A big day for Magellan AO today. As planned, we packed up our computers and the NAS and moved them to the summit.
We first had to put a little work into the cable that runs power, data, and cooling to the NAS. This is the cable that needs to be wrapped up.Our computers and ASM electronics are in these nice wheeled racks. It makes us look like a rock band on the road.The first run to the top was our electronics racks and the CCD cooling system.
This video shows the truck leaving the cleanroom. This was the practice run for the much more delicate NAS.
The Magellan telescopes with the Aux building in between. You can see the truck with our racks and pump just backing up. Click for high resolution.
After lunch, we moved on to the NAS itself. We homed our stages, put on our dust covers, installed the electronics box lids, and threw it on a truck.
Laird and Jared roll the NAS over to the loading dock.The team is making sure the kick stands on the cart will clear.The NAS being rolled from the lift onto the truck.The NAS makes it onto the truck.All strapped down, we're ready to start the drive.Jared, Laird, and Jason wait for the drive to start.The NAS has just left the building. The truck is very carefully backed out of the parking lot so no sharp turns are made.The NAS about half way up the hill.
This video shows most of the loading process and the drive up the hill.
This video shows the NAS making the last turn at the top.
Just pulling in at the Clay telescope. Home at last.The NAS arriving at the Clay telescope. Finally.Unloading got a little tricky. The kickstands again.The NAS lives in the Aux building between the telescopes when we aren't using it. It's all tucked in for the night.The last thing we did was fire up the computers in their new home. We've been talking about whether our racks would fit in the equipment room for years. They do. Tyson, Jared, and Povilas discuss the finer points of caring for lifting straps.Our mascot supervised most of today's work from a high vantage point.But our friend couldn't bear to watch the drive up the mountain. Too scary.
The other big news from today was the run’s first Guanaco sighting. Laird caught some movement on the side of the hill on our way to lunch, and Jason and I got as close as we could to investigate.
A lone Guanaco watches us suspiciously. Click for high resolution.This is as close as it let us get. Based on last time, this probably means they'll be all over the place tomorrow. Click for high resolution.
We start our move up to the Clay tomorrow, so today was mainly spent getting ready. We disconnected and drained the supply lines for the NAS cooling system.
Laird, Jason, and Tyson move some hose.
That hose, along with a bunch of power and data cables, was made into a cable and we started wrapping it around the NAS. The NAS will move up to the Aux building between the telescopes tomorrow.
Another detail to worry about is balancing the NAS so we don’t overload the rotator motors. The crew finished a counter-weight today, and Alan and Tyson installed it.
A counter-weight to make the NAS easy to rotate. It's on top - most of the heavy stuff is on the bottom!
Meanwhile, we also tested the main chiller which keeps the ASM itself cool.
Jason in the exhaust tunnel.
Emilio wrote some software to monitor and control the system. See below for a video of it in action during the above test.
Control software for our ASM cooler.Here's Juan next to the PLC box. Thanks to everybody here and back at Steward who helped make this happen.
While everybody else has been getting their hands dirty, I’ve been putting our VisAO camera through some tests (mainly focusing). As I complain about regularly, we never get very much time to see what it can do. Here are some reduced images with our coronagraphic occulting spot.
Our coronagraphic occulting spot blocks our SDSS i' PSF. Same, but in our y-ish 1 micron filter.
Tonight’s quote: “Hey Laird, how long do you plan to use this instrument? I mean it’s not just for Jared’s PhD right?” (Jason Lewis)
Hector and Jose surprised us with Sushi at lunch.I noticed this nice little indoor garden today for the first time. I did get out of the lab just in time to see the top of the Sun.
Tyson and Jason finished designing our new cable wrap system. Here are some views of the plan (note: if you are an important person at Magellan, check your email for more):
The cable loops under the platform as the NAS rotates.The pipe guides the cable down through the hole.
Luckily Juan found a piece of 4″ PVC pipe to use for the “stove pipe”. I don’t want to know where it was used before.
This morning we declared our CCD cooling system air-tight and started running water through it. Here are some videos of the filling, pressurizing, and starting of the pump for the first time.
Laird ponders the risks and rewards of running glycol through our precious system.
