Apache Point Observatory 3.5m User's Committee Meeting ****************November 9, 1998********************** Attending: Michael Strauss, Rene Walterbos, Bruce Gillespie, Ed Turner, Jeff Brown, Chris Stubbs, Ed Kibblewhite. Not attending: Alan Uomoto Agenda: Results from the Seattle meeting The status of the Echelle installation new secondary and its mounting Status of GRIM Miscellaneous Appendix: Minutes of a phone-con on rebuilding the telescope front-end ************Seattle Meeting Highlights************* There was a 3.5m user's community meeting held in Seattle at the end of October. Minutes from the meeting were not taken; we here summarize the highlights. It was agreed that the current scheme of having institutional shares in telescope time adjusted whenever a new instrument is built was not working; in particular, it was not giving sufficient incentive for people to build instruments. It was suggested instead that the observatory as a whole would make arrangements with individual instrument builders both inside and outside of ARC, to have them supply instruments for the telescope. For outside instruments, the arrangement would be to exchange the use of already existing instruments by the APO community for guaranteed telescope time, as well as the opportunity to get more time by collaborating with ARC institution members. Within the collaboration, the idea would be to have ARC institution instrument builders propose to build an observatory instrument, in exchange for guaranteed observing time, as well as some amount of in-kind resources and/or cash from the observatory. An instrument builder could use this to "sweeten the pot" in a instrumentation proposal he or she was writing, e.g., to the NSF. The director would have a pot of money and/or telescope time for these negotiations in both cases, with advice by the User's Committee, or some equivalent advisory body. Approval of this idea awaits the upcoming ARC Board of Governor's meeting. Also discussed in Seattle were plans to formalize arrangements with Chris Stubbs' engineering group at Seattle, to have their responsibilities with respect to maintenance of the telescope and instruments, and on-going improvements to the system (automated tertiary rotation, tip-tilt guiding, DIS chip upgrades, etc.) acknowledged and formalized. There was a general recognition that it is well-nigh impossible to run a 4-meter class telescope for under $1 million per year, which is indeed close to the current operating budget, once you include the funding of the 3-year plan, and in-kind contributions. It was therefore deemed advisable to continue funding operations plus general upgrades (including new instruments) at the current spending rate, for at least the immediate future. *********Echelle Installation********************* Gillespie: The echelle will be lifted to the telescope level this morning. Things are going fine. [Update from Gillespie: a fit problem was encountered 11/11, requiring modification of the hole in the floor. this may cost a week in schedule.] Counterweights for the telescope are being put in now (at least in a temporary way; the final version of it will be done somewhat later). [Update from Gillespie: "Final" counterweights were delivered 11/12 and are being installed.] Fiber-optic interfaces are going in soon. In general, things seem to be on track. [Update from Gillespie: On-sky tests may begin around the week of 11/23]. See the APO web page for pretty pictures of the installation process: http://www.apo.nmsu.edu/Telescopes/ARC.progress.html Commissioning of the instrument is planned as two-phase. Shu-i Wang is in charge of the first phase, to do hardware commissioning/installation; this should be completed by the end of November. The second phase is science commissioning, starting early December and lasting through February or so, to get the instrument to the point that it can be used by general users. It should be available for general use by 2nd quarter in 1999, and on a shared-risk basis by the end of the first quarter. In fourth quarter, the time for science commissioning will be taken as engineering pre-empts from pre-scheduled observing, with 2-week notice where possible, and possible protection of some already-scheduled programs. Once the echelle has been permanently mounted, and once the automated rotation of tertiary is in place, we can switch between instruments *very* quickly, which will allow us to set observing plans based on the weather of any given night. *************New Secondary and its Mounting************* There is a good chance of a delivery of the new secondary in January 1999; polishing is now underway at Steward. We hope to be able to mount the secondary on the current top-end "as soon as we get it." Jon Davis is managing this effort. This will not have all capabilities we would like to have (but should allow us to benefit immediately from the expected improvement in image quality). Thus there is an effort to build a more permanent mount for it, a rebuilding of the entire telescope front-end, on a timescale of 6-9 months, which will include such goodies as tip-tilt capability. Ed Kibblewhite