Pioneer 5 color picture Options

[Paolo]

Hi all
I have recently found this nice color image of Pioneer 5, which shows some mysterious blue cylinders on the solar panels, that I have never seen in any other picture. Any idea of what they may be?

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[edstrick]

I'm inclined to agree. The first spacecraft to get REALLY good interplanetary field data were the Interplanetary Pioneers (6-9) and Mariner 10. Previous missions like Mariners 2, 4 and 5 had headaches separating spacecraft magnetic fields from the weak solar field. Building a "Magnetically Clean" spacecraft is a pain, and is expensive. Mariner 10 cheated. They installed two magnetometers, one halfway out the magnetometer boom, the other at the end of the boom. Comparing the two sets of readings reduced the spacecraft field interference to a small fraction of the solar wind's field.