Jul 20 1988
From The Space Library
NASA announced it would test-throughout the month-a new deep-space communications system with its Voyager 2 spacecraft, in preparation for the Voyager 2 fly-by of Neptune in August 1989. As part of the new system, NASA added the 27 telescopes from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory's (NRAO) Very Large Array (VLA) facility to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Deep Space Network (DSN). This action more than doubled DSN's ability to capture the Voyager signal, which became extremely faint as it approached the vicinity of Neptune. Under an agreement between NASA and the National Science Foundation, NRAO sponsors, engineers installed new receivers and microwave horns, tuned to the Voyager X-Band radio frequency, on all the 82-foot dish antennas at the VLA. Special signal-processing and communication equipment was added so that the VLA would be linked by satellite to the DSN's Deep Space Communication's Complex at Goldstone, California. (NASA Release 88-102)
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