Weather Balloon Photography

[daveake]

Yeah, they're very popular. I used the Kodak as a) It's cheap to replace, and b) I already had one. Maybe when I'm more confident of always getting the payload back I'll invest

[Irrotational]

Ever since your original post, this has been on my "to do" list - amazing stuff!

[blindswelledrat]

Dave, which GPS did you go for in teh end?

We spent a lot of time looking for one and struggled to find anything that worked any better than an iphone. All the other ones seemed to need direct line of sight to sattelites to work, and we thought this was a bit risky as the thing could easily end up out of sight of one

[daveake]

I did use a GPS/GSM tracker thing once - the kind of thing sold to attach to wandering cats or grannies so you can find them if they get lost. It was temperamental, very poor at getting a lock and none of these things work above 18km. Waste of time/money IMO.

Other than that I use GSM modules connected to the flight computer. Lots have been tried by others and there's a list of ones known to work at high altitudes and another of those known not to work. First time I used an olde Jupiter 11 module - because I had one - and that worked fine but was very power-hungry. Now I use either a Lassen IQ (reliable and low power but not the most sensitive) or uBlox modules which, with a helical antenna, are very sensitive indeed.

Dave

[blindswelledrat]

daveake said:

I did use a GPS/GSM tracker thing once - the kind of thing sold to attach to wandering cats or grannies so you can find them if they get lost. It was temperamental, very poor at getting a lock and none of these things work above 18km. Waste of time/money IMO.

We bought one of these and it wasn't cheap. We had specifically asked whether it needed line-of-sight and was told "No, it wouldn't work if it did as your pet may well hide under things". And yet when it arrived it did indeed need line-of-sight. Useless.

Dave said:

Other than that I use GSM modules connected to the flight computer. Lots have been tried by others and there's a list of ones known to work at high altitudes and another of those known not to work. First time I used an olde Jupiter 11 module - because I had one - and that worked fine but was very power-hungry. Now I use either a Lassen IQ (reliable and low power but not the most sensitive) or uBlox modules which, with a helical antenna, are very sensitive indeed.

Dave

Excuse my ignorance but I genuinely don't know what any of that means. What are those modules?

[daveake]

The GPS modules are little circuit boards that feed the GPS data out on a wire which I then connect to a little single-board computer. So the computer knows where it is and can then relay that information down to the ground using a radio link. So basically the module + my computer + a little radio transmitter are together equivalent to the device you tried. Except it works a lot better.

Dave

[daveake]

Well, the altitude attempt failed (we suspect a bad batch of balloons) but the photographic flight went very well, reaching an altitude of over 38km (125,500 feet). See my blog for a write-up.

Meanwhile here's a sample picture:


Buzz In Space 2 by daveake, on Flickr

[blindswelledrat]

Dave, are you getting permission to launch beforehand?

[daveake]

blindswelledrat said:

Dave, are you getting permission to launch beforehand?

Yes, of course! I apply to the CAA 4+ weeks beforehand and they confirm with a permission certificate before the launch, plus they issue A NOTAM to cover the flight.

Dave

[jurbie]

I tried to follow this on Saturday but the trace on the map was some wild squiggle, like a child had gone at it with a crayon. Any idea what that was about as clearly you had a successful flight with Buzz.

[daveake]

You just needed to zoom out. GPS positions do bounce around a bit especially indoors, and if you load the map up before a flight starts the map zooms right in to the position. So all you saw was it apparently bouncing around my house and garden!

[Manicminer]

daveake said:

Well, the altitude attempt failed (we suspect a bad batch of balloons) but the photographic flight went very well, reaching an altitude of over 38km (125,500 feet). See my blog for a write-up.

Meanwhile here's a sample picture:


Buzz In Space 2 by daveake, on Flickr

Buzz looks inflatable Dave, how come he didn't explode at Altitude??

[daveake]

Nah, he's a soft toy made of foam!

[ccr32]

daveake said:

blindswelledrat said:

Dave, are you getting permission to launch beforehand?

Yes, of course! I apply to the CAA 4+ weeks beforehand and they confirm with a permission certificate before the launch, plus they issue A NOTAM to cover the flight.

Dave

Did you launch from around the Didcot/Oxford area? If so, I remember seeing the NOTAM's when doing a bit of planning in SkyDemon before flying on Saturday..!

I do like all this stuff too - mind if I pinch one of your photos for a bit of desktop wallpaper?

[daveake]

ccr32 said:

Did you launch from around the Didcot/Oxford area? If so, I remember seeing the NOTAM's when doing a bit of planning in SkyDemon before flying on Saturday..!

West of Didcot, and about 5 miles south of Wantage.

ccr32 said:

I do like all this stuff too - mind if I pinch one of your photos for a bit of desktop wallpaper?

Yes, no problem

[daveake]

Weather permitting, I should be launching again on Saturday morning, about 11am.

The interesting thing this time is that my payload is carrying a webcam connected to a Raspberry Pi flight computer that will be sending down live images. There's little bandwidth on these flights so each image - a massive 432 x 240 pixels - takes 8 minutes or so to transmit, so the flight duration of 2 hours or so will only result in about 30 images. However it should be exciting seeing those come in.

The same flight will also carry a GoPro for HD video.

There will also be a second flight by a friend, who's going for the altitude record.

You can watch the action live. Images will be at http://sanslogic.co.uk/ssdv/live and a map at http://spacenear.us/tracker/

Dave

[RobbieKB]

Excellent stuff. Good luck! I look forward to seeing the new shots.

[Manicminer]

Excellent Dave, have you checked the weather for your launch site on Sat given the pretty shocking stuff we've had recently?

[daveake]

Yeah, morning should be OK. Wind prediction takes it NE and not too far.

Dave

[Blib]

Great thread!

I was talking to the partner of one of Mrs Blib's work colleagues a couple of weekends ago. He was involved in the Toshiba flying armchair advert. Filmed in the states, apparently.