Topic: [Ongoing]Would you be interested in... High Altitude Ballooning? (Read 4995 times)

Holy crapballs.

Thats amazing, Cyclops! Show us more! 

So this was the final result 2000 photos like this:


Like it?

Relatively small ground track?

Found ALESP:

ALESP
Time: 2014-08-15 09:20:39
Position: 37.428667,-3.933095
Altitude: 1220 m Rate: -6.9 m/s
Max. Altitude: 29629 m
Temperature: 9C
Current Error: 0
Satellites: 8
Temperature, External: 9 °C
Receivers: ALTRACK

Man, that's really cool! To The Stratosphere!

Look for ALESP!!
http://spacenear.us/tracker/

Absolutely stunning! But at these extreme heights, isn't there quite a big risk that it lands somewhere unreachable, say in the middle of the ocean or someplace else where you can't collect it?

Launch is tomorrow!
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/tomorrow-a-btc-funded-payload-will-go-to-the-stratosphere-739313

WOW NOW THIS IS SOMETHING EXTRA-ORDINARY !!! BOTH HANDS DOWN MAN 

Your quite welcome. Infact, if you look @ some of the amateur radio satellites that are in orbit & functional now..many only use 250 mW of transmit power, and they are actually in orbit.

-Enjoy

I will, thanks for the suggestion!

Actually, considering the altitude of the ballon ( that is your HUGE HUGE advantage ), power levels on UHF and SHF ( microwave ) can be minimal. On VHF-UHF & Microwave frequencies, LOS ( line of sight ) is the advantage ( altitude ). I would dare say for a 30-40 km altitude, and a decent ground station for reception ( appropriate directional antenna ) you could keep TX power levels between 1-2 watts. When you get some free time.. take a look at this :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amateur_Radio_High_Altitude_Ballooning

&

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amateur_television

Enjoy

The problem is the power needed to transmit the info from 30km

True, theres different methods, amateur radio 'fast scan tv' is real time, and can be recieved with analogue tv tuners ..where there's a will..theres a way...fun project ..keep us posted

Data was sent by radio, and yes you can send images but as you mentioned you need more expensive and heavy components. Furthermore a lot of info has to be gathered and it takes a few minutes to receive a single picture.

I'm not sure if the creator/experimentor has done this, but via amateur radio, you can send photos, and well..even real time video via an R.F. Downlink. Some of the necessary items may had a slight weight to the payload.. but all you would need is your Goverments amateur radio license and some basic know-how. Possition data via APRS (2m FM), and mabey a broad band 900 mhz or 1.2 g video downlink.. just a thought. Its pretty cool.

Launch will probably be in August. June is the deadline to get the funds to do so.

Great, I am already looking forward to seeing the video.
It should be online somewhere in the 3th week of June?

Sure!

You might already be planning this, but please do link to your final video. I love watching them. I guess we all dream of visiting space.

It works worldwide, in fact I used it in Spain.

Oh yes, if your in the UK that one looks awesome. Cheers M8.

Well radio tracker is not that expensive, if you do it yourself about 70-100€ depending on parts. I have access to some that cost 130€ already working (software...) receiver is the expensive part ~190€.

Yes I saw that predictor, but this one is better: http://predict.habhub.org from the ukhas.co.uk guys

That was a concern. Our hope was to have a chase vehicle heading toward our expected landing area then wait for the signal to return once it starts pinging towers. Budget was the main reason I was using the i425. It was the cheapest phone I could find with GPS and that takes pre-paid cards.  I think now there are better options.

Oh, and you may have seen this already...
http://weather.uwyo.edu/polar/balloon_traj.html

I highly recommend doing it, but don't use the motorola if you want to get live tracking. GSM signal only works below 1000m so above that height, and this things go really high, you would have no clue of the location (until landing).

I love this. Some friends convinced me to try this last summer then bailed on the project. My part was to install some java code on a Motorola i425. Each minute it fetched the GPS lat./lon. and sent it as a text message to a website that plotted the positions on google maps. 

Auction for project Sponsors up! https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/auctionyour-logo-in-the-stratosphere-502553

Remember that you can bring this project to life here!: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/crowfundbtc-to-the-stratosphere-the-project-high-altitude-balloon-involved-496829

The problem is  that condensation can form in the case creating a blurry image.

If you get enough funding, it would be neat to put a GoPro or other camera in it.  They're waterproof and such so they should be fine when you recover them (assuming the impact isn't too hard).

Thanks, if you have any doubt don't hesitate to contact me!

Thank you sir.  Something I will look into when I have a bit more free time.  Good luck in your project!

Capsule is made of expanded polyethylene foam that floats, and it can be made waterproof. Furthermore SD cards are completely waterproof.

Is the device waterproof and less dense than water?  If it lands in a river or lake, do you have the ability to retrieve it and not have lost anything?

I just created the Official Thread for the project!: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/crowfundbtc-to-the-stratosphere-the-project-high-altitude-balloon-involved-496829

This is amazing!! Count me in!

No problem on accepting different cryptos! And yes, the camera could take picture sod a logo with the earth behind like:
http://www.jwt.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Kit-Kat-Break-From-Gravity-by-JWT-London-still-6.jpg

I am finising the project info, and I will post shortly.

I have been asking around and might be able to get more people willing to donate. Would you accept different coins too as a matter of donation? As I am pretty much involved in one currency, I can make bigger donations in them. Maybe even put on a sponsor list of peeps that have cooperated with funding this flight.



Let me know, if you would then I could be able to start kicking it to alot of other users and see what happens:).

