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--- uc:uc20220906_september_6_2022 [2022/09/06 10:58]
nchanove created
+++ uc:uc20220906_september_6_2022 [2022/09/29 21:29] (current)
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-UPDATE EVERYTHING AFTER THIS:
+Attending: Nancy Chanover (NMSU), Joanne Hughes (Seattle U), Eric Nielsen (NMSU), Aleksandr Mosenkov (BYU), Jamey Eriksen (APO), Misty Bentz (GSU), Anne Verbiscer (UVa), Russet McMillan (APO), Mukremin Kilic (OU), Eric Bellm (UW), Chip Kobulnicky (UWy), Ben Williams (UW), Kevin Schlaufman (JHU), Derek Buzasi (FGCU)
-Attending: Nancy Chanover (NMSU), Chip Kobulnicky (UWy), Bill Ketzeback (APO), Eric Bellm (UW), Eric Nielsen (NMSU), Jamey Eriksen (APO), Joanne Hughes (Seattle U), Kevin Schlaufman (JHU), Aleksandr Mosenkov (BYU), Anne Verbiscer (UVa), Misty Bentz (GSU)
 === User feedback and comments from institutional representatives ===
   * UVa - nothing to report
-  * Wyoming - nothing to report
+  * NMSU - nothing to report
   * Washington - nothing to report
-  * FGCU - no report
+  * Wyoming - Chip just returned from APO, where he brought 6 graduate students and 1 undergraduate for an observing/training trip. Candace did a great job with the training and they all had a wonderful experience.
-  * Seattle - no problems to report; Joanne has been in discussion with observatory staff regarding preparing to use the MOS software for KOSMOS (discussed further below)
+  * Georgia State - nothing to report
+  * Oklahoma - nothing to report
+  * BYU - nothing to report
+  * Colorado - nothing to report
+  * FGCU - nothing to report
+  * Seattle - nothing to report
   * JHU - nothing to report
-  * Georgia State - nothing to report
-  * Colorado - no report
-  * Oklahoma - nothing to report (submitted by email)
   * NAPG - no report
-  * BYU - nothing to report
-  * NMSU - nothing to report
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@@ Line 28: / Line 26: @@
 The detailed site report is included below, followed by additional information discussed during today's meeting.
-//3.5-m Telescope and Instruments Highlights, 7/5/2022 - 8/1/2022 //
+//3.5-m Telescope and Instruments Highlights, 8/2/2022 - 9/5/2022 //
 ) Overview
@@ Line 34: / Line 32: @@
 APO is no longer under any staffing or indoor masking restrictions from the State of New Mexico due to COVID. The COVID vaccination policy for ARC/APO has not changed.
-Weather for July has been monsoonal, with dust also contributing to occasional closures.
+Weather for August has been very monsoonal.
+September is shaping up to be a very busy month at APO on the 3.5m side: Wyoming class 9/2-5, Washington class 9/17-21 and two visiting instrument teams from Los Alamos National Laboratory and University of Virginia.
 ) Telescope
-The telescope secondary issue may be related to the galil controller resetting.  A power supply board was changed out and behavior is being monitored.
+The 3.5m telescope summer shutdown is over and the telescope was returned to service without major issues.  Mirrors were washed, drive systems were cleaned and worn rollers were replaced along with other miscellaneous annual maintenance tasks.
+The telescope secondary issue has not recurred since power board replacement; the system will continue to be monitored.
 ) Instruments
-KOSMOS: Commissioning activities are continuing; the instrument is still being offered on a shared risk basis. A replacement shutter for the slitviewer has arrived and will be replaced during the summer shutdown. Flux was decreased for internal lamps, more tuning is needed; this will take place at the same time as the shutter work. Work is also proceeding on prototype multiobject masks at both NMSU and UW shops. Some preliminary fields were observed and lessons learned are being applied to second round of test masks.
+KOSMOS: Commissioning activities are continuing; the instrument is still being offered on a shared risk basis. A replacement shutter for the slitviewer arrived was replaced over shutdown. Flux was decreased for the internal lamps again and the flux levels are being evaluated. Work continues on prototype multi-object masks at both NMSU and UW shops; several programs made use of these prototypes and lessons learned are being applied to the next round of test masks.
-DIS: Servicing is tentatively being planned for early October to attempt to resolve the ice droplets on the red camera.
+DIS: Servicing of the instrument is tentatively being planned for early October to attempt to resolve the ice droplets on the red camera.
 TripleSpec: Cold, operational and performing nominally.
@@ Line 54: / Line 56: @@
 NICFPS: The instrument is performing nominally with the occasional need to reset the controller due to corrupted images, and previous cautions about rotator angle.
 ARCTIC: Cold, operational and performing nominally.
-) ARCSAT: Limited to no usage lately.
