Grape Version 1
Description
Documentation for the Grape V1, drawn from the Github at https://github.com/HamSCI/PSWS_Documentation/tree/master/Grape_Gen1_PSWS Crowdsourced data collection among the international community of amateur radio operators and shortwave listeners has great potential for addressing problems of undersampling in the geospace system. Quantitative Doppler measurements of high frequency (HF) time standard stations, used in bottomside ionospheric sensing, have been accomplished using existing radio hardware belonging to volunteers in distributed campaigns. However, typical shortwave receivers cannot be put to ordinary use while these measurements are being taken, do not have standardized signal chains, and are generally too expensive to be purchased for the purpose of taking Doppler measurements alone. Here, we provide documentation for a low-cost intermediate frequency receiver, the Grape Version 1, which is designed specifically for measurements of North American time standard stations. Grape receivers can be easily constructed and deployed by amateur scientists in order to gain a deeper understanding of variations in radio propagation in their local environment. When compared over long periods and across distributed networks of stations, the resulting data yield insights on greater spatial and time scales. At the time of this writing, several of these receivers have been deployed across the United States and are currently collecting data. These receivers form the first iteration of the Personal Space Weather Station network. See https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ohx.2022.e00289 for documentation, and https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2022-303 for data. ____________________________________________________ 16 May 2022: Posted software update, v1.2, to support automated data upload. 4 March 2022: Added hardware files for WWV Grape 1 Radio Ver 1.12, which has several significant improvements. See Grape v1.12.zip for most current hardware files. 1 - Input protection improved; parts now easy to solder 2 - Part selection updated according to current availability 3 - Added a 4th frequency band (15 MHz) as a selection for the input filter 4 - Bandpass filters were adjusted to the current Grape 2 values