The Toronto Spider team made a trip to Princeton at the beginning of April to put the gondola back together. While Theo had been a-salt-ed by the ocean during its pointless trip to New Zealand (not to Antarctica…thanks, US congress) the gondola survived the trip just fine. Most of the rust accumulation seems to have been in our heads, as there were more hiccups that usual getting everything together successfully.
We were very lucky to arrive during the very brief magical time while the Princeton highbay transitions from freezing cold to hot and humid.
For this trip, I was armed (photographically) with just my Nikon FM, a 50mm lens, and a roll of Superia 400.
First day's progress
Spend mostly organizing/unpacking, we assembled the gondola cart and base
Heat gun Anne
A staple of cryogenic operations
Reaction wheel adjustment
With Jamil and Ivan
Tightening bolts
So many bolts
Team Toronto
Various levels of enthusiasm
The land of finally-assembled-gondolas and empty boxes
(And stacked shipping contianers, accessible by ladder)
Theo
With shiny/caution curtain
Ritually sacrificed paper unicorn
From Ed's birthday
Ivan takes a break
Jon's so cool
I certainly can't pull off a sideways "Spanky" hat
Ziggy and his chin-strap-equipped hard hat
The whole team gathers for lifting Theo onto the gondola
Commander Ed
Surveys the situation
Lift hardware
My one attempt at useful documentation
Cyro/vacuum plumbing
The gloved SFT pump tube stays on until the last possible minute
Theo lifted
And peanut gallery
Hanging from spreader bar
Approaching the gondola
Ladder Anne
Preparing to reattach the SFT pump
Together at last
These are great! Thanks for scanning 🙂