TAUVEX Pictures

The Engineering Model (EM) of TAUVEX in one of the clean rooms of El-Op. The optical module (OM) is mounted on a (black) supporting stand. Visible are the beryllium bezel on which the three telescope assemblies are mounted. The telescope assemblies are shielded from direct Solar radiation by a very thin shield (see Fig. 2), visible on the right side of the image. On the left, protuding from the bezel, the three detector enclosures are visible. The mass of the OU is 18 kg and it requires up to 20W, mostly for active thermal control.

The EM seen from the sky side. Only one optical assembly is mounted in the center location. The weight-relieving machining of the bezel is visible in the left telescope, where the primary mirror is not mounted. The internal design of the shield includes many internal baffles which reduce scattered light and prevent Sunlight from reaching the focal plane with the Sun in the forward positioin.

The Electronic Unit (EU) of TAUVEX contains 14 printed circuit cards which are visible with the EU open. The different elements in the EU are analog front ends for the three telescopes, a doubly-redundant digital signal processor, a doubly-redundant central processor unit, power conditioning units, image buffer solid-state storage, two doubly- redundant disk storage units, and six high voltage power supplies. The mass of the EU is 14 kg and it requires up to 25W to operate (and up to 20W for active temperature control).

During qualification tests of SODART, the construction will be vibrated and shocked before being integrated with the whole SRG spacecraft. As preparation for this, at the Lavotchkin industries the TM of TAUVEX has been installed in its location on the sky side of SODART. Dr. Elhanan Almoznino fro Tel Aviv University and Mr. Rafy Hershkowitz from El-Op supervised this installation. The TAUVEX TM is covered by its protective cover (manufactured by the Babakin Space Research Center).

The SODART structure, with TAUVEX integrated alongside the two SODART X-ray telescopes, are supported by a special device to allow testing of the deployment mechanism in a quasi-gravitationless situation. The device is the U-like grey structure on the right and center parts of the image.

The SODART structure is half-open from the launch (folded) configuration to the open (operational) configuration. The image and the humans around the structure give an impression of the size of SODART and of SRG.

The TAUVEX TM and the two SODART telescopes with covers closed, at the Lavotchkin industries. The protective cover of TAUVEX is equipped with a pressure-relief valve (round dark device in the center of the ribbed structure). TAUVEX itself is covered by thermal blankets. These consist of ten layers of very thin aluminized mylar, some which are electrically conducting and are grounded. The outer thermal blanked has a pure gold coating.

The TAUVEX TM during its thermal tests at iABG (an ESA testing facility near Munchen, Germany). The TM is installed in a thermal vacuum chamber, where it is illuminated by a Solar simulator. It is possible to simulate fully different aspects of Solar illumination and the status of "eclipse", which is very rare but potentially dangerous for TAUVEX. The simulations demonstrated the compliance the the thermal design, and showed that TAUVEX will operate properly in the different environmental conditions within the operating envelope of SRG.

Mr. Zvi Rot (El-Op) during the integration of the special sealing gasket of the TAUVEX TM. The gasket seals the internal part of the OU from external contaminants and provides a flexible interface between the very fragile shield (see fig. 2) and the protective cover.