John. Initial defense satellite communications system...The first real communications system that the US military had. YOu can look on the web and get more information...but there is an amateur radio connection. The theory of the satellite constellation was that the satellites were dispersed about every 20 or so degrees in a "almost 24 hour" orbit which meant that they drifted across the sky, but slowly. This allowed multiple users by folks using different satellites and if one failed another was available.
They were TRW satellites and the TRW amateur radio club got permission to launch a ham sat (Oscar IV) with one "batch" of satellites. Had IV got into the correct orbit it too would have "drifted" across the sky a few degrees every day. All the satellites were launched on a Titan III (a IIIC if memory serves) which had what was called "the transtage" which did the final orbit insertion and then deployed the satellites...in the case of IV the transtage failed and IV and a bunch of IDSCS's birds (and another test satellite) were left in an orbit that was highly elliptical and short lived.
IV kind of looked like the IDSCS.
Its great satellite history...the IDSCS satellites had a 7 year kill timer ( a chemical timer) but at least 6 of the kill timers had not worked.
Robert G. Oler WB5MZO 5Nsomething and ARRL/AMSAT NARS member
Date: Tue, 22 Feb 2011 22:58:42 +0000 From: g7hia@btinternet.com To: amsat-bb@amsat.org Subject: [amsat-bb] Satellite OPS9328 Launched 1967?
Just been looking at the tracking site http://www.n2yo.com/satellites Some great stuff on this site and thanks for posting the URL to the bb.
At the bottom of the amateur radio satellite page there is a listing for OPS9328 (IDSCS 15)
Were they ham satellites, I don't recal reading about them. Is this just a simple mistake in the listing?
73 john g7hia. _______________________________________________ Sent via AMSAT-BB@amsat.org. Opinions expressed are those of the author. Not an AMSAT-NA member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program! Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb