Weekly Report for Week Ending May 31, 2001

The LIGO Executive Committee Agenda for Monday  June 4, 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)
• 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:   Joy Fan update, PAC meeting

Special Announcements:

Weekly Report Highlights

First (IR) light at the 40m!
 

LSC Issues (Weiss)

no report

LIGO I Construction/LIGO Laboratory Administration (Lindquist)

WBS 1.2 LIGO Operations--Administration

A site teleconference was held on Thursday, May  31, 2001. The following issues were discussed:

• The financial reports for the end of April.  The current projection for uncosted funds as of the end of September is $3.5 - $4.0 million.  There is still significant uncertainty, but this number is increasingly important since the NSF seems poised to allocated less funding than requested for FY 2002, and we will be monitoring costs closely.
• Status of DCAA audit of Operations Proposal--ongoing.
• Hanford OSB East Building--building height, computer room floor, fire protection.
• New Cooperative Agreement--draft has been forwarded to Vic Cook (NSF).
• Two new expenditure types are being set up by Finance for tracking LIGO Equipment: LIGO Equipment Government and LIGO Equipment Caltech. These new categories will be used on all future Purchase Requisitions for Equipment instead of the old Caltech Equipment and Government Equipment.

Joy Fans--Gerry Stapfer to provide status report during Executive Committee Meeting on June 8, 2001.  Need to understand decisions relative to maintenance contracts.

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

• No report--Ed is at home today.

>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

• Progress continues on auditing of PSI drawings.
• Electronic document submittals were a bit heavy for this reporting period.
• Linda will be out of the office for the next 3 weeks..

Press here to access the DOCUMENT CONTROL CENTER WEB PAGE.

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

Press here for ACCOUNTS PAYABLE HISTORY DATA.

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

• No report this week.

• Cindy and I have completed the report as of April 2001 for the R&D program using a revised format similar to that used for Operations.  Charts showing monthly expenditures by Expenditure Type and Cumulative Expenditures for the Periods from December 2000 through April 2001 are included in the report.  We are to meet with Gary Sanders this afternoon to go over the report.
• Met with Property Accounting regarding the new Expenditure Type recently created for all LIGO equipment purchases - 'LIGO-Equipment'.  We pointed out to them that LIGO Equipment needs to be identified as equipment owned by the Government and equipment owned by Caltech and this single Expenditure Type will make it difficult to make the required separation of LIGO property.
• Provided information requested for DCAA audit.

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

• CSI: Optics Materials (sapphire)  Pathfinder review was held at the Contractor's facility. LIGO and LSC representatives participated.
• CSIRO: CO No. 09 for Advanced LIGO optics polishing R&D was released to Procurement.
• REO: CO NO. 08 for re-coating of LIGO optics was released to Purchasing. The work is under way.
• BFGoodrich: CO No. 03 for initiation of Advanced LIGO optics polishing Pathfinder was released to Purchasing.
• HPD: LIGO's review of the procurement for full-up SEI mechanical structure design and fabrication project, to be processed for NSF approval, was completed.

• A new policy covering the use of LIGO and Government-owned vehicles at the sites has been issued.  This is to insure proper care and use of these vehicles, as well as establish who is eligible to drive them.
• Work continues on the repair of the Joy fans at Livingston.  The presence of spare parts for these fans significantly reduced the impact their failure could have had on operations.  The spares for these fans will be replenished, and the site managers are checking to assure that spares are available for other critical items.

Support (Wood)

Advanced LIGO (Frey, Petrac)

Progress Period from 05.25 to 05.31

Accomplishments:

• No weekly Advanced LIGO Project Controls meeting held this week due to holiday on the 28th.
• Prepared milestone report from Primavera Project Planner (P3) and a variance report in reference to DCC No. M010022-00 (http://docuserv.ligo.caltech.edu/docs/internal/M/M010022-00.pdf)
• No Meetings with the DCAA .
• Prepared transmittal cover letters as Phil requested them (7 total)
• Advanced LIGO MRE Proposal (Highest Priority)
• Continuing the development of the Cost Estimate.
• Continue to pursue all other sub system schedules.
• Added the schedule of reviews to the Advanced LIGO proposal page.
• Issued updated meeting minutes for PSL review action items.
• Met with Peter King and debriefed him regarding his next step and how his data was input.
• Working on the SUS schedule and expanding scope for all IFOs.
• Added a SUS list to the website for the SUS page.
• Issued meeting minutes for AOS review for comment.
• Started changes to the AOS cost and schedule per review meeting.
• Issued updated meeting minutes for COC review action items.
• Started changes to the COC schedule per comments by GB and review meeting.
• SEI group has not provided any data and meeting scheduled for the 4th has a changed scope due to this condition.
• Started the integration of the IO cost and schedule data.
• Filled all documents and prepared a MRE cost review notebook.
• Project Plan for the TNI Lab continues.
• Followed up with Eric Black regarding sapphire fab.  Due to technical issues at Crystal Systems earliest delivery is now October 15, 2001, provided some quality requirements are waived.  This still fits current time frame provided requirement can be waived.
• Project Plan for the 40-Meter Lab Upgrade continues.
• Nothing to report.
• Project plan for the LASTI project at MIT continues.
• Nothing to report.
• Continue to test the Cost Book Tool.
• Continue mapping and formatting of OPS cost data for input.
• Testing changes implemented by BK.
• Prepared a draft detail cost report for review and comment.
• Development of the Advanced LIGO Project Controls Guidebook continues.
• Project Web Site for posting schedule and progress related data continues to be updated with the latest and greatest.
• See http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~tfrey/index.html

• Next weekly Advanced LIGO Project Controls meeting will be on Monday, June 4th 10:30am at SSCR to discuss SEI MRE Cost Estimate and Schedule.
• Focus of the meeting will be the review of SEI cost data input into the Cost Book.  (How soon can they provide data?)
• Add milestones indicated by David S. and Dennis C.
• Will continue to provide support to Phil regarding DCAA data requests.
• Advanced LIGO MRE Proposal (Highest Priority Task)
• Highest priority is the development of the Cost Estimate.
• Will continue to pursue all other sub system schedules.
• Will initiate the updating of the COC and AOS schedules.
• Continue input of changes to the AOS cost and schedule per review meeting.
• Continue input of changes to the COC schedule per comments by GB and review meeting.
• Continue the integration of the IO cost and schedule data.
• Continue working on the SUS schedule and expanding scope for all IFOs.
• Will Continue to update the TNI Schedule and incorporate any changes.
• Will update the plan with progress as of 06.01.01 and  post to site by the 5th.
• Will Continue to update the LASTI Schedule and incorporate any changes.
• Will update the plan with progress as of 06.01.01 and  post to site by the 5th.
• Will incorporate  any additional changes provided by David
• Will continue updating the 40 meter schedule and incorporate any changes.
• Will update the plan with progress as of 06.01.01 and  post to site by the 5th.
• Will incorporate any additional changes provided by Alan.
• Cost Book Tool development continues.  (Highest Priority Task)
• Will finish ops cost data input.
• Will continue the development of the Advanced LIGO Project Web Site.
• Will continue the development of the Advanced LIGO Project Controls Guide Book.

WBS 1.4.1.2   Project Controls (LIGO Construction)

David Shoemaker has provided a final draft of the Advanced R&D Annual Report.  Elizabeth Wood is currently entering the report into FastLane for transmittal to the NSF.  She is going to need some additional help where information is incomplete, e.g., certain publications that have not been submitted to the LIGO DCC.

We held a meeting of the LIGO Change Control Board, Tuesday, May 29, 2001.  The following Change Request was approved.  Minutes have been prepapred and are being distributed (LIGO-M010167-00-P).
 

We held a Technical Review Board (TRB) on May 18th to discuss design and placement aspects of this building.  Minutes of the TRB are still being prepared.

Press for the latest Contingency Needs Projection.

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

• Continued work on incorporating the change request's into the construction baseline approved at the CCB held on May 8, 2001 for the May 2001 Quarterly NSF report.
• Continued work on the May 2001 Responsibility Assignment Matrix.
• Continued work for the CDS group's costs/commitments to complete.
• Continued with the reconciliation of the LIGO Project Change Request Log and the Contingency Lien List.
• Continued with construction contract/work package close out.

• The MIT invoice and TWONK for the month of April 2001 have been received and paid.
• Florence and I  worked together to setup reports (similar to the format used by Florence for her Operations Reports) for showing Expenditures and Available Balances for the Construction accounts, the Detector R&D accounts, and the new buildings at Livingston and Hanford.
• I am currently updating the LIGO Project Signature Authorization List and will put it out as soon as it is completed. (I am still waiting for input from someone who I will not name... at this time... again)

 
• I continue to reviewed the open encumbrances on the Construction and Advanced R&D accounts to see if the requested removals have been made. I will continue to review these accounts weekly until all encumbrances have been removed (Remember, I can only get these errors corrected if the Task Managers point them out to me)..

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

• On Tuesday, May 29, representatives of NTD Architects presented their proposed design for the new OSB East Building at Hanford.  This included exterior designs and interior layouts.  Present for LIGO were Barry Barish, Gary Sanders, Phil Lindquist, Ed Jasnow, and Otto Matherny by telephone.  The presentation was well received, but there are a couple of decisions still to be made by LIGO. These are scheduled to be resolved at the Thursday site teleconference.

Quality/Safety (Tyler)

Sanders, Scislowicz, Zydowicz and Tyler conducted an annual safety audit at LLO with G. Stapfer and J. Kern.
Two items on the audit agenda were of particular importance to LIGO:

• (1). The discussion/review of the proposed plan for closure of the laser safety action by Cook and Kern.

The proposed plan will implement a "smart-card" method of laser access control. The system for access control will be "standardized" as much as possible for all sites.
AI was assigned to develop a diagram for assignment of access authorization.
AI was assigned to diagram the access control system, show the chain of activities of how it will work.
• (2). The establishment of a LIGO Vehicle Policy.

The policy was accepted with a few minor changes as discussed to be incorporated in the final draft by G. Sanders.

LIGO Hanford Observatory (LHO) Operations (Raab)

no report received

LIGO Livingston Observatory (LLO) Operations (Coles)

The major focus of activity at LLO this week has been on the inspection and repair of the air handlers. Two of the fan units supporting the LVEA were found to have failed catastrophically resulting in their motor shafts being broken. A fan unit supplying the labs also is noisy and the bearings are suspect. These conditions probably resulted from long term wear of the shaft bearings that support the variable pitch fans. We believe the severe wear was due to inadequate maintenance lubrication of the fan bearings and overloading of the actuators which control the fan pitch. Investigation of the failed units has caused us to suspect that lubrication of the remaining operating motor units on the site may also have been improper and that other motors may now be on the verge of failure. To remedy this, we have begun a complete inspection of all of the air handlers, replacement of the failed motors with new motors, and motor rebuilds and other preventive maintenance on the remaining operating motors. The failure of these systems comes at a particularly bad time as it coincides with the planned service of the interferometer to replace OSEM's and plans to remedy some workmanship problems that are apparent with some of the SOS assemblies. To accomplish this work, we need to have a functioning and reliable clean air supply in the LVEA and the optics lab and vacuum prep lab so that the optics will not be contaminated. We have therefore had to defer the SOS work planned for this week and instead have placed the labs in a "buttoned up" state to minimize the impact of the air handlers being taken down for service. A service representative from the fan company is now on site, along with a team of riggers, members of the LLO staff, and Otto Matherny who has come from LHO to observe. Our work plan is the following:

• remove the failed motor and functioning motor from the first of two air handling units that supply the LVEA (each unit has two motor/fan assemblies) and replace them with two brand new motors (this step is nearly complete as this time). This allows the LVEA air to be turned back on and gives some redundancy since there is one functioning motor, along with one failed motor, in the other LVEA air handling unit. We discovered that the functioning motor has a shaft TIR that indicates it is bent and so prudently it will also be replaced.
• replace the noisy member of the pair of motors that supplies air to the labs with the normally functioning motor of the pair and insert a new motor into the spot vacated by the motor that is switched over. (Since one motor services the hot deck and one services the cold deck, the new motor will be in the cold deck spot so that if the other motor fails in the short term, we can still continue to work in the labs using only the cold air supply. More about this below...). This step is in progress and should be completed on Saturday. This will allow us to begin work in the LVEA on Monday and remove optics into the lab area for rework.
• Remove the four operating motors which service the end stations, rebuild them, and reinstall them into their respective locations. Removal of the fans and motors should be complete by Saturday, but the completion of the rebuild and reinstallation step will require around one week, depending on the turn around time at the motor shop (we have been told that this service is readily available in this area because of the requirements of all of the chemical plants and refineries in the area.)
• Replace the motor with the broken shaft in the second LVEA air handler with a new motor. This step will require 4-6 weeks since a motor must be ordered from the manufacturer.
• Rebuild the motor servicing the hot deck for the lab areas. This step will be scheduled following completion of the SOS work.

Operators continuing cleaning efforts at the end stations in preparation for a future vent to do in vacuum re-work . Tooling has been staged in the LVEA for the possibility of removing the spool pieces on Friday. Precautions have been taken in the labs to protect in vacuum equipment during the building fan repair.
 

Optics and Installation: Ham 2's North door was removed last Friday and MC2 examined. We took it from the HAM table and into the vacuum prep lab. Visual inspection made and no grounding evident but we did find something interesting. The suspension wires were not trimmed, and one is 7-1/2" long.It is possible for the untrimmed wire to dangle into the tower and contact a suspension wire. Our examination of the tower is on hold, because of the air handler fan problem. When we learned on Tuesday that the lab fans were having problems we moved MC2 into the bake oven and roughed it down in order to keep it clean. The labs were secured yesterday, making sure everything was bagged and stored properly because airflow will be disrupted for a while during lab fan replacement. We're ready to go with OSEM replacement in the LVEA as soon as the air handlers are back on-line.

General Computing: We have received three Sun Blade 100s, which we are setting up in the Computer User's Room. We have requested an additional T1 line from LSU, and are looking in to the details.
 

Detector/Technical Support (Whitcomb, Coyne)

See also the daily electronic logs for the installation and commissioning activities:
Hanford Detector Log
Livingston Detector Log

1.1 LHO INSTALLATION & COMMISSIONING

2km

Betsy, Rick and Dick adjusted the EOMs to minimize the rf AM on the light entering HAM7.  The residual AM is about 1e-5.

4-k Commissioning

An accidental cycling of the power on the 10 W laser caused a fault with its internal shutter.  Mark Guenther and Rick spent some time debugging it, but it basically went away without any clear cause. We will continue to monitor it.

Mark Barton is working on the suspension tuning procedure for the small optics using the 4 km MC2.

Gerardo and Hugh have been making steady progress getting the optical levers installed, pointed and enclosed.

1.2LLO INSTALLATION & COMMISSIONING

Commissioning

• install the new OSEM heads in all the masses
• investigate shorts in the wiring to the OSEMS
• adjust the mode cleaner length to place the modulation sidebands half way between two long arm longitudinal resonances
• adjust the mode matching telescope to improve the match into the long arm cavities
• remove an obscuration of the beam at the antisymmetric port
• investigate the reasons for the low Q and non-linearity in the mode cleaner suspensions
• improve the alignment in several of the optics to reduce the bias current under operating conditions

The problems with the HVAC fans have stopped further installation activities.

Osems for LLO

IOO

Guido Mueller                   6/14-19  (definite)
Stacy Wise                      6/14-19  (definite) (a new grad student at UF)
Michael Hannawald               6/14-26  (definite) (postdoc candidate for IOO)
Malik Rakhmanov         TBD

PSL

2.0 OtherEngineering and Scientific Activities

2.1 Design/Analysis/Fab

Optics

An specialized laminar flow maintenance firm will replace the light cover, seal it accordingly, replace the ballast (that was the defective part), replace the lights and certify the   laminar flow bench as a Class 100.

Optical modeling

Erika D'Ambrosio
On "Flat Top Mode".
I found out the recycling mirror must be carefully designed when the flat beam (whose shape minimizes the thermoelastic noise) is excited inside the arms. Since the superposition of Gaussian modes that the flat beam consists of, will not be a superposition of Gaussian modes after the interaction with the ITM mirror, no simple calculation applies other than evaluating the result of that interation numerically. I am currently writing a piece of code assuming a flat surface for the AR-side. During the holiday weekend I documented myself with some papers on reshaped mirrors but coupled cavities were never mentioned. I found interesting experimental results and useful mathematical considerations.

