UKIRT Project
Please note that the MPIA UKIRT Project has been closed in 1996.
For historical reasons, we keep the webpages for this project as they were in 1996. For more information check out:
http://www.mpia-hd.mpg.de/IRCAM/MAX
and
http://www.jach.hawaii.edu/JACpublic/UKIRT
Introduction:
In a collaboration between the Royal Observatory Edinburgh (ROE) and the Max-Planck-Institut für Astronomie Heidelberg (MPIA) an upgrading of the United Kingdom Infrared Telescope (UKIRT) on Mauna Kea Hawaii is taking place since Oktober 1993. The contribution of the MPIA to this program is the supply of a complete Tip-Tilt secondary mirror system.
Its "Top-End" (see the above photo) consists of a piezo platform for the fast adaptive Tip-Tilt and focus motions, surrounded by a hexapod for the slow actice collimation and focus motions, altogether carried by a new front ring with inclined and viscoelastically damped vanes.
The secondary mirror is made of Zerodur, 65% lightweighted by ultrasonic erosion; it weighs 2.0 kg at 313,4 mm diameter.
At the "Bottom-End" a fast CCD-wavefrontsensor is mounted to a crosshead in the Cassegrain focus. The incoming wavefront is analyzed for inclination and curvature yielding the signals for the piezo platform in terms of tip/tilt and focus in a closed loop.
In return for the procurement of this active and adaptive secondary mirror system MPIA receives observing time at UKIRT.
The MPIA-UKIRT-Project includes a complete software package for easy operation of the entire system. All Graphical User Interfaces (GUI's) are either EPICS based Display Lists or TCL/TK based code. Check out what our GUI's look like and how to use and install the software.
A Postscript manual of the MPIA-UKIRT-Project electronics and the entire control system is available here. For a pdf version of the manual click here.
MPEG movie of a guide star with tip-tilt correction on and without tip-tilt correction.
The UKIRT team:
Eckhart Pitz (PI)
Andreas Glindemann (science)
Stefan Hippler (software)
Ralf-Rainer Rohloff (construction and mechanics)
Karl Wagner (electronics)
Heinrich Bellemann (construction and mechanics)
Günther Hille (general support)
e-mail address: lastname@mpia-hd.mpg.de
last updated on September 12, 2001 by Stefan Hippler
