INAF LBC+MODS queue observing, 2011 October 19-20

Observer: K. Boutsia, M. Fumana, P. Santini
Telescope Operator: G. Bechetti
Support Astronomer: D. Thompson, O. Kuhn
Instrument: LBC+MODS

Summary

Clear skies at the beginning of the night but with very variable seeing from 0.7'' to 1.3''.
0.5h lost due to telescope problems - some actuators were off and had to be rebooted.
~1hr lost du to problems switching fromLBC to MODS - the shell ripped,the guider and wfsc had to be rebooted.
Lost 2x400sec images because the telescope jumped as we were transiting
The LBC team has reset a CCD controller manually and it has recovered automatically.
First INAF science night with MODS. A full set of OBs has been tested including calibrations. The data looks promising.

Data Summary

Project	Objects	Filter	ExpTime	Notes
Bragaglia	Ber81	Bbess - Vbess / Ibess	20min	the seeing was <0.8'', the OB finished at airmass 1.45 (lower than the requested limit 1.3) but we consider it within spec
Bragaglia	Ber98	Bbess - Vbess / Ibess	20min	the seeing was <1'' - within spec
Bragaglia	Ber99	Bbess - Vbess / Ibess	20min	the seeing was ~1.3 for the last blue image but all red images have <1'' - within spec
Clementini	AndXXV	Bbess - Vbess	1hr 20min	the seeing was <1'' for most images - within spec
Clementini	AndXXVII	Bbess - Vbess	1hr 20min	the seeing was <1'' for most images - within spec
STD	Stetson_L92	Bbess - Vbess / Ibess		1 position
STD	SA113	Bbess - Vbess / Ibess		4 positions
STD	SA98	Bbess - Vbess / Ibess		4 positions
Donnarruma	MAC0717b2	r_sdss	~1hr	the seeing was <1.2'' - STD + flat +lamps + bias obtained

Details

12:51 Dome is open and moving to take flats

01:05 SkyFlats

• BV 0 (2sec-1sec)
• BV_180 (1sec - 1sec)
• BI_0 (1sec-1sec)
• BI_180 (3sec-1sec)
• the blue counts are a bit low but in the red channel both filters should be fine

01:24 Slew to pointig star WT10_198

• dofpia,/first
• it seems that the telescope is not tracking in the red channel - intstead it is very bad astigmatism (??)
• repeat dofpia after manually setting global offsets Z=-0.8
• stopped after the 9th iteration - it is almost converging

01:45 lbcrangebal on WT10_198

• it does not work - it gives CA=0.0 and CE=0.0
• it was a network problem - we switched pc (obs3-> obs2) and now it is working

01:55 Slew to SA113 for standard calibration (elev~53 , airmass=1.23)

• dither in 4 positions

02:02 before going to our target we run again lbcrangebal on WT10_198

02:06 Slew to ber81 - dofpia

• dimm 0.9''

02:14 ber81.ob

• after first image, red channel clearly out of focus - stop OB
• dofpia

02:25 ber81.ob again

• red images still look bad - elongated
• we look at the PSF gui and some actuators are off

02:35 OB interrupted so that they can restore the actuators

• in the meantime we do dofpia
• blue channel started really bad but it recovered
• run dofpia once again - actuators are fine now and both channels converge

02:46 ber81.ob again

• half an hour lost due to telescope problems (actuators)
• images look fine now
• seeing measured on the images is <0.8''
• the OB finishes at airmass~1.45 (limit requested by the PI is 1.3 but with such good seeing we will consider them within spec)

03:01 Slew to ber98.ob - dofpia

03:11 ber98.ob

• seeing measured on the images <1.0''

03:25 Slew to Stetson_L92_1 (airmass ~ 1.5)

03:34 while we are uploading the second OB - LBC crashes (probably because the OB is not correct).

• it automatically restarts

03:35 Stetson_L92_2/3/4/5 (airmass=1.5)

03:51 preset to ber99 - dofpia

03:58 ber99.ob

• wind is picking up and seeing is getting worse
• the last blue image has fwhm~1.5 but all red images are <0.9'' (PI limit is 1.3, so we consider OB within specs)

04:14 slew to M31_AndXXV_400s_1 - dofpia

• dimm ~ 1.5''

04:20 M31_AndXXV_400s_1.ob

• seeing measured on the images is always <1.0''

04:43 slew to M31_AndXXVII_400s_1 - dofpia

• dimm ~ 1.4''

04:47 M31_AndXXVII_400s_1.ob

• seeing measured on first images is <1.0''
• last images have seeing <1.3''
• dimm 1.4''

05:11 slew to M31_AndXXV_400s_2 - dofpia

05:16 M31_AndXXV_400s_2.ob

• seeing measured on images: blue 1.25'' / red 1.15''
• last images have seeing ~0.7'' (blue) and ~0.9'' (red)

05:41 slew to M31_AndXXVII_400s_2 - dofpia * dimm 1-1.2''

05:47 M31_AndXXVII_400s_2.ob

• on of the blue images has 1/5 of the 4th chip saturated - F. Ped, will change clocking settings to see if this is the reason
• during the last exposure the camera has jumped and all sources are double in both channels.
• this probably happened because at 6:00UT the source crosses the meridian! the azimuth tracker has a problem(?)- the elevation though is not that high (~78)

06:12 repeat OB - M31_AndXXVII_400s_2.ob to see if the guiding problem persists

• this time all images are good and measured seeing is <0.8''
• dimm seeing ~0.75''

06:36 The OB has finished but before moving on F. Ped. will change the clocks to see if this is that caused the saturation on the 4th chip- blue channel (lbcb*.054738.fits)

• TurnOFF / Turn ON LBC to implement changed clocks...

