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All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1979

Plasma wave observations near Jupiter - Initial results from Voyager 2

The Voyager 2 flyby of Jupiter, which occurred in July 1979, provided the second opportunity to study plasma waves in the vicinity of Jupiter (first measurements made by Voyager 1 in March 1979). Because of the somewhat different trajectory and plasma conditions at Jupiter, the Voyager 2 mission provided new perspectives for analyzing many of the phenomena detected by Voyager 1, and also revealed the presence of several new types of plasma waves. A survey is presented of the initial results from the Voyager 2 plasma wave instrument, with special emphasis on the new observations and comparisons with the Voyager 1 results. The data base for the present discussion starts with the first detection of radio emissions from Jupiter about six months before closest approach and ends about two weeks after closest approach

Gurnett, D. A.↗
NASA NTRS1983

The Voyager 2 scan platform anomaly

The two Voyager spacecraft were launched in the summer of 1977, flew past Jupiter in 1979, and reached Saturn in 1980 and 1981. The Voyager Attitude and Articulation Control Subsystem (AACS) controls the positioning of a scan platform on which scientific instruments are mounted. On August 26, 1981, it was discovered that the azimuth axis of the scan platform of Voyager 2 had not completed the commanded slew. The profile of the failed slew command resembled a similar scan failure on Voyager 1 on February 23, 1979. In that case, contamination of the output gear mesh in the azimuth actuator was identified as the most probable cause of the failure. The problem was solved by cycling the azimuth actuator until the contaminant broke down and smooth operation was restored. A similar treatment applied to the Voyager 2 problem failed. Details of the Voyager 2 anomaly investigation are discussed.

Marchetto, C. A.↗
NASA NTRS1988

VLA telemetry performance with concatenated coding for Voyager at Neptune

Current plans for supporting the Voyager encounter at Neptune include the arraying of the Deep Space Network (DSN) antennas at Goldstone, California, with the National Radio Astronomy Observatory's Very Large Array (VLA) in New Mexico. Not designed as a communications antenna, the VLA signal transmission facility suffers a disadvantage in that the received signal is subjected to a gap or blackout period of approximately 1.6 msec once every 5/96 sec control cycle. Previous analyses showed that the VLA data gaps could cause disastrous performance degradation in a VLA stand-alone system and modest degradation when the VLA is arrayed equally with Goldstone. New analysis indicates that the earlier predictions for concatenated code performance were overly pessimistic for most combinations of system parameters, including those of Voyager-VLA. The periodicity of the VLA gap cycle tends to guarantee that all Reed-Solomon codewords will receive an average share of erroneous symbols from the gaps. However, large deterministic fluctuations in the number of gapped symbols from codeword to codeword may occur for certain combinations of code parameters, gap cycle parameters, and data rates. Several mechanisms for causing these fluctuations are identified and analyzed. Even though graceful degradation is predicted for the Voyager-VLA parameters, catastrophic degradation greater than 2 dB can occur for a VLA stand-alone system at certain non-Voyager data rates inside the range of the actual Voyager rates. Thus, it is imperative that all of the Voyager-VLA parameters be very accurately known and precisely controlled.

Dolinar, S. J., Jr.↗
NASA NTRS1989

Voyager: Neptune Encounter Highlights

Voyager encounter data are presented in computer animation (CA) and real (R) animation. The highlights include a view of 2 full rotations of Neptune. It shows spacecraft trajectory 'diving' over Neptune and intercepting Triton's orbit, depicting radiation and occulation zones. Also shown are a renegade orbit of Triton and Voyager's encounter with Neptune's Magnetopause. A model of the spacecraft's complex maneuvers during close encounters of Neptune and Triton is presented. A view from Earth of Neptune's occulation experiment is is shown as well as a recreation of Voyager's final pass. There is detail of Voyager's Image Compensation technique which produces Voyager images. Eighteen images were produced on June 22 - 23, 1989, from 57 million miles away. A 68 day sequence which provides a stroboscopic view - colorization approximates what is seen by the human eye. Real time images recorded live from Voyager on 8/24/89 are presented. Photoclinometry produced the topography of Triton. Three images are used to create a sequence of Neptune's rings. The globe of Neptune and 2 views of the south pole are shown as well as Neptune rotating. The rotation of a scooter is frozen in images showing differential motion. There is a view of rotation of the Great Dark Spot about its own axis. Photoclinometry provides a 3-dimensional perspective using a color mosaic of Triton images. The globe is used to indicate the orientation of Neptune's crescent. The east and west plumes on Triton are shown.

