Weekly Report for Week Ending March 22, 2001


 Exec. Comm. Agenda
Highlights
LSC
Administration
Hanford Observatory
Livingston Observatory
MIT
Caltech
Detector
40 Meter
TNI
LASTI
Data Analysis
LIGO II/Adv. R&D
Past Weekly Reports

The LIGO Executive Committee Agenda for Monday  March 26, 2001 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)
  5. WBS 2 LIGO Lab Operations
  6. WBS 3 and 4  Advanced R&D and LIGO II (Sanders)
Executive Committee only 11:30 - noon   Topics:
 

Special Items:


Special Announcements:


Weekly Report Highlights
 


LSC Issues (Weiss)


No report.


LIGO I Construction/LIGO Laboratory Administration (Lindquist)



 

WBS 1.2 LIGO Operations--Administration



LIGO Weekly Site Telecon (Lindquist)

A site teleconference was held on Thursday, March 22, 2001.  Discussion included the end of February costs and action #85 concerning VISA issues.  Tuesday Gary, Elizabeth and Ed will meet with the immigration specialists recently hired onto the Caltech staff (E. Sommers and H. Willis).

The next site telecon is scheduled for Thursday, March 29, 2001.  The list of current actions revised to reflect open actions assigned through March 22, 2001 may be found at ACTION LIST.


PROPERTY MANAGEMENT (Chargois)

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


DOCUMENT CONTROL CENTER (Turner, Mak)

>From: Linda Turner - turner@ligo.caltech.edu>

Web pages for the DCC give simple how-to's for document numbering, easy access to the latest on-line documents, and search capabilities for the DCC database. Take a look. . .

ACCOMPLISHMENTS

LSC MEETING, LIVINGSTON

DCC ACTIVITIES From: Cleveland Mak <mak_c@ligo.caltech.edu>
Packages Faxes
In 27 37
Out 9 39

Press here to access the DOCUMENT CONTROL CENTER WEB PAGE.


COST SCHEDULE CONTROL SYSTEMS (Cunningham, Brambila, Akutagawa, Kaufman)

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

Press here for ACCOUNTS PAYABLE HISTORY DATA.

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

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

SUBCONTRACTS MANAGEMENT (Petrac, Jasnow)

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

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


Support (Wood)

 
Dorothy Lloyd
  • Processed the usual requisitions, invoices and receiving on-line. For more detail, see "Cost Schedule Control Systems" report by Esther Cunningham.
  • Tracked and followed up on invoice problems.
  • Reviewed and recorded payments processed by Esther for the week of March 12, on contract summary sheets and in the LIGO database.
  • Continue to monitor contract and blanket order encumbrance and notify task managers when supplements are needed.
  • Jim continues with data entry in the LIGO database and also help out in the travel and DCC areas.
Rita Torres
  • Checking weekly for incoming LSC reports and plans.  Obtained Oracle requisition number for regular PO with Sharplan Lasers, Inc.
  • During the somewhat quiet week, I chased lots of info.  From packing slips and the like for my Pcard purchases, to documents D. Lloyd needs to pay the bills.  Scurried to get info for G. Salone to place an urgent order; we thought it was placed a couple of weeks ago, but it wasn't.  Got some info regarding a hotel charge for P. Lindquist for a trip he never took, World Travel to correct the error.  Contacted Newark to get some parts they forgot to ship.
  • Reconciled 16 Pcard purchases this period.  Filed away invoices arriving by snail mail.  Followed up on orders for long-lead items.  Updated site trips on the web.
Irene Baldon
  • I processed eleven (11) new trips (including Advance Checks written and hotel/car rental authorizations filled out and FAXed to appropriate vendors in various locations); five (5) trips have been ticketed and are awaiting completion of necessary paper work; and twelve (12) trips are pending final approval before tickets can be issued.
  • Completed twenty-one (21) Expense Reports and have forty-nine (49) Expense Reports to work on.  I'm holding two (2) reports which need a check from the traveler before processing and an additional four(4) which need information from the traveler.  Jim Covington completed twelve (12) Expense Reports and has seven (7) reports that he is still working on from the nineteen (19) he had from last week.  I continue to train and supervise him on expense reports.
  • I reconciled one-hundred-seven (107) items on my P-Card, for a total of one-hundred-seventy-one (171) for the month.  Assisted a few travelers with their reconciling and/or data entry.
  • Prepared the Travel/Vacation Itinerary for the Week of March 19, 2001.  Performed normal recording and filing associated with Travel and Reimbursement.  Also performed miscellaneous duties as requested by various members of  the LIGO Project here at Caltech as well as from members of the staffs of each of the two (2) sites.   I continue to do MIT's travel to the sites for installation activities and also to assist them wherever possible.
Elizabeth K. Wood
  • This week dealt mostly with personnel issues.
  • Did some entry work on FastLane (TM, all rights reserved) for Gary.

Advanced LIGO (Frey, Petrac)

From: Thomas Frey <tfrey@ligo.caltech.edu>

Progress Period from 03.16 to 03.22

Accomplishments:

Schedule 03.23 to 03.29:

WBS 1.4.1.2   Project Controls (LIGO Construction)



Reports (Lindquist)

A reminder that I require contributions for an end-of-February Quarterly Progress Report.  I have requested contributions this week.  Thanks!

Also working with David Shoemaker to set up assignments for Advanced R&D Annual Report.  We should be sumbitting this report (necessary to get FY 2001 funding) over the next month or so.



Change Control/Contingency (Lindquist)

The following Change Requests have been submitted:
 

CR-000018 WBS 1.1.4 Curbing for Service Roads at Livingston G. Stapfer
CR-000019 WBS 1.2 Additional Lab Equipment D. Coyne
CR-000020 WBS 1.1.4 Staging Building and Renovations to Existing Building--Livigston F. Asiri
CR-010001 WBS 1.1.4 Return of Unused Construction Budget To Contingency F. Asiri

Press for the latest Contingency Needs Projection.


