Talk:James Webb Space Telescope

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[edit] Spectrum

I'd heard that the JWST had a different spectrum from the HST and, thus, was meant to augment rather than supplant the HST. Is this true? blahpers 04:18, 2005 Jan 22 (UTC)

This is true; JWST will be primarily an infrared observatory, whereas HST was mostly optical. AdamW 20:45, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I agree with your dissagrement of
"intended to be a significant improvement on the aging Hubble Space Telescope"
It's like sayig This apple is redder than that orage is orange. Should we tag a citatin needed to the line and remove it if none is found? I remeber somewhere it said specifically it is not a replacement. I need a sorce for that thoug.--E-Bod 22:12, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
Ps I am verry persanally attached to the HST so it would be inapropreat for me to make that change. The JWT isn't even even disined to be esily servisable and not be an ongoing thing (i remeber a long time ago it will be for 4 years, but this artile says 5(probably more current))(of corse same for all the other projects they allways love to underestimate their equipent so they can't be dissaponted and they proclam How Wonderul a sucsess when the misson last way longer than "expected" --E-Bod 22:12, 26 March 2006 (UTC))
How can it be designed to be easily servicable when it is 1.5m km from Earth. Give me a break. Because you love HST doesn't mean you have to bag on JWST. How completely odd.

[edit] Deorbit date

Is it correct to talk about a "deorbit date" for a mission at L2? Something out there isn't going to come back to the Earth when it's finished with... AdamW 20:45, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Not really. Generally the objects at L2 simply drift away from the Earth after stationkeeping activities cease, perhaps to crash into it some time in the very distant future. A more pertinent time is the nominal mission life (5 years) and the goal (10 years). Also, the launch date has been changed to 2013 due to budgetary limitations. I am a novice and reluctant to edit such a nice summary for the mission. PeterStockman 19:19, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

In 'Current Status,' it says "Recently NASA has decided to slip the launch date two years to 2013." Can someone throw a date there instead of "recently?" Maybe link to a press release? Shaggorama 10:25, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Deorbit date wrong

The deorbit date has to be wrong, Hubble will last for at least 20 years yet this will last 5? If this is true then the project should be scrapped for being a waste of time and money.

That five years is more an artifact of the procurement process than an actual plan. Essentially they say "specify what observations you want your proposed instrument to make, design a platform that will achieve that, cost it, and the funding and science comittees will decide if that's good science-value-for-money". So when they say JWST will last five years they really mean that the observations they plan to do in those five years will justify the price of the telescope, and that the engineers are sure (to a reasonable degree of certainty) that the systems they've designed will last long enough to succeed in that goal. In practice things are overspecified, overdesigned, and overbuilt, and so many things last much longer. Nobody expected Voyager to be working after its planned encounters (certainly not a decade later), the Mars rovers were planned to work for a month or two and still work more than a year later, and Hubble was planned for a few years (I think seven). So it's likely that we'll see good science from JWST long after its official death-date. That said, its high altitude means it's way out of the reach of the Space Shuttle (and who knows what, or when, Crew Exploration Vehicle will actually be able to do); there's no chance of an in-flight upgrade - so it almost certainly will have a shorter life than Hubble. That's not such a bad deal, even if it is only five years. Once you amortise the cost of shuttle missions to maintain HST, or face the progressively poorer science you'd get from an aging, deteriorating obervatory, it's probably cheaper and smarter to launch a new, cutting-edge telescope when the old one fails. And just like other modern electronics products, if you don't have to make something repairable you can make it much much cheaper. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 01:21, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

The website of JWST refers to a "design" mission length of 5 years and a "goal" mission length of 10 years. I've replaced "deorbit date" with those two numbers. Of course the actual mission length is not known ahead of time. Kingdon 16:49, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Hubble wasn't supposed to last 16 years when they launched it. The Mars Rovers were supposed to last only 3 months (they're still working, more than 2 years later. The same observation can be made about the Galileo probe. What we should understand is that any probe or satellite has a primary mission, which lasts a finite amount of time. If everything goes fine, the mission is extended indefinitely... for as long as the piece of hardware keeps going (and going and going). Limitations can come from batteries or propeller tanks, from the inability to service it (due to the distance), or from degradation suffered from the space medium (cold, radiations, micro-meteorites). Best regards, Hugo Dufort 06:13, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Failed Wikipedia:Version 0.5 nomination

I have failed this article for Wikipedia:Version 0.5 for several reasons:

  1. It has very few refs, and none are inline. Articles should have as many references as possible to verify the information.
  2. It isn't very comprehensive. This may be because it's far into the future, so this wasn't really the deciding factor.
  3. It's not very notable. It may be the most important astronomical telescope when launched, but that's at least 7 years away, and most people haven't heard of it now.

With improvements, this may be good enough for Wikipedia:Version 1.0 in the future, but it is not at written encyclopaedia quality yet. I would rate it a strong start class. --Rory096 05:35, 15 June 2006 (UTC)