is attached on. An Arduino Nano with Bluetooth module allows control of the servo.

The video below shows a test of the system, over on Reddit he has written a comment explaining the project and over on Imgur he’s uploaded some photos of the construction.

Outernet patch antenna project