Weekly Report for Week Ending March 16, 2000

The LIGO Executive Committee Agenda for Monday  March 20, 2000 will be:
 (Meeting time: 10:30 am Pacific Time)

Open meeting 10:30 - 11:30

1. Announcements
2. LSC Issues (Weiss)
3. Comments on Weekly Report
4. WBS 1 LIGO I Construction (Lindquist)
• Field Change Orders/Contingency Liens/Change Requests
5. WBS 2 LIGO Lab Operations
• Administration (Lindquist)
• Sites (Raab, Coles, Shoemaker, Sanders)
• Detector (Whitcomb, Coyne)
• Campus Research Facilities (Weinstein (40 Meter), Libbrecht (TNI), Zucker(LASTI))
• Data Analysis and Computing (Lazzarini)
6. WBS 3 and 4  Advanced R&D and LIGO II (Sanders)

Special Items:   LSC meeting reprise

Special Announcements:

Weekly Report Highlights
 
 

LSC Issues (Weiss)

No report this week.  LSC meeting in progress at LLO this week.

LIGO I Construction/LIGO Laboratory Administration (Lindquist)

WBS 1.2 LIGO Operations--Administration

LIGO Weekly Site Telecon (Jasnow)

From: Ed Chargois <chargois_e@ligo.caltech.edu>

Assisted the Seismic Isolation Section (R. De Salvo) with the packing and shipping of Seismic hardware to the LIGO Livingston Observatory (S. Mark).   Account Number LIGO.00002 3 NSFLIGO.504800.

Assisted the Systems Administrator with the packing and shipping of a Computer and two (2) Monitors via SDI Freight Company to the LIGO Livingston Observatory (B. Evans).  Account Number LIGO.00003  1.5.3 NSFLIGO.000001.  A Claim is being filed against SDI for late delivery.

Assisted the Detector Group (B. Smith) with the packing and shipping of hardware for the 4K PO Beam Optical Train to the LIGO Hartford Observatory (B. Weaver). Account Number P96937.

Provided the LIGO Safety Officer with a copy of the Laser Inventory and Registration Form for ANSI classification for Lasers 3B and above, also a copy of the inspection findings.  This report does not include the 40M Lab.

Requested for Lease two (2) Vehicles (Truck 1/2 Ton  B/ extended Cab) from the General Services Administration for the LIGO Livingston Observatory.  Copies of this request is being forwarded to the appropriate personnel.

From: the DCC <dcc@ligo.caltech.edu>

ACTIVITY HIGHLIGHTS

• For this week's processing statistics, check the DCC web page.
• Prepared and released 1 DCN.
• All processing was completed for the facility as-built drawings for the Livingston Observatory.  These are now available electronically.
• Received four full boxes of travel files from Irene.  These were addded to the database and filed into new folders for the shelves.
• Handled a large volume of electronic document submittals.
• More than half of the SEI as-built drawings from Hytec were added to the database.  As soon the remaining documents are processed, all 200+ drawings will be available electronically and posted on the web.

 

	Packages	Faxes
In	26	32
Out	20	54

Special Projects: Prepped and shipped 6 packages from Gateway that were suppose to have gone to Livingston.  Continued to work on Hytec electronic drawings.

From: Esther Cunningham <esther@ligo.caltech.edu>

Press here for ACCOUNTS PAYABLE HISTORY DATA.

From: "Brambila, Ruth" <Ruth.Brambila@caltech.edu>

Just became aware of a delinquent account with GE regarding a copier which needs to be brought current.  Looks like a buyout of the copier needs to be negotiated and the payoff made to bring our account current.  I'll being working on this next week.

Working on setting up the folders for subcontracts that need to get approvals from across the street.

From: Florence Kaufman <fkaufman@ligo.caltech.edu>

• Completed monthly Operations reports for fiscal years 1999 and 2000 for activity through February 29, 2000.
• Finalized reporting format for Site Facilities accounts - new format included in the February reports.
• Working with Travel Audit group to see if any additional travel encumbrances need to be deleted.

