Here is a summary of our last telecon as well as an update about the optics from Brian Ramsey.
-] Ishikawa-san will be visiting SSL/Berkeley next week starting on Monday for the week. An ASIC and interface board will be delivered to SSL and design and testing will begin.
-] A meeting between the Berkeley FOXSI team and Takahashi-san and Tajima-san is organized for the afternoon of Sept 15th at Stanford in order to further discuss detector work.
-] A summary of the FOXSI MIC meeting at Wallops was presented. We’ve found that the FOXSI payload is a fairly simple payload compared to most and there should be little to no problems accommodating our needs. A pdf of the FOXSI MIC presentation is online.
Some concern about the optics versus launch vibrations was expressed by the Wallops team. Testing of the optics is therefore advisable. Vibration loads specifications will be sent to us by the Wallops team. It was also found out that the weight of the optics may not be an issue due to the dynamics of the rocket. It may be best to maintain their current weight though reducing the weight is certainly necessary for a future space-based mission so this problem should not be forgotten.
The Wallops rocket team will now work with us to prepare a rocket plan which will be presented through telecon in about 45 days (around Sept. 29th).
-] We’ve created a google calendar to keep track of the FOXSI schedule. Here is an html link to access it in a browser. To import it into your favorite calendar program use the following links, ICAL or OTHER.
The next FOXSI telecon will take place in about a month. We will send out an email to schedule it.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
An update on the optics from Brian Ramsey:
We are waiting for completion of the mandrel blanks. They are coming back here from a local machine shop for a special stress-relieving heat treatment then go back for a final cut. After that we send them out to another shop in central Alabama for an electroless nickel coating, then back here for diamond turning. All the fixturing for the diamond turning machine is being made at the same time. We had a design review on this fixturing a week ago and the models show us that we shouldn’t have a sag problem which could lead to vibrations in the turned part. We’ve also done some more tests on the machine to check that the head and tail stock are perfectly aligned (we don’t normally turn long, thin parts —- the HERO ones were all ground as they only had straight cone figures — so we had to configure a tail stock specifically for the FOXSI parts). So,this all looks good. Our prescription modeling is nearly finished. Ron has been constructing a global optimization for all 7 shells. He said he will have the data for us next week.