is taking the lead on the development of this new front-end. See the appendix for minutes of a phone con discussion of the new front-end plans. The following, from these minutes, is a list of improvements this new front-end will have, together with the person in charge of each: o implement tip-tilt secondary motions, Chris Stubbs o fix temperature hysteresis in truss, vanes, etc., Jon Davis o suppress vibrations, Ed Kibblewhite o enable more vane tension, Jon Davis (see WIYN) o enable motorized x-y secondary translation, Chris Stubbs o implement AO laser launcher (by July?), Ed Kibblewhite o improve thermal management, Ed Kibblewhite o implement position, temperature, acceleration metrology, Chris Stubbs o make mods to focus motion (improve speed, etc.), Chris Stubbs The median seeing has been 0.9" with GRIM, and 1.1" with SPICAM recently, implying that things are going to be really wonderful with the new secondary, if we get the expected improvement in the image quality of a few tenths of an arcsecond. ******************Status of GRIM********************* It has been a dramatic few weeks. GRIM had a hard failure last week. Dale Sanford, one of the original GRIM builders, happened to be at APO, working on echelle; reseating some of the processor cards, and some of the chips thereon, brought it back to life. Dale will work on some of the other electronic problems that GRIM shows (which manifest themselves when reinitializing after cycling the power). ****************Observing Specialist**************** We're up to full strength again. Russet McMillan, who has been working on the SDSS Monitor Telescope, has come over to the 3.5m. She has a PhD in astronomy, and therefore can bring a unique perspective in terms of a scientist working with a telescope full-time. ****************New Quartz Lamps********************* Bernadette Rodgers has taken the lead on getting new, brighter quartz lamps for flats, with much help from the staff at APO. Gillespie emphasizes that this is the way we should work, when members of the User's Community see a need, and work with APO staff to see it done. ****************Primary Support Oscillations******** Gillespie: There is a maintenance issue: If water gets into the compressed air system, nasty things can happen, which has caused some oscillations in the primary in recent weeks. We are looking for ways to keep the air in the system dry with local dessicants, even in the presence of tiny leaks. They are now pumping dry nitrogen through the system, to get the water out. There will be a Board of Governors meeting November 24. The budget presented there will include the third year of the 3-yr plan, plus routine operations, plus an additional 1/2 FTE of telescope engineer because the current person shared with SDSS is being stretched too far. Stubbs: Let's sustain the level of effort going into the 3-year plan in instrumentation support/development, and telescope improvements. The folks in Seattle are planning to lead that effort. The formal decision for this will take place at the BoG meeting. Last month's minutes are approved. Next meeting, Monday, December 14, 12:30 PM Eastern Time. ***************Appendix********************************* Minutes of Telecon to plan for installing new secondary and for subsequent top-end enhancements Attendees: E. Turner, C. Stubbs, M. Klaene, J. Davis, B. Gillespie, A. Uomoto, E. Kibblewhite "Quick Mount" plan for new secondary o agreed that imperative to get mirror mounted as soon as practical after receipt o transverse support need modification--design, fabrication o use same wiffles, lengthen or otherwise modify "flexure" connectors o use SDSS adhesives on pads, etc. o glue pads to mirror when they are attached to wiffles o modify flexures to gain compliance o Jon Davis to design mount mods, group to review, UWash to fab and help install o need to specify our "acceptance" procedure for SOML delivery of mirror o APO coats mirror at Sunspot, bare aluminum o collimation using Shack Hartmann--get SH tester ASAP and use on existing mirror first o need to get quantity of "Alloy 39," APO to procure(?) o need to make new custom handling band, APO to procure "Phase II" plan for Front-end enhancements List of improvements and "owner" o implement tip-tilt secondary motions, Chris Stubbs o fix temperature hysteresis in truss, vanes, etc., Jon Davis o suppress vibrations, Ed Kibblewhite o enable more vane tension, Jon Davis (see WIYN) o enable motorized x-y secondary translation, Chris Stubbs o implement AO laser launcher (by July?), Ed Kibblewhite o improve thermal management, Ed Kibblewhite o implement position, temperature, acceleration metrology, Chris Stubbs o make mods to focus motion (improve speed, etc.), Chris Stubbs APO APO APO APO APO Apache Point Observatory 3.5m APO APO APO APO APO This is message 322 in the apo35-general archive. You can find APO the archive on http://www.astro.princeton.edu/APO/apo35-general/INDEX.html APO To join/leave the list, send mail to apo35-request@astro.princeton.edu APO To post a message, mail it to apo35-general@astro.princeton.edu APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO