July "Astronomy" I was interested to read that although the experiments
were turned off in the 1970s for budgetary reasons (I understand they
were also simply not returning useful data), the transmitters are still
working and still being used. That's very impressive for 1960s

I seriously doubt that. the nuclear fuel depleted and the experiments were
turned ff to prevent interference. I think your info is wrong, and without
experiments what would the transmitters be sending?
HAVE A GREAT DAY!