06:44 slew to M31_AndXXV_400s_3 - dofpia

06:47 M31_AndXXV_400s_3.ob

• seeing measured on first mages: blue 0.65'' / red 0.6''
• seeing measured on images: blue <0.75'' / red <0.72''

07:09 slew to standard Stetson_L92_1/2 (two OBs only)

• airmass 1.21

07.22 bias - to verify that changed clocks did not introduce problems

07:24 slew to M31_AndXXVII_400s_3 - dofpia

07:30 M31_AndXXVII_400s_3.ob

• seeing measured on first mages: blue 0.86" / red 0.84"
• seeing measured on images: blue <0.91'' / red <0.88''

07:53 slew to M31_AndXXV_400s_4 - dofpia

• dimm seeing 0.8

07:57 M31_AndXXV_400s_4.ob

• seeing measured on second mages: blue 0.88" / red 0.84"

08:20 slew to M31_AndXXVII_400s_4 - dofpia * dimm seeing xxxx

08:25 M31_AndXXV_400s_4.ob

• seeing measured on second mages: blue 0.84" / red 0.90"
• seeing measured on images ~0.9''
• seeing measured on images ~1''

08:48 slew to standard Stetson_L92_1 (one OB only)

• airmass 1.48

08:55 Slew to SA98 for standard calibration (airmass=1.86)

• dither in 4 positions

09:02 Before switching to MODS F. PEd.&Co need to do a test

• during a 180sec exposure, the tracker has been manually disabled and it has recoverd on its own.
• in the meantime the telescope kept guiding.
• the test is considered successful

09:10 SWITCH TO MODS

09:30 We are switched to MODS but images do not arrive at the AGW.

• according to an old issue track that might be caused by the AZcam.

10:16 AZcam computer has been reboot.

• a preset has been send but the telescope sais that 'no star is found' - the star is there - we see it (active mode has failed)

10:18 repeat preset in acquire mode.

• the computers that run the guider and the wfsc have problems - they have been rebooted.

10:36 restart GCS

10:43 we are collimating and we can start with MODS * wind is pickinh up again - seeing is getting worse (1.5'')

10:46 slewing to the target - MAC0717 (mods.7189.201130b2.mms) - Donnarumma

10:49 taking the throughslit image (through the aquisition script) - acqMODS *acq

• MACS0717 - throughslit - aquisition (0001)
• field image (0002)
• to run modsAlign we NEED the mms files in one directory.
• we cp all mms files in Donnarumma and we run the command (from the same directory)
  

modsAlign mods.7189.201130b2.mms mods1r.20111020.0001.fits mods1r.20111020.0002.fits - it does not work from INAF account nor from LBTO

• we add absolute path that works on the LBTO account
  

modsAlign mods.7189.201130b2.mms /newdata/mods1r.20111020.0001.fits /newdata/mods1r.20111020.0002.fits - it does not work either on INAF account but it does work from LBTO

• we go on with the mask alignment using the LBTO account
• after centering the mask - the script exited without giving us the possibility to send the preset
• we send the preset manually from the MODS interface: offsetpointing -0.2026 2.167 -0.952 detxy rel
• in the throughslit all stars look reasonably aligned

11:05 execMODS *.obs

• seeing on the MODS guider - 1.2''
• during the first exposure the seeing si 1.1''-1.2''
• on the first image we see only the specta of the reference stars - no obvious spectra in the other slits.

12:01 dimm 0.9''

12:16 stop during 2nd exposure (800sec missing)

• we checked new data and it actually saved a 2250sec image (mods1r.20111020.0004.fits) and a 1381.9sec image (mods1r.20111020.0005.fits).
• this means that if an exposure is interrupted with the STOP command a file is saved with the integration so far - you don't loose the whole image (very useful!!)

12:22 acqMODS standard_star.acq

• we did find an appropriate guide star using LBTview
• the preset fails because it does not manage to collimate on the star (it is becoming bright)
• we collimate on a nearby bright star and we preset again - the preset fails
• we go ahead and take the through slit image because it is a standard and we use the 5'' slit so we should have all flux in the slit.
• 15sec as acquisition time is too much - tomorrow we will try 2sec
• the star is rather centered and we go ahead with the standard_star.obs
• the standard spectrum with 120sec has a maximum of 30000counts - this should be ok.

12:40 Closing telescope - moving in MODS calibration UNIT

• we need to check flats exposure times and whether the lamps are the correct ones for this grating - we do have a script for flats and lamps
• tomorrow we will need to make a cal script also for flats without the slits (for pixel to pixel corrections)
• before executing biases we need put MODS to sleep execMODS ~MODSeng/modsScripts/Support/modsSleep.pro
• after this we run the bias script

14:00 END OF NIGHT

• flats and arcs for MOS mask
• bias
• flats and arcs for the 5'' slit were obtained on 20111021UT

-- KonstantinaBoutsia - 20 Oct 2011