Coating Plant Progress

Telescope & Site team members Tomislav Vucina and Doug Neil travelled to Germany recently to review progress on the Coating Plant, which will be used to aluminize both LSST’s Primary/Tertiary Mirror (M1M3) and its Secondary Mirror (M2). At the MAN factory in Deggendorf, the LSST Team verified that major components of the Coating Chamber Assembly are already in place. The team then traveled to the Von Ardenne facilities in Dresden, where they inspected the Washing Boom and other components of the already-assembled Washing Station. The 9-meter Coating Chamber is still scheduled to be shipped to Chile in May 2018, and to be ready for initial coating of the M1M3 and M2 mirrors in September 2018. This photo shows a side view of the Coating Chamber, showing the vacuum pumps that will be located on the side of the chamber. From right to left, the electrical panels that will control the vacuum system and the coating chamber movements, the roughing pumps, sealing system pumps, helium compressors, main glycol manifold, turbo pumps and heat-exchange unit.