UKSBS PR17118 MOONS Cryostat Optical Bench

Tender description

CLOSING TIME FOR BIDS IS 28th November 2017 14:00 HOURS BST. Scope of requirement: Manufacture and construction of an Optical Bench. DO NOT APPLY DIRECTLY TO THE BUYER. To express your interest in this opportunity email expressionOfInterest@crowncommercial.gov.uk. To register on our e-sourcing portal click on https://gpsesourcing.cabinetoffice.gov.uk and follow the link "Supplier eSourcing registration". Note: Please disregard any content in this notice that requests your organisation "to apply directly to the buyer" as this is unfortunately a system generated error, that is outside of the Contracting Authorities control. MOONS (Multi-Objects Optical and Near-infrared Spectrograph) is a new concept for an astronomical spectrograph for the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (VLT). It has been selected by the European Southern Observatory (ESO) in response to a call for proposals for the development of 3rd generation instrumentation. The Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), through its UK Astronomy Technology Centre (UKATC), require a Cryostat Optical Bench to be manufactured and constructed as part of the MOONS project. The MOONS Spectrograph design consists of two identical cryogenic spectrographs. Each spectrograph incorporates three cameras fed by fibre optics. The optical elements of each Spectrograph will be mounted on an Optical Bench inside a vacuum vessel, cooled to cryogenic temperatures (about 120K). The Scope of this requirement is for the Optical Bench. The Optical Bench must be fabricated in Aluminium due to the operational weight constraint of the instrument. The Optical Bench must be capable of operating with no trapped volume. The Optical Bench will be machined flat after fabrication and will require multiple machining operations after fabrication. The contract will be awarded based on the criteria set out on the sourcing documents. For the full technical specification, please see the following documents: 'PR17118 MOONs Cryostat Optical Bench Drawing number VLT-DWG-MON-14620-00-330-050-B' and supporting lower level drawings which are provided as attachments within the e-sourcing platform https://gpsesourcing.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/sso/jsp/login.jsp