+) ARCSAT: Observing started up again after summer shutdown. We had some pointing and software issues at startup but it has been working well since then.
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 === Additional telescope and instrument discussion ===
-We've had monsoonal weather at the observatory. The secondary mirror issue may be resolved since a board was replaced in the controller that moves the actuator on the back of the mirror. This was an old board and we are working on preparing for potential future failures. There has been some testing of MOS capabilities with KOSMOS. DIS is tentatively scheduled for servicing on red camera in early October. Everything else is nominal.
+The weather at APO has been very monsoonal over the past month. September is going to be a busy month with two visiting classes, one from UWy (they were there in early September) and the other from UW, and two visiting instrument teams, The summer shutdown was completed and we are now back to normal operations. All routine shutdown maintenance activities were completed and the issue with the secondary mirror has not come back so hopefully it is resolved. Once again the 3.5m technical and operational staff did a fantastic job of conducting a successful shutdown and returning the telescope to science operations without a hitch. DIS servicing is currently scheduled for October. Ed Leon, the 3.5m electronics technician, retired on September 1. Nancy expressed her appreciation for his efforts and dedication to APO and the 3.5m over the past decade. The job ad for his position is now posted ([[https://jobs.nmsu.edu/postings/47642]]) - please share this widely and encourage people to apply!
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-=== KOSMOS Update ===
+=== KOSMOS update ===
-The KOSMOS activities that are planned for summer shutdown include the following:
+Over summer shutdown several KOSMOS-related tasks were accomplished. We reduced the brightness of the internal calibration lamps by putting an ND filter in place. This will affect both flat fields and arc lamps, but since observers need to acquire arcs more frequently because of the known instrument flexure we don't want to dim those any further. We are recommending that observers use truss lamps for flat fields if the frames are still saturated. We are currently trying to see if we can address the brightness of the internal quartz lamps but not the arcs, which requires a tradeoff between the needs of narrow vs wide slit observations; no decisions have been made yet. We are optimizing the system for good arc lamp exposures for the moment. A new shutter was installed in the slit viewer camera. We hope to have the new slits from the UW shop by the end of the month. Nancy posted some info to the wiki concerning how some have been handling the flat fielding of KOSMOS data (see [[:kosmos|]]). We have gone through just about one entire cycle of seasonal changes with KOSMOS, so we are now developing a more complete understanding of its behavior with environmental changes. The multi-object capability is still coming; we hope to do some more testing during engineering time soon.
-  * replace shutter in slit viewer camera with a new one that is rated for operation at colder temperatures
-  * try to resolve internal cal lamp brightness issue (again) by lowering the brightness of lamps with ND filtering
-  * a user is trying to use KOSMOS for bright planetary work with ND filters that are screwed on, but it was discovered that this results in interference with the cal stage. We will attempt to address this, possibly by removing some material from edge of the cal stage itself.
-  * if time allows, we will warm the instrument, pump on it, and bake out the getter
-As a status update on the MOS capability for KOSMOS, Bill got the KMS software running under certain operating systems; he can provide instructions on how to install it. He has been working with Joe Burchett at NMSU on streamlining the process; currently the software outputs files in a format that is used for making electronic boards but not used by many machine shops so Bill has been converting them to SolidWorks or AutoCAD. We've had a few slit masks made at the UW machine shop using a wire EDM but this is expensive. We attempted to have some made at the NMSU machine shop using a laser cutter but the results are of low quality. However, in both cases we found that the scale factor between the slits and the sky is off by a small amount, so we are iterating on that to get the slit positions to match on-sky coordinates. Bill has also been working with former KOSMOS folks at NOIRLab to work out the intricacies of setting up the software configuration files to make it more applicable for APO. We are hoping by mid-September to have the process streamlined to help users create slit masks for multiobject spectroscopy. UC reps should remind their users of this exciting new capability at APO!
-Chip asked if anyone knows where KOSMOS users have placed recommendations for KOSMOS flat fielding given the bright rows in the flats attributed to the zeroth order. **Nancy will follow up and share this information once she has it.**
 ----
-=== Summer shutdown ===
+=== Summer shutdown recap ===
-Last month we discussed the fact that we have to delay the realuminization of the primary mirror due to the Contreras Fire at Kitt Peak. We are still actively pursuing other options, including whether a silver overcoat is an option that we can consider (we need to make sure that the short wavelength performance matches the needs of our users). Discussions of this topic remain ongoing.
