Michael John Bartlett, RF Engineer
Carnarvon and Tidbinbilla
LOS 22 April 2024
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Mike Bartlett in the 1970s. Photo: Trish Kindley (Michael’s daughter) via Bruce Window. |
Bruce Window writes:
Mike was educated in Queensland at Church of England Grammar School and went on to do Engineering at Queensland University.
He arrived at Tidbinbilla as an RF Engineer in February 1971 when SpaceTrack P/L lost the O&M Contract to AWA Limited. He had previous AWA experience at the NASA Station, Carnarvon from 1967.
Mike was responsible for the RF Systems at DSS42 including the MSFN Wing (HSKX) RF systems and the Microwave Link to Honeysuckle. In addition, he was also responsible for the implementation of RF equipment into the emerging 64 meter antenna, DSS43, in conjunction with the Cognizant JPL design engineers.
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Tidbinbilla some time after DSS43’s Opening in 1973 |
He was responsible to AWA Chief Engineer, Ron Cuthbert, at Tidbinbilla.
When AWA lost the contract for Tidbinbilla in August 1974, Mike stayed with the company and transferred to Sydney.
Mike ended his working career as Chief Engineer back at BTQ9 Television, Brisbane.
As a personal note, I would like to add that I knew Mike before I joined SpaceTrack, Tidbinbilla, in 1965 because of the following circumstances:
In July 1964 while I was employed by Department of Supply, Weapons Research Establishment at MiniTrack, Island Lagoon, Woomera, I heard that JPL were building an 85 foot dish in the Canberra region. While travelling back to Brisbane on recreation leave, I called in to Canberra to see John Galbraith who was SpaceTrack CEO at Tidbinbilla about a position. He told me he couldn’t employ me because I worked for WRE and they wouldn’t release me to work for SpaceTrack. The answer was either stay at WRE or get another job for a while.
When I got to Brisbane I called into Channel 9 Television station and was offered a job as a Technician, which I took. I returned to Woomera and resigned from WRE and then took up employment at BTQ9 Television, Brisbane, working to Mike Bartlett, who was the RF Engineer.
Some 4 months later, I left Brisbane after I was successful in getting a job at Tidbinbilla as an RF Technician. You can imagine my surprise when Mike turned up at Tidbinbilla when AWA took over the contract in 1971.
When DSS43 was being built, Tidbinbilla Station Management put me into a job to coordinate the implementation of equipment and cabling arriving from JPL. In this role I had a lot of interaction with all of the Section Engineers at Tidbinbilla, including Mike Bartlett. To me, Mike was “the complete Professional” and a gentleman.
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A more recent photo of Mike. Photo: Trish Kindley via Bruce Window. |