From: Russet McMillan Subject: 3.5m Night Log 20060211 Date: Sun, 12 Feb 2006 06:33:12 -0700 (MST) Apache Point Observatory 3.5m Telescope Night Log Saturday, February 11, 2006 ACTUAL ASTRONOMER OBSERVER(S) INSTRUMENT START FINISH -------------------------------------------------------------------- G.Wolf-Chase M.Smutko,J.Walawender, NIC 18:00 18:23 G.Wolf-Chase 19:20 22:15 23:25 23:35 L.Walkowicz L.Walkowicz DIS, Ech 00:10 06:15 INST SCHED(TWILIGHT) WEATH EQUIP OBS DAY NOT USED I/ROW/DN START FINISH D B D B D B USE D B ---------------------------------------------------------------------- UC05/R 18:40 00:10 0 1.8 0 0.5 0 3.2 0 0 0 UW12/R 00:10 05:56 0 0 0 0 0.0 5.8 0 0 0 note: scheduled times listed include instrument change time ------------- ACTIVITY LOG -------------- Observing Specialist: R.McMillan Tonight had clear skies, strong winds, and variable seeing. The first half observers had some trouble getting started because NIC had been left on subframe all day, and it took a while to clear the rest of the chip down to the same dark level as the subframe. They got going just at sunset, but then had more trouble because their only target field was in the north, so they were pointed into the wind. Image quality suffered noticeably, and I closed twice due to high winds. The second time I re-opened, the image quality had changed and showed distinct signs of tracking trouble in azimuth, as the field was reaching the point of direction reversal. The observers really had nothing else they wanted to look at, so they took darks for their last half hour when I said the telescope simply couldn't track there. Adjustment of the tracking parameters is planned for next week's engineering; we don't know yet how much that can mitigate the behavior of the azimuth drives near the direction reversal. The second half observer had targets in the south, which made the primary mirror dataq much happier and allowed me to be more relaxed about the wind. Some images were subarcsecond (proving that tracking was fine), but many images poofed up to larger size. ------- FAILURE LOG ------- PROG INST FAILURE MODE TIME (SEDFNVOG) TI/SHU START FINISH DESCRIPTION ----------------------------------------------------------------------- UC05 N T/H 23:30 00:00 az couldn't track at reversal ---------------- FOCUS LOG --------------- Air/Truss Wind Time Instrument Focus Az El Temp-C Dir MPH filt FWHM --------------------------------------------------------------------- 18:11 NIC 225(1030) -7 49 -3.3/-3.2 8 20 H2-2.121.6 00:24 DIS(blue) 50(353) 151 75 -3.2/-3.9 21 22 - 1.15 02:01 Echelle 58(-427) 236 63 -2.8/-4.2 26 23 ND1 1.2 ------------- WEATHER LOG ---------------- Wind Precip.or Time Temp F Dewp F MPH Direction Dust Sky Conditions ------------------------------------------------------------------ 16:01 25 -2 11 27 (NNE) 804 clear none 17:01 28 -15 15 7 (N) 557 clear none 18:01 27 -17 24 26 (NNE) 460 clear wind 19:01 27 -17 22 7 (N) 435 clear wind 20:01 27 -17 23 354 (N) 466 clear none 21:01 27 -18 20 0 (N) 453 clear none 22:01 27 -19 11 356 (N) 455 clear wind 23:01 27 -18 19 4 (N) 582 clear wind 00:01 26 -19 15 21 (NNE) 542 clear none 01:01 26 -12 25 25 (NNE) 554 clear wind 02:01 27 -14 23 26 (NNE) 512 clear none 03:01 30 -14 25 23 (NNE) 500 clear none 04:01 31 -14 22 20 (NNE) 537 clear none 05:01 32 -13 11 13 (NNE) 523 clear none 06:01 32 -13 6 357 (N) 485 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 Telescope drives operational. Current TCC version: 2.8 Current TUI version: TUI 1.1