What material was the heat shield made of?
The forward heat shield of the deceleration module was made of carbon phenolic while the aft heat shield was made of phenolic nylon. Although these materials have been used extensively for Earth re-entry vehicles, on the Probe they were subjected to conditions never before experienced in flight due to the high entry velocity caused by Jupiter’s massive gravitational pull. The heat shield dissipated heat principally by absorbing the energy through an ablation process and allowing the heat to be carried away by the gases coming off the surface. During the high speed high temperature entry phase, mechanical erosion of the forward heat shield reduced its mass from about 152 kg to about 65 kg. The radio signal from the Probe ended 61.4 minutes into the entry when the high atmospheric temperatures caused the radio transmitter to fail.
