Subject: APO 3.5m users committee minutes, Dec 2012
From: Suzanne Hawley
Submitted: Thu, 6 Dec 2012 20:24:11 -0800 (PST)
Message number: 1298
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APO 3.5-m Users Committee Phonecon, 12/03/12
Attending: Suzanne Hawley, Mark Klaene, John Bally, Scott Anderson, Jon
Holtzman, Rene Walterbos, Michael Strauss, Mary Beth Kaiser, Al Harper,
Remy Indebetouw, Bill Ketzeback, and Bruce Gillespie.
Absent: none
**********************************
User feedback and comments from institutional representatives:
o Washington (Scott Anderson) - Scott mentioned that John Wisniewski has
had recent experience using the echelle and reports that the flip mirror
is now working well. He has not seen any increase in overall throughput
since the new grating was installed. Mary Beth added that JHU users have
seen a drop (down about 25%) in the echelle lamp cals. Suzanne and Bill
noted that this is normal after a lamp changeout.
o Chicago (Al Harper) - Al had nothing new to report.
o New Mexico State (Jon Holtzman) - Jon had nothing new to report.
o Princeton (Michael Strauss) - Michael had nothing new to report.
o Colorado (John Bally) - John had nothing new to report.
o Virginia (Remy Indebetouw) - Remy had nothing new to report.
o Johns Hopkins (Mary Beth Kaiser) - Mary Beth had nothing new to report.
**********************************
Discussion of telescope/instruments report:
Mark said he thought things were going well, overall. There was a problem
with a Hub process memory leak, which was solved. The weather has been
exceptionally warm and clear of late. DIS is running well, with tuning of
the cryotigers and set points in progress. Agile has been well-behaved,
and SPIcam is back on the sky with its new vacuum window. SPIcam's recent
problem with noise pickup appears to have been solved with a new
electrical isolation disk.
Mark Klaene's detailed report for the reporting period follows:
*************************
3.5-m Telescope and Instruments Highlights
11/01/12 through 11/27/12
0) Overview
Productive period with good seeing at times and some weather-associated
lost time. One occurrence of loss time due to a HUB memory leak from a
test program that was running.
1) Telescope
The telescope performance has been nominal this period.
2) Instruments --
DIS has been operating nominally. Both red and blue cameras have been
functioning normally with good vacuum and temperature. Adjustments were
made to the cryotiger systems that affected blue temperature slightly.
We are seeing slight variations in CCD temps with diurnal variations of
ambient temperature as well as seasonal variations. The diurnal
variations vary with cameras to 2-6 deg K but often do not settle out
until 2 to 4 hours after sunset. We are looking at making improvements
and talking with the cryotiger manufacturer about options.
Agile had no issues this period.
SPICam window was replaced. The AR coatings on the new window are likely
better than the old window (we had no data on the old window). The new
window coating plots will be added to the documentation. A new aluminum
nitride disc was manufactured and installed to provide electrical
isolation between the cold strap and the cyrotiger coldhead. Bias levels
are comparable to pre-shutdown levels. SPIcam is now back in routine
operation (as of Nov 19).
The new TripleSpec cart is in routine operation. We had one failure of
the cart's jacking mechanism that has been repaired.
Echelle is operational. We are testing new cables this week that should
improve flip mirror operations. The slitviewer camera had another shutter
failure. This is a design flaw in the APOGEE camera. We are now running
on Ed Leon's in-house driver circuit indefinitely.
NIC-FPS is operating in shared-risk observing mode due to occasional image
corruption issues.
**********************************
GIFS status and training opportunity:
Suzanne discussed the status and plans for GIFS, the "Goddard
Integral-Field Spectrograph", formerly known as GFP. Mike McElwain (the
new PI at Goddard following Bruce Woodgate's retirement - thanks Bruce for
all your efforts over the years!) and Carol Grady wish to train users in
its use. Users were asked to send observing proposals, although not much
feedback has been so far received. Bill mentioned that GIFS is usable as
a direct imaging instrument, without the coronal stop, in the wavelength
range from 4800A to 7800A, which hopefully will soon be increased to 4000A
to 9000A. The integral-field spectrograph has about two-thirds of its
functionality implemented -- the high-resolution grating is not yet
available, and a draft version of the GIFS users manual has just been
posted on the APO website. The Fabry-Perot option is not currently
available for users. Carol Grady has also offered to help users learn how
to run the data reduction software. Suzanne said that the on-site
training will likely be in Q2, to insure that the instrument software,
manuals, etc. are fully ready. Several of the users committee agreed that
it was better to wait a couple months than to try to do the training
before everything is in place and properly working. Bill said that an
announcement will be sent to apo35-general before the next proposal cycle.
Suzanne said that the training will be done during DD time, and then the
science programs will be block-scheduled adjacent in time to the training.
Users are encouraged to review the users manual, and to contact Mike and
Carol for more information if they wish to put in a proposal for Q2 and to
attend the on-site training.
**********************************
DIS slitviewer:
The slitviewer focus mechanism was upgraded in November and appears to be
working well. Mark stated that the DIS slitviewer upgrade is making good
progress. We are planning to replace the camera and working on an optics
upgrade. Bill added that the current system has a 2-1/2 arcminute FOV on
a side, and we are aiming to get up to 4 arcminutes with the new system.
Also, the slit-view data should be less noisy.
**********************************
Issue with image headers (time reporting):
Bill reported that we have been inconsistent in the header UT1 and LST
time stamps since the summer shutdown. This was fixed in early November,
but users need to know that the header times were incorrect, often by a
large amount. In any case, Suzanne recommended that users should try to
use TAI.
**********************************
Echelle update:
Jon Holtzman said he is still working on the echelle throughput question,
i.e., did it improve as hoped for after the new grating installation last
summer. The instrument is fully operational, however. Mark mentioned
that the echelle slitview shutter failed again -- the problem is with the
Apogee electronics, and we are now using a home-brew driver circuit that
seems to be working well.
**********************************
TUI support ending for Mac OS 10.5:
Suzanne reminded us that TUI support for Mac OS 10.5 will be ending in
June 2013 when summer shutdown starts. All users are encouraged to
upgrade to at least Mac OS 10.6 (the current version if Mac OS 10.8).
**********************************
Other business:
Mark said that although we continue observing operations through the
holidays, between Dec. 22 and Jan. 1 the day staff support will be
minimal. E-mail and phones will continue to be monitored as usual.
**********************************
ACTION ITEMS:
[open from previous meeting]:
===> ACTION: Send new ARC partner suggestions to Suzanne and Rene (before
next meeting).
Status: Open, committee members need to keep sending suggestions.
We need the names of institutions (of any size) and a named contact.
Send info to Rene, Suzanne and Bruce.
===> ACTION: Users committee members should discuss APOGEE fiber feed to
3.5-m proposal with their users and forward feedback, and ideally name(s)
of interested users who would be willing to participate in an ATI proposal
to Suzanne, Mark and Fred Hearty.
Status: Open, see notes from previous meeting. Suzanne didn't
hear much feedback. At the ARC Board meeting, the possibility of keeping
the APOGEE spectrograph at APO hinges on the success of getting funding,
possibly through the MRI grants program, to build a 2nd spectrograph for
APOGEE-2S.
**********************************
Next meeting: The next Users Committee phonecon will be on Monday 15
January at 8:30 AM Pacific Time. The agenda and other materials will be
sent to the committee members during the preceding week.
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