Re: Paint the Moon

[Bernard Cleyet <anngeorg@PACBELL.NET>]

Right.  Didn't the successful application use a large telescope as a beam
expander in addition to one on the receiving end?  Also, I bet they used a
Q spoiled (pulsed) LASER and  a cooled MPT or CCD.

bc


Herbert H Gottlieb wrote:

> On Thu, 25 Oct 2001 09:06:43 -0400 Chuck Britton <britton@NCSSM.EDU>
> writes:
> > Excellent point. There may be more than one retroreflector that were
> > left by the Apollo people.
> >
> > Aiming at one of these is the best hope of seeing anything.
> > If you watch one with a telescope, you might actually SEE
> > something!!!
>
> Only those with vivid imaginations are likely to "see" anything
> even with the most powerful telescope in the world. The beam
> from a laser pointer is not collimated. If you shine your laser pointer
> on a wall 20 feet away the spot will be much smaller than the spot on
> a wall 40 feet away. by the time that the beam reaches the moon,
> 240,000 miles away, the spot would have spread out over thousands
> of miles and be even dimmer than the combined IQ's of the people trying
> such a stunt.
>
> Herb
>
> > At  5:54 AM -0500  on  10/25/01,  brian whatcott   wrote
> > > Watch for that faint glint from the retroreflector!
> > --
>   Education is what is
> > left when you have forgotten everything
> > North Carolina School of Science & Math         you learned in
> > school.
> > (919) 286-3366  x224      Albert Einstein,      1936