Weekly Report for Week Ending May 17, 2007

LSC	Administration	Hanford Observatory	Livingston Observatory
Optical & Mechanical	Controls and Data Systems	40 Meter Facility	TNI
LASTI	CIT Science Group	Laboratory Computing	Adv. LIGO Development

Past Weekly Reports

There will be no LIGO Executive Committee meeting scheduled Monday, May 21, 2007 due to the large number of members who will be participating in the LSC/Virgo and other meetings.

Special Announcements:

Weekly Report Highlights

LSC Issues (Reitze)

Virgo officially joined S5 on Friday, May 18! We welcome them to the run.
Plans for a letter writing campaign in support of Advanced LIGO by LSC members have been finalized. US-based LSC members are being asked to show their support for Advanced LIGO by writing to members of Congress.

LIGO Laboratory Administration (Lindquist)

STATUS OF LSC MOUs (Lloyd)

The GEO 600 MOU was signed-off today with Attachments ACF, DAT, LAS, OPT, SUS and Z, and was posted and submitted to the DCC.

PROPERTY MANAGEMENT (Luna)

>From: Rod Luna <rluna@ligo.caltech.edu>

Provided assistance to the Detector Group (H. Armandula) with packing and shipping of ten 1"dia. fused silica substrates to REO, Boulder, CO. Account number LIGO.SCANR - 1 - NSFLIGO.FY02CA.
Provided assistance to Mike Pedraza in shipping a package to IBM.
Worked with personnel at the Australian National University to settle an outstanding FedEx invoice for equipment shipped in March.
Requested to change the expenditure type from "Supplies - Allocable" to "Equipment Caltech" to on PO# S022127. This purchase is for a Pumping Station System.
Provided assistance to the Detector Group (H. Armandula) by driving to Newport Beach to deliver a Glass Mass to Navitar. Account number LIGO.PRLAS - 5.16 - NSFLIGO.FY02CA for truck rental.
Provided assistance to the Detector Group (K. Mailand) in making arrangements to ship three crates (elevator and conveyor tooling) to MIT. Account numbers LIGO.PRLAS-5.16-NSF.LIGOFY02CA (50%) and LIGO.PRCIT-5.17-NSF.LIGOFY02CA (50%)
Working in reviewing P-card Equipment Purchase Orders for FY05 and FY06. Expenditure type corrections for 15 purchases are expected (63K).

DOCUMENT CONTROL CENTER (Turner, Mak)

>From: Cleveland Mak <mak_c@ligo.caltech.edu>

Looks like the publication surge that has been hitting us for the last few weeks has finally cooled off. It is now under control.
Processed small number of MOU's & Attachments.
Scanning Update - Progress continues on scanning of all non-electronic "L" category documents on file. The process has also begun on scanning of all non-electronic "M" category documents on file.

Update to Current Document Management System (Lindquist)

Several people have been exercising an instance of DocDB. Stuart presented his impressions. I provided a Linda with the link to the Administrator’s Manual for her comment. Rich Abbott will be preparing a simulated engineering release tree.

FINANCIAL SYSTEMS (Funaro, Brambila, Kaufman)

>From: "Funaro, Catherine" <Catherine.Funaro@caltech.edu>

For ACCOUNTS PAYABLE HISTORY Press Here.

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

Followed up on the status of the A-133 certificate for University of Michigan, which is still needed.
Requested for three certificates from Triad. Submitted change order #185 to Triad.
Working on the MIT modification where the amount still needs to be revised so that it can be submitted correctly to the vendor.
Completed the change order to Yamilet, and I am waiting for the revised modification to be submitted to the vendor.
Working on the modification to REO, which was submitted with an outdated form.
Followed up on the status of several pending modifications still not received.
Assisted with the loan of equipment from JPL.
Assisted with the import of the equipment from England.
Working on having outdated forms updated on the web.

