CONTOUR Status Report 4 Mar 2002

Last week, preparations for the thermal vacuum testing continued. On
Thursday, the spacecraft was moved from a clean room tent to the large
thermal vacuum (TV) chamber at GSFC. The large TV chamber at GSFC
has its opening on a railing that allows the top portion to be moved for
spacecraft entry. Spacecraft are lifted
via crane into the chamber. Our picture of the week shows the
CONTOUR spacecraft in mid-air in the GSFC high bay area on its way
to the TV chamber. (The chamber is not visible in the picture.) In the
lower right hand side of the picture, the top portion of the thermal
shroud can be seen. This shroud is used to select the thermal conditions
for the various tests within the chamber. The individual panels can be
heated or cooled to simulate conditions expected during the mission. This
shroud will go into the chamber over the spacecraft. (The other large
item seen in the picture is a full size mock-up of the Hubble Space
Telescope in the cargo bay of the space shuttle. This is the large vertical
cylinder in the background of the picture. In the lower middle portion of
the picture, a smaller clean room tent is seen with its plastic curtains.)