The VST secondary mirror support system

Abstract

The VST telescope is equipped with an active optics system based on a wavefront sensor, a set of axial actuators to change the primary mirror shape and a secondary mirror positioner stage. The secondary mirror positioning capability allows the correction of defocus and coma optical aberrations, mainly caused by incorrect relative positions of the optics. The secondary mirror positioner is a 6-6 Stewart platform (also called "hexapod"). It is a parallel robot with a mobile platform moved by 6 linear actuators acting simultaneously. This paper describes the secondary mirror support system and the current status of the work.