Launch from Cape Canaveral (KSC); landing on Edwards AFB.

The launch originally was scheduled for December 18, 1985, but had to be delayed for several times because of technical and weather problems.

The communications satellite Satcom-KU1 was successfully deployed. The flight also carried a large number of small experiments, including 13 GAS canisters devoted to investigations involving the effect of microgravity on materials processing, seed germination, chemical reactions, egg hatching, astronomy and atmospheric physics. Other cargo included a Materials Science Laboratory-2 structure for experiments involving liquid bubble suspension by sound waves, melting and resolidification of metallic samples and containerless melting and solidification of electrically conductive specimens.

Finally, an experiment called the Comet Halley Active Monitoring Program (CHAMP), consisting of a 35 mm camera to photograph Comet Halley through the aft flight deck overhead window, was not successful because of battery problems. Congressman William Nelson became the second poltician in space.

It was planned to shorten the mission for one day, to have more time for maintenance work between the Shuttle missions, but bad weather in Florida forced to extend the mission duration about two more days.