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Mars Antenna Gets Legs

Nov. 3, 2010
Workers at NASA's Deep Space Network's Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex put into place a set of support legs to help hold up a portion of the giant 'Mars antenna' on May 4, 2010.

Workers at the Deep Space Network's Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex put into place a set of support legs to help hold up a portion of the giant "Mars antenna" on May 4, 2010. Three sets of support legs bore about 3 million kilograms (7 million pounds). They had to lift a portion of the antenna -- which included the reflector dish, instruments, counterweights and pads -- about 5 millimeters (0.2 inches) to replace the hydrostatic bearing assembly. The hydrostatic bearing assembly enables the dish to rotate horizontally.

From March to October 2010, the Deep Space Network performed a major refurbishment of the Mars antenna. The 70-meter-wide (230-foot-wide) Mars antenna got its nickname comes its first task: tracking the Mariner 4 spacecraft after its historic flyby of Mars in 1966. The antenna's official name is Deep Space Station 14.

JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Deep Space Network for NASA Headquarters, Washington. More information about the Deep Space Network is online at http://deepspace.jpl.nasa.gov/dsn/index.html.

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