>From: Florence Kaufman <fkaufman>

Assisted in the preparation of numerous Fabrication Equipment Request Forms for Enhanced LIGO and Advanced LIGO and the submission of PTA Setup Forms related to these Fabrication accounts.
Prepared a summary schedule for Eric Gustafson showing the financial information for all accounts managed by individuals in the Instrument Science Group.
Made modifications to the monthly financial report, at the request of Carol Wilkinson, to include a column showing the Budget less Expenditures & Commitments (Available Balance).
Made format changes to the monthly financial report, starting with the May report, to show data for the 'Mechanical & Optical', 'Controls & Electronics', 'Instrument Science' and 'Data Analysis and Astrophysics Science' as separate lines on the Summary Report. Also modified the supporting schedules and charts to show the data for each of these groups separately.
Financial reports can be found at: http://docuserv.ligo.caltech.edu/~fireport. (For passwords contact Florence)

SUBCONTRACTS MANAGEMENT (Jasnow, Salone)

>From: Gina Salone <gsalone@ligo.caltech.edu>

Gina Salone, Dennis Coyne, and Riccardo DeSalvo continue to work to resolve issues regarding the invoices from Galli & Morelli for the HAM-SAS prototype effort.

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

The review package for the HPD option exercise to manufacture, assemble and test the HAM ISI was sent to the NSF on Friday, May 11. We are waiting for their approval before we issue the contract to HPD.
The issue of PSI claiming intellectual property rights for the seismic isolation actuators was resolved with a discussion between Ed Jasnow and David Pickett, Executive Vice President of PSI. It was agreed that PSI had no intellectual property rights on these actuators, and that claim was dropped.
David Flores, of OGC, and Ed Jasnow continue to work the issue of legal representation for LIGO in the latest effort to erect a windfarm near the LHO site. Several options are currently being explored.
P-Card and TechMart training have been scheduled for both sites. Michelle Reagan will conduct training at LHO on June 11, and Criselda Rodriguez-Brodeur will conduct training at LLO on June 26.

PROPOSALS and REPORTS (Lindquist)

The end of April summary report was sent to the NSF.
We have started to receive contributions for the Continuing Operations Proposal (FY 2009 – FY 2013). I will continue to harass those who still owe material. I am currently assembling a first draft. My assignment is to prepare a clean draft for review by the PAC in June. I will also be preparing a budget based on direction provided by the Office of Sponsored Research and Jay’s discussions with the NSF. Several people have asked where that budget model might be. I will distribute a draft as soon as it is available.

CHANGE CONTROL/CONTINGENCY MANAGEMENT (Lindquist)

Change Request CR070004 requests the release of FY 2007 and FY 2008 budget to cover a priority subset of the Advanced LIGO "wish list" items. I will put this request is on the agenda for the Executive Committee meeting as soon as possible.

Quality/Safety (Tyler)

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

A safety audit/review was conducted at the LIGO Livingston Observatory (LLO) during this reporting period.

A walk through safety check was done of the new Livingston Science Education Center. Only one safety related item was noted for an outside exit, which needs to direct people to an assembly area (parking lot).

The audit team was pleased to find that the LLO continues to maintain good safety practices and housekeeping.

There is one major safety concern, and that is the lack of appropriate storage facilities (space) for the large quantities of flammable solvents used at various locations at the Observatory.

A limited visual inspection was also done of the X and Y arm BTEs. The X arm inspection included a short top of the BTE "walk" and a limited look inside the BTE to ascertain the condition of the Beam Tube, thermal blanket and support structure. Digital photos were also taken of "areas-of-interest" to assist with planning for repair and/or refurbishment as needed.

LIGO Hanford Observatory (LHO) and Interferometer Operations (Raab)

Summary of S5 Activities at LIGO Hanford Observatory (compiled by M. Landry)

LHO interferometer performance was in stark contrast this week. H1 ran in science mode for 90% of the time, with typical ranges of 15Mpc and some periods in excess of 16Mpc. H2 however was plagued by an unknown noise source in the 40-100Hz band that periodically came and went, playing havoc with the inspiral range. The result was H2's range varied from the mid 7Mpc down to 5Mpc or lower, with a duty cycle of 79%. Some of this low duty cycle can be attributed to noise hunting, and weather (wind and high microseism on the weekend).

