HiRISE Focal Plane for use on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, David Dorn, William Meiers, Jon Burkepile, Ed Freymiller, & Alan Delamere, Alfred McEwen, and Peter Maggs, Peter Pool, Ian Wallace, Proceedings of the SPIE, Volume 5167, pp. 63-71 (2004)
This paper marked a fairly major change in my function at EEV - now renamed e2v. In 1997 a new MD had arrived; sometime later, I acquired a new boss. I had been Divisional Sales Manager for Power Tubes Division, reporting to a director. Now it was all change, but I was given a job that I really wanted. This was Business Manager for 'Superpower' devices, the very high power microwave tubes with specialized applications in science and industry. Superpower tubes were the engines of the great particle accelerators in use or planned in Europe, America and the Far East. The technology was fascinating, but since it was a), very costly, and b), mostly for research, government funding was required. Many of the projects either withered on the vine or were forever delayed. After a while, the decision was made (not by me) to terminate e2v’s interest in the work. I ended up managing the sales of a different set of products, some of which I had absolutely no knowledge or experience of. My relationship with my boss had been deteriorating; he was one of the ‘new brooms’. Naturally, everything that had been done before was inefficient or just plain wrong. It could not last; I did not match the profile required by the new management team.
I was demoted down two levels of seniority and sideways, and given the job of project manager, organizing the design and manufacture of CCDs (charge-coupled devices) for space applications. With hindsight, it was the best thing that had ever happened to me in the company. EEV had slowly built up the business over a number of years, and now had an impressive orderbook for custom CCDs designed for use in space imaging. It was a multi-disciplinary activity involving design, manufacture, assembly and test. Although the project managing function was really just glorified progress-chasing with a customer interface, it was a key activity because of the many and varied disciplines involved.
The Mars Reconnaisance Orbiter was a satellite due to be put into orbit around the red planet. One of the principal experiments on board was HiRISE, the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment. The business end of this was a telescope with a 50 cm diameter mirror, capable of imaging the surface of the planet in full colour with a resolution of around 30 cm. e2v won the contract to make the CCD imagers, and I managed the project. The satellite was launched in 2005 and entered Mars orbit in 2006. The pictures sent back of the Martian surface were (and are) spectacular, and to date (November 2021), HiRISE is still operational. It photographed the NASA surface probe Curiosity in parachute descent phase. As I recall, the camera had a design life of two-and-a-half years, so for it to be still functioning fifteen years later is a pretty good advertisement for Ball Aerospace and e2v.
The paper was written and published by personnel at Ball Aerospace, who designed and built the camera/telescope. Three e2v personnel, Peter Pool, who had overseen the CCD and carrier design, Ian Wallace, who was technical authority and I, project manager, were cited as co-authors.
This paper marked a fairly major change in my function at EEV - now renamed e2v. In 1997 a new MD had arrived; sometime later, I acquired a new boss. I had been Divisional Sales Manager for Power Tubes Division, reporting to a director. Now it was all change, but I was given a job that I really wanted. This was Business Manager for 'Superpower' devices, the very high power microwave tubes with specialized applications in science and industry. Superpower tubes were the engines of the great particle accelerators in use or planned in Europe, America and the Far East. The technology was fascinating, but since it was a), very costly, and b), mostly for research, government funding was required. Many of the projects either withered on the vine or were forever delayed. After a while, the decision was made (not by me) to terminate e2v’s interest in the work. I ended up managing the sales of a different set of products, some of which I had absolutely no knowledge or experience of. My relationship with my boss had been deteriorating; he was one of the ‘new brooms’. Naturally, everything that had been done before was inefficient or just plain wrong. It could not last; I did not match the profile required by the new management team.
I was demoted down two levels of seniority and sideways, and given the job of project manager, organizing the design and manufacture of CCDs (charge-coupled devices) for space applications. With hindsight, it was the best thing that had ever happened to me in the company. EEV had slowly built up the business over a number of years, and now had an impressive orderbook for custom CCDs designed for use in space imaging. It was a multi-disciplinary activity involving design, manufacture, assembly and test. Although the project managing function was really just glorified progress-chasing with a customer interface, it was a key activity because of the many and varied disciplines involved.
The Mars Reconnaisance Orbiter was a satellite due to be put into orbit around the red planet. One of the principal experiments on board was HiRISE, the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment. The business end of this was a telescope with a 50 cm diameter mirror, capable of imaging the surface of the planet in full colour with a resolution of around 30 cm. e2v won the contract to make the CCD imagers, and I managed the project. The satellite was launched in 2005 and entered Mars orbit in 2006. The pictures sent back of the Martian surface were (and are) spectacular, and to date (November 2021), HiRISE is still operational. It photographed the NASA surface probe Curiosity in parachute descent phase. As I recall, the camera had a design life of two-and-a-half years, so for it to be still functioning fifteen years later is a pretty good advertisement for Ball Aerospace and e2v.
The paper was written and published by personnel at Ball Aerospace, who designed and built the camera/telescope. Three e2v personnel, Peter Pool, who had overseen the CCD and carrier design, Ian Wallace, who was technical authority and I, project manager, were cited as co-authors.