GBT Operations & Commissioning Meeting 19 August 2004 AGENDA 1. Az track, antenna Report -- Bob 2. Observing News -- Ron 3. Scheduling Status -- Carl 4. Frontends, IFs, and Spectral Baselines -- Roger 5. Spectrometer Status -- Rich 6. Software Status -- Nicole 7. Project Planning Status -- John 8. Any other Business REPORTS 1. Az track, antenna Report Track: * The 3 plates made from 4340 are almost ready. Max Gum will pick them up on Tuesday. * The 4 plates made from 4140 have been straightened, and are being surface ground. Will be ready in 2 to 3 weeks. * We expect metallurgy results on the original plates also late next week. * We collected tilt data again last week. Two joints are pretty high, but we are awaiting the new plates before working them, as one of the plates involved is the one with the worst cracks. We will replace that one, and maybe one or two others due to the gouging at the end of those plates. It appears that that is a big factor in those tilts, and cannot be shimmed without leading to worse cracking. * SGH is working on Task 1. We should be ready to review that around Labor Day. -- RAA 2. Observing News This week we supported nine projects in twelve observing sessions. About 100 hours were scheduled for observing, 12 for SDD tests and releases, and 12 for receiver checkouts and commissioning. Lost time this week is much higher than for the last few weeks and amounted to about 7% of the time scheduled for observations and tests. The significant sources of lost time were: o Spigot setup : 165 min o Spigot software release : 110 min o Problems requiring a system-wide restart : 105 min o Titania logging out the observer : 70 min o RFI @ S-band (digital radio?) : 40 min o Antenna (Az Transducer; trajectory failures) : 25 min I have no details as to why the Titania problem took so long to fix. The average setup time was longer than usual (~55 minutes) almost exclusively because most observing used the Spigot card. Continuum X-band tests and the 300 MHz receiver checks went well. Toney and Glen will work on X-band spectral-line and polarization tests next. We've assigned all of the recently-reviewed 4C proposals to the various support scientists. Most of the proposals can be scheduled without any checkouts. My preliminary estimate is that we were too pessimistic when we allotted telescope time this fall for checkouts. Those that require checkouts are either Q-band proposals that need good baselines (a project Phil and I are scheduled to work on) or those that will use widely separated bands (which tend to exasperate our problems with I.F. power levels). Most of the latter proposals can be checked out during a maintenance day and without a moveable antenna. -- RJM 3. Scheduling Status Last Week ========= Observations for proposals GBT04A-030, GBT04A-045, GBT03C-031, GBT02A-021, GBT04B-003, GBT04B-026, GBT04B-029, GBT04B-008, GBT04B-009 Next Week ========= Observations scheduled for GBT02A-021 PI Felix Lockman A Search for Recombination Lines from Diffuse Gas in the Galactic Center Region GBT04B-037 PI Scott Ransom A Pilot 350MHz Survey for Fast Pulsars GBT04B-017 PI Amy Lovell OH Observations of Long-Period Comets GBT04B-008 PI Haydon Knight A High Sensitivity Millisecond Pulsar Survey GBT04B-009 PI Joseph Lazio Direct Detection of Baryons in the Local Group: Giant Pulses from Extragalactic Pulsars Scheduled hours [backup] ======================== Category/Month-> August September October November Astronomy ~ 389 331 [154] 306 [016] 391 [056] Maintenance ~ 208 210 91 [051] 21 [077] Test & Comm ~ 144 174 [055] 269 [004] 175 [008] Shutdown ~ 0 0 0 36 Un-assigned ~ 3 5 79 98 Proposal Checkouts ================== Awaiting checkout - 39 Active checkout - 5 On Hold - 5 Schedule - 49 Completed - 210 Current backlog [hours prior to 04B*] = 1420 Total time to discharge [hours] = 3101 * Includes projects that are on hold for trimester 04B -- RCB 4. Frontends, IFs, and Spectral Baselines Operational issues: No new operational issues this week. Baselines: Nothing new to report. Q-band: Work continues on the Q-band receiver. Tests this week indicate that the LO X4 multiplier is not a major contributor to the noise power ripple. X-band: The X-band receiver was installed on Monday the 16th as planned. Initial tests indicate the receiver is functioning as expected. Other: Detail work on the Penn Array electronics shielded box is proceeding (by Jeff Cromer), and we hope to have drawings out for review next week. R. Norrod 8/19/2004 5. Spectrometer Status 6. Software Status 7. Project Planning Status August 16, 2004 Planning Meeting Minutes Rm 137 10:45 A.M. [0] Observer comments & operator log items resulting in lost time: Observer's comments: Tom Bania et. al. A very useful set of comments. Most comments were favorable, including support, system performance, reliability. Operator's log comments Significant failures the past 2 weeks stemmed from: Computing: Titania OS failed Really what happened is the observer's session failed, causing them to have to re-start all their windows. Software: Converter rack restarts, Spectrometer Manager faults, Spectrometer data interrupt failures, IF Manager confused, security failure, software system failure, GO failure Nothing out fo the ordinary here. Electronics: Optical Receiver #1 power loss, structural temperature sensor, RFI @ S band in geostationary belt Telescope/Servo: AZ transducer fault, AZ redundant prelimit failure Other Problems from Observing Reports: T. Minter Reports on beta release of Observing system Problems setting up spectrometer reliably G. Langston : rt_idl reports [1] Resource calendar schedule conflicts and discussions No conflicts noted [2] Observing Schedule discussions Nicole brought up that the SDD was ready to release the M&C release that was set to be released on THursday, so it was decided to do it Monday night instead. [3] GBT development planning Discussion of Draft of CCB proposal The draft of the GBT Change Control Board proposal was approved, and Bob Anderson will forward a checklist that he developed some months ago for mechanical and electrical modifications. The document will be edited and released soon. [4] AOB None -- JMF 8. Any other Business