RASTA is an experimental .NET 10 WPF MVVM application for amateur radio astronomy. It is a personal, exploratory project aimed at building a complete workflow for hydrogen‑line observation using affordable hardware, custom tools, and a lot of engineering curiosity.
There is no guarantee this project will ever be “finished” — and that’s part of the fun. RASTA is a space to learn, experiment, and gradually assemble a system that might one day produce meaningful 1420 MHz data… or simply serve as a playground for telescope control, SDR capture, and spectral processing ideas.
RASTA exists because radio astronomy is fascinating — and because building your own tools to explore the universe is even more fascinating.
Long‑term aspiration:
To create a unified, hobby‑grade radio astronomy application that can plan observations, control a telescope, capture SDR data, process hydrogen‑line spectra, and visualise results — all in one place.
Whether it reaches that goal or not, RASTA is designed to be a rewarding engineering journey.
RASTA is intentionally ambitious. The project aims to explore:
-
A full hydrogen‑line workflow
Prepare → Plan → Observe → Process → Visualise -
Telescope control via ASCOM Alpaca
Slew, track, park, unpark, and manage mount state safely. -
SDR‑based capture
Focused on RTL‑SDR devices.
(Airspy is not planned.) -
Spectral processing experiments
- FFT stacking
- Cold‑sky normalisation
- Drift‑scan accumulation
- mx+b calibration
- Background correction
- Hydrogen‑line extraction
-
Custom visualisation tools
2D spectra, 3D surfaces, drift‑scan heatmaps, hydrogen‑line features. -
A clean, modular architecture
- .NET 10
- WPF + MVVM Toolkit
- Dependency injection
- NUnit tests
- Separation of Core, Infrastructure, Processing, App, and Simulators
RASTA is not a polished product — it’s a growing ecosystem of ideas.
RASTA is structured around five workflow stages:
Configure telescope, SDR, frequency, gain, FFT parameters, and capture settings.
Create observation plans:
- Declination sweeps
- RA sweeps
- Drift scans
- Custom geometries
Plans can be saved, loaded, and reused.
Execute the plan:
- Telescope slews and tracks
- SDR captures raw IQ or FFT data
- Real‑time status monitoring
- Safety logic for mount state
Apply experimental calibration and correction algorithms.
Render spectra, surfaces, drift‑scan maps, and hydrogen‑line features.
- RASTA.Core — domain models, interfaces, telescope/SDR abstractions
- RASTA.Infrastructure — Alpaca telescope implementation, RTL‑SDR capture, FFT engines, storage providers
- RASTA.Processing — calibration, spectral math, heatmap generation
- RASTA.App — WPF MVVM application
- RASTA.Tests — NUnit test suite
- RASTA.Simulators — simulated telescope and SDR for offline development
- Telescopes: ASCOM Alpaca compatible mounts
- SDR: RTL‑SDR
- Antennas: Hydrogen‑line LNA + feedhorns, DIY dishes (e.g., 1.4m build)
RASTA is in active, exploratory development.
Major components already exist, but many are incomplete or experimental.
The application will connect and disconnect to an ASCOM Telescope Mount via the ASCOM Remote Server. If the telescope is Parked you are given the option of unparking (and also the option to park again when you disconnect.
It will as respond to plugging and unplugging an RTL-SDR device (tested with a Nooelec NESDR SMArtee V5). An SDR device must be plugged in to enable the Plan View (which is the most complete view at the moment).
The Calibrate button on the Plan View will run a calibration sequence and return a calibration profile.
These are hopes, not promises:
- More robust hydrogen‑line processing
- Real‑time waterfall view
- Automated calibration sequences
- Multi‑night drift‑scan accumulation
- Additional visualisation modes
- Plugin system for custom processing modules
Because building your own radio astronomy tools is fun.
Because learning is fun.
Because seeing a hydrogen‑line bump in data you captured yourself is magical.
RASTA is a hobby project — a place to explore ideas without deadlines, pressure, or expectations.
GNU GPL 3.0
This is a personal project, but contributions may be welcomed once the core stabilises.
Phil Crompton
Coalville, UK
Software developer & astronomy enthusiast