2.7.2 Salyut 6 Notable Features
- Most notable single feature was aft docking port that permitted dockings by Visiting Expeditions and resupply by Progress freighters. Aft port equipped with the Igla approach system. Docking collar contained ports for transfer of propellants and pressurant from a docked Progress to Salyut 6’s tanks. The aft port was connected to the large-diameter work compartment through a small intermediate compartment.
- Large-diameter compartment longer than the one on the firstgeneration Salyut 1 and Salyut 4 stations (6 m vs 4.1 m). Omission of the Soyuz-based propulsion module used on the first-generation stations meant total station length did not change.
- As with the earlier Salyuts, Salyut 6’s large-diameter work compartment was dominated by a conical housing for scientific equipment.
For Salyut 6 it contained astronomical equipment, including the BST-1M multispectral telescope
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- and the Yelena gamma-ray telescope.
- Had three sets of large solar arrays–one set on either side of the hull, and one on top. The arrays were equipped with motors and sun-sensors for automatic Sun tracking. Communications antennas were located on the ends of the solar arrays. Radio signals from the antennas and electricity generated by the arrays passed through “rotating connections” at the bases of the arrays to enter Salyut 6. Salyut 4 also had steerable arrays, though their functional details may have differed from those on Salyut 6. There was no fourth array opposite the array on top because it would have interfered with the instruments projecting from the conical scientific instrument compartment, which opened to space on that side (the bottom) of the station.[1]
- Guidance and control systems concentrated in the Orientation and Motion Control System of the Station (Russian acronym SOUD). It included gyroscopes, ion sensors, solar sensors, star
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- sensors, a sextant, manual controls, the Kaskad orientation system, and “the radio rendezvous equipment which jointly with the radio equipment of the transport ship provides for measuring the relative parameters of motion.” Rendezvous and docking was the SOUD’s most complicated operating mode. The system had several layers of redundancy.[2]
- Attitude control and main propulsion systems were brought together in Salyut 6 to form the Integrated Propulsion System (Russian acronym ODU). Both attitude control and main propulsion engines drew on the same supply of N2O4 and UDMH propellants. The two main engines each had 300 kg of thrust. The 32 attitude control engines each had 14 kg of thrust.[3]
- To permit changeout and addition of scientific gear, extra electrical outlets for new scientific equipment were provided within Salyut 6’s pressurized compartments.
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