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Aviation History
1962
1962 - 1444.PDF
236 FtJG"T ln«, ARIEL IN BUSINESS FIRST US/UK SATELLITE DI8C0VERS IONOSPHERIC "LEDGE" APRIL 26 this year was a profitable day for the rocket-makers, with the launching of an Atlas Agena and a Blue Scout from California, a Delta from Florida, and something else from somewhere in the Soviet Union. It was also a big day for Sir Harrie Massey and the British National Committee on Space Research, since the 1321b satellite aboard the Delta carried a neat package of six experiments from British universities. This was Ariel, the first international satellite, launched by courtesy of the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration in order to give British physicists the opportunity of placing some of their brightest ideas in orbit. It worked, thank heaven. The launch was successful, five of the six experiments were soon chirruping their results back via tele metry to the Minitrack stations, and large numbers of US and British scientists were able to relax once more. What has happened since then? As reported in last week's issue, the steady flow of telemetered data from Ariel to the ground stations sprang a leak on or about July 13, when the satellite's radio signals became intermittent in timing and erratic in content. Before that happened, however, over l,000hr of data had been transmitted from the satellite, passed back from the Minitrack stations to NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, processed and handed back to the British scientists for analysis. The full analysis of this data will doubtless keep many university scientists busy for a long time to come—the PhD thesis titles are only now beginning to flow—but already a number of significant dis- 1 Ariel satellite payload 2 Mass-spectrometer probe 3 Antenna 4 Solar paddles 5 Electron-density sensor boom 6 Tumble rockets 7 Fairing 8 ABL X-248 motor • Spin table 10 Spin motors 11 Second-stage telemetry aerial 12 Guidance aerial 13 BTL guidance package 14 Second-stage flight controller 15 Fuel (UDMH) 16 Pipe and cable fairing IT Helium gas bottle 18 Oxidant (WFNA) l» Aerojet-General AJIO-118 engine 20 Interstage structure 21 Thor autopilot 22 Fuel tank end bulkhead 23 Fuel (RP-I kerosmc) 24 Fuel anti-surge baffles 25 Lagged fuel delivery pipe 24 Cable and service fairing 27 Liquid-oxygen tank 28 Lox tank end bulkhead 19 Turbopump 30 Turbopump exhaust 31 Rocketdyne MB-3 engine 32 Starting propellant tanks 33 Vernier motors 34 Stabilizing fins (not on Thor IRBM) 35 Chemically etched skin panels Lift-off from Cape Canaveral at I p.m. local time on April 26; an initial orbit of 242-745 miles was achieved. Internal details of the Ariel-carrying Delta launch vehicle are shown in the cutaway drawing coveries have been made. 1 the recent international ioi Institute of Physics and th London. One important piece o Birmingham University exp has been the discovery of a tides beyond the previous Previously it had been tho at heights above the Fs la; disclosed a ledge which inte tration at about 450-500 mi DrR. L.F.Boyd of Uni the distribution of ionized as indicated by the UCL the experimental results ha from measurements of elec first direct determination t lower regions, while heliui higher sections of the orbit The UCL experiments al variation in the height at ion to the other occurs, f and their variation with ti gained. X-ray measuremen
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