COST SCHEDULE CONTROL SYSTEMS (Duncan, Akutagawa)

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

From: Cindy Akutagawa <cindy@ligo.caltech.edu>

SUBCONTRACTS MANAGEMENT (Petrac, Jasnow)

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

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

Quality/Safety (Tyler)

>From: Bill Tyler <tyler@ligo.caltech.edu>

LIGO Hanford Observatory (LHO) Operations (Raab)


(D.Cook)
4k build up ... It is our hopes to start closing up the 4k mode cleaner
HAM chambers near the end of this week if the IOO alignment goes as
planned. We have started machining the viton safety stops and will replace
the ones on the large optic suspensions that are currently installed. The
gaps will be set to a minimum distance (~.5mm) allowing maximum seismic
protection, but not to inhibit the several degrees of freedoms needed to
steer optics and allow for shifts in table tilts etc (there are no
guarantees that these improvements will prevent damage from future
shakers). The ETMy-4k  is the last of the core optics waiting for
installation, but the schedule is not set yet. We will re-vent the X
manifold on Monday. During this time we will align the ITMx-4k optical
levers through the arm cavity baffle, mark the baffle position and remove
the baffle so not to clip the 4k beam when we first transmit the beam down
the tube to the End station.

        2k recovery and retrofit ... If all goes according to plans, we will begin
the realignment of the 2k core optics starting with ITMy by Monday. The
alignment configuration will use a different method as purge air capacity
and access to the beam tubes and chambers is limited along with some of the
optics still installed. We will be replacing the balance of OSEMs and new
safety stops at this time as well. As we have found three loose magnets on
the MMT3 after it was removed we'll be checking the balance of the core
optics in situ for similar problems. These are optics that were thought to
be ok and not re-suspended. The RM and MMT3 were installed on Wednesday and
await alignment. The ETMy will come out of the vacuum bake load early next
week and will be re-suspended. The Mid station will be staged next week for
installation. The IOO optics and 2k mode cleaner rebuild is still on going,
but is parallel 4k activities.
 

        We continue to have a lot of support through out these activities.
Several folks are gaining valuable experience and added insight to the
interferometer workings.
 

        Hopefully we can wind up these activities in about the next 3 weeks. (any
bets?)


LIGO Livingston Observatory (LLO) Operations (Coles)



 

OPTICS: This week has been spent locating and positioning ISCT-3, and capturing the pickoff beams from the BS, ITM-x and y on
ISCT-4. (Kovalik/Overmeyer/Traylor/Kern)

Operations Support: Now that the LSC meeting is over, the control room staff has resumed shifts which cover extended working hours to support commissioning activities. This week, the Operation Specialists devoted about 50% of their time to control room support and the remainder to various tasks which included: Tune-up of the video titler system, LOS circuit board repairs, Vacuum Bake support for LHO and the 40 meter
LHO optics repair support at LHO, ISCT-4 table alignment, shipping and receiving, Particle Counter repair, and CDS Software upgrades and refinements. (Rich Riesen)

GC: Configured the Fore 2810 100 mbps switch to connect servers and heavily used machines to it. This will allow ~10 times the bandwidth the
servers have now. Put together an "audio visual" cart which has the Dell with the LCD monitor on it. There is a projector attached to the Dell
along with a wireless networking card so that any time anyone needs a projector, all they have to do is roll it into place and provide power. Testing
PHP and MySQL on the new web server (after a moderately difficult compile). Once we have put it through its paces and made sure that  everything is functioning properly we will move the web pages, ilog, etc to the new server. We will also consolodate other things that are
running under linux/apache at the present time. This includes the "Operator Checklist" and the associated database. Installed a network monitor to observe overall traffic etc over our T1. It can be found at http://fulton.ligo-la.caltech.edu:3000/.
CDS: Installed FrameMaker and Adobe Distiller on the CDS machines. There are several ways to make a PDF on CDS now. Had the local Sun
representative come in and repair an Ultra 10.\
LDAS: Working with Joe Hanson who is coordinating the electricians to provide the necessary power in the mass storage room for the LDAS equipment.

Cosmic Ray Counter: The scintillator counter was delivered to LIGO last week. On Saturday, Ray Frey of U of Oregon, along with Joe Langdale, Mike Stewart, and Mark Coles, unpacked and inspected the device and it was placed under BSC2 with Mike Fyffe's help on Monday. It is offset from the chamber center to avoid a dripping chilled water line that also runs other BSC2.

Outreach: Rai Weiss, Bonnie  Wascom and Rusyl Wooley participated in  the St. Bernard School Annual Science Symposium in Lafayette, Louisiana. This was an excellent opportunity to reach a large number of enthusiastic students. A detailed article will be sent to Dave Beckett, along with a link to photos taken at the symposium, for the LIGO newsletter.

Thanks to everyone that assisted with setup, support, and take down for the LSC meeting!


Detector/Technical Support (Whitcomb, Coyne)



 


 

Installation& Commissioning:
Hanford
Livingston
Other Science/EngineeringActivities:
Design/Analysis/Fab
Issues/Concerns
Seealso the Installation web page

1.1 LHO INSTALLATION & COMMISSIONING

2km Earthquake repair summary

Stan Whitcomb

2-k IOO repairs

Dave Tanner, Dave Ottaway, Guido Mueller, Betsy Weaver, Corey Gray, Gary Traylor, Dave Reitze
All of the 2-k small optics will be removed and their suspension wires
replaced. Many had one or more magnets knocked off by the earthquake. (It
is interesting that all the failures were in the magnet/standoff joint and
not the standoff/glass joint.)

New magnets have been glued to the standoffs. In the case of MMT1, a magnet
fell off MMT1 during the bake and we decided to strip this optic and start
again, this was done and currently the guide rods have been reglued on it.
We will glue the magnets on this and balance this optic tomorrow. All other
repaired 2K optics passed the magnet test and we will soon start
re-stringing them.
 

