[X] My Assistant

[cIclops]

Thanks for the image ObsessedWithWorlds, it's good to see proof that the camera works

Deep Impact have the image on their site now with a caption that i'll paste here to save clicking.

"Four days after launch from Cape Canaveral on January 12, 2005, the Deep Impact spacecraft pointed at the Moon to test its telescopes, cameras and spectrometer. This image was taken on January 16, 2005, with the Medium Resolution Imager (MRI). It was a 9.5 sec exposure. The spacecraft was more than 1.65 million kilometers (1.02 million miles) from the Moon, and a little more than 1.27 million kilometers (789,000 miles) from Earth. The spacecraft is scheduled to impact comet Tempel 1 on July 4, 2005."

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/deepimpa...mpact-moon.html

[cIclops]

Only 100 days to impact and still no update from the Deep Impact team, hopefully no news means good news.

Here is another site to browse while waiting for the encounter to begin: spacetoday

[Guest_Sunspot_*]

Only 100 days to impact and still no update from the Deep Impact team, hopefully no news means good news.

Here is another site to browse while waiting for the encounter to begin:  spacetoday

I got an email from the Deep Impact website:

DEEP NEWS
Newsletter for the Deep Impact mission
Issue #20, March 2005


The Deep Impact twin spacecraft is entering its third month in space. The project team is hard at work implementing their carefully planned mission. The spacecraft launched on January 12th from Cape Canaveral and is on its way to its July 4th impact with Tempel 1. What's been happening with Deep Impact? Read below to find out. If you aren't familiar with the Deep Impact mission, take a look at:
http://deepimpact.jpl.nasa.gov
http://deepimpact.umd.edu

Image of Moon/Jupiter:

http://deepimpact.umd.edu/gallery/commissioning.html

[cIclops]

From Deep Impact Mission Status 03.25.05

the good news:

"NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft has completed the commissioning phase of the mission and has moved into the cruise phase."

the not so good news:

"At completion of the bake-out procedure, test images were taken through the High Resolution Instrument. These images indicate the telescope has not reached perfect focus."

[dot.dk]

"At completion of the bake-out procedure, test images were taken through the High Resolution Instrument. These images indicate the telescope has not reached perfect focus."

Oh dear, Hubble disease again

Hope it's not too bad...

[DEChengst]

"At completion of the bake-out procedure, test images were taken through the High Resolution Instrument. These images indicate the telescope has not reached perfect focus."

Oh dear, Hubble disease again

Hope it's not too bad...

[DEChengst]

Oh dear, Hubble disease again 

Hope it's not too bad...

It's not uncommon for things like this to happen. Cassini had a similar problem that got solved by extra bakeout cycles. So we'll just have to wait and see what happens.

[Roby72]

The image of Jupiter taken with the HRI looked unsharp - I think it must be sometimes sharper and is described as "not reached focus" at the Deep Impact homepage.

Robert

[tedstryk]

http://aviationnow.ecnext.com/free-scripts...rticle=04045p04

Here is the latest. Looks bad.

[Marcel]

http://aviationnow.ecnext.com/free-scripts...rticle=04045p04

Here is the latest.  Looks bad.

You can say that !

I can't find out if they're planning more backing out cycles or not. Seems to me they're telling us however, that it doesn't have to do so much with the moist itself (in blurring the image), but with it's influence on the focal length (and dimensions of the scope-tube).

I don't like to say these kind of things, but it doesn't make sense to me that they "forgot" to implement an extra (secondairy) focussing device in the imager. I just don't get it. It is SO important to have a crisp view of what's happening in these seconds, that they should have put more effort in making sure it can be callibrated in more than 1 way !

[gpurcell]

http://aviationnow.ecnext.com/free-scripts...rticle=04045p04

Here is the latest.  Looks bad.

There goes the extended mission....

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

I'm looking into this matter myself -- I suspect that, given the cost problems with recent Discovery missions (including this one), they simply could not afford such a secondary focusing system. After all, they haven't had one on other cameras on planetary spacecraft, and were presumably gambling that it would not be necessary this time -- although this is by far the most powerful optical system ever put on a planetary spacecraft. As for how much ground-based deconvolution can compensate for the problem: I'm hearing conflicting accounts.

But at any rate this may be a further consequence of the crisis that the Discovery Program has now encountered, and which forced them to completely cancel their last mission selection -- namely, that the current cost cap for scientifically worthwhile Discovery missions has simply become too low and must be raised, at the expense of flying the missions less frequently than was previously the case. As was pointed out recently, given the cost rise in launch vehicles and the less general inflation rate, the Messenger mission -- which was initialy accepted beneath a $300 million cost cap -- would take $430 million to fly today. And the current cap is only $350 million, so obviously something has to give. The new Discovery mission selection round -- which will be initiated this month -- will have a raised cap.

We are now running out of Solar System missions that can be so cheap and yet make significant new scientific discoveries at this point. By insisting on flying one new Discovery mission per year, we have been flying them at a faster rate than the rate at which new technical innovations can cut their cost back down. And one conclusion of NASA's new Solar System Strategic Roadmap Committee is that, in another decade, the same thing will start happening to the the medium-cost New Frontiers missions as well.

[cIclops]

edit: oops nothing to read here now, i see sunspot has already posted this story elsewhere.

[Guest_Sunspot_*]

http://www.planetary.org/news/2005/deep_im...mpel1_0427.html

Deep Impact's First Glimpse of Its Destiny

Two months away from its rendezvous with a comet, Deep Impact has caught its first glimpse of its target. Comet Tempel 1 was 63.9 million kilometers (39.7 million miles) away from the spacecraft when it captured the snapshot at right.

[cIclops]

Nasa Mission News

now just 68 days to impact