The Northrop Grumman and NASA team started preparations for the milestone seven years ago, when engineers began the design and build of the flight hardware and tools needed to join the halves.
With the base composite structures for the SCE and OTIS, engineers used an interface transfer tool to physically match the connection interfaces, preparing them for this very moment. At roughly 3,600 kilograms, spanning 3.3 metres, OTIS had to align with six launch load interfaces.
This resulted in stringent alignment requirements to within 0.01 millimetres, about the width of a human hair, and meant engineers had to be meticulous. Over the two phase operation, OTIS was lifted and suspended in the air, then lowered to connect in tight quarters (up to approximately 5 millimetres) between in-place hardware and parts of the OTIS.
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Scott Willoughby, vice president and program manager, James Webb Space Telescope, Northrop Grumman, said, "This milestone marks a major achievement for all of us at Northrop Grumman and NASA."
Earlier this year, Webb’s SCE completed its final environmental tests in preparation for the milestone. To date, both halves have undergone environmental testing separately. The fully assembled observatory will complete the next steps of the integration process in the coming months in preparation for acoustic and vibration environmental testing next year.
The James Webb Space Telescope will be the world’s premier space science observatory when it launches in 2021. Webb will solve mysteries in our solar system, look beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probe the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency.
"Seeing the full observatory for the first time further reinforces our commitment to mission success. There is still more work to be done, but it is a great feeling seeing something that was once a concept, become reality," Willoughby added.
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