2-k COC re-alignment

Mike Smith
A 4 W fiber-coupled laser was ordered as an option to the 0.5 W laser used
in the COS autocollimator; this will facilitate the visibility of the
projected reticle pattern during alignment of the IFO. The best delivery schedule for the laser is
the week of 4/9/01, or just after the scheduled alignment. It will be available if delays occur and for future re-alignment needs if they arise.

4-k IOO installation

Dave Tanner, Dave Ottaway, Guido Mueller, Betsy Weaver, Corey Gray, Gary Traylor, Dave Reitze
All of the IOO components have been placed in HAM 1 and 2. In order to
complete
the installation,  MC1 was replaced by a mirror removed from the 2-k
interferometer. (Two weeks ago, the suspension wire for MC1 broke and when
the optic fell, a magnet was knocked off of its standoff.) The equivalent
MC1 for the 2k had the same problem, so MC3 from the 2k was used. MC1 and
MC3 have mirror-image wedge angles, so this replacement required a small
change in the input beam angle, accommodated by the 2 DLC mounts that
direct the beam into the mode cleaner. (The mode cleaner path itself is not
affected by this change.)

Current status is:

1. Mode cleaner aligned with flashes observed, maximum yaw setting on any MC
optics is less than 0.5, maximum pitch setting is 0.6

2. Mode matching telescope is aligned, with the spots centered on all MMT
mirrors including MMT3. Maximum yaw bias is 0.5, max pitch bias is ~3

As a precaution, we decided to check all the OSEM voltage settings and
found some disturbing findings. Some particularly low (~0) and high voltages
(~1.6) were found. So after carefully re-checking the levelness of both HAM 1
and 2 we set about re-setting all of the OSEMs. This was finished late Wed
afternoon and all OSEM voltages were between 0.85-1.15V. In addition a blown
OSEM was discovered and replaced. Fortunately, given the location of the
problematic OSEMs we should not have to do much major re-alignment. We will do
a final check tomorrow.

Richard McCarthy is working on getting the electronics and field wiring in plac to attempt to lock the mode cleaner in air, in part by borrowing components from the 2 km IFO. An attempt may be made late this week.

COS 4km Vertex Installation

Mike Smith
BSC1, BSC2, HAM3, HAM4 COS installation is complete. A COS reticle pattern
was aligned with the RM and projected onto the MMT3 target; the reticle
pattern was 5mm to the right, and 6 mm down from the target at the center
of MMT3. The accuracy of the COS beam positioning was unknown, so the MMT3
was not moved. MMT3 was steered to position the reticle pattern onto the
center of the target placed on MMT2. The table beam dump in HAM 2 remains
to be installed.

 LHO 4K ASC/LSC/Suspension Electronics

Jay Heefner

1.2LLO INSTALLATION & COMMISSIONING

Commissioning

Rai Weiss
With the E3 run and the LSC meeting behind us, we are again
attempting to lock the recombined interferometer. Last week the
Michelson and a single cavity were locked. The main effort has still been
to determine the parameters to use in the lock acquistion code. In this
process we have uncovered hardware problems in the LSC whitening filters
which are being fixed. An encouraging aspect of the work is that we are
able to control the end test masses in both x and y cavities with the
three functioning coils, thereby providing the control of enough degrees
of freedom to lock the recycled/recombined system.

The amplitude stabilized oscillator AC OSEM circuits were tested on the
mode cleaner and MMT3. The circuits were found to damp the masses.
Preliminary measurements indicate that the circuits are 3 times noisier
than the DC OSEM. Further work is needed to establish the cause of the
excess noise and hopefully to determine a fix.

E3 Preparation & Run

Szabi Marka
The data collecting part of Engineering Run 3. was successfully
completed and we started the analysis phase. For new results please
visit the frequently updated E3 homepage

We collected 3(+1) days worth of reduced data set (RDS) on disks
(~0.5TB) at the observatories and ~1TB full data on tapes at LDAS. To
access the data at the observatories you have to have access to FORTRESS
and/or DECATUR. On DECATUR the E3 data is stored at /export/raid1/E3/.
To download data from the CalTech archive please follow Peter's
instructions

I also gave talks at the LSC meeting. (E3 summary, E2 Timing
investigation, SNEWS)

Rolf Bork

1) Found that DAQ in EY would periodically shift data from one channel to
another.  This had been seen before but had thought to stop after changing out
the VME crate about a month or so ago.  The only way I can think of that this
happens is that the ADC module and CPU get out of sync with each other ie ADC
gets a read command and outputs next value to VME bus but CPU does not actually
get the data or gets the next data point instead, thereby shifting all further
data one DAQ channel up.  Another problem was seen where a GPS timing ramp
channel would peridically move three DAQ cycles out in time.  This problem seems
to coincide with the reset of another CPU on the DAQ network.  Dave and I are
discussing the implementation of additional diagnostics within the DAQ to catch
these errors, such that, at minimum, data is not taken for long stretches
without an indication of a problem and secondly to determine the cause and
perhaps correct these problems.

2) Keith Riles pointed out 16Hz noise which appeared Saturday afternoon on coil
driver signals on optics driven by the LSC.  This has been seen before at LHO.
However, when I came back later to try to track the problem, the 16Hz spikes
could no longer be found.  Checking with the operators and the E log, nothing
had changed in the LSC, ie it had not been reset.  Continued to check these
signals throughout the weekend, but never saw the problem again.

