OSU/RC Queue Observing UTC 2011 Dec 28 (civil date 2011 Dec 28/29) =========================================== Observers: BShappee & ERyan Observing Assistant: Support Astronomer : DThompson Instrumentation : Instrument: MODS Summary: High Cirrus mostly on the horizon. Seeing ~0.5-0.8. Program completed: ND_oldsn with LBC (both OBs observed at beginning of night) OSU_Monitor targets observed: M81, N2403, N925, N672, N628 (first 2 from multi-epoch list, other 3 from priority 1 list) OSU_QSO targets observed: 0957 (all 4 OBs completed), 0949 (last 2 gz OBs completed) Minor issues with ellipticity during night requiring re-collimation Moderate issues including B arm lockup wherein the blue arm stopped taking images in the middle of the OB when the red arm continued Time lost due to instrumentation glitches: ~ 2 hrs Details: 25 Biases taken/ skyflats in 2 position angles, 5 point dithering Uspec and z B and i V and R (a bit dark so use with care) 01:45ish: preset sent to ND_oldsn_sn09ig_BR dofpia, /x2, /first 01:54: ND_oldsn_sn09ig_BR seeing blue~0.86 red~1.04 2:48: ND_oldsn_sn09ig_VI stopped after 6 images- sources elongated in blue- ellipticity in blue = .18. Ellipticity in red = .08 redo dofpia to correct and restart script at 2:51 UTC to finish last 8 of the 14 images after running dofpia, ellipticity still seems the same but the fits are within the 1.2 arcsec upper tolerance for the program. Proceeding with program, will give a few bonus frames to make up for mid-OB interrupt. Checking telescope log- blue trackers giving errors in the telescope log, so after OB finish, will restart LBC and see if that flushes the problem out of the system 3:06 UT: seeing about 0.7 arcsec in blue and 0.56 in the red 3:12 UT: end ND_oldsn_sn09ig_VI onto OSU_Monitor N925, decide not to restart instrument, proceed with dofpia at focus OB position approx 3:25 UT: start OSU Monitor OB for N925, estimated seeing from dofpia is red ~ 0.73 arcsec and blue ~ 1.04 arcsec first frames pop up- stars trailed in circular path, appears there is a rotation problem (blue frame *032428.fits and red frame *032413.fits), kill OB script at ~3:32 UT after 1st images. Field basically transiting, possible cause of problem? retry dofpia- finish about 3:47 UT, claims red seeing ~ 0.62 arcsec, blue seeing ~ 0.93 arcsec. B/c field at zenith, we have a longish slew btwn focus and science field as they are straddling zenith. try to use focus OB to co-align mirrors. 3:56 UT: start the OSU Monitor OB for N925 again. Spent enough time on dofpia and co-aligning mirrors that science field and focus field both on same side of zenith this time, so short slew! After first set of images find seeing as measured via imexam more like 1.5 arcsec. 2nd set of images gives seeing in red of about 1 arcsec and in blue of 1.4 arcsec. Little high in difference, watching the control system, it seems probable we're experiencing collimator drift. Last images look a tad better but 041237 has weirdness in chips 3 and 4- kinda bright-ish rope-y structure about 1000 counts above background. Ought not effect science however as it is not on the chip with the science target. 4:20 UT: off to N672 field for OSU monitor, hit the focus field first and run dofpia at ~4:25 UTC (long slew!) DOFPIA claims seeing in red ~ 0.80 arcsec, seeing in blue ~ 1.05 arcsec start actual data acquisition for N672 at ~4:38 UTC after 1st images: seeing ~ 0.65 in red, ~ 0.81 in blue 5:15 UTC: move to OSU Monitor N628 focus field, start w/ DOFPIA and coalign 5:22 UTC: move to N628 science field and start exposing, after 1st images finding seeing in red ~0.7-0.8 & seeing in blue ~0.9 noted that blue arm barfed and and only took 2 blue arm images, restart camera at ~6 UTC 6:06 UTC: restart and do DOFPIA to collimate 6:14 UTC: back to the science OB for OSU Monitor N628, may be slightly over needed airmass (is at 1.69) but seeing is ~0.8 in bleu and ~0.75 in red so we're going to try and complete this OB even at 35 deg elevation Last frames: 29 deg elevation (~2 airmasses) but 0.8 arcsec seeing in V and 0.75 in R! 6:52 UTC: move to N2403 focus field first N2403 science frames: 0.6 arcsec seeing in red (Bessell R), 0.73 arcsec in blue (Bessell B) 7:25 UT goto OSU_QSO obj 0957, letter a of the sequence first images give seeing 0.64 in g band and in z band seeing is 0.5 arcsec 8:10 UTC: do OSU_QSO obj 0957, letter b of the sequence, start science exposurers after reverifying the collimation seeing more of the rope-y structure on chips 3 and 4 of the blue channel 8:55 UTC: start DOFPIA again to check collimation before doing last gz OB for OSU_QSO obj 0957 8:58 UTC: start last of 3 gz OBs for OSU_QSO obj 0957 last frame (092948.fits and 092925.fits) have sat trail cutting across chip 3 and lower left corner of chip 2 9:45 UT: start ri 0957 OB for OSU_QSO after re-running the collimation in r band, seeing is 0.75 arcsec, and in i, seeing is 0.65 arcsec based on first images in the sequence 10:33 UTC: start OSU_Monitor M81 science field after collimation and co-pointing on focus field 10:55 UTC: start OSU_QSO object 0949 gz OB (1 of 2 needed to finish that field in program) blue arm crashed in first image, 11:25 restart OB- focus in blue poor, choose to rerun DOFPIA, gives results of red converge at 0.43 arcsec and blue converge at 0.84 arcsec. Note recent dewpoint temp drop, maybe we're at the edge of something weatherwise? 11:42 restart OB again 12:18 UTC run DOFPIA one last time before last OSU_QSO object 0949 gz OB. Start OB at 12:24 UT potentially one g image with bad read watch sky levels in the last couple images... 01:05 starting sky flats V V did 20 s set at pa =0, but prob to faint, double the exposure time and ran again PA = 180 then another set of V V g I V R figured might as well try to get the V for free be careful with the last 1 or 2 flats, sky getting bright