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We've now received our 1000th application for a Starshine 2 mirror polishing kit, so that's it! No more applications will be accepted for the Starshine 2 mission! The kit shipping production line is in full swing, finally, and we hope to finish mailing out the last of the 1000 kits by Saturday, November 11. Your polished mirrors must be in the mail back to the Aerospace Development Center in Jacksonville, AL by November 30, 2000. We apologize again for the huge delay in getting the kits to you, but you should still have time to get your mirror back by the deadline if you get right on it. It only takes a couple of class periods to do the grinding, polishing and final inspection. Good luck with it! The first 858 mirrors that are received by the deadline will be flown on Starshine 2 aboard Endeavor on its STS-108 mission to the International Space Station on or about October 4, 2001. Incidentally, we have just become aware of a problem with some of the Starshine 2 mirror blanks. Apparently, some schools have not been able to polish the outer portion of the face of the mirror to a shiny condition, because it was machined down to a slightly lower level than the central portion of the mirror. The solution to the problem is to go back to the first grinding step and perform it vigorously for an additional thirty minutes. Then proceed with the second grinding step and the two polishing steps, as before. Additional polishing pads were put into your kit, just in case something like this came along. If you have used up all your diamond paste trying to get your mirror flat, please send an email to me at gilmoore12@aol.com, and we'll mail extra paste to you.
Gil Moore
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