A Novice’s Guide to Amateur Radio Astronomy

2024 Western Conference

University of Texas – Dallas

April 2024

Outline

• Why radio versus visual astronomy?
• cost
• Coolness
• Time
• Dark skies not required
• Why do radio astronomy at all?
• Unique opportunities
• Hardware
• Software
• Science
• Electronics
• How to get started
• Decide which area you want to learn more of
• Telescopes
• Software
• Math
• Physics
• SDR all the way
• Repurpose old computers
• “off the shelf” software
• Pay attention to details
• Check, double check, triple check; patience is key
• Antenna are pat of an electrical circuit
• Learn the science, one bite at a time
• Never be afraid to ask questions
• Make the studies fit your constraints
• Not everyone has acres to string multi-meter dipoles
• Radio astronomy is about learning, never stop

Introduction

You’ve fallen down an intellectual or engineering rabbit hole and you’re thinking about taking up radio astronomy.

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Excellent choice!

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It’s fun, it’s challenging, it’s rewarding, and most of all I’ve made lots of mistakes that you can learn from to help make your path a little bit easier (hopefully).

If you’ve gotten this far in your own research, you know what radio astronomy is. In this work, we will discuss why you would you want to do radio astronomy, what to expect on your foray into RA (lessons learned and realistic expectations), its benefits over other forms of astronomy, and, importantly, how to get started on the right foot.

My hope is to encourage incoming novices to be the kind of radio astronomer they want to be (wannabe) and to do the kind of radio astronomy they want to do.

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The initial audience will have capabilities far beyond this talk. But these points could also be good to keep in mind when talking to someone who is starting to show interest in the endeavor.

What this will not be

This will not be a treatise into what radio astronomy is, how it was developed, nor how to do it.

Why Radio vs. Visual

• Who is the average new “Amateur” Astronomer today?
• Mostly male
• Over 35 years old
• Probably have a family
• Technically and scientifically curious/capable
• What do these people probably not have a lot of?
• Time
• Money
• Access to dark, quiet skies (probably)

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This is where Radio Astronomy can help!

Why Radio vs. Visual

• Cost
• Depending on your project, you can start your journey for less than $100 USD
• You can do serious work in Hydrogen for less than $300 USD
• Projects do not scale in cost or complexity linearly!
• A lot of stuff may already be in your home

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Examples of projects with costs

Super SID

Scope in a Box

SOKYRAD Pyrmid Horn

• Unbuilt kit - $95
• Kit + Receiver - $220
• Built kit + Receiver - $249
• Built Kit + Receiver + Software - $384

• $48 + your computer

• $350 for all hardware

• Pyramidal Horn
• 0.45m22 collecting area
• $20
• Galvanized steel waveguide
• 52.5mm Copper Feed
• $10
• Nooelec NESDR SMArt V5
• $50
• Nooelec SAWbird H1+ LNA
• $35
• Raspberry Pi 4 8gb
• $75
• Total = $190

Why Radio vs. Visual

• Time/Dark Skies
• Can perform RA in day or night, in most all weather
• Once up and running, you can collect data 24x7 with minimal input
• Work on it as you can
• Coolness (Something dad’s the world around need help with)
• Your children might learn to enjoy this new hobby, include them!
• You’ll learn to enjoy explaining to your neighbors what that weird thing in your yard does
• That you’re not receiving radio stations from space, but from Hydrogen
• And that you’re not trying to catch aliens
• Maybe

Why Radio Astronomy at All?

• Unique opportunities
• Easier to analyze WHAT is happening
• Fundamentally the same, while being fundamentally different than visual astronomy
• Easier to watch Space Weather, an important part of our history and our current safety
• Combining all the spectrums important to understanding our universe

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Why Radio Astronomy at All?

• Hardware
• Can be as complicated or as simple as you like
• Easily built at home
• Always evolving
• Endless designs, tuning, testing to experiment with
• Good data goes hand in hand with good hardware

Why Radio Astronomy at All?

• Software
• Develop software
• Good software already exists
• Software to collect, analyze, clean, calibrate….the list goes on

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dspira

Sdr#

Why Radio Astronomy at All?

• Electronics
• An interesting way to learn basic electronics
• Also RF electronics

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Historically speaking, Radio Astronomy was developed by electronics experts, and was the realm for highly skilled amateur electronics fans.

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The highly technical usage and application of analog electronics are being replaced with newer digital technologies that take advantage of the greater processing power in modern computers.

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While this has reduced the quantity of electronics that need to be applied per setup, it hasn’t detracted from new and exciting RF technologies, and their design, into higher resolution, higher frequency, digital electronics.

(Supplied: CAASTRO)

(Supplied: https://teknokoodiradio.vuodatus.net/lue/2019/04/rtl-sdr-blog-wideband-lna)

Why Radio Astronomy at All?

