SatNogs is fantastic for satellites operating in the amateur band. A global coordinated ground station network and community with loads of expertise. They have on at least a couple occasions (including a cubesat mission I was involved in) found satellites (ie tracked and identified from beacons) after deployment before the satellite operator. Hoping to add a station to the network sometime in the next 12 months. The grafana dashboard they set up is super cool also.
Buying in bulk, one could probably get the price down to $200 and still keep a profit, but the volume would be so low that it's probably not worth the time and effort.
I've thought about doing this, ran some math, and that's the conclusion I came to.
I suspect so, but it's pretty heavy machinery and really made for a big mast. I've shied away from it so far because it's a big investment, and it's a bit unclear how precise it is, how exactly to connnect it to a computer and so on.
My gut feel is that SatNOGS would be easier end-to-end (and probably easier to repair and upgrade if necessary).
