ESA Science & Technology - Mounting and alignment of IXO mirror segments

Publication date: 31 July 2010

Authors: Chan, K-W., et al.

Journal: Proc. SPIE
Volume: 7732
Year: 2010

Copyright: SPIE

A suspension-mounting scheme is developed for the IXO (International X-ray Observatory) mirror segments in which the figure of the mirror segment is preserved in each stage of mounting. The mirror, first fixed on a thermally compatible strongback, is subsequently transported, aligned and transferred onto its mirror housing. In this paper, we shall outline the requirement, approaches, and recent progress of the suspension mount processes.

This paper was presented at the SPIE conference on Astronomical Instrumentation 2010 conference.