For a listing of the FY 2000 POETA Accounts see

http://docuserv.ligo.caltech.edu/docuserv/home/accts_ops.pdf
http://docuserv.ligo.caltech.edu/docuserv/home/accts_adv.pdf

From: irena@ligo.caltech.edu (Irena Petrac)

• No report this week.
• MIT: Conversations with NSF indicate that they might approve the change order for FY 2000 with the caveat that additional materials will be required including budget sheets for each funding source in the standard NSF format. --pel

From: Ed Jasnow <jasnow@acrux.ligo.caltech.edu>

Discussion continues concerning the acquisition of computers.  At a meeting held yesterday between all division administrators and the Caltech administration, represented by Bill Jenkins and Al Horvath, all of the unresolved details of the "buy only through Wired" policy were reviewed.  It was agreed that Al Horvath would continue to research these issues to try and resolve them.  One of these is LIGO's use of its Acquisition personnel to acquire computers.  Until this is resolved, we will continue to purchase computers with P-cards, and, where we can't, we'll go to Wired, unless they cannot give us the best price and delivery, and then we'll use our Acquisition personnel.

Irene Baldon

Worked on preparing the paper work for eight new trips taken recently or upcoming (8 Payment Requests and 3 Advance Requests). There are approximately an additional 11 new trips in various stages pending completion of travel arrangements before the paper work can be completed.

Completed 57 Expense Reports, some of which were extensive, involving 2-3 or more pages each. There are 21 Expense Reports still to be done. I'm holding six completed Expense Report which requires a check from the Traveler before sending to Travel Audit to clear.

Performed normal recording and filing associated with Travel and Reimbursement.

Prepared the Travel/Vacation Itinerary for the Week of March 13, 2000.

Rita Torres

For I. Petrac formatted, from their respective emails, 6-month LSC reports for CACR-CIT, IAP-Russia, and CEGG-CIT then submitted electronically for DCC posting after review. Formatted CRRI-Russia Attachment 1. Also formatted Attachments B, and Z for Iowa State University; these to be reviewed during LSC meeting at LLO. Did letter to FedEx Attachments A, B, & Z with University of Colorado (JILA).

During this quiet time, helping D. Lloyd to capture transactions recorded under one Poeta which should have been recorded under a different Poeta. Some transactions are to the 1999 account codes, others to the new 2000 codes.   Usual P-card activities.   For P. Lindquist FedExed Annual Report to NSF.

Dorothy Lloyd

The processing of requisitions, invoices and receiving on-line continues. However, for whatever reason, the total invoices received this week for processing was much lower. For more detail see "Cost Schedule Control Systems" report by Esther Cunningham.

Tracked and follow up on various invoice problems.

Reviewed payments processed by Esther for the period March 1-10. Payments were entered in contract summary sheets and the LIGO database by both Jim and me.

Monitored contract and blanket order funding levels and notified task managers where supplements needed to be made.

Elizabeth K. Wood

Successfully submitted LIGO's Annual Report via FastLane. Currently working on an outreach proposal for Fred Raab.

Made preparations for the NSF Site review in May, including making hotel reservations and dinner arrangements at the Ath for the visitors.

LIGO II (Frey)

No report this week.  Thomas Frey and Irena Petrac are attending the LSC meeting in Livingston to get plugged into the LIGO II process.

• The FY 2000 Annual Work Plan has been submitted to the NSF in their FastLane on-line system.
• The Annual Report has been sent to the NSF.  See: http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~phil/AnnualReport/November99.pdf
• A reminder that we must prepare a Quarterly Progress Report for the Quarter ending February 2000.  I have requested materials by the end of next week.

The following change requests have been submitted:
 

Press for the latest Contingency Needs Projection.

From: Kris Duncan <kris@ligo.caltech.edu>

• Completed the January 2000 Cost/Schedule Status Report (CSSR).  This report included only earned value on level of effort activities.

[Our intent here is to jump ahead two months to the end of February to catch up.--pel]
• Advanced the calendars in COBRA, rebuilt indexes and began the input of actual costs and commitments through February 2000.  Ran draft cost performance reports and earned value reports for task managers to update.
• Initiated a reconciliation of actual costs reported by CIT finance and LIGO.
• Continued with construction contract/work package close out.
• Resolved (finally) the registry problems on my PC.

• The monthly reports (Allocation of Actual Costs for Construction, 1997 Operations, and Advanced R&D) for the period ending February 2000 has been put on the network. E-mail has been sent to the Task Managers noting the location of the files.
• I continue to work on identifying the open encumbrances for the Construction and Advanced R&D accounts. This seems to be moving along.
• I continue to work on identifying the actuals paid and open encumbrances charged against the LIGO non-existing accounts (formerly referred to as "Roll-up" accounts, which are actually summary accounts that are not recognized as real accounts by ORACLE, but somehow ORACLE still lets charges be paid and encumbered against them, although for some reason, will not allow anyone to remove these charges...).
• I am working with Florence Kaufman to set up the LIGO Visitor's Program account structure.
• I have updated the FTE Graph after receiving some FTE information from F. Raab and D. Shoemaker (still waiting for M. Coles).

From: Ed Jasnow <jasnow@acrux.ligo.caltech.edu>

A contract modification in the amount of $118,096 was issued to Richard Price Construction for erosion control work along the back of the outer half of the south arm at Livingston. Work will begin immediately.  The contractor is also preparing an estimate to construct an asphalt curb along parts of the front of the same arm.  Both of these items will shortly be presented to a CCB for approval of the additional funds.

Quality/Safety (Tyler)

No report this week.
 

LIGO Hanford Observatory (LHO) Operations (Raab)

No report this week.

LIGO Livingston Observatory (LLO) Operations (Coles)

Optics Installation: ETM-x installation and alignment has been completed. The optical lever has been installed. Every available COS on hand in Livingston has been cleaned and baked. "Bag and Tag" is in process.

Mode cleaner commissing: The mode cleaner now locks in high finesse mode for extended periods of time (> 1 hour)!!!

Beam tube: Equipment and heating blankets are being removed from Y-1 in preparation for bakeout of Y-2.

Community relations: Mark Coles gave talks on the status of LIGO at an APS zone meeting and an educational outreach meeting, both held at Northwestern State University in Natchitoches, LA March 10-11. Mark also gave the physics department colloquium at Univ of New Orleans on March 15.

The LSC meeting is in progress, so a more extensive report on LLO activities will be furnished next week.

MIT (Shoemaker)

Nothing this week.

Caltech (Sanders)

Nothing this week.

Detector/Technical Support (Whitcomb, Coyne)

DETECTOR

See also the daily electronic logs for the installation and commissioning activities:
Hanford Detector Log
Livingston Detector Log
(The multiple electronic logs or the Detector at Hanford will be combined into one in the near future.)

Notes: (1) We are experimenting with a new format for the Detector section of the weekly report. Expect this to change as we attempt to make it more informative, easier to assemble and generally sexier. Please send comments or complaints to Dennis Coyne.
(2) Weekly report contributors: Just because you don't see something you reported included below, doesn't mean it shouldn't have been in your report; The content below is edited to contain content thought to be of wide interest (generally).

1.0 INSTALLATION (including fabrication and subsystem test)

1.1 LHO

Seismic Isolation (Larry Jones, H. Radkins, M. Guenther, G. Moreno)

Installation of the seismic internals was completed. During the bellows installation, small dings were seen on the support tube Conflat seal's knife edges, so three of the four tube ends were stoned as a precaution. The spring/leg element stacks and the ribbon cable assembly were installed, the balance weights installed and the levelness of the optical table was confirmed. Configuration photos were taken and the dome and door were installed; pumpdown began on 3/15.

PZTs and controllers for BSC SEI fine stages were calibrated and installed at WBSC 5 (X mid). One of the controllers had a signal oscillation problem; this was replaced and is being investigated.

COS (Mike Smith)

PO optical train parts have been received by LHO: Almost all the parts for 8 sets of PO telescopes have also been received by LHO and are in the process of cleaning and baking. The input baffle for the 2K APS telescope is being fabricated and will be shipped to LHO the week of 3/20. 3 sets of PO telescopes will be assembled and bench-aligned during the week of 3/27.

A revised layout of the PO telescope/optical train on HAM9 and HAM10 to locate the beam dumps was completed The beam dumps are being fabricated and are expected to be shipped to LHO during the week of 3/27.

Large parts were cleaned and shipped by Allied to LHO on 3/14; they are expected to arrive by 3/20. The arm cavity baffle glass in being fabricated and is expected to arrive at LHO during the week of 3/27.

One magnet assembly and 3 half-wave plates are being shipped back to CIT for baking during the week of 3/20.

LSC Electronics (Dale Ouimette, Mohana Mageswaran, Paul Russell, Rich Abbott)

The schematics for the Common Mode Servo (boards 1 and 2) are complete and Dale is laying out the PC boards now. The goal is to have both done by the end of this weekend and send them out for fab early next week. Mohana is ordering parts and Fred is designing front panels to send out for fab.

The gerber file of the LSC Antialias filter board has been sent to the Teknicircuits.  Mohana will be starting the whitening filter board design and will decide the low noise variable gain stage amplifier to be used in the whitening filter.

Rich delivered about 9 I&Q Demodulator Boards fully tested to Dale Ouimette and began board stuffing and general checkout of the first block of the new LSC/ASC Frequency distribution system. He finished the second block of the LSC/ASC Frequency distribution system and began board layout. Final block of the LSC/ASC Frequency distribution system is to be in CAD next week.

Suspension (Jay Heefner)

- 5 modulated satellite amplifiers have been sent to LHO for testing on the interferometer.
- Gerber files for the LOS controller rev C mods have been sent to the board house and should be returned in ~2 weeks.
- An evaluation module of the new Pentek low distortion DAC has been tested for output noise. The new module appears to have ~2 uV/rtHz output noise, and the noise spectrum appears to have fewer and smaller peaks. For reference the old modules have an output noise of ~7 uV/rtHz. This lower noise may allow us to get away with fewer stages in the universal dewhitening module being design for the ASC/LSC and digital suspension systems.

Diagnostics Installation at LLO (Daniel S. and J. Zweizig)

With the help of Scabolcs M. and Rolf B. the arbitrary waveform generator was installed in the LVEA and the software was successfully tested. The diagnostics test tool was successfully installed and tested on the control room machines. The LLO setup for performing diagnostics tests is now essentially identical to the LHO one.

With the help of Alex I. the frame multicast software was installed on the second frame builder machine. After connecting the machine to the reflective memory ring of the data acqusition system we were able to broadcast frame data and recieve them on the data monitoring machine. The DMT software was successfully installed and tested on this machine. We are still missing an ATM network board to be able to connect to the CDS net, but apart from that the DMT is fully functional.

1.2 LLO

PSL (Peter King, Rich Abbott)

New versions of the PSL operator screens are being tested and debugged.
The new PZTs for the pre-modecleaner have arrived.  According to data provided by Kinetic Ceramics, the PZTs provide approximately 6 microns for an applied 450 V.  Other parts to complete fabrication of a pre-modecleaner utilizing the new PZT should be completed by Central Engineering Services by mid-next week.

Rich will travel to LLO to install and hopefully gather data on the new premodecleaner cavity servo system.  Plans on installing the DAQ links for the PSL at LLO during the trip.

COS (Mike Smith, Lee Cardenas)

A batch of COS parts were cleaned and are in the process of being baked. Four sets of cleaned and baked PO mirror parts were sent from LHO to LLO, to be held for future COS assembly and installation.

2.0 COMMISSIONING (incl. diagnostics and characterization)

2.1 LHO

One Arm Test (Nergis Mavalvala, Bill Kells)

There have been a couple of arm cavity runs this  week. A number of things were studied:

- The quad PD of the transmission monitor seemed to show peculiar behavior where cavity misalignment in only one direction (about optimal) caused the QPD to register angular misalignment. There was also a large enhancement in the total level when the spot was well centered on the QPD. We tested the QPD on the bench and found the electronics to check out fine. The behavior described above could be observed if the spot size illuminating the QPD is too small. The QPD was repositioned but the spot size illuminating it is still unknown.

- We measured the cavity resonant reflectivity as a function of aperturing the beam at the detector. As predicted by Stan's calculation, the apparent cavity reflectivity does decrease with smaller aperture (indicative that the cavity resonant mode is larger than the input beam). We hope to improve the measurement to get a quantitative estimate of the cavity reflectivity/losses.

- We found a "step" or inchworm like motion in the ASC bias for ITMx yaw, which is under further investigation.

IO (H. Rong, D. Ottoway, Nergis Mavalvala)

Modified satellite amplifiers for phase sensitive shadow sensing have arrived at LHO. 3 of them will be used for the mode cleaner mirrors and 2 other for the 2k test masses. Preparation for locking MC and 2kx with higher laser power is in progress.
 
Nergis and Haisheng worked on the EO shutter protecting the MC RFPD to make sure that it will be working safely when the laser power reaches the level that could damage the RFPD. We found the right formula for setting the threshold with hysteresis and observed the correct time delay when the shutter is triggered open, which prevent the shutter from switching back and forth when the cavity swings through fringes before falling into lock.
David Ottoway and Haisheng installed another EO shutter in the IO beam path on the PSL/IO table to cut off the input light quickly for ringdown measurements of both 2kx and MC. New ringdown data have been provided to Hiro for further analysis.
Robert S and Haisheng continue monitoring laser beam jitter/drifts and looking for correlation with other PEM signals. Some of the mirror mount resonances appear clearly in the beam position sensor signals and the level of these resonance peaks increase with acoustic excitation.

Mechanical resonances in the PSL/IO table optical components:

David Ottoway and Mike Landry continue woking on identification and suppression of mechanical resonances of the mirror mounts used on the PSL/IO table.

LHO one arm data transient analysis:

Julien Sylvestre  implemented a transients identification pipeline for the one arm LHO data (spectrogram, bursts id, coincidence between channels, time series extraction). Explicit coincidences were exhibited for bursts in the control signal and the seismometers.

2.2 LLO

IO (Peter Saulson, Sany Yoshida, Dennis Coyne, Jay Heefner, Mike Zucker, stan whitcomb)

The modecleaner was aligned in air and the vertex section evacuated.  The PSL input beam started with the low finesse polarization and at relatively low power (~100 mW) into HAM1.  After a few small problems, short locked sections (10-15 seconds) in the TEM00 mode were obtained.  The figure is the transmitted light throught the modecleaner

After a day, the locking seemed to deteriorate.  Eventually, a satellite with failed readouts on the upper OSEM readouts was found on MC1.  This was replaced. The polariztion was changed to the high finesse polarization, and again after a little fussing with the electronics, the cavity started locking quite robustly.

 
A quick look at the loop gain for the modecleaner locking servo showed that it was operating basically as designed.

3.0 Other Engineering and Scientific Activities

Optics Metrology (GariLynn Billingsley)

We've been looking into possible reasons that the fringes on the demonstration interferometer in 114 E. Bridge looked so much more stable than the fringes on our interferometer in 39 Lauritsen.  A bridge was installed between the interferometer and the aluminum dummy mass which holds a reference flat for the three flat test.  The fringes appeared rock solid.  If we can get some clean fixtures this may be a short term approach to solving our vibration problem.  The drawback is that it may stress the optic.

Interesting note:  The rms repeatability was still ~20% worse than the same setup at this time last year.

I've opened discussions with Veeco about possible upgrades to the interferometer system.  Namely;  removing the ground glass screen from the imaging path in order to minimize internal vibration, upgrading to a 10 bit or better camera and upgrading to a faster computer with more local drive space.

Alain Brillet has responded that Virgo will be interested in doing some comparative metrology.  COC-A001 has been measured at NIST, HDOS, CSIRO and LIGO and would be a good candidate for measurement.

ISC (Mike Zucker, Peter Fritschel, Matt Smith, Myron McInnis)

The optical lever diode lasers have been failing prematurely at the sites. Myron and Ken have dissassembled one of the failed units and have found burned areas around the voltage regulator. The temperature after 1 hour of operating is above the operating range. On the voltage regulator is a stud for adding cooling, but the supplier does not supply cooling. We are investigating a means of cooling the laser diode driver and to determine the extent of the damage. A unit has been sent to Blue Sky for their evaluation.
The new ETM transmission monitor assembly layout is just about complete. We assembled the optical components last week and made some last minute improvements which required some minor machining to parts.  Matt just finished the new drawing for a new kinematic base plate.  This will need to be sent out for quotes and machining.  The next step is to design an enclosure to fit the new assembly, which is now the size of a 12x18 breadboard.
Matt Smith, Peter F. and Myron M. went over the new component locations for IOT1.  Matt has assigned a new drawing number, D000085-00-D, and has made the first cut at the changes.
DAC antialiasing filter modules (Sander Lui)
Updated the schematics for both BNC (D990146-A-C) and LEMO (D990147-A-C) version of the data acquisition system antialiasing filter chassis. Rev. A added a terminating resistor at the output of each of the 32 channels in the chassis to compensate the lack of line terminating resistors at the receiver end down stream. It should be pointed out that the DC offset for the Frequency Devices Filter module varies from 2mV typical to 10mV max. For a 1volt FS (full scale) digitization at 12 bits, one LSB (lease significant bit) corresponds to only 244 uV. A 2mV offset can cause up to 9 bits of errors for a DC coupled system and should be properly nulled out before use.
2K APS Telescope focus and Guoy phase accumulation (Mike Smith)
A Gaussian beam propagation analysis is being conducted to model the focus parameters of the 2K APS telescope as determined by the COS focussing procedure. Once the focus parameters are modeled, the Guoy phase accumulation through the APS telescope optical train will be calculated for comparison with the as-built Guoy phase measurements made on ISCT10
Timing System:  (Dale Ouimette)
The 25ns delay chips that were delayed several weeks finally arrived and are ready to install in the 3 remaining GPS Clock Driver boards. Flavio is going to help with this and complete the testing.
Mathematica Interface for Accessing Data (Daniel Sigg)
A Mathematica interface to access data from the two observatories is now avaialble at http://www.ligo-wa.caltech.edu/gds/math/. Hera are the details: The Network Data Server (NDS) interface for Mathematica supports remote and local access to the data stream of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO). The user can retrieve data from right within a Mathematica notebook by importing the NDS package. The NDS package is build around the MathLink interface which allows data exchange through standard network protocols. At the observatories a MathLink server program is constantly listening to user requests which are then translated into requests for the Network Data Server. When the Network Data Server completes a request the data is sent back through the MathLink interface to the Mathematica notebook where it is then accessible to the user for further processing and viewing as a native Mathematica data array.
 
Algorithm Library for Diagnostics Tests (Daniel S., Peter F. and Ed D.)
The algorithms used by the diagnostics test tool have been made available as a separate library. They can be downloaded from http://www.ligo-wa.caltech.edu/gds/algorithm/.  The diagnostics algorithm library supports:
- Time conversion between UTC and GPS seconds.
- Common numerical and physical constants.
- Random number generator.
- Decimation and upsampling algorithms.
- Averaging algorithms.
- Fourier analysis (FFT, power spectrum, coherence, cross-spectrum, windowing).
- Sine analyze algorithms.
- LU Decomposition.
A preprocess functions is also supported which collects, upsamples, time delays, decimates, down-converts, decimates, time shifts and partitions the data; this greatly simplifies the interface to the most common set of preprocessing tasks.
Frame Multicast/Broadcast Library (Daniel S.)
The transport protocol which transfers frame data form the frame builder to the data monitoring tool(s) is now available at:
http://www.ligo-wa.caltech.edu/gds/framexmit/. Its main features are:
- UDP/IP multicast or broadcast protocol using propritary packets.
- Optmized for high speed links and bulk data transfer.
- Reliable; uses UDP/IP retransmission packets.
- Quality of service implemented in the receiver.
- Simple buffer management.
- One transmitter / any number of receivers.
- All handshaking hidden from the user; join at any time.
- No complicated start-up procedures.

40 Meter Interferometer (Weinstein)

March 16, 2000

• Dennis Ugolini is making steady progress in implementing the new EPICS-based controls of the 40m vacuum system.
• cdssol9 now mounts the RAID array (thanks to Larry Wallace and Stuart Anderson), and just-about all remaining problems with the 40m online computers are resolved. We can run DAQS and log data. We will soon use this to make seismic transfer function measurements.
• Steve is purchasing new hardware for the vacuum system, including equipment for regenerating the 5 ion pumps and installing new gate valves for them, and for baking out the output cavity.
• AJW has prepared a talk on the optical design for the 40m upgrade, to be discussed tomorrow at the LSC meeting. It's here.

Thermal Noise Interferometer (Libbrecht)

No report this week.

LASTI (Zucker)

LASTI (Zucker, Kruzel, Burgess)
--------------------------------
Interferometry:
Prepared presentation materials for initial meeting of LASTI technical
advisory panel to be held during LSC meeting in Livingston.
 

Vacuum envelope:
Completed wiring and instrumentation for main pumping system
and set up dial indicators to measure shrinkage.  We began
our initial pumpdown of the vacuum envelope on Monday 3/13.
Annulus and RGA components were not ready for this run, so
we proceeded without to uncover any problems with other
systems.
 

Except for a couple of minor glitches everything went well.
Turbo crossover occurred at 0.3 torr, 9 hours into roughing; we crossed
1e-5 torr at 12 hours.  Lowest pressure reached in this short
test (terminated at 15 hours) was 5e-6 torr. A quick-and-dirty rate of rise
test afterward indicates a total gas load consistent with about
1e-9 torr-liter/s/cm^2, which is reasonable for clean unbaked
steel. However this test also implies our turbo speed is ~ 200 l/s, about
a factor of 5 lower than it should be. We will do more calibrated
tests when the RGA/cal leak tree is added next week.
 

The vacuum system shrinks about 1/4" in length on each arm on
evacuation, in
the ballpark of what PSI calculated.
 

Due to a suspected miswire on the interlock panel we are not qualifying
the system for unattended operation yet; we sealed it off and killed
the pumps Tuesday night for an extended rate-of-rise test.
 

And so it begins.

Data Analysis and Computing (Lazzarini)

Simulation and Modeling

One basic scenario of the 2K IFO was designed based on the LHO site
seismic motion, including correlations of the the seismic motions
of chambers at the corner station. Matt is summarizing a report of
this work.

Adlib

Modules are created to deal with vectors and matrices.
Biplab contacted Giancarlo to get some code of MSE for STAIC.
 

LIGO Data Analysis System

LDAS Software

The FrameCPP was enhanced to support extremely fast read access to individual
channels without reading the full frame file using a hash table generated at
the time of the first frame with a particular frame. As long as the run number
is unchanged this hash table is valid for LIGO framebuilder frames. The speed
improvement when reading in this mode is nearly two orders of magnitude faster
for access to a small number of channels in the frame. Even full frame reads
are roughly 3 times faster. Of course, the hash table must be rebuilt when the
run number changes (which is associated with a configuration change of the
interferometer state) and the full frame will need to be re-parsed causing a
single frame slow down. This additional functionality has aready been added
to the frameAPI and tested.

Extensive performance tests of the infrastructure of LDAS was carried out
this week. This included re-evaluating the frame I/O and Frame to ILWD casting
times, data ingestion rates into the individual tables using the metadataAPI,
and inter socket communication speeds using the ospace C++ class transmission
library. Results showed tremendous improvement in frame to ILWD translation
rates, a slight slow down (though exceptable) in the data ingestion rates into
the DB2 database tables, and significant boasts in ILWD socket communications
for complex data objects. These tests also identified a network bottleneck
between several workstations on the floor. Between some of the linux boxes,
it is thought that the choice of ethernet driver is the cause of a factor of
50 slow down over line speeds. Other problems with the floors network included
several workstations being locked into 10Mb hubs instead of the desired 100Mb
ports. These problems are being looked into and should be fixed soon.

A major inconvience in the choice of compiler rules used within an extern "C"
block of code using the GCC C++ compiler was identified this week. C header
files which use C rules for initialization of variables fall victom to C++
rolls when included into the C++ compiler with extern "C" causing the variable
initialization to throw a compiler error. To avoid this the initialization of
the C variables had to be removed from the header and place in C++ classes.
The impact to the wrapperAPI where this occurs is minimal, however, there is
an issue with LAL code initialization which will require stringent validation
for code running under the wrapperAPI.

An update on the LDAS system was presented to the LSC at Livingston this week.
The presentation focused on new an improved functionality within LDAS since the
last meeting.

Stuart Anderson
        Attended meeting with Sun and CACR to consider the possibilities
of support from Sun in setting up the Caltech LDAS data archive.

General Computing

MIT:
Jennifer worked on the LSC web page setup and worked through some of the
logistics with Larry and Barbara at CIT.

Livingston: (Tom Evans)

Preperations for the LSC were performed which included setting up network
connections and computers for the visitors.
Larry took the opportunity to test the video streams of the inauguration and
play them using the computer projectors. It looked pretty good.
Went through a number of network configuration issues. The layout of the
communications closet will be changed.
Worked on the video camera setup on the SUN box. We were able to get some of the
items to function but did not have time to work everything out.
Albert, Larry and Tom met with a group from LSU and Bellsouth concerning the
network connections at the Observatory. Options for the future were discussed
and Ric Simmons of LSU will be setting up a follow up meeting (teleconference)
to take place in a couple of weeks. LSU has also setup a web page showing the
network traffic load at the Observatory. Presently, the web site can only be
seen from a LSU address.
Resolved a few procurement issues. Setting up a cd burner and finally received
the E3000 unit.
Worked a number of user account and connectivity issues.

Hanford:(Christine Patton)
Continued working with Oudone to get more computers upgraded to Windows
98 and the latest versions of other application software.  Submitted 20
more computer serial numbers to Caltech for inclusion in their Norton
Antivirus site license. Still can not access the Norton AV software
from the Caltech site. Caltech ITS is working on the access problem.

Followed up on shelving that needs to be returned for LDAS.  Stored the
shelving that has arrived here in the warehouse.

Following up on a PR for the latest version of Exceed that was submitted
2 months ago and hasn't been seen since.

Installed the PCPhotoreader onto the new guest computer and got it
working.  Helped several people set up email accounts.  Monitored
network usage and prepared graphs of usage.  Continued network security
maintenance, did the weekly backups, helped users with several printer
and PC problems and kept the GC accounting paper work up to date.
 

CIT:
Barbara worked on web pages and video clips for dedication.

Suresh fixed the license daemon problem with IslandDraw in sirius. Upgraded GNU
plot utility (gnuplot) and ghostview (Postscript file viewer) applications in
sirius.
Installed secured shell version 1 in system sargas (Sun 450) in addition to
version 2.
Testing various softwares. This includes GNU compilers (gcc-2.95.2), Pretty
Good Privacy (PGP) and Latex.
Working on TCP wrappers on servers.
Generating a list of unused accounts for removal.

Larry worked a few procurement issues concerning computers and cables. Also,
helped Tom at Livingston with a few procurements. Went through the procurement
process of Caltech Wired with Tom.
Some network testing and configuration checkouts for computer video connection.
Definitly more work needed to get the computer-video system working correctly.
 
 

LIGO II/Advanced R&D (Sanders)

From: Sam Richman <srichman@ligo.mit.edu>

stiff isolation system report

The stiff team double active stage prototype was shipped from JILA and
arrived at MIT on Thursday 9 March.  Assembly on the high bay floor and
installation took place over the next few days.  Some minor problems with
spring installation were overcome and the two stages were suspended and
aligned on Monday 13 March.  The system was locked down and hoisted into
the vacuum chamber (formerly of the PNI) for testing.  Initial tests were
conducted to check functioning of the instrumentation.  Transfer functions
of vertical forcers to vertical geophones on the first stage were
measured.  Three vertical loops were closed around those sensors with
modest gain (x10 at 10 Hz).  Isolation performance was verified by
comparing a seismometer on the ground to an independent (out of the loop)
seismometer on the stage.
 

From: "Ryan C. Lawrence" <rclawren@ligo.mit.edu>

Core Optics Compensation:

CO2 laser controller is defective, returned it to the manufacturer for
replacement.  While the laser is down, finishing up construction of the
in-vacuum heater assembly (ring heater w/
shield).

For additional information about this report, contact sanders@ligo.caltech.edu