Lance Peters was at Tid, 1965/66 and 67/70 and Honeysuckle in 1970 in various areas to do with the receivers, transmitters and antennae.
Lance writes:
“I read a recent article where Tidbinbilla was chosen as the site for a tracking station as part of the DSN because of the low level outside noise and interference including that from aircraft.
Experiments were conducted where a DC 3 of the RAAF was used to try and fly through the main beam whilst tracking Mariner 4 to see if there was any impact on the received signal.
An S-band test transmitter was fitted to the aircraft with a very small yagi antenna. This was tracked with the acquisition antenna to try and get the aircraft through the main beam. A bulls-eye was painted on cardboard and fitted on the dish surface around the main feed. The navigator stood on his seat and called the pilot onto the target visually.
There were a few successful passes and it was decided that there wasn’t any impact on the signal. This went on for a couple of days. I flew in the aircraft to turn the S-band signal on and off.”