The spacecraft was placed in a cislunar trajectory and injected into an elliptical near-equatorial lunar orbit on February 8 at 21:54 UT. The orbit was with an inclination of 20.9 degrees and a period of 3 hours 25 minutes. After four days (25 orbits) of tracking the orbit was changed to . The spacecraft acquired photographic data from February 15 to 23, 1967, and readout occurred through March 2, 1967. The film advance mechanism showed erratic behavior during this period resulting in a decision to begin readout of the frames earlier than planned. The frames were read out successfully until March 4 when the film advance motor burned out, leaving about 25% of the frames on the takeup reel, unable to be read. A total of 149 medium resolution and 477 high resolution frames were returned. The frames were of excellent quality with resolution down to . Included was a frame of the
Surveyor 1 landing site, permitting identification of the location of the spacecraft on the surface. The future landing site of
Apollo 14 including
Cone crater, was photographed by the orbiter. Accurate data were acquired from all other experiments throughout the mission. The spacecraft was used for tracking purposes until it struck the lunar surface on command at 14.3 degrees N latitude, 97.7 degrees W longitude (
selenographic coordinates) on October 9, 1967. Image:Apollo Project - Liftoff of Lunar Orbiter III.jpg|Launch of
Lunar Orbiter 3 from an
Atlas-Agena rocket on February 5, 1967 Image:Lunar Orbiter 3 - FRAME 3040-H2 - DPLA - ef9f3cec4c2a25df602c8e80cbf18ead.jpg|Unnamed rille southwest of
Manners crater in Mare Tranquillitatis, on February 16, 1967 () Image:Lunar Orbiter 3 - FRAME 3103-M - DPLA - f2e1ce1c997d7a3b64a53e416f201418.jpg|
Rima Schröter, on February 18, 1967 () Image:Lunar Orbiter 3 - FRAME 3110-H2 - DPLA - 330fa729d3faf46688eb64450c3f0c3c.jpg|View inside
Hipparchus crater on February 19, 1967 () Image:Surveyor 1 on lunar surface photographed by Lunar Orbiter III.tif|
Kepler crater on April 28, 1967 Image:Intricate young ejecta blanket in ancient Murchison Crater (LROC25).jpg|Oblique view of
Murchison crater ==See also==