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TopHat
in the Anechoic chamber. The walls are made from
a microwave absorbing material (eccosorb) to minimize
the effect of stray reflections. The TopHat telescope
is mounted in view of a large parabolic mirror which
feeds TopHat parallel rays of light.
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Three
members of the TopHat union doing the job that a
computer could easily do.
Grant
Wilson, Tom Crawford, and Steve Meyer repositioning
TopHat after making the secondary mirror adjustments.
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Tom
Crawford backseat driving.
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A
nearly bore-sight view of TopHat.
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Grant
Wilson aligns TopHat's secondary mirror. The secondary
is suspended above the primary mirror by thin Kevlar
threads. Wilson is >smiling despite the need to
keep 1 mm tolerances in the secondary position ...
a sure sign that he knows what he's doing.
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Dale
Fixsen checking the tension in one of the Kevlar
strings which support the secondary mirror. Behind
Dale is the large parabolic primary mirror.
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The
TopHat telescope shortly before beammapping begins.
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Members
of the TopHat team carefully navigate the "cones
of pain and agony" to be able to work on TopHat.
This view is from the edge of the chamber's primary
mirror. To the left of Crawford is the prime focus
of the chamber mirror where we have placed a 4K
microwave detector. TopHat, meanwhile, is running
in "broadcast" mode with a 1000 K blackbody source
at its focus.
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