All this plumbing appears to have paid off. Our CCD39 read noise is down to 4.1 electrons, and we can read our CCD47 (the VisAO science camera) full-frame with 4.5 electrons – and maybe lower depending on ambient temperature. The cooling system helps us achieve these numbers because it keeps dark current low. The CCD 39 having low RON helps us work on faint guide stars, especially important for Clio2 (in case you missed it, Katie posted an update on Clio2’s progress towards shipping here).
It wasn’t all work today.
We've been in the hands of Hector and Jose on this turno. The food is awesome.
Today’s quote: “I can imagine the feeling.” (Alan Uomoto)
And speaking of Alan, I know at least two things about him. He reads this blog, and he cares. So much so that he went out of his way to make sure that Marcia Males has a poop-free picture of her son.
Thanks to Alan and some windex, the bird poop is gone.
And on my way down for supper, I had a close encounter with the VisAO mascot. He’s getting to know me I think.
This morning we woke up to this: This light dusting was the most we got, though it spit throughout the day as the clouds rolled through.
We’re here for a reason – to find out what doesn’t work so we can fix it before the real deal happens in November. Today’s discovery was that the planned route for our cable wrap through the Nasymyth platform deck won’t work. Our instrument has to rotate to track the sky through the night, which means our power, data, and cooling lines all have to rotate with it. So we need a cable wrap to manage them as they get longer and shorter. Tyson and Jason are busy sketching out plan B.
Tyson on the catwalk under the Nasmyth platform, looking for a good place to cut a hole.
Speaking of cables, the staff has been running new network fiber for us. Our system moves lots of 1s and 0s every second, so we have our own networks to handle it all.
Emilio working in the tunnel under Clay.
The observatory was inside a cloud for most of the day. We frequently couldn’t see the next building over.
The Baade from just down the boardwalk.
Tonight’s quote: “Ok, whoosh is maybe a strong term. More like swish.” (Laird Close, discussing rotator speeds and decapitation)
Lunch was a good cold and foggy selection.Before my mom starts complaining, here's me. The bird poop is still there.It was starting to clear by dinner. Alan got a nice sunset shot.One of the last wisps of clouds.
Meanwhile, back in Tucson… We interrupt the NAS Fitcheck program to bring you this update on the Clio2 infrared camera.
After the Pre-Ship Review for Clio2 in Amsterdam in July, we have been completing preparations to receive diffraction-limited near-IR to thermal-IR photons from MagAO. Yesterday and today we installed the new J-band filter, and the cold pupil stops sized for Magellan. This was done in a CAAO lab at Steward Observatory in Tucson, where Clio2 is undergoing its final testing before shipment.
Cold pupil stops: Clio2 used to be “Clio” and was installed on the MMT telescope in Arizona. The MMT, like Magellan, is a 6.5-m telescope, but the Magellan secondary is 0.85m while the MMT secondary is 0.7m. Therefore, because the pupil is different, we needed two new cold stops for Clio2 on Magellan. A cold stop is a cryogenically-cooled metal mask located at an image of the telescope pupil, and its purpose is to block stray light (heat sources in the dome cause a lot of background thermal light) from contaminating the infrared image. Here is a picture of the pupil wheel with the new cold stops:
We also added a new J-band filter, taking out the old 3-5um Janostech filter from filter-wheel 1:
Clockwise from the red arrow: J (new), Blocked (for darks), Open (home), MKO M', Barr M, Direct vision prism, 3.1um, Barr L'.
We updated the Clio2 user manual at http://zero.as.arizona.edu/groups/clio2usermanual/ so that we can repeat this in Chile if need be. Note the tools required: Most of the wrenches were found in a standard set of Allen keys, except for the 0.035” driver which is a special size.
Tools required for changing Clio2 filters: Phillips/flat head, 0.035, 5/64, 3/32, 7/64, and 9/64 inch Allen keys.
It took about 3 hours to take it apart and insert the new filter and pupil stops, including finding new spacers, etc. It took about 1 hour to put it all back together.
T.J. Rodigas (foreground) and Andy Skemer (background) helped take Clio2 apart.The box labeled 3 and 4 contains filter wheels 1 and 2. The box labeled 2 contains the cold pupil stops. We disconnected the wires and unscrewed the bellows (those keep the shafts straight at cryo temperatures) to access the filter and pupil wheels.The same view as the previous image, with the filter and pupil wheels removed.Opening the pupil box to put in the new cold stops, and also Phil put in a new home switch. (Otherwise we could have just inserted the new cold stops through the port and not had to open it all the way.)Oli Durney putting Clio2 back together
