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Class: Technology. Type: Communications. Nation: Japan. Agency: NASDA.

Japan's NASDA space agency sponsored the LDREX experimental antenna. Ariane V138's EPS upper stage carried an ASAP5 small payload attachment ring with a special camera system. LDREX was a 6-m diameter antenna which was to have deployed 40 minutes after launch, to test the deployment mechanism for the larger antenna to be used on the ETS-8 satellite. After the test the antenna was to have been jettisoned. However the experiment failed and no deployment or jettison took place.


LDREX Chronology
  • 2000 December 20 - LDREX - Launch Site: Kourou. Launch Complex: ELA3. Launch Vehicle: Ariane 5. Mass: 1,414 kg (3,117 lb). Perigee: 241 km (149 mi). Apogee: 30,257 km (18,800 mi). Inclination: 2.40 deg. Period: 527.50 min.
    Ariane V138's EPS upper stage carried an ASAP5 small payload attachment ring with a special camera system and the LDREX experimental antenna for Japan's NASDA space agency. LDREX (Large-scale Deployable Reflector EXperiment) was a 6-m diameter antenna which was to have deployed 40 minutes after launch, to test the deployment mechanism for the larger antenna to be used on the ETS-8 satellite. After the test the antenna was to have been jettisoned. However the experiment failed and no deployment or jettison took place.

  • 2006 October 13 - LDREX 2 - Launch Site: Kourou. Launch Complex: ELA3. Launch Vehicle: Ariane 5.
    LDREX-2 was attached to the upper stage. It deployed a 6.5-meter antenna design planned for the later ETS-8 satellite


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