Welcome to the HamSCI Personal Space Weather Station (PSWS) Working Group. The group builds, deploys, and operates the HamSCI PSWS network, a distributed array of affordable ground-based instruments that measure how space weather disturbs the ionosphere and the geomagnetic field. Most stations are hosted by amateur radio volunteers, and the instruments are designed to produce data of research quality.
A PSWS station carries one or more of four instruments:
- an HF receiver, which measures the Doppler shift of time-standard stations such as WWV, WWVH, and CHU, and decodes WSPR and FST4W amateur signals;
- a VLF receiver, which records natural radio emissions such as whistlers and dawn chorus, along with Navy VLF transmitters;
- a ground magnetometer, which measures the geomagnetic field;
- a WSPRSonde, a GPS-disciplined HF beacon that transmits on up to eight bands at once.
Stations upload their data to the HamSCI PSWS central database at The University of Alabama, where the data are publicly available.
PSWS is the lead working group for HamSCI’s instrument and observing activities. The instrument groups (Grape, VLF, and magnetometer) and the observing campaigns that use PSWS data coordinate through it. The group’s leads, mission, and meeting calendar are listed in the HamSCI working group directory.
If you have any questions or suggestions, please open a new issue. This leaves a public record that can help others.
Learn more
Gwyn Griffiths (G3ZIL) explains the development, deployment, and data of the PSWS, covering all four instruments, in this presentation to an AMSAT-SA forum in July 2026.