NASA do it again, they have monkeys testing their scopes.

skyandtelescope.com/news/article_1463_1.asp

Seems like the Spitzer telescope has flawed optics !!!
Not as bad as the hubbles spherical abberation but noticable.

Ok, the title is a little harsh, but why not get it perfect.

skyandtelescope.com/news/article_1463_1.asp

Seems like the Spitzer telescope has flawed optics !!!
Not as bad as the hubbles spherical abberation but noticable.

Ok, the title is a little harsh, but why not get it perfect.

dave,
answer is $$$.
stephen.

Its not a good reflection on an organisation which has been hit with flaws in design for a few years. Mars Orbiter was sent blasted off with instructions for the journey in Metric I think, and landing at Mars in Imperial! Its probably been a factor why they have had budget cuts, OR, its because of the budget cuts that are the factors.

Seanie.

this telescope is within spec, Hubble was not even close
all the more galling when you know that the spare Hubble
mirror was perfect!


wormhole

My Cousin in US is aCollege buddy of the guy involved in the "Flawed Hubbble" mirror they made the mirror exactly to spec IE the spec was wrong It would have been easier to make one properly to put the flaw in it was very difficult ,They checked re spec and were told just do it!!
If you enlarged the Hubble mirror to the size of the circumference of the Earth the flattening at the edge equates to about 40 feet !!!
Again NASA is never wrong !
Eugene

My Cousin in US is aCollege buddy of the guy involved in the "Flawed Hubbble" mirror they made the mirror exactly to spec IE the spec was wrong It would have been easier to make one properly to put the flaw in it was very difficult ,They checked re spec and were told just do it!!
If you enlarged the Hubble mirror to the size of the circumference of the Earth the flattening at the edge equates to about 40 feet !!!
Again NASA is never wrong !
Eugene

there was either a horizon or an equinox program on a few years ago if i remember correctly about the making of the mirror. the idea when it was first touted in NASA was to make the perfect mirror. when they started to make it they used to work at night in this remote building so no traffic vibrations would interefere with them shaping the mirror. what happened was that at some point a small fleck of paint came off the fittings of the machine and fell down onto the mask the machine was using to shape the mirror to the corect shape. the machine not knowing any different added this to the mirror and no human picked it up. NASA ran out of funding before an optical test was carried out and it was stored. the project was further delayed by challanger. by the time the shuttle came back and the project was back online the mirror was already in hubble. when the defect was discovered after launch some of the people who had designed were a little upset as they had spent a a major part of their career on it, and due to funding cuts and bad luck it came out flawed.

it was a very interesting program as it showed the project goes back to the 60's and how they had gone through this whole design process, coming up with new ideas only to be defeated by circumstances beyond their control.
stephen.