On diffractional losses
I checked on the power gains obtained by the FFT-code when the diameter of the ETM mirror (where the spot size is planned to be pretty large) is shortened. I solved the problem in that parameter for the diffractional loss associated to the mirror and the numerical curve is ~2.5 times the curve generated by using the clipped light approximation.

PSL

Five Freq Ref boards built and ready for test
Remaining boards (two sets of PMC & Freq Stab Servo) kitted
Some parts shortages exist -- work is in process to resolve the matter
We are short RFPD(2)/FreqServo(1)/VCO(2) PC boards -- We will work to resolve the situation.

Ben Abbott
I still await testing of my intensity servo DC photodiode board while integrated with Rick's servo.

ISC

LSC photodetectors: Tested and tuned 3 of 4 new photodetectors sent by Rich Abbott on their way to LHO for the 4k IFO.  They're now compensated to give less than 1 degree pk-pk change in RF response phase from <1 mW to over 150 mW detected power.  Transimpedance gains are nominal (around 4 kOhm), but two have slightly higher RF noise than we are used to (one is slightly over specification). The fourth PD (a refurbished one with a "checkered history" as they say) mostly works but seems to have a subtle problem with its bias control.  We are investigating.

Photon calibrators: consulted with Rich Mittleman and Peter Fritschel, who now have a revised quote for 1047 nm photon calibrator lasers. By delaying purchase until now we can get three times the power (1.5W vs. 0.5W) at one third the price ($2k/unit vs. $6k/unit).

LSC

Mohana received the boards for the DC readout module and will begin testing.

Flavio is putting together details regarding the timing system tests to diagnose a potential error in design involving the ICS110B ADCs.

ASC/LSC/Digital Suspensions

Jay Heefner
All boards and components for the upgrade of the LHO 2K and LLO 4K Digital Suspensions are being fabbed or ordered. Cross connect harnesses will be started and we should be ready to convert by early September.

It has been decided that for the time being the DAQ coil readouts for the LHO 4K Digital Suspensions  will be DC coupled. The cross connects and connections to the DAQ system are designed and should be installed next week. Once we get some operational experience with the system we can design a DAQ interface that has more optimal whitening.

All custom electronics for the 4K ASC has been built and tested. The cross connects and rack wiring are installed and ready for test. Testing of the system will occur as time permits over the next month.

AC OSEMs

Data Acquisition

New DAQ controller is having problems coexisting with the test point manager (TPM) at LHO. Controller sending timing interrupts to TPM kills it; TPM getting timing interrupts from GPS module results in controller GPS module blacking out. Had hopes of testing/troubleshooting offline here at Caltech until I found that our new GPS modules don't work.

Sander Liu
Delivered 32 850Hz filter modules to 40m. Ordered 25 LEMO version DAQ antialiasing boards as well as 10 front panels. Obtained a quote for 240 850Hz filter modules from Frequency Devices.

