Tidbinbilla

Tidbinbilla, ACT, Australia

Tidbinbilla Deep Space Communication Complex

While the first DSN 26 metre network (Goldstone, Woomera and Johannesburg) was adequate for the Ranger and early Mariner missions, planned missions (e.g. Surveyor, Lunar Orbiter and futher Mariner spacecraft) meant that a second network would also be needed.

The Echo site at Goldstone was already operational. Political concerns meant that Spain, rather than South Africa, would be the site of the station 120° east of Goldstone. Problems in attracting staff to remote Woomera led to a site closer to a capital city for the Australian station in the new network.

In August 1962, a NASA site survey selected a radio-quiet valley 10 air miles from Canberra, in the sheep and cattle grazing lands of the Tidbinbilla Valley. In March 1963, NASA and the Australian government agreed to lease 150 acres to accommodate a 26 meter antenna and other tracking equipment.

This October 1965 WRE map shows the locations of the three NASA tracking sites in the Australian Capital Territory.

It was produced for WRE by Richard (Dick) Collins, who participated in the site survey for Honeysuckle Creek, and early work on planning the station.

Orroral Valley is marked as DAF – i.e. Data Acquisition Facility.

Also marked are 41 Jardine Street, Kingston, which was a Department of Supply Office, and Endeavour House, on the corner of Canberra Avenue and Captain Cook Crescent, Manuka (the main Dept of Supply office).

Red text added to this small preview. Large, Larger.

With thanks to Dick Collins. Scan by his daughter, Jo Allen.

Bob Leslie, the inaugural Station Director of Tidbinbilla writes:

An area of 364 acres was withdrawn from the lease of Mr N. Reid’s Oakey Creek Station (now Mr Harding’s Mulumba Station) for the site and the access road to the Tidbinbilla Road was made through the Congwarra Station of Mr W. Flint. An area of about 29 acres was fenced as the inner site of the tracking station and the remainder was returned to Mr Reid for agistment.

A contract for maintenance and operations services at the station was let to Space Track Pty Ltd in early 1963. This company was a consortium of de Haviland, Elliots and Amalgamated Electronic Industries (AET), formed for the purpose of the contract. Stan Joiner of de Haviland managed the contract for the consortium and John Gaibraith was the company’s senior representative for carrying out the task under the contract.

The design of the facilities for the station was undertaken by the ACT Regional Office of the Commonwealth Department of Works. Bob Irvine was the project engineer and George Dunlop was the architect. Basil Monckton and Lance Sharpe of WRE and Mel Glenn of JPL, worked with the Department of Works on the specification and acceptance phases of the construction. The contract for construction of the buildings, the power house and other facilities was let to A.V. Jennings on 1 July 1963. The attractive buildings, basically as we know them today, were completed within one year.

The driving force for the hurried establishment of the Tidbinbilla Station was the need for additional support for NASA’s rapidly expanding deep space programme. In particular NASA needed support from our longitude for the first probe to Mars; Mariner 4, in late 1964, while still supporting the Ranger lunar exploration project from the Island Lagoon Station at Woomera.

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By November 1963, the power building was completed and the operations building was under construction. Jan Delgado took these first three photos in December 1963.

In December 1963, Jan Delgado and her parents travelled on holiday from DSS-41 at Island Lagoon to Canberra. Not surprisingly, they took time to visit the site of DSS-42 under construction. This is the road in.

Large, Larger. Photo: Jan Delgado.

December 1963, Tidbinbilla is under construction, as seen from the access road.

Large, Larger. Photo: Jan Delgado.

December 1963, Tidbinbilla Operations Building under construction.

Photo taken from just past the location of the current visitors’ centre.

Large, Larger. Photo: Jan Delgado.

Bob Leslie became the WRE Station Director, Tidbinbilla, in May 1963. He writes:

The first task was to work with John Gaibraith of Space Track on plans to staff the station, for equipment installation and for the first operations. At the request of JPL, a team of engineers and technicians from the station spent the first half of 1964 at NASA’s Goldstone Deep Space Station in California,, becoming familiar with the techniques involved in the Deep Space Network and in assisting to assemble and test the electronic equipment destined for Tidbinbilla. Subsequently, the same group carried out the main work of installing and commissioning the equipment at Tidbinbilla in good time to take over support for Mariner 4 from Island Lagoon in late 1964. This cooperative exercise resulted in excellent working relationships between the US and Australian engineers and so became the model for most of the development that followed in the deep space programme in Australia and elsewhere.

Tidbinbilla Deep Space Communication Complex was opened by the Australian Prime Minister, Sir Robert Menzies, on 19th March 1965.

Photo: NASA/DSN.

Australian Minister for Supply, Mr (later Sir) Allen Fairhall (left); Australian Prime Minister, Sir Robert Menzies (centre) with Station Director Bob Leslie (right).
19th March 1965.

Photo preserved by Clive Jones, passed on by John Heath, scanned by Mike Dinn.

The brand new DSS-42 antenna at Tidbinbilla, 1965.

This was a 25.9 m diameter parabaloid antenna on a polar mount, driven in hour-angle and declination, as for astronomical telescopes.

The antenna was erected by the US Blaw Knox Company on foundations by Australian builder A.V. Jennings.

Photo provided by Les Whaley, scanned by Mike Dinn.

Tidbinbilla Deep Space Communication Complex
Photo taken in 1965.

Provided by Les Whaley, scanned by Mike Dinn.
Click for a larger version. Large 3.9MB version.

Aerial view of the DSS-42 antenna and the Tidbinbilla operations building, circa 1964.

Provided by John Heath. Large. Larger (3.3MB).

Tidbinbilla Deep Space Communication Complex

Photo taken in 1965.
Provided by Les Whaley, scanned by Mike Dinn.

1966

At the main gate of Deep Space Instrumentation Facility No. 42
(also known as Tidbinbilla Deep Space Communication Complex)