Date: Thu, 6 Mar 2003 06:55:21 -0700 (MST) From: Jack Dembicky Subject: 3.5m Night Log 20030305 Apache Point Observatory 3.5m Telescope Night Log Wednesday, March 5, 2003 ACTUAL ASTRONOMER OBSERVER(S) INSTRUMENT START FINISH ------------------------------------------------------------------- R.Walterbos R.Walterbos, C.Chiappini DISII 22:13 00:00 B.Moorthy B.Moorthy DISII 00:00 07:00 INST SCHEDULED WEATH EQUIP OBS DAY NOTUSED I/RO/DN START FINISH D B D B D B USE D B ------------------------------------------------------------------- NM02/R 18:57 00:00 1.6 1.6 0 0 1.8 0 0 0 0 NM04/R 00:00 05:32 0 0 0 0 5.5 0 0 0 0 note: scheduled times listed include instrument change time ------------- ACTIVITY LOG -------------- Observing Specialist: J.Dembicky Clouds and lt. snow around 17:00 kept me closed. The clouds started to thinned around 21:00 but we started picking up radar echos between us and Holloman AFB shortly thereafter. I turned on the cooling fans and opened the louvers around 21:30 as the skies appeared to be clearing, but was hesitant to open due to the increasing radar echos still between us and Holloman AFB. Better safe than sorry attitude. The radar echos started to fade around 21:50 and the skies seemed clear so I decided to go ahead and open. I got the telescope and guider focused around 22:20 with around 1.4 arc sec seeing. The 2nd half observer reported that the telescope seemed to be drifting in the X direction. I checked the focus on the guider images and they appeared a bit out of focus. I refocused the guider (issued a gfocus command manually) to bring the guider a bit more in focus and that seemed to fix the problem. I think the focus had drifted (as the guider was reporting 1.3 arc sec seeing and the DIS slitview camera was around 2.0 arc sec, but the observer didn't feel it was necessary to refocus the telescope). I checked over the guiderstar identification lines in the TCC log and didn't really see anything strange (but I may have very well missed something). Anyway, after focusing the guider better the problem went away. The observer finished talking lamp cals around 06:40 and started a sequence of 50 biases, I dis-mounted the instrument and went to bed rather than wait an hour for them to finish. ------- FAILURE LOG ------- PROG INST FAILURE MODE TIME (SEGDFVO) TI/SHU START FINISH DESCRIPTION ----------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------- FOCUS LOG --------------- Air/Truss Wind Time Instrument Focus Az El Temp-C Dir MPH filt FWHM --------------------------------------------------------------------- 22:17 DISslit -150(21) 103 57 -4.0/-2.6 341 10 none 1.39 22:20 NA2gdr 511(41511) 104 58 -4.1/-2.8 329 15 R 1.23 01:07 DISslit -120(-35) -84 51 -4.7/-5.1 355 19 none 1.03 01:09 NA2gdr -711(40288) -84 51 -4.7/-5.1 353 21 R 1.00 --------------- WEATHER LOG ---------------- Wind Precip.or Time Temp F Dewp F MPH Direction Dust Sky Conditions ------------------------------------------------------------------ 16:01 32 18 17 256 (WSW) 369 Cloudy Lt. Snow 17:01 29 18 25 269 (W) 367 Cloudy Lt. Snow 18:01 27 20 11 273 (W) 555 Cloudy Lt. Snow 19:01 27 20 7 268 (W) 445 Cloudy none 20:01 27 20 13 290 (WNW) 381 Cloudy none 21:01 26 19 13 292 (WNW) 175 Pt. Cldy none 22:01 25 18 24 297 (WNW) 140 Mst. Clr none 23:01 24 15 13 319 (NW) 180 Clear none 00:01 24 14 7 14 (NNE) 140 Clear none 01:01 24 13 13 30 (NNE) 130 Clear none 02:01 24 13 19 351 (N) 151 Clear none 03:01 24 12 15 341 (NNW) 117 Clear none 04:01 24 11 11 11 (N) 134 Clear none 05:01 24 10 14 351 (N) 118 Clear none 06:01 24 11 14 339 (NNW) 136 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 particles > 1u per 0.1 cubic feet. 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: 2.82 Current guide software version: GIm Ctrlv4.1b2 Current TCC version: 2.6.8