GDS

DMT

40 Meter Interferometer (Weinstein)

• PSL (King, Cardenas, Karwoski, Russell, Ugolini, Abbott):
• First (IR) light at the 40m! The MOPA laser arrived this week, and was connected to the chiller and to the power supply. On Wednesday at 5:30, we donned our laser safety glasses, instituted temporary safety standard operating procedures, and we switched it on. Nothing happened. Peter swapped a couple of RS232 cables, and we tried again. IR light exited both ports of the MOPA enclosure. After a few minutes, the power diodes warmed up to operating temperature, and the beam registered ~ 11.85 watts into the calorimeter.
• Peter and Lee took beam scans at various distances from the MOPA, verifying that the beam was more or less level, measuring the transverse profiles, and determining the waist size, position, divergence, k-factors in both transverse dimensions. All looks ok.
• Lee and Peter fabbed the PMC, and it is sitting on the PSL table.
• The PSL reference cavity is still being pumped on with a turbo pump; it's at 5e-8 torr. We will switch to the ion pump today or Friday.
• Peter awaits some optical mount spacers, expected from the shop on Friday, to complete the optical layout on the table.
• Mike Smith has completed a detailed PSL optical table layout, showing all components, including those for diagnosing the output beam and for sensing the mode cleaner transmitted light: D010092.pdf.
• Rick, Paul, and Ben have completed all the custom electronics boards, and they are all in place in the PSL rack. Paul hopes to have all the rack wiring done by the end of this week, and all the table-to-rack cabling shortly thereafter. Also in progress: wiring to the DAQ system.
• Missing: the Kepco power supplies that power the Pockels cells. They won't arrive for some time. Peter will lend us some power supplies in the interim.
• Dennis installed our PEM Motorola vme cpu to function as the PSL IOC (I/O controller), while we wait for the one ordered by Peter for that purpose to arrive. He downloaded the ioc software, brought up the EPICS screens, and after a bit of tinkering, it all works! (Although the wiring of signals to/from the ADCs and DACs is not complete, so they were reading out, and controlling, nothing real). All the PSL control software is now in place.
• Our expectation is that we'll have a fully operational, controlled and controlling, PSL by mid-next week!
• Reference cavity temperature control will come later; Peter is still trying to get a heating jacket made. All the control electronics is in place.
• Electricians continue to wire up all the safety equipment (laser interlocks, kill switches, illuminated warning signs, laser enclosure door alarms). They expect to be done by Friday.
• We are assembling most / all of the diagnostic equipment we need to do a full characterization of the PSL, and make a complete documentation, with the help of 2 SURF students (including a 2nd reference cavity that the TNI group is loaning to us).
• DAQS (Rolf Bork): We have been running our DAQS system for 8 days with no problems. The system has been invaluable in keeping track of the status of our vacuum control system. Rolf needs to set up a few more things (automatic startup scripts, etc). We will set up a Frame Broadcaster CPU and a small (ok, one cpu) DMT farm / network, with help from Larry & Lisa.
• PEM (Ugolini, Abbott, AJW): Ben and Dennis have put three accelerometer channels into the ADCU (analog data collection unit) which is reading out well (responds neatly to door slams, etc). The IOC for the particle counter and other misc RS232-readout devices was borrowed for use as the PSL ioc, until the MVME-162 purchased for that purpose arrives. The weather station works well in standalone mode; Caltech student Victor Tsai will get it into the EPICS IOC soon. Then: STACIS controllers, RGA, etc.
• Vacuum control system (Ugolini, Vass):
• Steve and Guillaume installed our 4 newly regenerated ion pumps onto our new gate valves last week, and we pumped down with the turbopumps and cryopump shortly thereafter.
• Then, the ion pumps were turned on. After a brief period of coughing and belching, the ion pumps began removing more gas than they were emitting.
• One of the 4 ion pump controllers was reporting apparently incorrect HV. It was replaced by a spare, and all seems fine now.
• With all 3 sets of pumps going, the vacuum fell to an 40m ALL-TIME RECORD LOW of 3.3e-7 torr; Still dominated by water and by diffusion of air through the electrical feedthroughs (to be replaced).
• Since we never could get the EPICS ARchiving going, the DAQS system was invaluable in keeping track of progress. (We're still trying things to get it to work).
• We then turned off the cryopump, and the pressure quickly rose to ~ 1e-6 torr. Then we turned off the turbopump, leaving only the 4 ion pumps going, and the pressure rose to 1.3e-6 torr and stayed there. This is roughly consistent with expectations from pumping speeds.
• The RGA reported rather high hydrocarbon levels (> 10-10 torr for AMU=41) with ion pumps only (as compared with (< 1e-11 torr with the cryopump). It appears that the ion pumps are rather inefficient for these molecules.
• Steve is in the process of running with all possible combinations of cryopump, ion pumps, and maglev turbopump to intercalibrate their pumping speeds for total pressure and hydrocarbon partial pressure.
• We will not be able to operate the IFO with the noisy cryopump on, but the ion pumps and maglev turbopump together should give us pressure levels we can live with.
• Dennis is working on several mods required to make the EPICS control system completely complete: one cable remains to be run to sense the state of one of the new valves; the EPICS state code must be changed to read in the ion pump status correctly; the AutoBURT facility must be used to recover from control system reboots gracefully; and then we need to figure out how to talk to the turbopump controllers, which do not behave the way they should. All but the last should happen very soon.
• Vacuum envelope and hardware (Larry Jones):
• We got one quote for the small pressure balanced expansion joint needed for the 12m mode cleaner (to replace the gimbals currently in hand for the vacuum envelope). It's a problematic piece to make... We don't need it immediately.
• Allied had some delays in starting the clean, test, bake of all of our large vacuum pieces (mode cleaner vacuum envelope, etc); still optimistic that everything should be back in the lab by the end of June.
• Still plan to install the bulk of the vacuum envelope changes in July, with all the rest in the fall.
• Larry has completed drawings for the custom supports for the six small optical tables needed for the 40m, and is ordering the tabletop breadboards from TMC.
• Larry has a quote for the in-vacuum kapton-coated ribbon cables and feedthroughs for the suspension OSEMS (and all other in-vacuum electrical components). He's waiting to hear whether LASTI wants to add to the order.
• Larry and Steve will install epoxied floor anchors for all vacuum chambers, this month.
• Optical layout (Mike Smith): Mike has made numerous housecleaning improvements to the optomech layout D000184-03.pdf. He has established paths for video cameras to view all the suspended optics, while keeping the cameras out of the way and supportable. He has begun the task of making drawings with detailed parts lists for all of the external optical tables in the 40m IFO, starting with the PSL: D010092.pdf.
• Facility (Vass, Abbott): Ben has ordered parts to fix the control room chairs that are way too small. Ben is waiting on bolts before he can assemble the last control room desk. Steve is placing new Laser warning signs everywhere.
• Computing: Larry and Lisa are helping us on many fronts: assembling new Sun Blades for operator consoles, one for a DMT machine, getting more PCs for the lab, a printer, cross-mounting disks, etc. Many thanks to them!
• Optics (Billingsley): Garilynn has shipped the 3" MC optical blanks to Wave Precision for polishing. She is preparing specs for polishing the 3" and 5" core optical blanks. Most of these blanks are in hand, a few pieces from Heraeus (ITMs and BS) are expected soon.
• Suspensions (Romie): Janeen reports that the MC SOS's are just about finished, and most of the parts for the OSEMs are in hand - except for the infamous pigtail problems.

Thermal Noise Interferometer (Libbrecht)

This week we have continued trying to improve the hold time of our
arm-cavity lock.  We have been focusing mainly on studying lock
acquisition in our mode cleaner using actuation only on one of the
mirrors.  This system is very similar to our arm cavities, but its lower
finesse and lower mirror mass make lock acquisition much easier.  By
studying what works and what doesn't for the mode cleaner, we hope to
gain a better understanding of the lock acquisition and hold process in
a suspended cavity and eventually apply that knowledge to the arm
cavities.
 

So far we have observed three things:
 

1) We can reproduce the arm cavity's 10 to 20ms transient locks in the
mode cleaner.
 

2) We can extend the mode cleaner's lock to hold times of an hour or
more, with feedback going only to the mirror. The difference between a
stable lock and a transient lock appears to be in the amount of
low-frequency gain.
 

