More SPIDER 500A radio telescopes installed in Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences & Technology

PrimaLuceLab team installed more SPIDER 500A radio telescopes at the Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences & Technology! In April 2019 we installed the first 5 meter diameter radio telescope and now we added two more in preparation to use together as the first interferometry array composed of SPIDER radio telescopes!

More SPIDER 500A radio telescopes installed in Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences & Technology: from the left: Dario Gava (Radio2Space installation services manager), Issam S. Abujami (SCASS IT & System Specialist), Professor Ilias Fernini (SCASS Professor of Physics and Astronomy), Filippo Bradaschia (Radio2Space general manager) and Omar Cauz (head designer of Radio2Space).

The 2 more SPIDER 500A radio telescopes have been shipped in proper crates for a safety delivery to the academy and have been moved to the location previously prepared. The first step in the installation is the installation of the 2 giant C400-HEAVY piers that have been installed at a distance of 30 and 40 meters from the radio telescope previously prepared.

More SPIDER 500A radio telescopes installed in Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences & Technology: installing the C400-HEAVY pier on the concrete base

Then Radio2Space installation team prepared the 5 meter diameter antennas, with the specially design rear supports that avoid any flexure in the large structure in order always to have the maximum performances. The antenna comes pre-assembled from our factory and can be finished in around 3 hours.

More SPIDER 500A radio telescopes installed in Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences & Technology: assembly of the 5 meter diameter antenna

At the same time, the Installation Team lifted the Wp-400 mounts on the C400-HEAVY pier and perfectly fixed all the mechanical parts in order to insure the best rigidity of all the radio telescopes. In fact all the radio telescopes have to be operational also in the typical windy conditions of the nearby desert.

More SPIDER 500A radio telescopes installed in Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences & Technology: WP-400 mount preparation

Next the Radio2Space Installation Team checked the alignment of the 3 SPIDER 500A radio telescopes in order to allow them all to perfectly point the same area in the sky when the user request a particular object in the Universe to be pointed and tracked. This is a key point for the future use of the 3 radio telescopes as interferometer.

More SPIDER 500A radio telescopes installed in Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences & Technology: 3 SPIDER 500A installed

In the control room, we installed all the receivers and antenna control units in the racks (one for every SPIDER 500A radio telescope). All the radio telescopes are remotely controlled from the main building of the institutes by using the Networking Module for RadioUniversePRO.

More SPIDER 500A radio telescopes installed in Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences & Technology: H142-One radio astronomy receivers and RCPU-400 antenna control unit installed in the control room.

Every device in the rack is connected to a computer where we installed RadioUniversePRO software to control every SPIDER 500A radio telescope, collect and process data. We checked all the connections to the radio telescopes and we performed some acquisitions in order to test that all the systems were perfectly working.

More SPIDER 500A radio telescopes installed in Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences & Technology: in the control room, every radio telescope has a rack with receiver and antenna control unit, and it’s controlled by a computer with RadioUniversePRO software.

Now Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences & Technology has 3 SPIDER 500A radio telescopes connected to the central control room and ready to be used to explore the Universe in radio waves. And this system will be upgraded in the future with our next developments that will allow them to use as an interferometer!

More SPIDER 500A radio telescopes installed in Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences & Technology: 3 SPIDER 500A installed and ready