3) We found that if more than a combination of 8 LSC tp/exc signals were
selected, the LSC controller would lose sync with the DAQ system.  Today I ran
some tests using the LSC system at LHO.  While the actual servo calculation time
does not vary (read ADC, calc filters, write DAC output), use of the remainder
of the 60usec allotted time varies by cycle (cycle = 1/16384 sec).  This is
because the code uses this remaining time for writing DAQ, writing TP, reading
EXC signals, and other housekeeping. With no TP/EXC selected, the longest time
used by the code to do the servo calcs, DAQ, and other housekeeping is 52usec.
When Tp/Exc signals are selected, it takes approx. 1usec extra time per Tp/Exc.
So, it looks like it's in keeping with the numbers that 9 LSC Tp/Exc signals
being selected would drive the LSC CPU beyond the allotted time, causing it to
go further out of sync the longer these signals are selected, eventually
dropping ADC data.  This problem will become worse when the LSC has to handle
yet more ADC channels, which is being proposed, as then even less time will be
available for Tp/Exc signals.

If we continue to require more I/O from the LSC for ADC channels and/or Tp/Exc,
changes will need to be made to improve performance.  Some thoughts are:
a) Spread the housekeeping tasks out over more cycles, thereby reducing the
maximum cycle time.  I will look into this and see what can be squeezed out
here, but I don't expect a whole lot, as I/O is the key driver.
b) Push ahead more rapidly for the development of an ADC module for advanced
LIGO and/or get Pentek to make changes to their ADC module.  We initially used
the Pentek module in a "packed" data mode, whereby two ADC channels could be
read on each VME read cycle. However, we found that in doing this, the Pentek
module would delay one clock cycle in providing data in this mode, setting us
60usec behind. (This problem was confirmed by Pentek after we raised the issue
and they studied their design). We therefore had to abandon this and only get
one ADC data point per VME read cycle.  Each read cycle takes on the order of
1usec, so this is a costly change.  Secondly, the Pentek module will not read
out in "Block" mode. Block mode transfers on the VME bus are on the order of ten
times faster than single reads.
c) Change the CPU from a Pentium to a Power PC.  There is a vendor of Power PC
VME processors which uses a proprietary I/O interface to the VME bus and claims
higher performance in single read/write modes.  This would be a bigger change.
First, we trade an 850MHz PentiumIII for a more expensive (double) 480MHz Power
PC, which may or may not lead to longer servo computation times.  We would also
have to buy a new vxWorks license and learn the nuances of Power PCs.

4) Worked with Russ Wooley on vacuum system gate valve readback problems.  In
the LVEA, the three gate valve on the X arm were indicating both open and closed
at the same time.  It turns out that the Xycom212 VME card which reads the limit
switches had been replaced at some point, but the traces which select on board
power had not been removed (required, as we use an external power supply).
Fixing this cleared this problem, and two of the three valves read correctly.
The third valve then needed its limit switch adjusted.

In the Y end station, we found that the open and closed switch wires were
twisted together and tied to the same connection point in a PSI interconnect
box. This was corrected and now all LLO gate valves appear to indicate
correctly.

PSL

Peter King
The laser continues to hold up well after the replacement of the
master oscillator.  Both the pre-modecleaner and the frequency
stabilization servo remained locked for the duration of the E3 run.

Otherwise I have been trying to take part in the daily commissioning
related work that needs to be done.  Including the prep. work for the E3
run.

Following on from the E3 run, trend data for the last month was
examined in order to set the gains for the PSL generic DAQ interface card.

2.0 OtherEngineering and Scientific Activities

2.1 Design/Analysis/Fab

Embedded Controller Board (MVME162) Upgrade

Jay Heefner
We are in the process of returning all of our new MVME162 modules and trading them for the "PA" version. This new version is supposedly compatible with EPICS. We can only return the "unopened" modules. This will leave us with ~6 modules that will have to be upgraded. I am working out the details with the distributor.

Optics Modelling

Bill Kells
Very productive confab with R. Beausoleil and others at the LSC meeting last week. Since then I have been running extensive FFT simulations of various situations pertinant to MELODY validation and with respect to SB behaviour in initial and advanced LIGO.

LSC

Rich Abbott, Flavio Nocera, Mohana Mageswara
A version of the new modecleaner servo board is now ready
for release to board manufacture.  This version incorporates all the
changes to date and can be released at any time.  Mohana is the person
actually doing the work, and she is tracking all the changes so any input
regarding desired features should be passed by her.

Working with Flavio Nocera on a new theory
regarding the apparent saturation of the AS port PD during a lock
transient.  His suspicion is now focused on the bias regulator's response
during a current limiting event.  Also have been lending a hand towards
getting users familiar with the existing PSL designs, some of which can be
subtle.

PSL

Peter King
A new drawing for mounting blocks that mount the Newport U100 mirror
mounts was completed.  This was a slight modification to the original
design.

The delivery date of the super polished substrates from Mindrum Precision
has slipped by two weeks to the end of April.

I have been looking in to the use of UV cured epoxies for fabricating
pre-modecleaners.  Enquiries have been made to Masterbond and Norland Optical
about low outgassing epoxies.  At present I'm leaning towards the NOA88
adhesive from Norland.  This epoxy is low outgassing, UV curable and has
a reasonably fast cure time of around a minute or so. A sample of UV curable
epoxy from Norland Products has arrived.  The data
sheets indicate that it would be a good candidate epoxy for use in
fabrication of the PMCs.  Low-outgassing, reasonably fast curing time and
it also has a pre-cure which will come in handy for adjusting the final
gluing position.

I spent some time this week trying to fix the broadband photodiode
for use in measuring the relative intensity noise after the pre-modecleaner
(PMC).  For reasons I don't understand, there was a discontinuity in the
the noise spectrum.  A check of the photodetector did not reveal any
obviously damaged components.  However a check of the RF path showed a large
input offset in the MAX4107, even in the absence of light.  The part was
replaced and the photodetector seems to function okay.

With the forementioned photodetector, I have just completed measuring the
relative intensity noise before and after the PMC.  Analysis of the results
has not started yet, to see if the PMC provides sufficient filtering at 25 MHz.

