AO-27 Returns from the Dead

A number of amateurs have reported that the FM repeater of AO-27 has been active for brief intervals in recent weeks.

When commanded on by control operators, the transponder is active for about two minutes before reverting to telemetry transmissions only.

Patrick Stoddard, WD9EWK, remarks that AO-27 wasn't originally intended to be an FM satellite. It lacks the audio filtering normally seen with an FM receiver since its uplink receiver was going to be used for data.

With the lack of audio filtering on the uplink receiver, AO-27 was used for tests with D-Star radios.

Michael Wyrick, N3UC, has announced that AO-27 is now running on a schedule that places the FM repeater on for 8 minutes per orbit: 4 minutes ascending pass and 4 minutes descending pass. (ANS thanks Stephen DeVience, N8URE, for the above information)

The Wayback Machine has captures of the former ao27.org web site, detailing how those tests were done. Two radios were used for that D-Star QSOs, one for uplink and the other for downlink).