JBTSETI

It is now generally accepted in the scientific community that life is an ordinary process of nature and that it occurs wherever the conditions exist to support it.

We know that stars are continually being born and that planets are a natural consequence of starbirth.Organic molecules,the basic building blocks of life,have been detected in interstellar space,life began on Earth almost immediately after it formed,and natural selection seems to favor intelligence.The point is, that ALL of the scientific evidence available to us today adds up to this, that "we are alone in the universe" is the LEAST likely of all possibilities!

So where is everybody? Good question.That's why so many people are doing SETI. Some of them are listed here. The "Thoughts on SETI Page" contains suggestions for possible SETI projects and the following section deals with our own very modest efforts.

I strongly suggest that you check out the SETI League. They can give you a pretty good idea what amateur SETI is all about.

SETI Institute<--these guys are the professionals.

SETI League<---these are the amateurs,like us.

This section will give a brief overview of our construction projects in chronological order. Links on this page will take you to more detailed desriptions of each one. In each case just follow the links to "JBTSETI page" to return here. For the most part they will bring you back to where you came from in the text.

At the moment our project consists of constructing an equatorial drive for our 10 ft dish. What are we looking for? Don't know yet.There are too many possibilities. We're open to suggestions.In fact we are LOOKING for suggestions. After you have taken a look at our project pictures,why don't you look at our "thoughts on SETI page" , above, and then email us any ideas you can come up with.

The Tripod	The Mount

The Gear box	The Boom

A close up of the boom	Almost assembled

Due to recent conversations with the good folks at the Bootes Project,and others,we are presently working on the necessary hardware and electronics to use our dish as the first ground station of the:

The Solar System Mapping Project is based on the assumption that it is at least possible for an extraterrestrial civilization to send a probe into our solar system that would attempt to gain our attention by returning our own radio or television transmissions to us. On this page we will show the construction of this project. For a more detailed explanation of the Mapping Project just follow the link provided above. Then follow the links back here,to the JBT S.E.T.I. page.

The Solar System Mapping Project

The tripod pictured above has been modified slightly to simply nod up and down for tracking the plane of the ecliptic, and the necessary electronics has been assembled in what is left of my dining room.

The electronics consists of a VCR and a television with the output (low frequency video) of the TV going to the input of the sound card on our computer. Various FFT packages have been downloaded from freeware sites and more will probably be purchased.

A hardware based spectrum analyzer is presently being designed and details will be posted here when available.

In this photo of our control room please note the VCR and TV on the left, and the various decorations betraying the other interests of our family, including rocketry ,anthropology and astronomy.