Boston, MA 05/21/2014 (wallstreetpr) – Ball Corporation (NYSE:BLL) announced yesterday that it has executed the last phase of thermal vacuum environmental tests on vital components for the “Defence Projects agency (DARPA) Membrane Optic Imager Real-Time Exploitation (MOIRE) telescope”.
Successfully Completes Environment Test
The environmental tests included testing of the primary mirror composite back structure along with the deployment hinges, the one developed by Ball Aerospace. The tests returned successful results as it stimulates the vacuum and temperature rang eof a space environment. Ball Corporation (NYSE:BLL)’s National Defense strategic business unit head, David Kaufman said that the results obtained from the environmental tests are very encouraging for its future implementation. He added that through enhancing technology readiness level and decreasing risk, it gets one step closer to facilitate continuing imaging from space, a technology that many communities are waiting to access.
Stable Platform A Requisite
The quality of image transmitted from space is highly dependent on a stable platform. While the composite back structure designed by ATK Space Components gives the required stability through its lightweight support, Ball Aerospace developed and built deployment hinges that would aid in unfolding of the telescope primary in space. Thus, running tests in a relevant environment helps to reduce the risk element and proves that the primary has the required stability characteristics.
Ball Corporation (NYSE:BLL)’s Aerospace & Technologies division aids national agencies in its critical missions. Some of these agencies include Department of Defense, NOAA, NASA, and several other U.S. government and commercial agencies. The company designs and builds spacecraft, components, advanced instruments and sensors, data exploitation systems as well as RF solutions for tactical, strategic and scientific functions.
Apart from this, the company had earned a NASA contract a day earlier, under which the company is entrusted with the task to build a “High-spectral-Resolution-Lidar” meant for Aerosols winds and clouds by using Optical Auto covariance Wind Lidar (HAWC-OAWL).
