A Φ 3.5m diameter Sic telescope for Herschel mission

Since ten years ASTRIUM has developed sintered Silicon Carbide (SiC) technology for space applications. Its unique thermo-mechanical properties, associated with its polishing capability, make SiC an ideal material for building ultra-stable lightweight space based telescopes or mirrors. SiC is a cost effective alternative to Beryllium and the ultra-lighweighted ULE. In Complememt to the material manufacturing process, ASTRIUM has developed several assembly techniques (bolting, brazing, bonding) for manufacturing large and complex SiC assemblies. This technology is now perfectly mature and mastered. SiC is baselined for most of the telescopes that are developed by ASTRIUM. SiC has been identified as the most suitable material for manufacturing very large crygenic telescopes. In this paper we present the development of Φ 3.5 m telescope for Herschel Mission. Herschel main goal is to study how the first stars and galaxies were formed and evolved. The Herschel Space telescope, using silicon carbide technology will be the largest space imagery telescope ever launched. The Herschel telescope will weight 300 kg rather than the 1.5 tons required with standard technology. The Herschel telescope is to be delivered in 2005 for a launch planned for 2007.