Ka-Band Payload for New Services

The ASTRA 1H satellite, built for Société Européenne des Satellites (SES) by Hughes Space and Communications Company (HSC), now Boeing Satellite Systems, Inc. (BSS), includes a Ka-band payload to provide interactive applications across Europe. This is in addition to the Ku-band frequencies that carry SES' broadcast services.

ASTRA 1H is a powerful Hughes 601HP body-stabilized model spacecraft, the seventh in a series for SES that Hughes has built in its facilities in El Segundo, Calif. The satellite is collocated with other SES spacecraft at 19.2 degrees East longitude. The satellites enable SES to provide analog and digital television and radio programs together. Because each spacecraft provides an effective isotropic radiated power (EIRP) typically 51 dBW, these satellites deliver video and audio signals strong enough to be received by 60-cm dishes.

All the SES satellites operate in Ku-band and use traveling-wave tube amplifiers (TWTAs) for power. On ASTRA 1H, it's 98.5 watts. ASTRA 1H offers a minimum of 28 active Ku-band transponders with 32 being available for the first five years. The two Ka-band transponders operate in the 18.3-18.8 GHz downlink band and use the 29.5-30 GHz uplink band. The Ka-band payload allows SES to launch services for point-to-point or point-to-multipoint interactive multimedia applications across Europe.

Stowed (left); In Orbit (right)

SES ordered its first Hughes 601 satellite, called ASTRA 1C, in late 1990. That was followed in late 1991 by an order for ASTRA 1D; in 1992 for ASTRA 1E; in 1993 for ASTRA 1F; in 1994 for ASTRA 1G; in 1995 for 1H; and in 1996 for 2A. ASTRA 1G was the first in the series with the HS 601HP (for high power) configuration, and ASTRA 1H and 2A are similar. ASTRA 2C, another 601, and ASTRA 2D, a Hughes 376 model, were ordered in 1999.

The ASTRA 601 model satellites are similar in appearance to other 601 models, with each having a cube-shaped body and two solar array wings oriented along its north-south axis and the antennas located on the east-west axis. All Hughes 601 spacecraft use the same basic bus design, allowing HSC to realize efficiencies gained by production volume, tooling investments and quantity buys. HSC introduced the 601 in 1987, and it has become the world's best-selling large satellite model, with more than 70 ordered. The "classic" Hughes 601 model, with silicon solar panels, provides up to 4-5 kilowatts total spacecraft power. The 601HP version uses gallium arsenide solar panels and other technological advances to provide as much as 10 kilowatts.

On the spacecraft, a flight-proven bipropellant propulsion system with an integral 490-Newton (110-lbf) Marquardt liquid apogee motor and 12 thrusters provides the impulse to achieve and maintain the orbit and attitude necessary for geosynchronous operation. ASTRA 1H also carries Hughes' xenon ion propulsion system (XIPS) for north-south stationkeeping.

SES, founded in 1985, is a privately owned satellite system operator. The ASTRA satellites are controlled from the SES ground station at Betzdorf in Luxembourg.

BSS is the world's leading manufacturer of commercial communications satellites, and payloads for national defense, science and environmental applications. The company was formed in October 2000 when Boeing acquired the Hughes Electronics satellite manufacturing companies, which included Hughes Space and Communications Company, Hughes Electron Dynamics, Spectrolab, Inc., and Hughes Electronics' share of the HRL research facilities in Malibu, California.

ASTRA 1H SPECIFICATIONS

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