<\/a>Llorothaag starts to be boxed in <\/div>
I hope she (Spider's cryostat) isn't claustrophobic.<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Boxed on two sides <\/div>
<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>All sides on, plus extra 2x4 bracing at the top <\/div>
Plus Simon, proud of his work.<\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>All boxed up <\/div>
In the increasingly empty Princeton highbay<\/div><\/div>![Sea container "A" before its "final" closing \u2022 <a style="font-size:0.8em;" href="http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/27717602@N03\/52123767101\/" target="_blank">View on Flickr<\/a>](https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/52123767101_1076c22a4c_m.jpg "Sea container \\"A\\" before its \\"final\\" closing")
<\/a>
<\/a>Sea container "A" before its "final" closing <\/div>
"Not quite final", but the last I have a photo of<\/div><\/div>![And ccontainer "B" \u2022 <a style="font-size:0.8em;" href="http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/27717602@N03\/52123797998\/" target="_blank">View on Flickr<\/a>](https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/52123797998_3eaffd6cf7_m.jpg "And ccontainer \\"B\\"")
<\/a>
<\/a>And ccontainer "B" <\/div>
<\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>The truck departs Princeton <\/div>
<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Back in Palestine <\/div>
Back at CSBF's science team highbays, basically our home away from home.<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Unpacking <\/div>
I arrived a day later. First-wavers Susan and Suren have already unpacked a lot<\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Full of boxes <\/div>
We won't be playing any badminton in the west highbay<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Lloro arrived intact <\/div>
<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>I spy on Sherry taking a selfie <\/div>
<\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>More fo Lloro <\/div>
Plus a better view of our good luck sacrificed unicorn head. And Corwin unpacking parts from the crate base.<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Tables set up for telescope insert work <\/div>
<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Bye bye bugs <\/div>
Suren cleans out the bug graveyard in the highbay's cable trough<\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>East highbay <\/div>
Also full of Spider boxes, as we sprawl over the whole building<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Cryostat plus love seat <\/div>
The love seat is excellent swag that came with our large Uline orders while packing<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Starting to uncrate inserts <\/div>
<\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Applying protective top cover <\/div>
Texas highbays have a lot of fauna<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Intact shipping brackets <\/div>
And Vy peeking inside the outer wrap. The new brackets (black plastic parts) to support the focal plane during shipping arrived safely<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Office area <\/div>
Set up in the back of the highbay<\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Four inserts out <\/div>
<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Lloro <\/div>
Lifted off the crate base<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Shackles <\/div>
Used to rig the ground-support cart to the lifting spreader bar<\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Break time <\/div>
Joseph and Sherry reset in front of the inserts<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Progress <\/div>
The highbay grows slightly more organized<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Lloro lifted <\/div>
To the normal position for ground operations. Also swapped the support bearings to the flight versions<\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Lloro in profile <\/div>
<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Lloro's crate is tarped in the "Tim shed" <\/div>
Where Tiny Tim once roamed<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Tim Shed <\/div>
<\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Group action shot <\/div>
<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Tagging the new IRTHM <\/div>
"Insert rotation thingamajig". One more needed to be made to be able to work on all 6 inserts at once<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Spider stencil <\/div>
<\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>Bemco <\/div>
Meanwhile Susan moves electronics over to the "Bemco" thermal-vacuum test chamber. To test things in simulated flight-like conditions.<\/div><\/div>
<\/a>
<\/a>
<\/a>
<\/a>![\"Progress\"](\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/52124267535_94be6db56e_n.jpg\")
Spider-2 finally has a chance to go to the field! After a short notice decision that we’d have a chance to fly this year, we jumped into action spending a frantic month packing. I include a few photos from this time in Princeton, mainly of our cryostat (named Llorothaag, or Lloro for short) going into her box. First we go to Palestine, TX, and the Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility. There we will reassemble and test Spider, and integrate with the NASA electronics. Lloro’s trick arrived on May 27, the first wave of people arrived on May 31, and I came with another wave the day after. Much of the time so far has been spent unpacking and organizing our work area, but we’re also starting on some work and assembly that will take a while: preparing Spider’s six telescope inserts to do science, and preparing to test all of the ambient temperare electronics in the Bemco. The Bemco is a big thermal\/vacuum test chamber used to simulate the environment of a balloon payload in the stratosphere. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[22,8],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/droppingballast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6577"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/droppingballast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/droppingballast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/droppingballast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/droppingballast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6577"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/droppingballast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6577\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6580,"href":"http:\/\/droppingballast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6577\/revisions\/6580"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/droppingballast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6577"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/droppingballast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6577"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/droppingballast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6577"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}