Some S5 highlights from the LHO elog are bulleted below:

summaries: Tuesday maintenance, CDS maintenance, most recent range & duty cycle weekly, IFO maintenance
H2 lowish-frequency noise was elevated at the end of the weekend. Initially the noise was hypothesized to be glitches due to dust falling through the light on the ISCT10 AS port, however, a back-of-the envelope calculation on rates eliminated this explanation. Current suspicion is cast on the REFL table and potential scattering or clipping issues there
test detonations motivated by the Rattlesnake mountain windfarm project began this week; studies were made to employ VEA walls as acoustic membranes
the table-floating servo employed on ISCT10 may be degrading
noise generated by Energy Northwest when bypassing their cooling towers comes and goes
measured higher wire losses were incorporated into the noise budgets of both H1 and H2

Outreach (D. Ingram)
~90 sixth graders from nearby Kiona-Benton Middle School dropped by LHO for a showing of Einstein's Messengers on 6/17 following their lengthier visit to Columbia Basin College. Josh Myers cleverly captured a 360 photographic view of the site from the roof of the Corner Station.

LIGO Livingston Observatory (LLO) and Interferometer Operations (Giaime)

L1 S5 Summary (Antonio Lucianetti)

During the last week, L1 collected 77.4 % science data. The binary inspiral range varied between 12 and 15 Mpc depending on seismic motion.
On May 14 two power outages took L1 IFO out of science mode for many hours. Glitches in the BS optical lever had grown significantly Thu May 10 and Fri May 11. On Fri May 11 the old optical lever laser was replaced successfully with a new Micro Laser Systems Fermion II sn 104.

[JG note: The LLO staff restored L1 to smooth running twice after Monday's power outages without delay or drama. The last remaining "secret switches" are being documented in the LLO wiki.]

CDS Computing (Lisa Bogue)

Power outage recovery.
Continued work on CDS VPN, preparation for beta testing.
Continued work on CDS LDAP server.

Safety & Security (Rich Riesen)

This reporting period was consumed by the annual LLO safety inspection.

[JG note: Kudos to Rich and all who assisted in preparing for our Safety Audit this week]

LLO Outreach (John Thacker)

Updated SEC Web page
Developed and delivered programs for 3 groups this week
Continued developing Docent exhibit training protocol
Developed a draft plan for Family Day as part of our outreach program
Participated in one teacher professional developement workshop (at LLO)
Attended a committee meeting with the LIGO Local Educational Outreach Partnership Phase 1 Closeout.
Participated in Safety review of SEC
Continued planning for MSP groups for summer
Began preparing proposal for LSTA workshop in the fall
Hosted a parents meeting sponsored by the Livingston Parish School Board
Drafted two pages of accomplishments in Education and Outreach for the LIGO Operations proposal

LIGO Computing and Network Security (Roddy)

Reported under General Computing, see below

General Computing and LDAS Admin (Giardina)

Reported under General Computing, see below

Reported under LDAS System Administration, see below

Data Analysis & Computing (Yakushin)

Storage/Condor/LDAS Admin

Reported under LDAS System Administration, see below

Data Analysis

Reported under Data Analysis activities, see below

Mechanical and Optical Systems (Coyne)

See Advanced LIGO

Controls and Data Systems (Bork)

See Advanced LIGO

40-Meter Interferometer (Weinstein)

IFO Commissioning, Electronics, Controls, Computers

Rob has finished modifications to the dewhitening boards for the test mass coil drivers, including lower noise opamp and a new PZ network for more dewhitening. Tobin measured transfer functions and offsets with the dewhitening switched on and off, and verified correct functionality.
After re-installation of the modified dewhite boards, and a bit of twiddling, Rob got the IFO locking again in low-noise PRFPMI mode. It handled the dewhite-switching without a hitch.
Steve finished installation of a new HeNe laser for the BS/PRM/SRM oplevs, and is doing final adjustment of the spot sizes on the QPDs.

Lab Infrastructure, Bake Lab

Sam has been doing some glass-on-glass epoxy tests for the ELI OMC assembly. He gave various glued optics to Bob for vacuum RGA tests.
Bob is nearing the end of vacuum prep of SEI parts for LASTI.

Thermal Noise Interferometer (Black)

Nothing significant to report this week

LASTI (Mittleman)

We are continuing to get the highbay ready for the ISI and new Quad assembly. The clean room over the x-end HAM has been moved so that there is now empty floor under it where the Quad gazebo can live, the floors have been cleaned and waxed, infrastructure type work.
The last box of ISI parts have been shipped to Caltech for cleaning, these include the new expanded set of trim masses and the blade springs.
Brett and Fabrice are diagonalizing the drive to displacement matrix on the triple. Along the way they found that they had 2 bad DAC channels, We are working with Jay to get this fixed.
We are preparing for next weeks vent, with all three in vacuum experiments planning to make changes and repairs.

CIT Science Group (Weinstein)

Kent Blackburn:OPEN SCIENCE GRID APPLICATIONS DEVELOPMENT:

Generated 363 job workflow with HEAD version of lal, lalapps, and glue.Attempted to run workflow on ldas-grid and OSG_LIGO_PSU. Workflow was too large and took too long so a smaller version was created.Generated 363 job shorter workflow (mini-hipe) by adjusting parameter space of template bank.Generated binary inspiral "mini-hipe" workflow with TAGged CVS version of lal, lalapps, and glue.Successfully ran mini-hipe on ldas-grid, OSG_LIGO_PSU and LIGO_CIT_ITB.Wrote agenda, attended and ciruclated minutes for LIGO_Pegasus weekly telecon.Continued training of Britta Daudert on configuring nanoHIPE with L4 data and the mini-Inspiral workflow with H(t) data on LIGO-CIT-ITB.
Recommended to Karan at ISI, a change in the default behavior of the VDS 1.4.8 release. Proposed change will not produce the statistic files (.lof) when generating a workflow plan with the -- nocleanup argument to gencdag.to improve backward compatability with previous VDS versions. Due to a bug in Condor 6.9.2, the current default behavior of VDS 1.4.8 breaks compatability with LIGO workflows.

OPEN SCIENCE GRID VALIDATION TESTBED:

Completed scalability tests with the Globus web services team. The Globus team will develop an improved version of ws-gram which will make local calls to the Reliable File Transfer service instead of GSI-enabled calls to improve scalability. The VTB team will test the improved version of the ws-gram/RFT stack in a few weeks.

OPEN SCIENCE GRID INTEGRATION TESTBED:

With the assistance of the Inspiral team, Kent Blackburn and Britta Daudert, validated a mini-Inspiral workflow usinig H(t) calibrated data with 363 DAG nodes and 8.1 GB of gravitational-wave data on the sites LIGO-CIT-ITB. Validation runs used Condor 6.9.2 and VDS 1.4.8.

OPEN SCIENCE GRID MANAGEMENT:

Held teleconference with OSG Executive Director, Executive Assistant, and Resources Managers to discuss planning for allocation and re-allocation policies and procedures for year two planning.Reviewed several figures, images and text proposed for OSG related newsletters and presentations.Presented Change Requests for approval by Executive Team as the OSG Resources Manager at weekly telecon after working with owners of the changes to construct requests.Worked with PI on new UI/NCSA Statement of Work to clarify several work activities planned for the remainder of the first year.Discussed planning of visit with Director of TeraGrid with Chair of the LSC Computer Committee and then at the weekly CompComm telecon.Chaired weekly Certificates and Security Working Group telecon and circulated the minutes to the Chair of the LSC Computer Committee.Attended review of Advanced LIGO CDS as reviewer.
Submitted Cybersecurity Scope section for the next operations proposal.

___________________

Gregory Mendell:

I am about to start working more intently on the S4 PowerFlux/StackSlide/Hough paper, and still working on presentations and results for Amaldi this summer. I hope to give a brief update on some of this at the Cascina CW F2F next week via phone.

___________________

Duncan Brown:

Worked with Diego on implementation of the PTF code in LALHelped Drew with implementing compression algorithm needed to complete S5 CBC searchAdded new radiation pressure formula to noisebudgetWorked with Jeandrew Brink on EMRI measurement problemGot all my papers up to date in the DCC
Helped Britta learn how to run the inspiral code on the OSG

Laboratory Computing (Anderson)

LDAS Software Systems (Maros)

Working on routines to track critical section lock acquisitions in an attempt to resolve a deadlock situation that has been observed in the diskcacheAPI. As part of the effort to capture and understand this condition, the diskcacheAPI at the TCL layer now catches the signal SIGTERM to prevent termination. At this time, it is unknown which process is sending the termination signal to the diskcacheAPI.The manager has also been modified to not reboot the diskcacheAPI if the WAIT_FOR_diskccache resource is true and to not reboot the frameAPI if the WAIT_FOR_frame resource is true.
There was no system testing of LDAS this week so all efforts could be focused on stabilizing the diskcacheAPI code.