3) The 28Hz peak, mentioned in last week's report, appears to be the
dominant noise source when the mode cleaner is locked using only
mirror-path feedback.
 

We are currently working to improve the performance of our servo, as
well as reducing the 28Hz noise peak.
 
 

LASTI (Zucker)

LASTI (MacInnis, Gray, Laliberty, Miller, Radkins, Shoemaker, Rollins,
Mittleman,
Harry, Ottaway, Mason, Mason, Zucker)
 
 

Hugh Radkins and Corey Gray have arrived from LHO and we are in an all
out effort to complete the final HAM and BSC seismic installation. Both
of these chambers will not include a stack, they will be built up in
preparation for the active seismic isolation prototypes.
 

BSC Chamber
The Dome was removed using the clean room skirts. Dome covers were
installed and the cartridge clean room placed over the opening. All
parts, hardware and fixturing were gathered and cleaned. The BSC piers
have been leveled and aligned.
 

HAM Chamber
The HAM door was removed. All parts, hardware and fixturing have been
prepared. The piers, scissor table adapters, and air bearing adapters
have been aligned and leveled previously. We have opened the support
tube blankoff plates in preparation for installing the support tubes.

Data Analysis and Computing (Lazzarini)

Simulation and Modeling (Bhawal)

LIGO I action items
-------------------
Based on the meeting on 22 May, Hiro has revised the e2e action items. That
now includes the action items we, simulation group, are going to
take, and the actions we are going to ask detector group people to
take. The revised note will be uploaded to e2e home page, and will be
sent to detector people who are going to help us by providing
necessary information.

Weekly Physics meeting
----------------------
In this week's Physics meeting Alain Weinstein talked about simulation
activities for Advanced LIGO that he and his student Michel are pursuing
with a model of 40 m IFO. The minutes ares available at
http://www.ligo.caltech.edu/~e2e

Realistic servo & Alignment sensing and control
-----------------------------------------------
Among the majors issued discussed in the kickoff meeting on 22nd were
(1) the implementation of more realistic servos in the simulation so
that it can be used to study the servo characteristics and noise
propagation. and (2) the implementation of ASC.

After the kickoff meeting, Luca Matone volunteered to work on the LSC
part and Andrea Vicere on the ASC part. To get this activity start
rolling, there was a meeting held on May 30th, having Nergis as the
detector expert/advisor. People attended were Luca, Andrea, Matt,
Nergis, Hiro and Biplab.

The following are the summary of the discussions:

(1) Time domain simulation of the servo noise will be necessary
because of the complexity of the system, even though the lowest order
estimation can be done (semi-)analytically in the frequency domain.
(2) There are many uncertainties of noise sources, so the model will
use the measured spectrum as the noise source at an appropriate point
and refine it when things change (reduced by hardware refinement,
understanding the physics origin, etc).
(3) The simplest model of LSC is: detector -> mixing -> whitening -> AtoD
-> [whatever the digital system ] -> DtoA -> de-whitening -> actuation.
At each stage, noise (from measured spectrum) could be added.
(4) the triangular mode cleaner simulation will be necessary to
simulation the amplitude noise induced by the length fluctuation.
(5) First will be the implementation of the simplest LSC model ( (3)
above ) with a very simplified (with a parameterized frequency noise)
laser coming into COC.
(6) Luca will go to Hanford to gather necessary information with the
help of Nergis.
(7) Part of the ASC model will be a copy of the same building blocks
developed for LSC, although N time more circuit lines.
(8) ASC is a moving target now, there are some things that are hard to understand.
Maybe simulation can help to understand them.
(9) Andrea will first understand the ASC design. The first
implementation can adopt the simple method used in the current LSC
model - no digitization etc, and the complex structure can be
embedded later on top of it.

Dual recycling code
-------------------
Malik has provided us a formula of the dual recycling cavity field
evolution. He sent us a matlab code as well. The formula will be
validated by comparing the matlab code with a simulation using e2e
primitives. This code is pure adiabatic approximation. We need to
implement a linear interpolation, which is a very complicated
calculation. In order to use this result in the e2e simulation, we
need to write a C++ code implementing this formula. The date for this
implementation is not scheduled yet.

Frame interface
---------------
(Andrea) The frame-E2E interface: I have almost finished it and hope to
test it extensively the next week.

E2E at CACR
-----------
(Hiro) Worked with Ed and Sharon of CACR trying to port the simulation
code to CACR HP clusters. After trying 3 compilers with various options
and identifying various bugs ( gcc 2.95.2 for HP gives NaN when a complex
number is divided by a double less than 1), now aCC (HP native compiler)
seems to be the candidate. There are still several things to be solved.
One is the size limit of the library builder. Another is that the compiler
crashes when compiling several of the adlib codes.
When Hiro had a meeting with Sharon about this compiler issue, he
found that it is possible to run a very long jobs, longer than 12
hours, if we ask them to set up.

Alfi
----
(Ed Maros)
  1. Reviewed Hiro's ALParser problem of bad directive quote_begin
     ( result of not having a proper LD_LIBRARY_PATH)
  2. Fixed the error message "/ldcg/bin/autoheader: Symbol
     `PTHREADS_IN_UNISTD' is not covered by"
  3. Added --enable-modeler flag for configure to control if
     modeler code is to be build. It is enabled by default. To disable,
     either specify --enable-modeler=no or --disable-modeler.
  4. Corrected header Alfi/lmbtb.h to conform to wxWindow'ss
     parameters for base class method AddTool.
  5. Make sure multiline change is in repository
  6. Make sure bundle change is in repository
  7. Build and install into Alfi-Dev (v 4.1.1)
  8. Change from input port to output port not reflected
     immediately.
  9. Create dialog prompt box for path resolution.
 10. Worked on getting ALParser compilable by aCC on CACR's HP
     systems.

