Subject: 3.5m Night Log 20231217 From: mcmillan@apo.nmsu.edu Date: Mon, 18 Dec 2023 13:38:32 +0000 (UTC) Apache Point Observatory 3.5m Telescope Night Log Sunday, December 17, 2023 PROG PI ASTRONOMER OBSERVER(S) -------------------------------------------------------------------- CU06 J.Bally J.Bally BY03 B.Boizelle B.Boizelle CU01 A.Feinstein A.Feinstein ON-SKY PROG INSTRUMENT START FINISH -------------------------------------------------------------------- CU06 ARCTIC 19:12 21:14 CU06 KOSMOS 21:30 00:04 BY03 TripleSpec 00:19 01:58 CU01 ARCTIC 02:09 06:10 PROG SCHEDULED WEATH EQUIP OBS NOT USED I/ROW/DTN START FINISH D B D B D B D B ----------------------------------------------------------------- CU06/R 17:08 00:10 0 0 0 0.6 1.8 4.7 0 0 BY03/R 00:10 02:10 0 0 0 0 2.0 0.0 0 0 CU01/R 02:10 06:51 0 0 0 0 4.7 0.0 0 0 note: scheduled times listed include instrument change time ------------- ACTIVITY LOG -------------- Observing Specialist: R.McMillan We had thin high clouds and good seeing during first half, with somewhat thicker clouds and moderate seeing second half. Just as the observer got set on the first target, the ARCTIC filter wheel got stuck. This was wheel 2 (is wheel 2 bad?), with two heavy filters which were 120 deg apart instead of 180 deg apart, and the instrument was upside down. The filter stickage made both the filter wheel controller software and the ICC software unhappy so that I couldn't get them both running at the same time. I tried multiple software restarts in different orders. Finally I applied all of the following fixes: pulled filter wheel out, moved the heavy filters 180 deg apart (rotating one of them in the wheel), reinstalled filter wheel, restarted ICC then FWcontroller then ICC again, homed filter wheel with instrument upright, advised observer to keep instrument near-upright for future observations. As a result of all this, arctic dropped a quad and will need recovery. There was a window in the middle of the night, but we were concerned that the instrument wouldn't have enough time for the temperature to stabilize before it was needed in the second half. There was an unexplained image jump of about 15 arcsecond in the azimuth direction at 5:23:18 UT. We were pointing close to the wind at the time but it wasn't strong (and should have affected altitude more than azimuth). I was unable to find an explanation for the jump. It occurred right at the end of an exposure so didn't ruin the spectrum, but the recovery took a few minutes. ------- FAILURE LOG ------- FAILURE MODE TIME PROG INSTR TI/SHU START FINISH DESCRIPTION ---------------------------------------------------------------------- CU06 R I/H 18:56 19:26 ARCTIC FW stuck, software restarts CU06 K T/H 20:23 20:28 Azimuth tracking jump ---------------- FOCUS LOG --------------- Time Instrument Focus Az El Temp Strc Prim Sec Air filt FWHM -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 17:36 arctic 369( 1270) 94 61 9.0 10.6 10.4 10.2 9.2 SII 1.12 20:23 arctic 360( 1125) 83 55 7.8 7.7 8.5 7.4 7.6 Ha 0.95 21:39 kosmos 335( 1016) 64 71 7.4 7.1 7.9 7.0 7.3 - 0.75 00:23 tcamera 359( 1205) -34 58 7.6 6.3 6.8 5.8 6.8 Ks 0.99 02:22 arctic 326( 907) 103 72 3.5 4.0 4.8 4.0 3.9 SSDS_i 1.27 ------------- WEATHER LOG ---------------- Wind Precip.or Time Temp F Dewp F MPH Direction Dust Sky Conditions ------------------------------------------------------------------ 16:00 49 3 4 351 (N) 159 ptly cldy none 17:00 49 -1 13 6 (N) 90 ptly cldy none 18:00 48 -2 13 46 (NE) 55 mstly clr none 19:00 47 -3 16 49 (NE) 58 clear none 20:00 47 4 11 46 (NE) 84 clear none 21:00 46 6 7 88 (E) 131 clear none 22:00 45 1 18 59 (ENE) 64 clear none 23:00 44 3 17 64 (ENE) 84 clear none 00:00 45 2 13 81 (E) 67 clear none 01:00 41 3 14 80 (E) 95 mstly clr none 02:00 38 7 12 82 (E) 92 mstly clr none 03:00 38 12 9 85 (E) 149 ptly cldy none 04:00 43 3 5 186 (S) 63 ptly cldy none 05:00 43 1 5 200 (SSW) 65 ptly cldy none 06:00 43 2 2 203 (SSW) 84 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 SOFTWARE ---------- Current TCC version: 1.4.2 Current HUB version: v20171231_01 Current TUI version: 3.1.3