Late last week the IQ Team bade farewell to their clean room captor/patient...
Then this morning it was wheeled out into the loading bay.
It was securely rigged up with the necessary slings & counterweights.
Then slowly lifted up on the dome crane.
& steered up through the hatch into the telescope enclosure...
The Terrestrial Receiver stayed behind, wondering what all the fuss had been about.
The SAC hung menacingly for a while before continuing its journey trackerward.
Darragh looked on pensively from the catwalk!
Up top it was met by Charl, Eben, Ockert & Jonathan who secured the installation ring, holding the SAC to the carriage, on the platform.
Next the SAC was tilted to 37 degrees, the yoke of the carriage installed & the whole assembly Very slowly & carefully raised until the SAC entered the hole in the NRS.
Great care + much tweaking & nudging was needed to negotiate the minimal clearaces involved to prevent the collars getting wedged against each other.
Once the steel collar was lined up with the aluminium collar, the bearing assemblies could be installed.
Some adjustments had to be made the the NRS as well to get the whole lot squared up.
With the SAC in position, there isn't much room left on the installation platform for taking photographs, but you get the idea :)
A long, hard & hugely successful day - Fantastic job everybody! Let's hope there's much more champagne consumption to be done once we go on-sky...
Bending that, "no drinking on the plateau," rule again I see? Well done to everybody involved!!! I'm looking forward to the next few posts :-)
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