Dosmas

PS Is it btw possible to let the camera take pictures, as it does, but then with visability of say, a sponsorlogo/message?

As the ballon ascends you can't see it, and at 20+ km is nearly impossible to point with an antenna.

How about using cheap TP-Link 703N for high speed communication.
If you keep a parabolic dish pointed at the balloon it might work

Thanks OgNasty for the support, I will prepare a Solid plan with all the steps to accomplish this and talk to a few people I know who are in the hobby, I'm sure they will be interested.

You just gave me the "energy" necessary to start this

And beyond!

The beauty of getting the community involved is that there are folks all over.  I say you make a super ballon that will stay up longer and go farther than any other balloon of this type with a radio that is capable of sending back pictures (maybe a satellite link?).  We as a community could make sure that nearby folks are helping to receive the signal and recover the unit if necessary.  I think this is a cool idea and I'd throw a few bitcents at it and follow the project.  I think you could easily raise enough BTC to build whatever you wanted with a solid plan.  I also think if the plan went successfully, a lot of donations would be made, and probably several other units could be launched in countries all over the world.  This could turn into something huge if done right and expose balloon hobbyists to Bitcoin.  Perhaps even a website could be developed to fund and track awesome projects like this.

If (safely) launched with a couple lit flares, you could even get a massive amount of media attention: http://ktar.com/6/814826/Man-claims-responsibility-for-Phoenix-mystery-lights

In my case it only travelled 20km, though we had to travel 60km by car, there was not an straight road to it . It usually takes 90 minutes from launch to landing, can be more or less depending on balloon, weight, parachute...

On a non-windy day, what would you estimate the distance would be the balloon will travel from the launch site?  Also, how long does the balloon stay in the air before popping?

I was wondering the same thing. Too bad I can't try this where I live - there's a very good chance it may land somewhere on one of the four military bases here. 

Yes, it has a GPS module that sends data over RTTY each 30 secs, so you can track the balloon on a map. By using a software that analyses all the world wind data you can predict the landing spot, in fact the prediction I did before launching was nearly perfect. Also, it is advisable to launch on a non-windy day and far from sea.

Very cool toys
How do you recover the camera, is there a gps module? How can you be sure that the balloon won't drop in the sea or in a river?

As I can reuse parts from my previous flight (Data receiver costs about 200€) about 600€ +/- with 2 cameras inside, plus the BTC to be put inside.

Thanks!

Wow! That's amazing! You did a great job! This personal project deserves our attention

Seems like a good idea, I'll start working on it.

I will do some research for better ways of sending pictures, but the only one I've seen is with a 300baud module. The problem is that someone has to be in range to receive pictures. There are two types of balloons, this that go up and down quickly (mine took about 90 mins to go up 31km and down) or floaters that can be for days floating and travel thousands of Km, but as said if nobody with a radio at range signal would be lost.

Great, the I will prepare a serious project to do it right.

You only have to ask for permission, bear in mind that planes travel at 10km and balloons usually reach 30km, ascending at 5m/s they spend little time that high.

Could the radio be upgraded with enough funds, or is there a better method that could be used?  It would be cool to see enough BTC raised to put up something awesome and have it stay up for a long time sending back pictures.

+1

I'd like to be in on it. as microfunding a flight.

For shop I wouldnt know, seems like it would possibly cause troubles with aero traffic right if done too often?

In fact I had to contact the Air Space Management Agency in my country and they issued a NOTAM (Notice To Air Men) about the payload, so not that unidentified though ;P

Im glad you like them, I just uploaded a few more

Yes you have to recover it, as the radio module works at 50 baud rate (50 words per minute) and it would take very long to send a picture (Though using special modules you could send tiny images). 3G internet would not work above 1000m. It would be awesome to launch this year, everyone could track it because when the data is received the computer uploads it to http://spacenear.us which shows current location, altitude and info about sensors (Temperature...)

Bitcoin could go to the stratosphere before reaching the moon ;P

EDIT: Radio data is received in a 500km range.

Do you have to recover it to get the pictures, or can they be viewed while in flight?  It would be a cool little community project to fund and launch one of these things for everyone to track and view the pics.     You could probably even raise even funds to add some other cool gadgets to the payload.

EDIT: More info can be found here: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/crowfundbtc-to-the-stratosphere-the-project-high-altitude-balloon-involved-496829


Hello Bitcoin Community!

This summer as a personal project, I launched a payload consisting of a tracker, radio and cameras into the stratosphere, it reached 31km and measured up to -37ºC.

This type of artifacts is what is called HAB, or High Altitude Ballooning, a hobby extended mostly in the UK.

The Idea is simple, a big balloon filled with helium tied to a payload with a parachute, once the balloon burst the payload descends safely. Inside payload a tracker and radio module send position data as well as temperature or what ever you tell them to do so (Open source, you can add what ever sensors you want if you know how) Cameras take photographs/video of all the journey.

Here is what I did:
The electronics:


Cameras:


Balloon


Images the ballon took:


Note that the balloon was launched in Spain, the blue mass is the Mediterranean. "Costa del Sol" with Gibraltar and even Africa.












I am making this post to introduce you to this hobby and to see if there is enough interest in order to set up a "Shop" to sell all the required components for doing this, like a basic Kit as some of them are tricky to found. (Only one person I know mades this custom trackers at affordable price). Everything costs about 1000€, but on each launch you only have to buy the Helium and Balloon (If you don't loose your payload)

EDIT: As OgNasty suggested, it could be a community project to do.