TELTRAC, A Telemetry Tracking Acquisition Aid System

Abstract

TELTRAC, A Telemetry Tracking Acquisition Aid System, was manufactured by Canoga Electronics Corporation for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to augment and update the Project Mercury systems for Project Gemini. In addition, many of the components of the TELTRAC System have been supplied to retrofit and upgrade the original Project Mercury systems. The features of the TELTRAC System that are new in comparison to previously existing Telemetry Trackers are the TELAR II Antenna and the Model 3403 Receiver, which employs both cross-correlation and phase-lock techniques. The TELTRAC System design criteria and a system error analysis, with particular emphasis on multipath errors, are discussed in this article. The detailed design of the TELTRAC System, as well as its subsystems, is also presented.