Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1999 06:36:41 -0700 (MST) From: Russet McMillan Subject: 3.5m Night Log 990103 Apache Point Observatory, Sunspot, NM Sunday, January 3rd, 1999 3.5-meter Night Observing Log Actual ----------------------------------------------------------------------- ASTRONOMER OBSERVER(S) INSTRUMENT DATE START FINISH ----------------------------------------------------------------------- B.Rodgers B.Rodgers DIS 1/3 18:37 20:37 G.Tovmassian C.Hastings DIS 1/3 20:37 21:37 D.Zucker D.Zucker DIS 1/3-4 21:37 01:02 W.Offut R.McMillan SPIcam 1/4 01:17 02:17 B.Gillespie R.McMillan Echelle/Other 1/4 02:52 05:39 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- INST SCHEDULED WEATH EQUIP OBS DAY NOTUSED I/RS/DN START FINISH D B D B D B USE D B ----------------------------------------------------------------------- UW02/R 18:37 20:37 - 0 - 0.1 - 1.9 0 - 0 UW??/S 20:37 21:37 - 0 - 0 - 1.0 0 - 0 UW07/R 21:37 01:09 - 0 - 0.3 - ?.? 0 - 0 TNO /S 01:09 02:37 - 0 - 0 - ?.? 0 - 0 EN03/S 02:37 05:39 - 0 - 0 - ?.? 0 - 0 -------------- Activity Log -------------- 1st Half Observing Specialist: Camron Hastings The telescope was opened at 18:15 after all the DIS cals were finished. Bernadette started up and right away we had some minor tech probs, the dome controller on the secondary was choked up for some reason. I went up, saw the red LED's and reset the controller box. All was fine after that. When Dan Zucker came on I had to change the slit mask wheel. It seems that DIS was confused as to which mask was in because it said the 2.0" slit was in but it wasn't. A simple 'home' fixed this. All else worked fine. 2nd Half Observing Specialist: Russet McMillan Second half was clear and very cold. When I dismounted DIS, I discovered that the transfer dewar was empty again. I had trouble filling it because the fill valve had frozen in place, and the nitrogen vented out as fast as I put it in. I got the valve to close with a little persuasion from a heat gun. There was additional trouble because the new improved scale for the transfer dewar proved just as sticky as the old one -- perhaps it was the cold. Despite repeated nudgings, the scale claimed to be at 50 lbs when the dewar was venting liquid. When I lifted it, the dewar was obviously much heavier. Because of these difficulties and UW07 running overtime, I did not get spicam mounted until 2:00. I made some observations of the same asteroid as last night, then set up the echelle and took a pointing model, which I saved in tdat:telmod_na1.dat;2 (the previous echelle model is in version 1, and the latest model for the na2 port is the default). I found a really neat bug in the echelle control window in Remark. If you request a camera control window while one is already up, the window will redraw itself -- and the "stop" button will move to the left. After repeated commands it can move right off the window. Unselecting and reselecting the echelle will redraw the window correctly. ---Observer Comments--- B.Rodgers (UW02): A slow start due to the slew failures early on. Once this was fixed, things went smoothly until a sudden jump in focus occurred about an hour into the evening. Overall, I ended up with about 1 hour of useable time out of the two hour block. Nonetheless, Camron's efficiency at lining the stars up on the slit allowed me to at least get 1 grating setting for several of my targets. No problems with DIS. Thanks also to Camron for giving me a few minutes overtime to complete a standard star observation. D.Zucker (UW07): I started an hour late in order to let Camron try to get a spectrum of a possible supernova. I had Camron switch DIS slits (from 1.5" to 2.0"), and then I moved the slit in and then out, then in again, then I started observing. I found that even relatively short spectra were saturated, so I took very short exposures on my targets. I assumed that the full moon was doing the saturating, but after about an hour I asked Camron to take a slit viewer image, and he noticed that the slit wasn't in, even though the DIS remark window claimed it was. DIS continued to claim the slit was in after syncing, so Camron had to home it. This cleared up the problem, but my target was sinking lower and lower in the sky. Thanks to Camron and Russet for their help, and to Russet for letting me run over a bit to finish taking calibration spectra. FOCUS LOG January 3rd 1998 Best Telescope Temp Wind Seeing Time Instrmnt Focus Az El Air/Truss Dir MPH filter FWHM" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 18:40 DIS +075(6019) 44 51 -5.8/-4.5 284 08 none 1.57" 20:20 DIS +200(6065) 117 53 -6.9/-6.0 323 11 none 1.41" 20:50 DIS +000(5926) -122 38 -6.7/-6.6 302 10 V 1.68" 02:10 SPIcam -225(5457) 164 62 -7.2/-7.6 325 12 r' 1.89 04:20 Echelle -650(5020) 221 64 -7.3/-7.8 38 14 WEATHER LOG January 3rd 1998 Wind Time Temp-F Dewp-F MPH Direction Dust Sky Precip ------------------------------------------------------------------ 16:01 22 5 8 329 (NNW) clear none 17:01 21 7 15 348 (NNW) clear none 18:01 22 5 13 349 (NNW) clear none 19:01 22 6 15 329 (NNW) clear none 20:01 20 6 11 307 (NW) clear none 21:01 20 8 9 314 (NW) clear none 22:01 21 6 19 316 (NW) clear none 23:01 21 7 11 330 (NNW) clear none 00:01 20 8 14 318 (NW) clear none 01:01 19 9 10 336 (NNW) clear none 02:01 19 7 0 279 (W) clear none 03:01 19 6 8 15 (NNE) clear none 04:01 19 1 15 35 (NE) clear none 05:01 19 1 19 17 (NNE) clear none 06:01 19 1 18 20 (NNE) 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: 2.42a Current guide software version: GIm Ctrl v3.0b 15.out - NCH, RM