apo-wiki

Attending: Nancy Chanover (NMSU), Bill Ketzeback (APO), Ben Williams (UW),

Kevin Schlaufman (JHU), Zach Berta-Thompson (CU), Aleksandr Mosenkov (BYU), Eric Bellm (UW), Misty Bentz (GSU), Russet McMillan (APO), Anne Verbiscer (UVa), Moire Prescott (NMSU), Joanne Hughes (Seattle U), Michael Hayden (OU)

• BYU - nothing to report
• Colorado - nothing to report
• Georgia State - nothing to report
• JHU - nothing to report
• NAPG - no report
• NMSU - Moire has not been receiving the quarterly institutional passwords by postal mail - Bill will follow up
• Oklahoma - nothing to report
• Seattle - nothing to report
• UVa - nothing to report
• Washington - nothing to report
• Wyoming - nothing to report

The detailed site report is included below, followed by additional information discussed during today's meeting.

3.5-m Telescope and Instruments Highlights, 2/05/25 – 03/03/25

1) Overview

Weather wise, it was a milder and drier than average February. There was one on-site astronomer but no instrument teams visiting APO in the month of February. The first of two groups of students from CU were scheduled for their first night on the telescope last night.

2) Operations

There is a new version of TUI available: v. 3.1.8. Visit the TUI Downloads page from the APO website for this newest version.

3.5m Telescope: Telescope is working as expected.

0.5m Telescope: Telescope is working as expected.

KOSMOS: The disperser and mask wheels have been struggling with multiple failures. We are evaluating the problem but in the meantime, moving them by hand is the quick resolution when they get stuck.

ARCTIC: Maintenance on the diffuser mechanism is scheduled for the upcoming engineering time. We have had three failed ion pumps in the past many months. We were sent the wrong model. The manufacturer recognized that this was their error and they are replacing them. Once we get the correct model in stock we will swap out the one on the instrument.

Agile: The camera is back at the repair house as the testing with APO software revealed a failure to select gain settings within the software; the demo camera they sent along for testing also did not work during recent bench testing on site. They confirmed they received the equipment we sent back. We are waiting to hear back from the repair house if both cameras work or do not work with their software and our controller.

ARCES: System is currently up and usable. There was a recent report that flat fields are shifting. The orders appear to shift a few rows from image to image. The cause is unknown at this time especially since the instrument had been so stable for years. It is advised not to use super flats in your reductions unless you carefully compare individual raw images you are combining.

DIS: System is cooled and usable.

NICFPS: System is cooled and usable.

TripleSpec: System is cooled and usable.

APOLLO: The system is operational. The team is currently undergoing a campaign to find and receive returns off of the Next Generation Lunar Retroreflector (NGLR-1) on the Firefly Aerospace Blue Ghost Lander.

xxx

UPDATE: We have some unassigned time in Q1 (mostly B halves) - most urgently Feb 08B, but there are a few others in February and March as well. We have received some requests for this time already but if there are any urgent requests or high priority (e.g. students) programs please let us know ASAP, otherwise we will allocate time (at least the slots in the first few weeks of February) to the people who already made requests. This time is listed as OPEN on the Q1 schedule. Users should look at the schedule and follow the usual channels for requesting this time (i.e. email Russet, Amanda, Ben, Nancy and their institutional scheduler when submitting requests, and provide a proposal cover page if you don't already have a program scheduled for the current quarter).

UPDATE: The 2025 Q1 ARCSAT scheduled is posted. There is available time that people can request in the next week and a half, and then again in the last week of March. In early March we will have an onsite class and other stuff going on so ARCSAT is not available during weeks when the schedule is marked BUSY.

UPDATE: No new announcements. We are trying to resolve some recent issues related to TUI logins; lots of work is going on behind the scenes but there is no news or action items for the Users Committee this month.

We still have heard no news from NSF regarding the pre-proposal that was submitted for ASPEN. The UW Telescope Engineering Group has been working on their response to the Ocotillo Critical Design Review report. Preliminary discussions are ongoing about the possibility of replacing Agile with a more modern and capable high-speed imaging camera. We will keep this group posted as things develop.

UPDATE: Nancy has drafted an instrument decommissioning document that she and Bill are working on. The hope is to have this general document finalized before the end of the month so that it can be applied to DIS. The first order of business will be to issue a formal notification to all stakeholders about our plans to decommission DIS.

Open action items from previous meetings:

• Nancy: get Mt. Cuba Foundation proposal for new KOSMOS grisms submitted. STATUS: OPEN. The proposal is done; Nancy needs to distribute it to the users who requested the grisms to ensure that their science cases are adequately described. She plans to submit it before the next Users Committee meeting.
• Nancy: Ensure that a short description of the impact of satellites be posted on the APO website somewhere and updated every 6 months or so. Nancy received examples of this issue from Anne Verbiscer and will get something added to the current (and new) web site. STATUS: OPEN.
• UC reps: remind your users to review the Q1 schedule and request OPEN/DD time if they can make a good case for it. STATUS: OPEN.

Open action items from this meeting:

• None.

None

The next meeting will be on April 1 (no foolin'!), 2025 at 10:30 MDT.