After looking through lots of web sites on foxhunting transmitters I think I finally found one that will work for our purposes. It's made by Doppler DF Instruments and broadcast at 146.565 MHz. This can be picked up by my 2 m HT and both of the scanners we use for tracking. This would allow us to have 3 directional receivers and antennas in the field in order to minimize retrieval times. 

I attended the Palouse Hills Armature Radio Club meeting last Wednesday for the first time. I wanted to see if someone had a antenna tuner and a SWR meter. It was an interesting meeting with most of the discussion centered around a field day coming up in June. I didn't get a contact for the meters. I will email the president of the club.

I have completed the tape measure yagi but need to hook it up to a SWR meter and tune it to the appropriate frequency. Initial test were inconclusive. 

Currently looking for a small 2m range transmitter to use as an on the ground location beacon with the yagi antennas. I have found some for around $100 but think if I find the schematics that I can build it myself. 

We will be adding directional finding antennas to our inventory. This weekend we will construct a tape measure yagi antenna and test it's directional finding capabilities. We chose this type due to it's portability. Portability is important for our operations. We will also try the arrow yagi design as well. 

This years launch was a tremendous success. Our balloon made it up to 80,000 feet. We had several experiments on board. Here is the list: solar cell efficiency, polymer integrity test, roach exposure, bacteria samples, pressure, and temperature. Also work was done on a cut-down system and a autonomous flight control system. 
We launched at 7:36 a.m. and recovered the balloon at 1:50 p.m.. The balloon landed around 9:30 a.m. but we had trouble located the balloon in the tall grass. We had two data loggers on board. One worked well and the other had power issues shortly into the flight. 
The experiment module design was a regular dodecahedron. As a result of this the camera and video equipment were mounted externally. This exposed the equipment to the cold air and the batteries died on the assent around 35,000 ft. 
A lot was learned and we look forward to the next launch.