(Bruce)
  - Finishing work on initial implementation of connection junctions.
  - Conducting full tests of connections, ports, and junctions for
    inclusion of the new junction code in next release of Alfi.
 

LIGO Data Analysis System
 

Software Systems (Blackburn)

Having almost recovered from the last MDC, the LDAS group is now busily
preparing for the so called LDAS/LAL/DMT camp that starts next week. It
is expected that there will be 22 to 24 participants with roughly 2:1
coming for LDAS/LAL vs. DMT.

We have also begun testing upgrades to our basic software development
tools. The two major upgrades are to GNU's GCC 2.95.3 compiler and to
the new 6.5.2 release of LAM for our MPI functionality. The LAM upgrade
appears to have gone without a hitch. However, the GCC upgrade revealed
some configuration problems for E2E. These have now been resolved and
we standardize on GCC 2.95.3 early next week. This will require a complete
testing of LDAS so we will plan a new release of LDAS after this testing.
This will also have the benefit of capturing all the bug fixes exposed
during the last MDC in a release. Documentation has been updated to reflect
the new required baseline code.

A minor problem with the new XML C++ parser library was discovered and
fixed this week. Testing of the lightWeightAPI with this new library is
pretty much complete now and we are comfortable with the Apache based
implementation. However, testing did discover a minor problem with
iterative translation of ilwd -> xml -> ilwd data formats which has now
been fixed.

The inspiral MDC did not conduct its final "challenge" test during the
scheduled week. In the inspiral upper limits group meeting it was decided
that this should be carried out in roughly two weeks allowing the MDC
to have closure in the minds of all contributors.

We began work on a new "trivial" user interface which allows users to
type in their requested ldasjob commands into a graphical user interface
front end which provide step by step menu options for connecting to the
different LDAS sites and for entering required information such as LDAS
user and authentication.

We also began exploring a graphical user interface called XMPI for studying
the coarse behavior of the wrapperAPI jobs on the Beowulf. The code is a
bit buggy, but may have turned up some interesting message passing behavior
in the inspiral search code on the slaves. A problematic Barrier in the
wrapperAPI was replace when it was discovered that sending large data sets
in non-blocking sends was actually using a blocking send behind the scene.

A problem has suddenly appeared in which the frameAPI and the dataConditonAPI
crash while connected through a socket communication. This is thought to
be due to an incompatibility in the objectSpace socket library on the sun
and on linux which as of this week are compiled differently while we sorted
out the problems with the E2E code using GCC 2.95.3.
 

The controlMonitorAPI now has support for monitoring of the tape writing
scripts without requiring a password. However, the password is however
required still to control the script, such as stopping the tape writer.
 

Hardware Systems (Anderson)

The LDAS Engineering run Beowulf at LHO is fully installed and undergoing
final configuration. The LLO system is currently being installed.

A new 19" equipment rack was installed for the ldas-test system and the
two T3 RAID boxes for that system moved into the new rack to enable better
air flow.

Extra network switches have been identified and ordered to support the
LDAS bootcamp at Caltech next week.

Research into the proper environmental controls for the LDAS computer
facilities has been carried out and is now in the hands of the site
managers.

A new Sun Solaris LDAS test box has been established for testing new
pre-release versions of LDAS software. Currently under investigation
is upgrading to a new version of the the gcc compiler.

The first T3 disk has failed at LHO, but being a RAID system this initial
failure did not result in any system downtime. However, there was an
unexplained system outage when the failed drive was physically removed
that needs further investigation.

Network security has been increased on most of the LDAS Sun machines
by removing a few more unused services.
 

Data Analysis Activities
 

* Data analysis: Andrea Vicere': I worked with Sanjeev on network analysis. I spent two days re-doing the computations in his paper on CB analysis with a network of detectors, in order to figure out all the details. There are several interesting things I was able finally to grasp. The method he proposes for network analysis requires that the individual instruments adopt a "common" template bank, placing the templates according to the requirements of network analysis in the space {\xi, \theta, \phi} where \xi specifies the chirp characteristics and \theta,\phi the direction of the source.
This can be done either collecting all the data in a single center and producing the template outputs for each of them, or asking each detector to produce the outputs of the template analysis for specified values in the {\xi} subspace and then combine.
The second is unrealistic because: If the need of exchanging, for each possible arrival time, all the template outputs! The first strategy is feasible from the point of view of the band, as discussed in February. Given that this is the optimal strategy, the question is what I lose if I go for a suboptimal strategy in which the detectors exchange only candidate above a certain threshold. This is tricky in network analysis, because of the effect of the antenna patterns a network "event" is built using the direction in the sky and the outputs of both the "in-phase" and "in-quadrature" filters from each detector. "event" can be small on a detector, but when summed coherently with the others can go above the network threshold: therefore the threshold on individual detectors are to be lowered, and I figuring out how much. Further, the way in which "cuts" on the analysis, done in individual detectors, propagate on the detection probability of the network is not trivial, and must be evaluated: I am working on this analytically now, and I shall probably have to do some simple Monte Carlo test.
 

General Computing (Wallace)

MIT:
-Configuring a IDE raid array on the Solaris system.
-Preparing to attend the LDAS boot-camp.
-Put in a order for the 15 PC units needed for LDAS.
-Looking at the RRDtool to be used with MRTG.

Livingston:
(Tom)
-We have received three Sun Blade 100s, which we are setting up in
the Computer User's Room.
-Along with the Blade 100s, we are preparing for summer students.
-We have requested an additional T1 line from LSU, and are looking
in to the details.
-We have received an additional Dell laptop.

