ATM, Electronics, Coronagraph

This motor drive and electronics box is from a Flight Design Verification Unit (FDVU) engineering prototype for the white light coronagraph that was flown on Skylab. The Apollo Telescope Mount (ATM) was the major scientific instrument aboard Skylab which was put into Earth orbit in May 1973. The white light coronagraph comprised one of the principal instruments on ATM for studying the sun. It was designed to photographically monitor the brightness of the solar corona over a wavelength range extending from 3500 to 7000 Angstroms. It was transferred to NASM from the Marshall Space Flight Center in June 1986.