Subject: 3.5m Night Log 20050809 Date: Wed, 10 Aug 2005 23:41:22 -0600 (MDT) From: bketzeba@apo.nmsu.edu (Bill Ketzeback) Apache Point Observatory 3.5m Telescope Night Log Tuesday, August 9, 2005 ACTUAL ASTRONOMER OBSERVER(S) INSTRUMENT START FINISH -------------------------------------------------------------------- R.Covarrubias R.Covarrubias DIS 21:30 01:04 P.Yoachim P.Yoachim DIS 01:05 06:03 INST SCHED(TWILIGHT) WEATH EQUIP OBS DAY NOT USED I/RO/DN START FINISH D B D B D B USE D B ---------------------------------------------------------------------- UW05/R 20:52 01:00 0 0.5 0 0 2.6 1.0 0 0 0 UW09/R 01:00 05:26 0 0 0 0 4.4 0 0 0 0 note: scheduled times listed include instrument change time ------------- ACTIVITY LOG -------------- Observing Specialist: B.Ketzeback A bit of a late start due to uncertainty in the weather. The clouds were approaching APO from the NE in our radar blind spot so I wanted to be extra careful about opening tonight. The clouds did thin shortly after sunset and I remained opened for the rest of the night under the cover of a uniform and moderately thick layer of cirrus. The first half observer had quite a difficult time setting up on his first object. He was attempting a challenging measurement of setting up on a nonvisible target while tracking the parallactic angle. After much head scratching on both our parts as to why the offsets did not land the slit on the right part of the sky, it was discovered the problem was observer error. The rest of the first half went smoothly until right before midnight when the rotator overcurrented. Less than 5 minutes was lost so no equipment time was recorded. Second half was rather peaceful. At shortly after 0405 while the observer was taking a set of comparison arcs the rotator again over currented. I caught it during the next slew and recovered from the halted axis. Therefore no time tracking on a science object was lost for this second event. During my end of night checkout I moved the rotator around by hand with DIS still mounted and with it dismounted. I did feel more friction then I can recall than there should be however, lets not trust my memory. The day staff should investigate further with strain gauges. Since a similar PR was filed yesterday, no new report was filed tonight. On a side note, during my afternoon checkout I thought I heard the low rumbling noises a compressor makes as it is starting to work harder (bearing) or beginning to fail on one of the cryotigers. I did not file a report due to when I went looking/listening for the noise this morning it was gone. Will keep an ear open for it the rest of this week. ------- FAILURE LOG ------- PROG INST FAILURE MODE TIME (SEGDFNVO) TI/SHU START FINISH DESCRIPTION ----------------------------------------------------------------------- UW05 D T/H 23:50 23:53 Rotator over current condition UW09 D T/H 04:05 04:07 Rotator over current condition ---------------- FOCUS LOG --------------- Air/Truss Wind Time Instrument Focus Az El Temp-C Dir MPH filt FWHM --------------------------------------------------------------------- 21:33 dis-slit 25(1173) 183 77 15.0/15.8 162 11 - 1.0 ------------- WEATHER LOG ---------------- Wind Precip.or Time Temp F Dewp F MPH Direction Dust Sky Conditions ------------------------------------------------------------------ 16:01 57 50 8 87 (E) 513 cloudy lt rain 17:01 60 49 7 80 (E) 531 cloudy lt rain 18:01 61 46 7 40 (NE) 415 cloudy none 19:01 62 48 6 101 (E) 478 cloudy none 20:01 60 47 11 147 (SSE) 526 mstly cldy none 21:01 59 46 10 134 (SE) 522 prtly cldy none 22:01 60 45 10 176 (S) 512 mstly cldy moderate cirrus 23:01 60 48 10 186 (S) 599 mstly cldy moderate cirrus 00:01 58 50 6 181 (S) 690 mstly cldy moderate cirrus 01:01 57 50 4 195 (SSW) 775 mstly cldy moderate cirrus 02:01 58 50 8 182 (S) 732 mstly cldy moderate cirrus 03:01 57 49 1 180 (S) 625 mstly cldy moderate cirrus 04:01 56 49 3 168 (SSE) 749 mstly cldy moderate cirrus 05:01 57 50 2 196 (SSW) 807 mstly cldy moderate cirrus 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 Telescope drives operational. Current Remark version: 2.85b Current TCC version: 2.7.3.2 Current TUI version: TUI 1.0