Observing log for UT 2011/02/07

Weather: Widespread cirrus at sunset, clearing slowly as the night
continued. We lost 3-plus hours to high winds. After opening again,
the clouds seemed to be all gone.

Seeing: 1.5 to 2'' most of the night, except for a couple of hours
right after re-opening the dome, when it was more like 0.8''.

Programs: 
OSU_monitor -- completed targets N628, N672, N2403, N2903, M81a,
N3344, and N4258.

OSU_wl -- obtained all requested g' band images of RX J1048. We were
not able to obtain U band images due to seeing and guide star issues
(see detailed notes).


Detailed notes:

01:03 Sunset. Thin clouds over the whole sky, so no flat fields.

02:02 Started focus OB for OSU_monitor, target N628.
02:15 Started N628.
Seeing around 2''. Still some thin cirrus all over.

02:50 Started focus OB for OSU_monitor, target N672.
02:58 Started N672.  seeing ~1.5-2.0 variable, still have high winds

03:31 Started focus OB for OSU_monitor, target N2403.
Cirrus clearing up. Still visible low in the west.
03:38ish Started N2403

03:47 Started focus OB for OSU_monitor, target N2903. Aborted because
elevation is low and collimation is probably still ok from the last
fpia. Now we need to rotate the dome.
04:01 Focus OB.
04:05 Started N2903.

04:45 Started focus OB for target M81.
04:51 Started M81 science OB.
The first image has star trails, as if the rotator was moving during
the exposure and the guider was compensating.

05:04 Closing for wind. We managed to finish the M81 OB.

08:05 Opened. Doing pointing and collimation.
08:17 Started focus OB for OSU_monitor target N3344.
Stopped by hand since dofpia seemed to be chasing some elusive spherical.
08:27 Started N3344. Seeing less than 1''.

09:01 Started collimation for OSU_wl program.
09:13 Started RXJ1048_gz1.ob. Checked the tech chip image to ensure
that the collimation star was there.
Seeing is pretty stable at ~0.8''
09:41 Started RXJ1048_gz2.ob
10:10 focusing and collimating
10:16 seeing still ~0.8'', starting  RXJ1048_Uz1.ob
10:34 Aborting; no useful data. We never were able to find a guide star.
Pointing check.
10:40 Running dofpia
10:45 Trying RXJ1048_Uz1.ob again... There is no guide star.

10:48 Moving to target RXJ1420_Uz1.ob for program OSU_wl. Collimating.
10:55 Starting RXJ1420_Uz1.ob
Stopping after one image. Seeing went down the tubes.

11:02 Started focus OB for target N4258, for project OSU_monitor.
11:18 No convergence, large bending forces. Clearing Zernike terms and
restarting collimation.
11:25 Started N2458 science OB.
11:33 Totally out of focus. Aborting and recollimating. Outside
temperature is increasing rapidly, which may be causing this
craziness.
11:48 Restarting the science OB. Dofpia converged, but the bending
forces are still large. PSFs are reasonable now.
12:25 Finished.

Preset failed because of large bending forces. Resetting.
12:38 Starting focus OB for target N5194.
12:48 Finished focusing. Twilight. Closing up shop.

Took biases.

Took sky flats in V, g', and U_spec. B band flats will have to come
later.