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From: ivy@aicchi.UUCP (Iverson)
Newsgroups: net.astro
Subject: Re: How good is the telescope aboard Voyager ?
Message-ID: <671@aicchi.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 31-Jan-86 22:39:35 EST
Article-I.D.: aicchi.671
Posted: Fri Jan 31 22:39:35 1986
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Distribution: net.astro,net.astro.expert
Organization: Analysts International Corp; Chicago Branch
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> 
>    Does anyone know how good the telescope aboard Voyager is ?
> 
>    Voyager 2 is now ~20 AU from the earth and, if I recall the
> trajectory correctly, Voyager 1 is even farther away.  The imaging
> hardware aboard the Voyagers is, undoubtedly, of excellent quality;
> could it be used to take pictures of the stars ?

This was covered in Astronomy magazine about three years ago. The response
from a NASA representative (well, so the signature claimed) was that while
stars could be imaged by the Voyager telescopes, and had been for calibration
and navigation, the resolution of the imaging device limited the system.
Because of the size of a pixel (not an ideal point!) Voyager would have to
reach many times greater than the distance to Pluto (and still be in radio
contact) before parallax resolution could compete with Earth-orbit baselines
used by ground-based, high resolution telescopes.