James Webb is fully deployed

#1

Post by Sami_Lehtinen » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 6:19 PM UTC

Re: James Webb is fully deployed

#2

Post by microjim » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 5:59 PM UTC

Great news! I’m happy about this. Just curious - had this mission critically fail, how likely would we be to simply try again? Who needs to approve the cost for that? Would it be politically important to succeed currently?

Re: James Webb is fully deployed

#3

Post by irrational » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 6:07 PM UTC

> Next up for Webb? Five months of alignment and calibration before we start getting images

I thought the L2 insertion burn was the next thing. Has that already happened?

Re: James Webb is fully deployed

#4

Post by ttul » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 6:29 PM UTC

microjim wrote: post #2

Great news! I’m happy about this. Just curious - had this mission critically fail, how likely would we be to simply try again? Who needs to approve the cost for that? Would it be politically important to succeed currently?

I don’t think there was a way to fix it remotely. It would just do minor science missions with whichever instruments actually worked.

Re: James Webb is fully deployed

#5

Post by kurthr » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 6:32 PM UTC

irrational wrote: post #3

> Next up for Webb? Five months of alignment and calibration before we start getting images I thought the L2 insertion burn was the next thing. Has that already happened?

From the Where_Is_Webb site, insertion doesn't happen for another 2 weeks. Like coasting up a hill half the time to L2 has elapsed but 75% of the way there (50% of the way in the first few days!).

The next thing looks like aligning the mirror segments. See the status bellow. I think there were already two relatively early correction burns.

https://jwst.nasa.gov/content/webbLaunch/whereIsWebb.html?un...

Re: James Webb is fully deployed

#6

Post by rwmj » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 6:34 PM UTC

The picture is a visualisation, but does the telescope have a camera pointing at itself?

Re: James Webb is fully deployed

#7

Post by Laremere » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 6:35 PM UTC

irrational wrote: post #3

> Next up for Webb? Five months of alignment and calibration before we start getting images I thought the L2 insertion burn was the next thing. Has that already happened?

It has not happened yet. See: https://jwst.nasa.gov/content/webbLaunch/whereIsWebb.html

However, the alignment and calibration starts soon, before the l2 insertion burn. It will just continue for months afterwords, too.

Re: James Webb is fully deployed

#8

Post by asplake » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 6:37 PM UTC

rwmj wrote: post #6

The picture is a visualisation, but does the telescope have a camera pointing at itself?

No. https://www.space.com/amp/james-webb-space-telescope-no-came...

Re: James Webb is fully deployed

#9

Post by coldcode » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 6:47 PM UTC

I wonder when it can start observing.

Re: James Webb is fully deployed

#10

Post by elefanten » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 6:48 PM UTC

For those not up on the project, what are some of the earliest novel types of information we expect to receive from it?