Rick Karwoski, Paul Russell, Ben Abbott, Sander Liu

PAM modeling

Mark Barton
I finished updating and validating the aspects of my suspension model
concerned with PAMs. It now incorporates a full 3D dipole potential
interaction for each magnet pair. It turns out that the reason we haven't
been getting quite the range suggested by my initial design calculation
is because of a cross-coupling through position. "Pitch" adjustments to
the PAM screws (left side in, right side out) cause a significant motion
in position as well as pitch and this in turn couples to yaw. It's
interestingly asymmetric: for one sense of the pitch adjustment, the
effect is almost entirely in pitch; for the other sense, the
crosscoupling to yaw is much large and eventually dominates.

This week I've been writing up the work I've been doing on the
various uses of magnets in the suspension. An update to T000119 is nearly
finished.

Revised Chamfer stops

Janeen Romie
The reworked viton tips seem to work well as chamfer stops. Molding
Solutions submitted a quote for half-football shaped tips that mount on
1/8" dia. dowel pins but admitted that getting the fit right could take
iterations. They quoted $24.15 (amortized)/tip with a 3-4 week lead time. I
believe the reworked tips will work well.

D. Coyne note: Near term retrofit of the earthquake stops will be done with the reworked chamfer stop tips for the large optic suspensions (conical tip machined cleanly). The small optics suspensions will use reworked, UHV qualified, viton sheet for tips for the face stops (cut from existing cable clamp viton pieces). An improved design for the stops is also being considered on a longer term basis, with the desire to have them available for future opportunities for retrofit as they arise.

Digital Suspension Controls (DSC)

Rolf Bork, Hongyu Ding, Lori Robison
Dividing up the remaining work to complete H1
system. Lori will work on the LOS coil driver VME system, Hongyu the necessary
EPICS interfaces and myself the LVEA suspension controller, the latter of which
controls the SOS optics and damping/optical lever part of the LVEA LOS controls.

DAQ

Rolf Bork
Working out details of modifications necessary to incorporate the new DCS (digital suspension controls).
A block diagram has been distributed to a few people for comment.

2.1 Issues

Digital Control System Coordination

Rolf Bork


After our ISC meeting, I am concerned that there are bits and pieces, such as microseismic and tidal, that have docs that I am not aware of or do not exist.  My primary concern is that, now that most controls are digital, control systems are so tightly coupled that it is difficult to totally isolate LSC from ASC from suspensions from DAQ, etc.  It has all kind of blended together into a MIMO monster.  It is therefore critical that I keep track of all servos and particularly the I/O involved with them, as in the digital systems, this eats up most of the allotted time.  The microseismic and tidal, for example, could impact the digital suspension controller in the end station, or LSC processing, or whatever.  I propose that we should develop a new top level diagram of the "LIGO control system", to incorporate all the ties between systems and all I/O presently in place and known future; Since I'm most effected, I will start on this.  I think it will be useful in the future as well in analyzing control performance/architecture as new ideas come along.
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40 Meter Interferometer (Weinstein)




Thermal Noise Interferometer (Libbrecht)


Since our last report, we have finished re-installing all of our suspended optics.  All seven optics are in now, with all magnets in place.  The mode cleaner uses old-style fins on its magnets for shadow sensing, and we are missing a side fin on one of the mode cleaner's mirrors.  This is not a critical item at this time and can be installed at any time before we close the chamber to pump out.  We have rebalanced the stack and are now in the process of optimizing the positions of the sensor/actuator heads.
 

In-vacuo beam dumps arrived from the physics shop and will go in the chamber soon, and we have begun steering the beam from the new laser into the vacuum chamber.  The beam now impinges on the mode cleaner's suspended input mirror, and we will begin aligning the mode cleaner next week.
 

Last week we spoke with Seiji Kawamura about backup plans in case lock acquisition proved difficult with our current design, and one of the options we discussed was lowering the finesse of the arm-cavities by replacing the test masses.  With Helena Armandula's help we have begun requesting quotes on grinding and polishing the spare fused silica blanks we have, and we expect to hear back from vendors either late this week or early next week.
 

We have also been pursuing coatings for our sapphire test masses and for our backup fused silica test masses, and we have ordered new magnets and suspension wires for both.  (Because they are nearly twice as heavy as fused silica masses, sapphire masses require stronger suspension wires.)
 

In anticipation of our seismic isolation system performance tests in about three weeks, we ordered a set of accelerometers, controllers, and mounting hardware.  Many thanks to Dennis Ugolini (and indirectly, Mike Zucker) at the 40-meter for pointing us to the right vendor and models.  We anticipate using these units for vetoing as well once we begin non-Gaussian noise studies.
 

The main item on our schedule for this week was to begin repair of our final, broken OSEM controller.  We have a deadline in about two weeks to have all seven OSEM controllers working and tuned, so we started work on this early this week.  We tested the ones already installed and found one more that was not functioning according to spec.  We have diagnosed the problem with this controller, and we believe we have corrected it.  We anticipate verifying the repair this Friday (tomorrow, as of this writing).  We also discovered that the mode cleaner's shadow sensors were not properly optimized and have corrected this.  The optical gains are now much higher than before, and we are now able to achieve over-damping with sufficiently high electronic gains, which we were not able to do before.  We are now in the process of lowering the electronic gains to give the suspended mirrors a pendulum Q of 8 to 10, which Peter Fritschel has estimated to be an optimal tradeoff between damping and seismic isolation.

Our final BNC vacuum feedthroughs arrived from Insulator Seal, Inc.  Watchful readers will recall that we ordered duplicates from ISI and Kurt J. Lesker in case one vendor suffered delays.  Some delays did in fact occur, but since the order from ISI has now arrived we have all the feedthroughs we need.


LASTI (Zucker)


No report


Data Analysis and Computing (Lazzarini)



 

Simulation and Modeling (Bhawal)

This Week

Hiro attended LSC meeting and gave a talk on current status of E2E.

Suspension system
-----------------
In the LSC meeting at LLO, Virginio gave a talk about his
quad-pendulum model using MSE and it was well accepted. Virginio
got new information from GEO people and is going to improve the
model including blade modules as well.

Lock-acquisition studies
------------------------
(Biplab) work has been affected due to a performance slowdown of the LIGO
sunbox and sargas computers where the e2e codes were running. Larry
and Suresh are looking into the problem because it appeared only recently.

Code maintenance
----------------
(Ed Maros) Built e2e software at Caltech.

Alfi
----
(Bruce) Continuing work on sanity checks on subnodes, connections,
and ports during loading of Alfi boxes (Problem Reports 199, 205-207).
 

Vicere':
* Simulation: started work to write modules for linear prediction, with
the
    purpose of exploring a way to reduce the errors implied by loops of
modules
    in a discrete time simulation.
    I keep following simulation in Virgo: a comparison with experimental
data
    on transfer function is underway. Great success of the simulation,
almost
    perfect agreement! The Virgo suspensions seem to behave as expected.

Last Week

Biplab attended Pacific Coast Gravity meeting at UC, Santa Barbara
and gave a talk on the End-to-End modeling and simulation efforts.
Hiro is attending LSC meeting.
Ed Maros installed E2E at LLO.

Physics Studies
---------------
Hiro completed work on generation of noise curves. The algorithm
to calculate the psd of noises with a wide dynamic range (e.g. Seismic)
was tested along with the box files for generating thermal noises (internal,
suspension, violin) made by Biplab.

Biplab continued studying mirror angular fluctuation effects in presence
of offsets.

Code Improvement
----------------
(Tavio) Working on three things: debugging/testing LAPACK & performance
-library changes to matrix class (which is theoretically done except for
the fact that I can't find the actual .a file for the library anywhere to
link and test it out).
Finding a faster random # generator (gaussian and flat) than the
linear-congruent one we're using.
Getting profiling to work on the multithreaded version of modeler.

Alfi
----
(Bruce) Working on sanity checks on subnodes, connections, and ports during
loading of Alfi boxes (Problem Reports 199, 205-207).

LIGO Data Analysis System

  • Software Systems (Blackburn)

  • LDAS was demonstrated at the LSC meeting in Livingston this week. The
    general turnout for the demonstration was surprisingly large and
    generated plenty of questions. One other interesting note related to
    this demonstration is that GEO participants went home and quickly
    downloaded LDAS on their system for evaluation.

    The metaDataAPI has now been upgraded to support multiple databases
    concurrently. Prior to this upgrade, LDAS had to restart the metaDataAPI
    each time we changed over from development to test or production versions
    of the database tables. This enhancement will also allow LDAS to make
    dramatic changes in table designs which do not easily migrate and still
    support access to the older data collected in engineering runs as we
    move towards the LIGO I science run. The upgrade was accomplised in just
    3 days of coding effort which is a tremendously powerful statement of
    value of the combined modular/object oriented structure of LDAS.

    Support for BLOBs (binary table data) in the wrapperAPI was added this
    week and tested using a dynamically loaded shared object developed by
    a caltech undergraduate. This will allow search codes running on the
    LDAS beowulf cluster to insert things like spectra and waveforms into
    the LIGO database tables. Previously, only simple datatypes were allowed.

    Several bug fixes and enhancements were made to the lightweightAPI
    this week. Cheif among these were support for threading and the addition
    of complex data support.

    A modest effort went into cleaning up documentation in the data-
    ConditionAPI this week. The latex documentation is being made
    standalone and the perceps documentation in the FFT code is being
    upgraded to reflect the the new rules.

    A new set of test scripts which automate the access of all frame
    attributes was started this week. This will give LDAS a much clearer
    view into the validation of frame software and data stored in frames.

    Development on the eventMonitorAPI continued this week. It is now
    able to receive and register the different data objects sent by the
    wrapperAPI. Work will continue on parsing this data and sending it
    to the next APIs in the pipeline, e.g., the metaDataAPI.

  • Hardware Systems (Anderson)

  • LDAS hardware/sys-admin activities
    ----------------------------------

    The purchase orders for the 28TB of LDAS disk storage and 6000-slot tape silo
    where signed and placed with the respective vendors. Shipping dates for
    all of this equipment are scheduled for the last week in March.

    Ordered 7 5000VA UPS units to run the large LDAS disk systems at CIT, LHO, and
    LLO and coordinated the shipping and installation of the STK 6000-slot tape
    silo with the appropriate personnel at CACR.

    Ordered a small network switch for LHO to support the move of the LDAS servers
    to the staging building scheduled for the last week in March.

    Successfully recorded the E3 data at both LHO and LLO. Ingestion of these
    data into the main archive at Caltech have been suspended after 0.5TB to
    await the imminent arrival and installation of additional redwood tapes.

    Installed and begun testing of a new LDAS software server (E220R) which
    will free up the current E450 for duty as the database server in the
    ldas-dev system.

    Installed and begun testing of an additional 3GB of memory for a total
    of 4GB in the data-conditioning server in the ldas-dev system.

    Begun plans to specify and order the MIT LDAS system for the duration
    of the Engineering runs.

     
  • Data Analysis Activities
  • FCT research:

    Linqing Wen is at UTB to particpate in a workshop on writing LAL-LDAS code for search algorithms. She will be working on porting FCT to this environment for MPI based analysis.

    Charlton:

    * Worked on (finally) getting Rick's FCT code to work properly with
    the Newtonian chirp function.

    In terms of tau0 and frequency, the Newtonian component
    of the chirp is

              tau0*(6/5)*PI*f0*(f/f0)^(-5/3)

    where f and f0 are in Hz. I chose f0 = 175 based on Sathya's paper.

