As part of the procurement for the Mosaic Cameras, SITe has delivered a superb Grade 0 2K × 4K CCD for use with Hydra. The CCD will be integrated into a 400mm focal length Schmidt camera using a custom dewar with the CCD on a cold finger. The combination should become available sometime during semester 1999B. The new CCD has read noise almost three times lower than the present Loral 3K.
The new camera is expected to be somewhat more efficient, have longer focal length and significantly better image quality than the present Air Schmidt/Loral combination. With the Loral/Air Schmidt, only alternating fibers can be used because of image overlap. Using the new camera and SITe CCD, the images of the fibers will be separated and all of either the large or small fibers can be used simultaneously.
Alistair Walker (awalker@noao.edu),
Tom Ingerson (tingerson@noao.edu)