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NASA NTRS2016

Voyager Interstellar Mission: Challenges of Flying a Very Old Spacecraft on a Very Long Mission

Two Voyager spacecraft were launched in 1977. After the successful flybys of Jupiter and Saturn by both Voyagers and Uranus and Neptune by Voyager 2, the mission has been extended for another 30 years in search of the transition region between the dominance of the solar energy and interstellar energy. The Voyager Interstellar Mission (VIM) started on January 1, 1990. It can be characterized by several factors including extremely long communication distances, aging hardware, reduced staffing levels and difficulty in obtaining Deep Space Network (DSN) resources necessitated by the increasing distance between the spacecraft and Earth. The mission was redesigned to compensate for such factors while maximizing the science return. After 25 years of VIM and several significant science discoveries, both Voyager spacecraft are still functioning well and the Voyager flight team is preparing for an even longer mission - until the year 2025 and beyond. In order to work around the challenges and to continue the mission even further, the team has been implementing numerous changes, mainly through flight software modifications and hardware reconfiguration. The major drivers for the changes are two-fold: resource constraints (such as decreasing power output and difficulty in obtaining the necessary DSN coverage) and anomalies due to the aging hardware. The majority of changes occur through flight software modifications so the state of the on-board responses is appropriate for the changing space environment and mission phase, and the flight software is compatible in allowing the maximum data gathering. The on-board flight software routines such as baseline sequence, fault protection routines, the High Gain Antenna POINTing to Earth (HPOINT) table, and long-term events table need to be maintained through flight software updates. The changes also occur through hardware reconfiguration such as selecting the backup Hybrid Buffer Interface Circuits (HYBIC) or attitude propulsion thrusters. This paper will describe the challenges of VIM and what has been done to overcome or mitigate those challenges. The primary focus will be the major flight software changes made during VIM and the changes that are in store for the near future in preparation for continuing the extended mission, from the originally projected year of 2020 out to the year 2025 and possibly beyond.

Matsumoto, Sun Kang↗
NASA NTRS2018

Creating a Voyager Thermal Model 39 Years Into the Flight Mission, Along with Model Correlation and Application

After 39 years of continuous operation in space, the output of the Voyager 1 & 2 spacecraft RTG power systems has decreased to the point where managing the power margin and maintaining thermal control has become increasingly difficult. As the total power dissipation in the bus has decreased, propellant line temperatures and margin above minimum AFTs have decreased, creating risk of the hydrazine freezing (at 1.6°C). This is further complicated by the lack of existing thermal models that can be used to assess propellant tank and line temperatures. In 2014, an effort was begun to create a Voyager spacecraft thermal model for that purpose.A steady-state Thermal Desktop model has been created from scratch over the past two years. The initial thermal model development was started by Applied Sciences Laboratory (ASL) under contract to JPL. The effort relied primarily on archived manufacturing drawings, limited documentation, interviews of senior engineers who worked on the Voyager design and implementation, and the experience of the Voyager Flight Operations team.Data from the Voyager System Thermal Vacuum tests is no longer available, making it necessary to correlate the model to more recent flight data and small in-flight tests. Correlation was achieved to within ±5°C for a hot case and a cold case (both data sets from 2014). However, the flight system has very few temperature sensors directly on propellant lines. So the task remains to determine how best to use the model, in conjunction with flight data, to make sure the Voyagers can continue to fly successfully. How does one go about creating a thermal model for a spacecraft that is already launched, has limited existing mechanical description files, no thermal model in order to do a maneuver that was never planned when the spacecraft was designed?

