Date: Tue, 15 Dec 1998 07:10:53 -0700 (MST)
From: Russet McMillan
Subject: 3.5m Night Log 981214
                         MONDAY DECEMBER 14, 1998
                         APACHE POINT OBSERVATORY
                              OBSERVING  LOG
                                                          ACTUAL
ASTRONOMER      OBSERVER(S)        INSTRUMENT   DATE   START FINISH
York          Gloria, McMillan      Echelle   12/14-15 18:26 03:53
 INST        SCHEDULED     WEATH     EQUIP      OBS    DAY   NOTUSED
I/RS/DN    START FINISH   D    B    D    B    D    B   USE   D    B
EN03/S     18:26 05:30    0    0    0    0   9.5  1.6   0    0    0
(note: times listed include instrument change time)
                              ACTIVITY LOG
(* means a trouble report has been issued or appended to)
1st half observing specialist: Karen Gloria
[paraphrased by S.Wang]  We need a pointing model for this port, and
software from Russ Owen/Jeff Morgan would help (since the automated
pointing model software is set up for Nasmyth2)
2nd half observing specialist: Russet McMillan
The weather was marked by varying amounts of thin, high clouds, but
nothing to prevent us from staying open all night.
The first half, after focusing, was spent trying to find a boresight.
The plan was to pick a bright star near the zenith and let the sky
rotation take it in a nice arc which would reveal the center of
rotation.  Unfortunately, there is no pointing model for the Nasmyth1
port (and it wouldn't do us much good unless the movements of the
tertiary are repeatable).  The pointing errors were such that even in
moves of less than ten degrees, the star would be off the guider field
of view (~45 arcsec).
So the tracking and pointing errors outpaced the sky rotation -- some
of our stars arced one way, some another, and some went in a straight
line.  After some scratching of our heads over the fact that we need a
boresight for a pointing model and we need a pointing model to find
the boresight (in absence of a rotator), we gave up and headed for an
actual target.
* During the extended process of finding and centering stars for the
boresight check, we encountered a refusal to slew.  The error message
indicated a syntax error in a simple calculation.  Later in the
morning this occurred again, and Craig discovered that it was due to
tcl objecting to the use of leading zeros in front of the numbers "8"
and "9".
We went to a target in the Trapezium in Orion to obtain some spectra
at varying CCD focuses.  Guiding during exposures to keep the object
on the slit was difficult, but possible.  We obtained some good
exposures there, but when we attempted to get some quartz flat images
afterward, the exposure command never got from the mcnode to the
echelle controller.  This, again, turned out to be the leading-zero
problem; in the interim between the last successful object image and
the unsuccessful exposures, the sidereal time had clicked over 08:00,
and tcl was objecting to the 08.  Craig managed to fix this so that we
could expose again, although he hadn't quite resolved the slewing
problem and it was still necessary to input coordinates by hand
through the TCC.
We reached a second target after 05:15 (including the long centering
process), and were able to get some data there as well.  We adopted a
process of going to a very bright ( 1 micron per 0.1 cu. ft.
                             TELESCOPE STATUS
Primary, secondary, and tertiary mirrors in place and collimated.
Primary support system operational.  Mirror ventilation system in
place.  Telescope drives operational.  Current Remark version: 2.42a.
Current guide software version: GIm Ctrlv3.0b15.
- Karen Gloria, Russet McMillan