Pioneers Ancestor - the Advanced Planetary Probe Options

[gndonald]

I occasionally look through the NTRS and today I've found the ancestor of Pioneer 10 & 11, the Advanced Planetary probe. Yet again I get a look at what might have been, a concerted evolutionary program starting in 1972 that would have led to the dropping of a re-entry capsule into the Jovian atmosphere sometime in the 1980's.

That is, of course if the first probe survived the Jovian radiation belts and I'm not sure if the planned probe would have done so.

See:

1. Advanced planetary probe study. Volume 1 - Study approach Final technical report(5mb)

2. Advanced planetary probe study. Volume 2 - Spin-stabilized spacecraft for the basic mission Final technical report(35mb)

3. Advanced planetary probe study. Volume 3 - Alternate spacecraft and missions Final technical report(14.7mb)

4. Advanced planetary probe study. Volume 4 - Appendixes Final technical report(7mb)

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