Ledeboer, William C.↗
NASA NTRS2018

Creating a Voyager Thermal Model 39 Years Into the Flight Mission, Along With Model Correlation and Application

After 39 years of continuous operation in space, the output of the Voyager 1 & 2 spacecraft Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator (RTG) power systems has decreased to the point where managing the power margin and maintaining thermal control has become increasingly difficult. As the total power dissipation in the bus has decreased, propellant line temperatures and margin above minimum Allowable Flight Temperature (AFT) have decreased, creating risk of the hydrazine freezing (at 1.6°C). This is further complicated by the lack of existing thermal models that can be used to assess propellant tank and line temperatures. In 2014, an effort was begun to create a Voyager spacecraft thermal model for that purpose. A steady-state Thermal Desktop model has been created from scratch over the past two years. Applied Sciences Laboratory (ASL) started the initial thermal model development under contract to Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). The effort relied primarily on archived manufacturing drawings, limited documentation, interviews of senior engineers who worked on the Voyager design and implementation, and the experience of the Voyager Flight Operations team. Data from the Voyager System Thermal Vacuum (STV) tests is no longer available, making it necessary to correlate the model to more recent flight data and small in-flight tests. Correlation was achieved to within ±5°C for a hot case and a cold case (both data sets from 2014). However, the flight system has very few temperature sensors directly on propellant lines. Therefore, the task remains to determine how best to use the model, in conjunction with flight data, to make sure the Voyagers can continue to fly successfully.

Ledeboer, William C.↗
NASA NTRS2020

Voyager and its Team—A Journey to The Outer Planets and Beyond

The Voyager Program and the twin Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 spacecraft are leg-endary, and the mission they continue to fly achieved significant milestones in the history of solar system exploration. NASA launched the two spacecraft in separate months in the summer of 1977. Eventually, between them, Voyager 1 and 2 would explore all four giant outer planets of our solar system, 48 of their moons, and their unique systems of rings and magnetic fields. To achieve this great success, the Voyager team had to work through a series of anomalies, start-ing with safe mode entries shortly after launch and telecommunications issues in early operations. The Voyager team pioneered deep-space exploration as they learned to solve these and many other problems in the mission’s 40-plus years.

Wolf, Aron A.↗
DOE OSTI2024

Evolving Outer Heliosphere: Tracking Solar Wind Transients from 1 au to the VLISM with IBEX and Voyager 1

Abstract Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) observations of energetic neutral atom (ENA) fluxes from the heliosphere have greatly enriched our understanding of the interaction of the solar wind (SW) with the local interstellar medium (LISM). However, there has been recent controversy surrounding the inability of most ENA models to produce as high an intensity of ∼0.5–6 keV ENAs as IBEX observes at 1 au, especially as a function of time. In our previous study (E. J. Zirnstein et al.), we introduced a new model that utilizes a data-driven magnetohydrodynamic simulation of the SW–LISM interaction to propagate pickup ions through the heliosheath (HS) after they are nonadiabatically heated at the heliospheric termination shock. E. J. Zirnstein et al. only simulated and analyzed IBEX observations from the direction of Voyager 2. In this study, we expand our model to include fluxes from the direction of Voyager 1, as well as in the low-latitude part (middle) of the ribbon (10° below the ecliptic plane). We show that the model results at Voyager 1 are consistent with E. J. Zirnstein et al.’s results at Voyager 2 in terms of a secondary ENA source contribution of ≲20% from both directions. Our results in the middle of the ribbon also reproduce the data, when including a time-dependent secondary ENA source. Finally, we demonstrate with our simulation that three large pressure waves likely merged in the VLISM and were observed by Voyager 1 as “pf2,” while at least one of the wave’s effects in the HS was observed by IBEX as a brief enhancement in ENA flux in early 2016.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS1979

Voyager design and flight loads comparison

Estimates of flight loads for Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 are summarized. These member loads are obtained by using the measured flight accelerations at the launch vehicle/spacecraft interface as forcing functions for the Voyager mathematical model. The flight loads are compared to the Voyager design loads obtained from the shock spectra/impedance method and to the loads obtained using space vehicle transient loads analysis. Finally, based on these data, an assessment of the shock spectra/impedance loads method used for Voyager is presented.