Hanford:
Nothing to report at this time.

CIT:
(Lisa)
-Returned from Hanford where I was giving Greg Mendell a hand.
-Working on trying to get the modem pool ISDN lines back up.  I'm certain the
problem is with the line itself.  I am working with the Caltech phone office to
resolve the problem.
-Starting to learn about epics.
-Spending some time helping Michael get familiar with various items.

(Mike)
-Performed 6 full software installs on desktops
-Loaded a laptop with all software for loaner purposes.
-Rebuilt two desktops that had hardware problems.
-Loaded additional software for additional clients.
-Setup a computer for a student in number 35WB
-Doing some checking on Microsoft XP operating system.
Just as a note that there may be some problems with WIN2K patch level 2
and Autocad.

(Barbara)
- Installed updates to the LDAS equipment web forms including improved
navigation, new security features, and ad-hoc reporting.
- Imported revised PSL data into the costbook.
- Made the Costbook Resource reports selectable by WBS number or System.
- Began efforts on printed costbook reports.
- Made several web changes for LSC, SURF projects, conferences, etc.
- Working on 40meter things (epics, shared disks, printer).

(Sam)
-Worked on updating some documentation.
-Worked on a couple of PC's including a laptop that
is giving us a number of problems.

(Larry)
-Resolved a couple of calendar issues. Mainly, just needed to update/fix
some of the scripts used for the WEB calendar generation.
-Configured and debugged a FORE 2810 network switch that will be put on a
single mode fiber. So far the testing has worked out so it should be installed
at location for more testing today.
-Worked a number of PC issues. As a note here we would appreciate it if those
who borrow the laptops would inform us if they have a problem with them so we
can resolve the issue in a timely manner(hopefully before they are loaned
out again). Also, we do not support LINUX on the laptops nor any other special
configurations.
-Worked on a number of procurements and worked with different people concerning
equipment configurations and quotes. Gradually, working my way out of the
procurement business. Some people are now being assisted by Rita with their
purchases and Bill Tyler has also been helping out.
-Ordered a few computers and memory for the 40M. So far the memory has arrived
and the computers should show up in a couple of weeks.
-Working on updating some of the GC documentation.
--
 
 

LIGO II/Advanced R&D (Sanders)

From Peter King:
 

40m Lab & LASTI
The 40m Lab pre-modecleaner was fabbed. The laser has been
installed on the optical table. The water cooling has been plumbed in.
 

Advanced LIGO PSL
The VME cards for the PSL were ordered. Delivery is expected
around mid-July.
 

On the 200-W laser development front, LZH have apparently sketched out a
draft design for a rod-based power amplifier.
 

From Janeen Romie:
New osems for 40m, LASTI, PNI etc.: I should have the new
rectangular connectors ready by Friday. Pal Pilot found the lost 100
connectors and sent them to us.
 

Advanced LIGO: Helena and I are working with Thomas Frey on schedule and
cost data for Advanced LIGO.
 

From Jay Heefner:
LASTI
=========================
- Jay and Dave will be going to MIT in late June to install and test the DAQ,
EPICS and suspension controls for LASTI.
 

From Rich Abbott:
2. The capacitance position sensors are finished with the specification phase and I am about to place an order for a first article. Delivery of first system is scheduled for the end of July. Additional systems can be delivered 12 weeks ARO.
3. Rich is looking at ADC requirements for the capacitance position sensors which appear to fit well with the proposed advanced LIGO ADC proposal that Jay and Rolf are putting together.

From: Helena Armandula <ahelena@ligo.caltech.edu>

Silicate bonding:

Performed a quick test on a sodium silicate bond made between a !/2" flat fused silica substrate and a 1/2" sapphire substrate that was flat only on 80% of the surface.
This bond showed prominent voids around the edges because the contact area was around 80% of the surface. However, it has been loaded with ~37.5 lb for the last 6 days.

Received the reworked 1/2" sapphire substrates.

From: Riccardo DeSalvo <desalvo@ligo.caltech.edu>

Florian
Diagonalization exercises.
 

Alessandro
Ultra sound cutting of joints tests at Faimond advancing.
Designing mini-GASFS for Newtonian noise vertical accelerometer
prototype.
 

Riccardo
Ordered sapphire machining from Sonic mill.
Making proper ballast weights for IP.
 

Kimio
Providing commercial vacuum feedthrough.
 

Riccardo, Yukioshi, Yukiko
Replaced magnets in actuator, reduced strength by a factor of 28 (the
remaining factor of 3 will come from electronics gain reduction), but
obtained different saturation and a 0.5%/mm gradient,  re-shimmed yoke,
brought back gradient below 0.25%/cm.
Rest of gain reduction (another factor of 3-5) to be obtained reducing
electrical gain and possibly rolling off gain above 3 Hz.  Electronics
and re-injected actuator noise now both below IP performance (below
10-11 at 1 Hz). Strength still sufficient to damp Olympia earthquake.
Reduced Q-factor of recoil mass from 3000 to 10.  All suspensions now
properly damped.
 

Yukioshi, Yukiko
Small cabling.
 

Akiteru, (Virginio, Roberto)
DSP ADC DAC operating.  Problems were misplaced pull-up resistor in
backplane and missing driving data file.  Now compiling filters
correctly.  Preparing to drive second ADC and DAC from DSP for driving
IP and suspensions at same time.
 

Szabi
Found some stepping motor drivers mis assembled, driver burned by wrong
voltages, replaced them and operating IP positioning stepping motor
drivers.
 

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