    The chirp transform has a factor of 2*PI in front so we
    want to divide that out and use

              2*PI*tau0*(3/5)*f0*(f/f0)^(-5/3)

    We also want to zero out everything below 40 Hz because
    seismic noise is dominant:

              phi = 0                          0 <= f <= 40
                  = (3/5)*f0*(f/f0)^(-5/3)     f > 40

    However, putting this function in "as is" doesn't seem to work - all
    I get is an image that looks like random junk, instead of a well
    defined chirp. I think the dynamic range of phi is too large and the
    capacity of float is being exceeded - the FCT contains a division of two
    parts of the phase function, which in this case can give a large number
    divided by a very small number, which might cause this.

    Things work much better if the phase function is
    scaled so that it's min is 0 and max is 1. I tried phi/phi_max
    instead. The tau0 becomes tau0*phi_max, so, at the end of the
    day, whatever value you get for the estimated chirp coefficient
    is divided by phi_max to get the real value. This seems to work out
    fine.

    Vicere':
    * Data analysis: I am getting acquainted with issues related to frame
    access and
        availability. Had meetings with Alex and Philip about accessing
    frames on
        directories: with Kent about needs for the next MDC (ingestion of
    LSC files
        and production of frames); with Albert and Roy Williams about the
    frame
        exchange with Virgo (and others) using Grid.

    Last Week

    E3 run (Charlton)

    This week and last weekend heve mostly been spent monitoring the
    acquisition of, and making plots of, spectra and cross-spectra from the
    E3 run. A selection of current results are viewable at

    http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~charlton/E3Run/

    The scripts worked reasonably well, except for a couple of occasions where
    the data conditioning API crashed. In the end I was able to produce a
    set of plots roughly once an hour while the scripts were running, from
    about 17 minutes of real data.
     
     

    General Computing (Wallace)

    This week

    MIT:
    (Keith)
    -Installed new IDE drive and rebuilt ultra-10 with 2.8
    tested the apop APOP/POP3 server.
    -Requested new MX records for mail server/backup
    tested out sendmail masquerading.
    -Installed CVS, built CVS repository, and hooked up
    cvsweb (interactive cvs web browsing tool).

    Livingston:
    (Shannon & Tom)
    -Configured the Fore 2810 100 mbps switch to
    connect servers and heavily used machines to it.
    This will allow ~10 times the bandwidth the
    servers have now.
    -Put together an "audio visual"
    cart which has the Dell with the LCD monitor on
    it.  There is a projector attached to the dell
    along with a wireless networking card so that any
    time anyone needs a projector, all they have to do
    is roll it into place and provide power.
    -Testing PHP and MySQL on the new web server (after a
    moderately difficult compile under Solaris). Once we have put
    it through it's paces and made sure that
    everything is functioning properly we will move
    the web pages, ilog, etc to the new server.
    We will also consolidate other things that are
    running under linux/apache at the present time.
    This includes the "Operator Checklist" and the
    associated database.
    -Installed a network monitor to observe overall traffic etc
    over our T1.
    -We have ordered a Sun Blade 100 workstation for testing, and
    for use in one of the labs.

    Hanford:
    (Christine)
    -Caltech ITS has finally decided that LHO Sun's can be registered with
    the Caltech Sun Scholar Pac to receive relatively free Sun compiler
    software.  I finally received a license file from Caltech ITS for the
    Sun Forte6 compiler software.  I have spent the last three days
    downloading the C, C++, Fortran and High Performance Computing compilers
    from the Sun web site.  Caltech ITS felt this was better than sending me
    the CDROMs.  I hope to have the compilers installed by the end of this
    week.
    -Installed bison software on the application server.  Through complaints
    from users, I continue to identify which software packages are needed to
    be installed on the application server.
    -Ordered D1000 replacement disk drives for CDS and computers and PCI
    cards for GDS.  Purchased software for development of Solaris code to
    run on Windows systems for porting Ligo Apps Tools to Windows.
    -Removed security from the TRINET seismic datalogger PC to facilitate
    off-site control.
     

    CIT:
    (Barbara)
    - Continued efforts on the LDAS Equipment web forms.  Finished
    password-based permissions for deletions, add/update, and view only.
    Finished feature to return to calling page after performing an edit.  Now
    just have a couple of reporting items.  Would be good to clone this
    application for all LIGO equipment.
    - Met with Linda Turner about the search tool for the document log.  Have a
    minor change to make to the tool.  Meanwhile Linda will contact staff with
    many reserved numbers to do some cleanup before the tool goes public.
    - Posted the LSC transparencies.  As of today we have 82 posted and about
    20 outstanding.  Updated the Employment page.  Posted some meetings;
    archived 1999 meetings.
    - Sent out the revised LDAS home page for review and have a number of
    changes to make.
    - Worked on the contacts.cgi script a bit.  The script is finished but I am
    adding some error checking and defensive programming.
    - Reviewed my router woes with Larry.

    (Lisa)
    -Configured rana in the 40m to act as a gateway to their cdssol network.
    -Installed graffias with samba 2.0.7 and began testing it with windows 2000.
    -Configuring an older ultra 10 with sunpci.  This required an update to the OBP
    and a second hard disk to be installed.
    -Spent some time playing with wlan access points.
    - I have 3 old pc's ready to be surplussed.
    -The usual round of pc issues.

    (Suresh)
    -Worked with Larry to resolve Bridge third floor networking problem. A FORE
    3810 ethernet switch has been replaced by working one. We noticed same resetting
    problem of 3810 box as before.
    -Worked with HPC technical representative (Mike), Larry and Stuart to resolve
    postscript printing problem with Laserjet 5000N printer in 6th floor Millikan.
    Finally it was found that formatter is the problem. A new formatter has been
    ordered. Hopefully, next week we will get the replacement.
    -A new e-mail alias "aligo_sys" has been set up. Also modified some aliases.
    - Working on resolving the running of modeler program rather slowly in certain
    CPUs.
    -Resolved some system problem with Sydney Meshkov's Sun workstation.

