[dgr582systems]

Agreed, but it is still more expensive in terms of direct costs than ‘do nothing’ which seems to be the case for the telescope.

Whoever downvoted me, thanks a bunch. Not sure why.

Running a team of painters still costs more than nothing. The cost of painting doesn’t cover the cost of ongoing inspections for metal fatigue etc etc. Engineering reviews, government oversight and so on.

Large bridges, especially with vehicle traffic, vibrate quite a lot and this is causes major ongoing concerns with fatigue, which means extensive monitoring along with the painting. More costs (not saying it’s unjustified).

Keeping a team going is efficient as you say, but more expensive than nothing.

[petschge]

Telescopes are not typically "do nothing. I am not aware of the details of Arecibo, but the big telescope in Greenbank has a paint crew work for 8 hours a day for multiple weeks each summer. And after several years the entire telescope is repainted and they start all over from the beginning. During the day time hours when the paint crew the is working the telescope can not be moved to point at objects, but is still taking data in the form of drift scans, recording whatever passes through the field of view of the telescope. A whole bunch of pulsars has been found that way.

[dgr582systems]

To clarify, I only meant that the telescope has not been maintained (do nothing) lately as per the article. My fault for not writing more clearly.

As you say, it would be a lot of work to maintain if they wanted to keep Arecibo running.