Chen, J. C.↗
NASA NTRS1979

Infrared observations of the Jovian system from Voyager 2

As on Voyager 1, the infrared spectroscopy and radiometry instrument on Voyager 2 returned a large number of spectral and radiometric data on Jupiter and its satellites for varying conditions of latitude, longitude, local time, and phase and emission angles. The Voyager 2 average spectrum is slightly noisier than that from Voyager 1. The paper presents selected examples of results from the Voyager 2 infrared investigation, with particular reference to latitudinal variation of the abundance ratio of ethane to acetylene, atmospheric thermal structure, Jupiter's ring, and satellites.

Hanel, R.↗
NASA NTRS1981

Magnetic field measurements at Jupiter by Voyagers 1 and 2: Daily plots of 48 second averages

A series of 24 hour summary plots of the magnetic field, in 48-s average form, measured in the vicinity of Jupiter by the magnetometers onboard Voyagers 1 and 2 are presented. The Voyager 1 data cover the period from 27 February 1979 (day = 58) to 23 March (day = 82) inclusive, and the Voyager 2 data cover the period from 2 July 1979 (day = 183) to 14 August (day = 226) inclusive. Closest approach to the planet occurred on days 64 (AT 1205 UT) and 190 (AT 2230 UT) for Voyagers 1 and 2, respectively. Also included are: a description of the characteristics of the magnetometers, a brief description of the near-planet trajectories of the two spacecraft, a listing of the bow shock and magnetopause crossing times, and a bibliography containing Voyager-Jupiter related papers and reports.

Lepping, R. P.↗
NASA NTRS1982

Infrared observations of the Saturnian system from Voyager 2

During the passage of Voyager 2 through the Saturn system, infrared spectral and radiometric data were obtained for Saturn, Titan, Enceladus, Tethys, Iapetus, and the rings. Combined Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 observations of temperatures in the upper troposphere of Saturn indicate a seasonal asymmetry between the northern and southern hemispheres, with superposed small-scale meridional gradients. Comparison of high spatial resolution data from the two hemispheres poleward of 60 deg latitude suggests an approximate symmetry in the small-scale structure, consistent with the extension of a symmetric system of zonal jets into the polar regions. Longitudinal variations of 1 to 2 K are observed. Disk-averaged infrared spectra of Titan show little change over the 9-month interval between Voyager encounters. By combining Voyager 2 temperature measurements with ground-based geometric albedo determinations, phase integrals of 0.91 plus or minus 0.13 and 0.89 plus or minus 0.09 were derived for Tethys and Enceladus, respectively. The subsolar point temperature of dark material on Iapetus must exceed 110 K. Temperatures (and infrared optical depths) for the A and C rings and for the Cassini division are 69 plus or minus 1 K (0.40 plus or minus 0.05), 85 plus or minus 1 K (0.10 plus or minus 0.03), and 85 plus or minus 2 K (0.07 plus or minus 0.04), respectively.

Hanel, R.↗
NASA NTRS1983

The Voyager Mission - Encounters with Saturn

The trajectories of Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 through the Saturnian system were selected in such a way that the observations would be complementary. The Voyager 1 trajectory provided a close encounter with Titan, making possible atmospheric occultations, a search for an intrinsic Titanian magnetic field, and studies of the interaction of Titan with either the solar wind or the Saturnian magnetosphere. The trajectory was also designed to provide an optimum geometry for the transmission of S and X band radio waves from the spacecraft through the rings; in this way, the attenuation and scattering of 3.6- and 13-cm waves by the ring particles could be observed. Besides this, Voyager 1 provided radio and ultraviolet occultation studies of Saturn's atmosphere as well as close approaches to three of the moderate-sized icy satellites (Mimas, Dione, and Rhea) and to a number of minor satellites. The much later arrival of Voyager 2 and the Saturn flyby distance were chosen in such a way as to make possible a gravity-assisted continuation on to Uranus and Neptune.

