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Tiny and Extremely Fast
Only 7.6 mm in diameter, the turbine rotor spins up to
400,000 rpm. The 3.6 mm diameter hollow shaft has a rare
earth permanent magnet inside.
The heart of the NCS, the NICMOS Cryo-Cooler (NCC)
was built to circulate cold Neon gas through the
NICMOS cryostat. As mentioned before, it uses experimental
micro-turbines rather than traditional pistons to
compress gas. The turbines turn up to 400,000 rpm
(about 100 times the operating speed of a typical
car engine).
This
innovative technology was selected for NCS
because of its low vibration levels that would
minimize the impact to Hubble's precise pointing
capabilities.
With the NCC, more stable and optimal temperatures
could be achieved than with a block of nitrogen
ice (which was actually colder than ideal).
The NCC was built by the contractor Creare
in New Hampshire.