, also known as Broadcasting Satellite or BS, was a series of Japanese

direct broadcast satellite Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location.ITU Radio Regulations, Section IV. Radio Stations and Systems ...

s. The first satellite of this series, called BSE or Yuri 1, was launched in 1978. The last BS series satellite, BS-3b (Yuri 3b), was launched in 1991.

Early models

The BSE was followed in 1984 and 1986 by the operational and essentially identical BS-2a and BS-2b satellites, respectively. Each spacecraft carried two active and one spare 100 W. 14/12 GHz

transponder In telecommunications, a transponder is a device that, upon receiving a signal, emits a different signal in response. The term is a blend of ''transmitter'' and ''responder''. In air navigation or radio frequency identification, a flight trans ...

. Built by

EURO The euro (currency symbol, symbol: euro sign, €; ISO 4217, currency code: EUR) is the official currency of 20 of the Member state of the European Union, member states of the European Union. This group of states is officially known as the ...

with assistance from ASR, the BS-2 series satellites were designed for five years of operation. BS-2a was moved to a

graveyard orbit A graveyard orbit, also called a junk orbit or disposal orbit, is an Orbit (physics), orbit that lies away from common operational orbits. One significant graveyard orbit is a supersynchronous orbit well beyond geosynchronous orbit. Some satellit ...

in 1989, as was BS-2b in 1992.

BS satellites

BS satellites were used for

Direct-To-Home Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location.ITU Radio Regulations, Section IV. Radio Stations and Systems ...

television services in Japan. Japanese

satellite television Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location.ITU Radio Regulations, Section IV. Radio Stations and Systems ...

, which uses an analog

format Format may refer to: Printing and visual media * Text formatting, the typesetting of text elements * Paper formats, or paper size standards * Newspaper format, the size of the paper page Computing * File format, particular way that informatio ...

, started with test broadcasts carried out by the semigovernmental

NHK , also known by its Romanization of Japanese, romanized initialism NHK, is a Japanese public broadcasting, public broadcaster. It is a statutory corporation funded by viewers' payments of a television licence, television license fee. NHK ope ...

(Japan Broadcasting Corporation) in 1984. At the time, direct satellite TV reception (DTH) was obtainable with a small parabolic antenna 40 cm to 60 cm in diameter in all areas of Japan when broadcast from a

geostationary A geostationary orbit, also referred to as a geosynchronous equatorial orbit''Geostationary orbit'' and ''Geosynchronous (equatorial) orbit'' are used somewhat interchangeably in sources. (GEO), is a circular geosynchronous orbit in altitud ...

earth orbit (GEO) at 110 degrees east longitude. All BS satellites were of the same basic configuration: 3-

axis An axis (: axes) may refer to: Mathematics *A specific line (often a directed line) that plays an important role in some contexts. In particular: ** Coordinate axis of a coordinate system *** ''x''-axis, ''y''-axis, ''z''-axis, common names ...

stabilization of a rectangular

satellite bus A satellite bus (or spacecraft bus) is the main body and structural component of a satellite or spacecraft, in which the payload and all scientific instruments are held. Bus-derived satellites are less customized than specially-produced satelli ...

with two elongated

solar arrays A photovoltaic system, also called a PV system or solar power system, is an electric power system designed to supply usable solar power by means of photovoltaics. It consists of an arrangement of several components, including solar panels to abs ...

. After the first successful test of satellite broadcasting with a TV signal, many Japanese producers of consumer electronics began to deliver a range of equipment with built-in

satellite A satellite or an artificial satellite is an object, typically a spacecraft, placed into orbit around a celestial body. They have a variety of uses, including communication relay, weather forecasting, navigation ( GPS), broadcasting, scient ...

receivers for the local consumer market. This included the

Satellaview The is a satellite modem peripheral produced by Nintendo for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, Super Famicom in 1995. Containing 1 megabyte of ROM space and an additional 512 kB of RAM, Satellaview allowed players to download games, maga ...

satellite modem A satellite modem or satmodem is a modem used to establish data transfers using a communications satellite as a relay. A satellite modem's main function is to transform an input bitstream to a radio signal and vice versa. There are some devices ...

peripheral for

Nintendo is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto. It develops, publishes, and releases both video games and video game consoles. The history of Nintendo began when craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi ...

Super Famicom The Super Nintendo Entertainment System, commonly shortened to Super Nintendo, Super NES or SNES, is a Fourth generation of video game consoles, 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan, 1991 in No ...

system, as well as

and

satellite radio Satellite radio is defined by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU)'s ITU Radio Regulations (RR) as a '' broadcasting-satellite service''. The satellite's signals are broadcast nationwide, across a much wider geographical area than te ...

services for the Japanese market. Eventually, the satellites of the BS series were replaced by the more advanced B-Sat series.

Satellites

References

External links

BS-Japan and Satellite Communication Services

Broadcasting Satellite 2

Broadcasting Satellite 3
{{Japanese space program Satellites of Japan Direct broadcast satellite services