New GPS and Scaled Down Flight

     After several months of messing with a Motorola GPS module, I finally gave up and bought a different unit. This Argent GPS is tiny compared to the Mototrola.

      This is the radio transmitter. (Bayonics MicroTrak 300) It transmits on the 2 meter Ham Radio band at 144.390 Mhz with about 300 mW of power. It should be able to be received for better than 60 miles.

     I've also decided against sending up the Arduino as a flight computer on the first flight. The plan now is to send up a small camera and GPS/Radio tracker and that's it.

     I have the rip-stop nylon fabric for the parachute, (black and lime green) that I cannibalized from an old Rokkaku kite I had built several years ago but broken one of the spars on. I just need to sew it together.

     Testing of the tracking unit should begin soon as I solder together this twinlead j-pole antenna.
  
     The first flight is now scheduled for March 26, 2011.