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By MARCIA DUNN
.c The Associated Press

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (March 5) - A fresh pair of spacewalkers attached a second powerful 25-foot solar wing to the Hubble Space Telescope on Tuesday with speed and apparent ease.

It was the second of five excursions planned this week by space shuttle Columbia's telescope-repair team.

''Beautiful day for a spacewalk,'' astronaut James Newman observed as he left the shuttle. ''Incredible,'' said Michael Massimino, a first-time spacewalker.

The men quickly moved through their chores 360 miles up, removing and stowing the old solar wing, and unpacking and lifting the new one into position. It mimicked Monday's work by two other astronauts, who installed the first new solar wing on Hubble.

Massimino tightly gripped the new 640-pound wing and held it steady as he rode the shuttle robot arm to the attach point on the telescope. ''Lean back a little bit,'' Newman told him. ''Take a deep breath and relax. You did a great job.''

Less than an hour later, Massimino unfolded the hinged wing like the cover of a storybook, opening it at a cautious rate of one degree a second. ''Ready? Here it comes,'' he said.

With that completed, the spacewalkers began replacing an unreliable steering mechanism.

One of Hubble's four reaction wheels briefly malfunctioned in November. Although the wheel has since been working fine, engineers concluded the failure was likely to occur again.

At least three of the 100-pound, cylindrical wheels are needed to aim the observatory at intended targets. Four speed things up.

Both the wheel and wing passed their initial tests. The work went so well, the spacewalkers had extra time to do some minor latch and insulation repairs.

Hubble's new $19 million set of wings, covered with ultra-efficient solar cells, should boost electrical output by more than 20 percent. That will be especially useful once an advanced camera is added later this week and two more science instruments are launched in two years.

The telescope's old solar wings had become damaged by eight years of wear and tear.

The new rigid wings also will reduce the rate at which the 43-foot, 24,500-pound Hubble gradually sinks in orbit.

Space shuttles periodically give a little boost to the telescope. But NASA plans to stop servicing Hubble in 2004 and to bring it back for museum display in 2010.

''We really hope they'll give us a nice, long science lifetime on Hubble Space Telescope,'' said Anne Kinney, NASA's astronomy director.

The astronauts also did some advance work for the next spacewalk, considered the most complicated one of the mission.

Massimino loosened bolts on doors leading to Hubble's batteries and power-control unit. That will save John Grunsfeld and Richard Linnehan precious minutes when they disconnect the batteries and attempt to replace the control unit on Wednesday. The observatory will be completely turned off for the repair, for the first time ever in orbit.

AP-NY-03-05-02 0813EST

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Attaching Solar Wing to Hubble