From: "Camron Hastings" Subject: 3.5 meter Night Log 980618 Date: Fri, 19 Jun 1998 05:30:32 -0600 Thursday, June 18th, 1998 APACHE POINT OBSERVATORY 3.5-Meter Observing Log ACTUAL ASTRONOMER OBSERVER(S) INSTRUMENT DATE START FINISH ---------------------------------------------------------------------- York G. Richards DIS 6/18-19 21:56 03:30 Turner C. Hastings SPIcam 6/19 03:48 04:13 INST SCHEDULED OBS WEATH EQUIP DAY NOTUSED I/RS/DN START FINISH D B D B D B USE D B ---------------------------------------------------------------------- UC02/R 21:56 03:30 4.5 1.0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 PU01/S 03:48 04:14 0 0.4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 (note: times listed include instrument change time) ACTIVITY LOG The enclosure opened this evening at 21:50, clear skies, low wind and low dust. Gordon Richards started this evening with his search for QSO absorption lines. We had trouble early on when the telescope was near zenith (78-86) with the tracking. A few "hiccups" of about 10", but reslewing seemed to help. After that, things smoothed out and we got good spectrums of his science objects. Switched instruments to SPIcam for the lens monitoring. I imaged lens objects with the 'sdss' filter set with no problems. Which brings me to a point I would like to mention: I have spoken to others at APO and UW, and it seems that all the handling of the 'sdss' filters is causing damage and to their very sensitive surfaces. These filters cannot be cleaned without further damage. To minimize future damage, I believe the best policy is to leave filter wheel #2 permanently loaded with the 'sdss' filters, and no longer allow changing to mix with other filters. The filter wheels can be switched out in about 5 minutes, so if someone is interested in using both the 'MSSSO' filters, or others, and the 'sdss', we would switch wheels when needed. Now that APO has a third filter wheel, it seems a good idea to permanently load #1 with the 'MSSSO', and load #2 with the 'sdss'. This would leave wheel #3 open for mixed sets or special filter requests. The 'sdss' wheel does have one empty slot, and it would be possible to add one other filter to that wheel when necessary. Please let me know how you feel about this. The 'sdss' filters are expensive, and the first priority should be in maintaining the quality of our science hardware here for present and future needs. -Camron Hastings OBSERVER'S COMMENTS ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A bit of a slow start since I forgot that the gratings would need to be calibrated. I lost about an hour trying to do so because I kept calculating the offsets wrong. We got 1 primary target at good S/N and 2 secondary targets. Minor problems tracking near the zenith, but otherwise not too bad. -Gordon ---------------------------------------------------------------------- FOCUS LOG June 18th, 1998 Best Telescope Temp Wind Seeing Time Instr Focus Az El Air/Truss Dir MPH filter FWHM" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 22:20 Guider 51625 -74 69 16.1/17.3 258 20.5 none .85" 10:02 SPIcam -300/6378 133 51 13.9/14.4 298 15.6 g' 1.39" WEATHER LOG June 18th, 1998 Wind Time Temp-F Dewp-F MPH Direction Dust Sky Precip ------------------------------------------------------------------ 16:01 73 22 18 282 (WNW) 609 Clear None 17:01 70 24 14 269 (W) 676 Clear None 18:01 67 21 13 289 (WNW) 631 Clear None 19:01 66 22 12 267 (W) 805 Clear None 20:01 63 23 10 256 (WSW) 797 Clear None 21:01 61 22 11 244 (WSW) 777 Clear None 22:01 61 20 13 247 (WSW) 840 Clear None 23:01 61 19 5 275 (W) 671 Clear None 00:01 60 20 11 271 (W) 763 Clear None 01:01 60 20 14 276 (W) 797 Clear None 02:01 58 21 12 268 (W) 863 Clear None 03:01 59 19 10 275 (W) 847 Clear None 04:01 57 15 14 287 (WNW) 1011 Clear None 05:01 58 15 15 291 (WNW) 886 Clear None note: the wind was coming from the azimuth listed. The convention used is north=0 degrees, east=90 degrees. The dust count is for the particles > 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: 2.41a Current guide software version: GIm Ctrl v3.0b 15.out - Camron Hastings