Astronaut Involvement
NASA created Hitchhikers to provide customers with a way to send small payloads into orbit on the space shuttle. This was done with a short turn-around-time--from manifest to flight took an average of 18 months. To keep the project on schedule, experiments needed to fit in canisters or on mounting plates and meet standard mechanical and electrical interfaces.
Because the payload met these conditions, it also was entitled to special "handling" in the orbiter that other small payloads, like the Get Away Specials did not receive. This special handling included tapping into the shuttle for power and "astronaut" services," such as requiring specific shuttle attitudes or maneuvers. The orbiter crew moved the shuttle when necessary to the position needed for the Hitchhiker experiment, provided it did not interfere with the needs of the primary payloads.
Hitchhikers were manifested to fly with primary payloads that either have similar requirements or that will not be affected by the changes in shuttle position necessary to the Hitchhiker experiments. In addition to making adjustments to the orbiter, the astronaut crew participated in the Hitchhiker experiments by controlling the flow of orbiter power on or off using two switches located on the Standard Switch Panel.
The first switch controlled power to the avionics unit. The second switch allowed power to flow from the avionics unit to the experiment. This simple measure allowed the astronauts to have some control over the experiment, in the event of a problem. For some payloads, the crew had a keyboard/display unit, for additional control.
Read more about this topic: Hitchhiker Program
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