From: Russet McMillan Subject: 3.5m Night Log 20060501 Date: Tue, 2 May 2006 05:39:52 -0600 (MDT) Apache Point Observatory 3.5m Telescope Night Log Monday, May 1, 2006 ACTUAL ASTRONOMER OBSERVER(S) INSTRUMENT START FINISH -------------------------------------------------------------------- A.Bender A.Bender NIC-FPS 20:00 22:20 D.York A.Bender,F.Hearty NIC-FPS 22:20 23:30 R.McMillan DIS 23:40 00:58 M.Strauss X.Fan SPIcam 01:12 05:20 INST SCHED(TWILIGHT) WEATH EQUIP OBS DAY NOT USED I/ROW/DN START FINISH D B D B D B USE D B ---------------------------------------------------------------------- CU04/R 20:43 22:20 0 0 0 0.1 0 1.6 0 0 0 UC05/W/D 22:20 01:00 0 0 0 0 0.6 2.0 0 0 0 PU02/R 01:00 05:17 0 0 0 0 4.3 0 0 0 0 note: scheduled times listed include instrument change time ------------- ACTIVITY LOG -------------- Observing Specialist: R.McMillan Another night of mostly good and sometimes excellent seeing, though not consistently clear. There were small puffy clouds first half and thin high haze second half, but nothing that would prevent observing. And the dust was reasonable all night. NIC-FPS had some problems, needing its control program restarted several times to clear up all-zero images. Two of those occasions occurred after the instrument was moved, one when only a filter wheel was moved. The latter cost a few minutes of observing time. There was a voluntary time trade in the middle part of the night to permit chasing a GRB with both NIC-FPS and DIS. This went well, although there was some concern about a charge gradient across the NIC-FPS images which looked almost like unfocused scattered light; that problem remains unresolved. When SPIcam was mounted for second half, the observer reported image elongation in the azimuth direction, despite a recent focus. The worst cases occurred low in the NW sky, leading me to suspect azimuth tracking troubles. I made a small, temporary adjustment to the azimuth drive tuning parameters, and image quality improved although the effect didn't disappear completely. Fortunately, the azimuth drives only have to last another week. Later in second half, there was a hard crash of the NA2 guider requiring a power-cycle for the controller. This cost no observing time. ------- FAILURE LOG ------- PROG INST FAILURE MODE TIME (SEDFNVOG) TI/SHU START FINISH DESCRIPTION ----------------------------------------------------------------------- UC05 N I/S 23:00 23:05 NIC ICS needed restart ---------------- FOCUS LOG --------------- Air/Truss Wind Time Instrument Focus Az El Temp-C Dir MPH filt FWHM --------------------------------------------------------------------- 20:16 NIC 0(1607) 113 47 13.0/15.2 217 8 Ks 0.79 20:24 NA2gdr -3469(39530)16 64 13.2/14.8 186 8 R 0.79 23:42 DISslit -75(994) 23 49 12.5/12.3 216 7 - 1.3 01:25 SPIcam 50(1360) -48 29 12.8/12.2 242 6 z 0.75 ------------- WEATHER LOG ---------------- Wind Precip.or Time Temp F Dewp F MPH Direction Dust Sky Conditions ------------------------------------------------------------------ 16:01 58 14 11 307 (NW) 1147 ptly cldy none 17:01 59 16 0 233 (SW) 1356 ptly cldy none 18:01 63 17 10 229 (SW) 1592 ptly cldy none 19:01 60 18 8 235 (SW) 1693 ptly cldy none 20:01 56 17 7 199 (SSW) 1743 mstly clr none 21:01 56 17 13 194 (SSW) 1942 mstly clr none 22:01 56 17 14 209 (SSW) 1939 mstly clr none 23:01 55 16 12 211 (SSW) 1737 mstly clr none 00:01 54 15 5 188 (S) 1635 clear none 01:01 55 17 4 201 (SSW) 1733 clear none 02:01 55 16 7 246 (WSW) 1773 clear none 03:01 54 15 8 265 (W) 1800 mstly clr none 04:01 54 15 6 261 (W) 1817 mstly clr none 05:01 54 16 7 264 (W) 1801 mstly clr 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: 2.8.3 Current TUI version: TUI 1.1