Stone, E. C.↗
NASA NTRS1986

The Voyager encounter with Uranus and Neptune

Voyager 2 approaches Uranus at a relative low phase angle and high southerly latitude. Only when the spacecraft is very close to Uranus does the geometry change appreciably. Most of the important observations occur within six hours of closest approach. Voyager flies through an Earth and solar occulation zone and leaves Uranus at a relatively high phase angle of about 145 degrees. There isn't much of an opportunity to look at the equatorial region of the planet. At Neptune, on the other hand, the approach is more nearly equatorial (about 35 deg S lat). Voyager 2 will come much closer to Nepture than to any of the other gas giants as it skims within about 2000 km of Neptune's cloudtops. It will pass through earth and solar occultation zones at both Neptune and its satellite, Triton. Again, Voyager 2 will leave Neptune at about 35 deg S latitude. Voyager operational instrument, interplanetary trajectories and planetary encounters are briefly discussed.

Miner, Ellis D.↗
NASA NTRS1989

The Voyager 2 mission to Neptune

Voyager 2 and its twin, Voyager 1, were launched in 1977. Both spacecraft investigated Jupiter's and Saturn's systems. Voyager 2 continued on to fly past Utranus in 1986 and Neptune in 1989, while Voyager 1 headed out of the solar system. The mission at Neptune presented many engineering and scientific challenges. Neptune is about 30 Astronomical Units (AU) from the sun and earth, resulting in extremely low lights levels (nearly 1000 times lower than at earth) and in communication distances of nearly 4.5 billion kilometers. To compensate for the long communication distances, several new techniques were developed. As at Uranus, an onboard backup computer compressed the imaging data. In addition, the data return was further improved by electronically arraying and expanding several receiving antennas. As a result, the data rates from Neptune were about the same as they were from Saturn, even though the distance was three times greater. Several changes were made in the onboard software to optimize Voyager's operations at the very low light levels at Neptune. Finally, to obtain the maximum information from the Neptune encounter, a trajectory was selected which passed within just 5000 kilometers of Neptune's atmosphere, but which also posed several possible environmental hazards.

Haynes, Norman R.↗
NASA NTRS1991

The Voyager encounter with Neptune

The investigations carried out by the Voyager Neptune/Interstellar Mission are discussed. Attention is given to the location of the various science instruments and the spacecraft subsystems on the Voyager spacecraft and to the charactgeristics of eleven instruments used in the Voyager mission. The Voyager 1 and 2 trajectories from the launch through the Voyager-2 Neptune encounter are presented together with data for the Neptune encounter events.

Stone, E. C.↗
NASA NTRS1989

Voyager Encounter Highlights

The following are presented: computer animation of trajectories for both Voyagers 1 and 2; view of Jupiter during one orbit of Ganymede; computer animation of Voyager 2's encounter with Jupiter and its satellites; time lapse of the planet's rotation and its satellites; stroboscopic sequence of selected frames; cloud motion; Jupiter's Great Red Spot (4/25 - 5/24, 1979) through a violet filter; and the Great Red Spot through a blue filter by Voyager 1. The dynamics of Jupiter's clouds are shown - the whole planet is shown first, then two closer looks are repeated several times. Also included are pans of stills of Jupiter's satellites and a computer simulation tour of Saturn system from POV just behind Voyager, made of 116 images of Saturn through a green filter and of 516 images taken by Voyager 1 (9/12 - 9/14, 1980). Frames are enhanced to show the motion of features in Saturn's rings. Pans of stills of Saturn's satellites are shown. There is computer animation of the planet's system, rings, and Sigma Sagittari. Images on January 14, 1986 are through an orange filter. Uranus's satellites are shown as is computer animation of an August 1989 encounter.

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