HEAO-1

High Energy Astronomy Observatory-1

High Energy Astronomy Observatory-1 (HEAO-1)

Spacecraft

The HEAO-1 spacecraft was developed by TRW, Inc. of Redondo Beach, CA and was roughly cylindrical, about 6 meters long and 2 meters in diameter. It had a mass of 2700 kilograms, and its attitude was controlled by hydrazine jets to provide a constant spin rate of 3 revolutions per orbit, or about 31 minutes.

High Energy Astronomy Observatory HEAO-1The spin axis direction was held within 1/2o of the solar direction by stepping the spin direction by 1/2o twice a day. In this manner the scanning instruments would complete a full scan of the entire sky every six months. During the 1.5 years of the mission, the instruments completed almost three complete sky scans. The spin would be stopped to make a long term pointed observation of a given object infrequently at first and more numerously later in the mission.

The solar panels provided 460 Watts of 28 volt power, and the instruments produced digital data at the rate of 6.4 kilobits/second that was recorded on tape recorders. This data was dumped to the ground stations around the world that were part of the NASA ground segment.

High Energy Astronomy Observatory HEAO-1 High Energy Astronomy Observatory HEAO-1 High Energy Astronomy Observatory HEAO-1High Energy Astronomy Observatory HEAO-1
High Energy Astronomy Observatory HEAO-1 High Energy Astronomy Observatory HEAO-1 High Energy Astronomy Observatory HEAO-1 High Energy Astronomy Observatory HEAO-1

HEAO-1 Information

Mission Objectives
Spacecraft
Hard X-ray and Low Energy Gamma-Ray Expt. (A-4)
Results
Publications