• Science
• Radio astronomy makes it easier to analyze what is occurring and by how much, other forms of astronomy need very sophisticated and expensive equipment to do this
• Galactic analysis
• Spectroscopy
• Masar
• Quasar
• Pulsars
• Fast Radio Bursts

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Cost of Entry

Many of these items can’t be studied with optical instruments or require equipment so far outside the budget of any amateur to make them realistically impossible.

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Except for FRB, that equipment is expensive for anyone….

How to Get Started

• Some people just want to see something, and that’s completely cool
• Look in your closet, or your work’s junk pile, or the local marketplace; you will find computers and electronics that are more than adequate for your purposes
• Avoid spending megabucks until you figure out what you want to do more of, after the idea of capturing images wears off
• Most expensive equipment is more sensitive and harder to setup out of the box, which will just frustrate you early, souring the experience
• SDR all the way – performance for $ for ease of use, they just can’t be beat

I have tons of SBC and use them exclusively for collecting data

How to Get Started

• You may find you want more than just collecting data, so at this point I recommend selecting a “specialty”:
• Hardware
• Software
• Math
• Physics
• By all means, don’t limit yourself to one, if you get serious you should consider deep study into all the above categories, as this will help make you a more complete astronomer.
• Along the way, search for experts in the areas you are working on
• Ask for help and they will gladly provide it

How to Get Started

Use all of SARA’s resources!

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There is more than just the listerv.

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There are several great sections with additional resources, presentations, and organizers. Go through these sections and review this material.

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Each section has a coordinator with their contact information listed at the top of the page.

And don’t forget the Education section of SARA, or the fantastic YouTube channel!

Learn from Mistakes, Trust the Process

• Pay attention to details
• Check, double check, triple check; patience is key
• Antenna are part of an electrical circuit
• You have to keep that in mind when building equipment. If something is grounded incorrectly, or if you are not electrically conductive, your system will spit out garbage. And when you’re new, you can’t tell the garbage from the gold at first.
• Sometimes there is a benefit to trying what others say won’t work!
• Sometimes you learn from your own experience
• But usually the experience is right, so don’t dismiss it
• Patience, patience, patience

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Learn the Science

• This is large reason we do this!
• You will benefit greatly from learning as much as you can about the electromagnetic spectrum, how it propagates, how the different parts of the spectrum work together, and about redshift
• Coordinate systems, coordinate transformations, local sidereal time and other time systems are also invaluable
• From here you will be able to apply physics and fundamental theorems to what you observe and make well informed, educated assumptions about the results

Make the Studies fit your Constraints

• If you live on 0.25 acre in the suburbs, you aren’t going to be able to do good Radio JOVE projects
• You may not have $300 to spend on an out of the box scope
• Collect pieces little by little
• Build/salvage what you can
• You may have a nasty HOA, or live near a roaming hoard of antenna eaters
• Find what is possible in your current set of constraints, and get really good at it
• You don’t even need a telescope. Lots of people have lots and lots of data already that you can work with processing and analyzing

(Source: Adobe Stock)

Never be afraid to ask questions

• We all benefit from your questions
• Maybe there’s a new perspective we haven’t thought of before and it encourages more communication/thought on the matter
• You have come to a place with many, many like-minded individuals
• Experiences will range far and wide
• 0 years to 50 years
• No electronics to 30 years electronics building
• No programming to master programmers
• A question not asked is a wasted opportunity to learn

Never Stop Learning

• If you stay interested in RA, you won’t have a choice, because there is always something new to learn
• Think like a scientist: theorize, plan a study, test that theory, analyze the data, update your theory
• Notes, notes, notes, notes, notes

(Source: Wikipedia)

How Can We Help More?

• For SARA members, how can we help new people get off the ground quicker?
• There is no “one source”, should we create a book/pamphlet/website which details experiences and instructions for how to get started
• Not just how to build but this is what a spectrum is, this is a time pulse, this is how you calculate rotation, etc.
• But maybe how to do the front end, back end, programs, analyzing, physics, etc. for many different projects?
• What can you hope to see and study with project A, etc?
• How do we help the new and experienced amateurs do something with the science?
• How can SARA contribute to the larger scientific community and continue amateur participation in it?

Thank you!

I would also like to let all future, Wannabe Astronomers, RA is easily doable with less than $300 of total expenses, can be built in your garage/patio, and can be performed even in urban areas like where I live. There are a host of other “off the shelf” software dedicated to SDR concepts for Radio Astronomy that are accessible to the novice. Start where you are and go from there. RA is a journey and is meant to be enjoyed. I hope my paper helps others discover the joys to be had.

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Questions?