+The problems that we had been having with the secondary mirror have not been recurring since shutdown; we hope it was resolved by the change in hardware that was made during shutdown. We are still vulnerable to a possible recurrence of the tertiary problem we had a few months ago but this is not a frequent issue so we hope it will not recur, The telescope came back together nicely after shutdown and we had good luck during the initial part of the shutdown recovery period. We expect to have good pointing with all instruments,
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 === Q3 3.5m scheduling ===
-As a reminder, because our summer shutdown was curtailed we have OPEN/DD time in August that can be requested. The early August time has been allocated, and although we have received several requests for the available time later in August, there is still some available. **UC reps please remind your users that they can request this time through the usual process** (submit requests to Russet, Nancy, Ben, and institutional scheduler, including a proposal cover page if the program doesn't already have one in place for Q3.
+There is only one remaining unassigned half night of time, on Sep 30A. [Note added in proof: this has now been assigned; there is no remaining open time in Q3.]
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 === Q4 3.5m scheduling ===
-The emails with the institutional allocations will be sent out later this week. We would like to know ASAP if any institutions expect to bring a class group to the site for training in Q4. This impacts our staffing schedule, for which we already have several constraints. //No one on today's call indicated that their institution is planning a class trip in Q4.//
+When the Q4 schedule comes out users should check it to verify the scheduling of their programs. We expect to publish the Q4 schedule by end of this week (i.e. on 9/9). There will be no on site classes in Q4. Several monitoring programs are requesting quarter nights in Q4. Users should copy Amanda Townsend (ajt@apo.nmsu.edu) in addition to Nancy, Ben, Russet, and their institutional scheduler on all schedule related emails.
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@@ Line 101: / Line 94: @@
 === Q3 ARCSAT scheduling ===
-The ARCSAT Q3 schedule is now published; there is still room for some more requests.
+There is some free time coming up after the week of 9/18 - the last week of the month is unassigned. Once Q4 schedule comes out we will post a call for Q4 ARCSAT proposals.
 ----
-=== Publications reminder ===
+=== Upcoming Meetings ===
+The ARC Board of Governors meeting is on Monday November 7. Nancy, Ben, and some of the observatory staff are starting to gather the relevant data and prepare their presentations.
+The January 2023 AAS meeting will be 8-12 January in Seattle. There will be lots of UW users there, and hopefully many from other ARC institutions and lease partners as well, We discussed options for doing something special for APO or ARC users. UC reps: please poll your users to see if they would be interested in an APO event (e.g. a meal or reception one evening) during the AAS meeting? One suggestion was to give out stickers to people with posters to indicate that they made use of APO data. Chip suggested that we try to connect those with undergraduates in attendance who are looking for graduate programs with representatives from other ARC member institutions, as a small-scale recruitment effort. Misty suggested that we start a Google Doc where people can list their APO-related posters and talks; this would help with connecting people. The abstract deadline for the meeting is Tuesday October 11!
+We will definitely have an APO booth in the exhibit area, so in a month or two Nancy will be looking for volunteers to help us staff the booth. Stay tuned!
-APO needs your help in updating the observatory publication record! Please send Nancy (nchanove@nmsu.edu) any references for 3.5m-related publications (refereed publications and student theses/dissertations that have been published or submitted) from Jan 1, 2021 to now. **The deadline was nominally July 31 but Nancy can take all updates through the month of August.**
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 Open action items from previous meetings:
-  * Nancy: start investigations re: short wavelength throughput (climate data, other facilities). Status: OPEN. Nancy reached out to some colleagues at other observatories to ask about short wavelength performance degradation of their optical coatings. She got some names from Bill and will contact those individuals next. The ongoing discussions about new coatings for the primary also relate to this issue so we will determine our coatings first before continuing to pursue this line of investigation.
+  * Nancy: start investigations re: short wavelength throughput (climate data, other facilities). Status: OPEN. No news. Old news: Nancy reached out to some colleagues at other observatories to ask about short wavelength performance degradation of their optical coatings. She got some names from Bill and will contact those individuals next. The ongoing discussions about new coatings for the primary also relate to this issue so we will determine our coatings first before continuing to pursue this line of investigation.
-  * UC reps: notify your users of remaining open/DD time in Q3.
+  * UC reps: notify your users of remaining open/DD time in Q3. -> CLOSED
-  * UC reps: remind your users to send Nancy all publications through 2021 by August 31, 2022.
+  * UC reps: remind your users to send Nancy all publications through 2021 by August 31, 2022. -> CLOSED
+  * Nancy: track down resources for KOSMOS flat fielding and post them. -> CLOSED.
-New action items from this meeting:
-  * Nancy: track down resources for KOSMOS flat fielding and post them.
+New action items from this meeting:
+  * UC reps: please poll your users to see if they would be interested in an APO-related event (e.g. a meal or reception one evening) during the Jan. 2023 AAS meeting.
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 === Next meeting ===
-The next meeting will be on **Tuesday September 6, 10:30 am MDT.**
+The next meeting will be on **Tuesday October 4, 10:30 am MDT.**
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