AzElGadget Integration

AzElGadget

Spider strikes back

… after the Palestine campaign with BLASTpol, Spider integration begins in Toronto.

Wall of Hope-Doom

Or, if you prefer, the Wall of Not Doom (WoND, pronounced “wand”). Whatever you call it, it’s everyone’s favourite absurdly large sun shield extension—and it was mostly assembled today. The gravity of the occasion called for such background music as Carmina Burana and Ride of The Valkyries.

More Cryostat

In this post, a few more photos of the cryostat setup, and the mega rack of monitors that Penn uses.

BLAST Cryostat Arrives, and Gets Undressed

Last week the BLAST cryostat arrived to begin the first full(-ish) integration of BLASTpol. Upon arrival it was undressed and bore its tender bits, to have travel legs replaced with thermally isolating ones. Also the HWPR (pronounced “hooper”, despite what Natalie may say about whatever the “whipper” is) had to be removed and sent immediately […]

Balance Pump

Juan has taken on fixing and programming the inner frame balance pump. Presumably he took these pictures.

PIC Preparation

While I was in Philadelphia (a couple months ago now…I’m still posting old pictures), everyone back in Toronto was working really hard to get the gondola pointing, the star camera mounted, and sun shield completely assembled. All this in preparation for the PIC (which can be thought of as “the pick”), at which NASA decides […]

Lock Pin

I downloaded a bunch of pictures today, and there are a startling amount taken of the lock pin. So I figured I’d post at least some of them, and combine it with a few I took long ago while repairing it.

Spider Reaction Wheel

In November, Juan and I assemled the Spider reaction wheel. Now, three months later, I realize I haven’t posted the pictures. In the past three months, the motor assembly has had a bearing added at the bottom to prevent binding.

While many of us will travel through the arms of the reaction wheel, so far […]