the Hindenburg, and the Edsel).[52] Nonetheless, during the first three years of the Hubble mission, before the optical corrections, the telescope still carried out a large number of productive observations. The error was well characterized and stable, enabling astronomers to optimize the results obtained using sophisticated image processing techniques such as deconvolution.[53][edit] Origin of the problemAn extract from a WF/PC image shows the light from a star spread over a wide area instead of being concentrated on a few pixels.The correctly ground backup mirror built by Eastman Kodak for the Hubble space telescope (the mirror was never coated with a reflective surface, hence its inner support structure can be seen). It now resides in the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC.[54]A commission headed by Lew Allen, director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, was established to determine how the error could have arisen. The Allen Commission found that the main null corrector, a device used to measure the exact shape of the mirror, had been incorrectly assembledone lens was wrongly spaced by 1.3 mm.[55] During the polishing of the mirror, Perkin-Elmer had analyzed its surface with two other null correctors, both of which correctly indicated that the mirror was suffering from spherical aberration. The company ignored these test results, as it believed that the two null correctors were less accurate than the primary device that was reporting that the mirror was perfectly figured.[56]The commission blamed the failings primarily on Perkin-Elmer. Relations between NASA and the optics company had been severely strained during the telescope construction, due to frequent schedule slippage and cost overruns. NASA found that Perkin-Elmer did not review or supervise the mirror construction adequately, did not assign its best optical scientists to the project (as it had for the prototype), and in particular did not involve the optical designers in the construction and verification of the mirror. While the commission heavily criticized Perkin-Elmer for these managerial failings, NASA was also criticized for not picking up on the quality control shortcomings, such as relying totally on test results from a single instrument.[57][edit] Design of a solutionCOSTAR on display at the National Air and Space MuseumThe design of the telescope had always incorporated servicing missions, and astronomers immediately began to seek potential solutions to the problem that could be applied at the first servicing mission, scheduled for 1993. While Kodak and Itek had each ground back-up mirrors for Hubble, it would have been impossible to replace the mirror in orbit, and too expensive and time-consuming to bring the telescope temporarily back to Earth for a refit. Instead, the fact that the mirror had been ground so precisely to the wrong shape led to the design of new optical components with exactly the same error but in the opposite sense, to be added to the telescope at the servicing mission, effectively acting as "spectacles" to correct the spherical aberration.[58][59]The first step was a precise characterization of the error in the main mirror. Working backwards from images of point sources, astronomers determined that the conic constant of the mirror as built was 1.013900.0002,