James Webb space telescope

[Rolmill]

Documentary about the new space telescope coming up on BBC2 at 8pm:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00197px

...thanks for the tip off, absolutely fascinating - I'm not a great watcher of science documentaries but this was jaw dropping both in its depiction of the extraordinary engineering involved and in the astonishing results of all that effort.

[kernelbogey]

...this was jaw dropping both in its depiction of the extraordinary engineering involved and in the astonishing results of all that effort.

Strongly recommended.

[muzzer]

As the years go by, the harder I find it to have anything meaningful to say about time. It’s overwhelming conceptually, the more you think about it. Trite and of course, not. That docu looks great, will watch, thank you.

[kernelbogey]

Documentary about the new space telescope coming up on BBC2 at 8pm:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00197px

The JWST cost '£8 biliion' and took 40 years to make. Among the engineering problems solved was how to transport the telescope with a a 3-metre wide mirror and 6-metre wide sunshield in a rocket into space. The solution was to construct it so that it left the earth folded and could be remotely instructed to unfold: the account of finding these solutions was in itself fascinating.

[Nick Armstrong]

The JWST cost '£8 biliion' and took 40 years to make. Among the engineering problems solved was how to transport the telescope with a a 3-metre wide mirror and 6-metre wide sunshield in a rocket into space. The solution was to construct it so that it left the earth folded and could be remotely instructed to unfold: the account of finding these solutions was in itself fascinating.

Have only watched the start but my recollection is that the mirror itself is 6 metres wide (compared with a 2.4m mirror in Hubble). The design solution to the need for a mirror wider than the rocket transporting it was astonishing (inc the level of precision required).

[I could have done without the Sky at Night presenter whose only function in the programme seemed to be to tell us how amazing and fabulous it all was, like the worst of the modern Radio 3 presenters Seems to be BBC house style…]

[kernelbogey]

Have only watched the start but my recollection is that the mirror itself is 6 metres wide (compared with a 2.4m mirror in Hubble). The design solution to the need for a mirror wider than the rocket transporting it was astonishing (inc the level of precision required)

Thanks, Nick, I thought I might have got that dimension wrong. Therefore the sun shield is an order of magnitude larger. The technology of the shield's design is astonishing - it's made of a very strong element, and consists of five layers of material one-fifth the thickness of a human hair - folded concertina-style to fit in the rocket.