    (Larry)
    -Worked a number of procurement issues and maintenance contract setups.
    Still have a few more to go.
    -Helped DCC move some data around. So far the change for getting the LSC
    conference presentations on to the web has been a big improvement.
    -Worked on a couple of SUN boxes. Mainly, just some minor setup and procedure
    problems.
    -Trying to work out a number of VPN issues with ITS so we can have more people
    on LIGO using it.
    -Finally, was able to check out some of the WAN configurations we were looking
    at for Hanford, with a FORE tech. rep.. Two of the methods we have been looking
    into will work according to FORE.
    -Fixed a couple of accounts.
    -Spent some time working various issues with Shannon and Tom at Livingston.

     (BS) Ilog maintenance, additions, and development:    (2.5 days)
            - Major fix to prevent bad XML characters from being written to the logs
              (thus breaking the log for that day.)  This has been an occasional,
              but ongoing problem.  With the use of Ilog continuing to grow, it was
              a needed fix.
            - Setting up more Ilog services on ldas-sw for various groups.

    Last week

    MIT:
    (Keith)
    -Migrated MIT machines to new printer server.
    -Investigated bizarre behavior from Ultra 10
    which ended up being an intermittently failing
    IDE drive.
    -Investigated POP3/APOP server (teapop)
    for use with mail server.
    -Installed StarOffice on several machines. Patched and installed
    maintenance update v3 on several more 2.8 nodes.

    Hanford:

    Nothing to report.

    Livingston:
    -Performed a number of fixes on various computers for the E3 run.
    Overall things went pretty smooth.
    -A great deal of time was spent setting up for the LSC.
    -Worked on getting more information on another 3rd party network vendor.
    Shannon has made some progress there.
    -Albert is now trying to get some information from the LAnet people concerning
    the OC3 connection for the Observatory.

    CIT:
    (Lisa)
    - rebuilt grumium, Ultra 30, with solaris 8.  I'm moving it upstairs today.
    - rebuilt Liz's old pc.  It's ready to be moved out.
    - Got demo licenses for Cadence microwave simulation tools.  This was a courtesy
    for EE.
    - chased down some email problems between Virgo and Ligo.
    - I also discovered an interesting e-mail problem with someone's home linux box
    using imap off of acrux.  That problem was resolved by switching the person over
    to pop.
    - dealt with some netscape instability under Solaris.  If you are on a sun box
    running solaris 8, netscape is part of the operating system.  It appears to be
    more stable than running netscape off of an nfs mount.  The path is
    /usr/dt/bin/netscape.
    - I've been babysitting the new modem pool.  I've had a couple of reports of
    problems from the LSC.

    (Barbara)
    - Finished search tool for the DCC log.  It is ready for review after folks
    return from the LSC meeting.  Also reworked the forms for reserving a
    document number to eliminate the Author pull-down which takes too long to
    load.  Made changes to all DCC web forms and pages to bring them up to
    standards.
    - Continued work on LDAS forms for equipment inventory.  Have
    password-based privileges just about working.
    - Set up Access database and web pages for the LSC transparencies.  Created
    a new logo for the LSC.
    - Installed various web site changes -- LSC, publications, PAC talk,
    construction accounts, etc.

    (Suresh)
    -Moved directories under /export/home3 and /export/home4 in sirius to 36 GB
    drive in Sun Storage D1000. Now directories under these two home directories are
    combined to one single home3 directory. Subsequently, modified auto_home file in
    sirius to reflect thsese changes.
    -Received bottom paper tray with housing enclosure from HP and replaced it in
    LaserJet 5000 N printer in the third floor bridge. Sent back the old broken
    module to HP.
    -Downloaded FORE ES 3810 and ES 2810 switch firmware's from Marconi web site
    and set up in System Admin Laptop.
    -Did some testing on ES 2810 switch with 10 db attenuated single mode ATM
    uplink module. This problem is not resolved yet. Seems like it need to be sent
    to Marconi for further diagnosis.
    -Installed application software's, set up printers and e-mail account in Ken
    Mailand's PC after Lisa passed me on with Windows 98 installed.
    -Created some e-mail aliases, fixed minor printing problems and help users in
    various ways.

    (Larry)
    -Spent the last week working with the E3 run at Livingston and assisting with the setup for the LSC conference.

    [Bruce Sears]
    * (BS) Ilog maintenance, additions, and development:    (1.0 days)
            - Continuing support of LLO Ilog move to a different machine.
            - Setting up new Ilog service on ldas-sw for various groups.


    LIGO II/Advanced R&D (Sanders)


    Peter King
    PSL for 40m and LASTI
    More components continue to trickle in.  Just about all the
    mirrors, waveplates and lenses from CVI Laser have arrived.  A fraction
    of
    the mirror mounts from Newport have arrived.
     

    Jay tells me that apparently the Motorola 162 IOCs ordered will not work
    for
    us and will have to be returned for a swap.
     

    From Riccardo DeSalvo

    We had no meeting this week only a few remarks.
     

    Finally got hold of some DAC units, unfortunately they will be in Italy
    until early next week.
     

    Feed through flanges, water cutting machines down until Monday, we will
    get them in Pasadena middle of the week, will mount cables end of week
    or weekend trying to ship to Hongo on Monday next week.
     

    Accelerometers, also some delays, all parts should be delivered early
    next week to Alessandro.  All the rest is ready to go.
     

    Gianni has introduced the modifications and the real vacuum tank
    geometry in drawings, after approval need to start the production of the
    two double nail head wire, should do by middle of the week.  Also need
    to redesign coil for F0 actuator.  Will need force versus position
    characteristics from Akiteru for old coil supports.
     

    New hard clamp and wedges being built, soon ready to test for
    hysteresis.
     


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