LDAS System Administration (Anderson)

Caltech(Dan Kozak)

Continuing to verify md5sums for data on tape to detect bit rot and to allow us to relabel tapes.Did more work with the 6140s (single mm per RAID 5).Did tape imports, discovered that gettapes isn't getting all the metadata for the tapes we're being shipped, but it will get it on a subsequent run. Suspect human error (not updating the glob given to gettapes) but I am not 100% sure yet.Verified that clusterstage is doing the right thing vis a vis the exclude lists (of non-science mode data).Calculated that the non-science data deleted from the cluster amounted to 14TB.Generated list of tapes for shelf storage at LLO.Created more output directories for Xavi's h(t) C03 work.Helped get tape drives/robot working properly again after power outage at LLO (cfgadm -c configure cX).Helped Lisa Bogue with replacing drive in her 3511 (fb0_frames) at LLO. Noted that this unit's battery backup unit has failed and needs to be called in.Worked with error tapes at LLO. Some ejected, some successfully relabelled.Set up Virgo S5 directories, changed username to virgo (from virgdata).
Am working on fixing gaps in raw data (some caused by gettapes problems, others by need to rearchive data at LLO and reship due to a bad tape).

(Erik Espinoza)

Initiated LIGO -> Virgo Transfer.Participated in OS Committee telecon.Reinstalled and tested node500 w/ FC4.Resolved 2.6.20.11 issue w/ iptables.Installed 2.6.20.11 on all nodes, ldas-pcdev1 and ldas-grid.Notified ASA of bigger fan issue.Found and resolved bbftp/solaris issue.Investigated "automatic installation" for Ubuntu.Wrote 'rpc.mountd' wrapper to kill and restart hung processes.
Communicated w/ condor team regarding CoreSize limits.

MIT(Fred Donovan)

Creating uniform uid across ligo-burst and ldas cluster for burst group.
Ldap services ligo-burst.

Livingston(Igor Yakushin)

Installed Solaris 10, upgrade 3 on the new X4500.
During this week we had to recover from a two-day network outage, two brief power outages and one unexplained reboot of the gateway machine.

(Dwayne Giardina)

Tape eject for shipment to CIT.Tape storage eject.
A couple power outages on Monday brought about various recovery tasks.

Hanford(Greg Mendell)

I am working to make sure all the data has successfully transferred to Caltech, and Level 3 and 4 RDS data has successfully transferred between the sites, since the network downtime last week and power failure this week at LLO. Also, I have checked into CVS a new driver script for generating h(t) data, based on the RDS driver script: CVS/Root=:pserver:anonymous@gravity.phys.uwm.edu:2402/usr/local/cvs/lscsoft CVS/Repository=dsorun/contrib/createhoft/scripts

(Ben Johnson)

Published initial WSR8 Virgo data. Investigating/developing tools to pull out data quality information from Virgo frames.The X4500 server has arrived. I will see there is rack space near a 240V outlet to hold the 4500 and its associated UPS.I've put together a software model for the LDAS NDS service. I have started writing some of the service's core functions (in C).Attended AdvLIGO CDS review, Virgo data transfer telecon, and the LDG OS Committee meeting this week.
I've copied grid-mapfile and passwd files from the LSC grid sites. I'm working on a perl script that will perform the data mining we need.

General Computing (Wallace)

MIT(Fred)

Solidworks performance issues swapping core 2 w/s for amd w/sThinkpad setup/configldap tweaking; additional ldap server integratingLigo-burst cluster and nova/lancelot/gravity cluster
LASTI network conf/security with PS (for sec. review)

Livingston(Dwayne)

assisted with HTML/javascript on www.ligo-la sitereplaced power supply in a user PC, apparently fried during power glitches. also added memoryapplied security updates to various Windows machinesusual user support requests
cleared spam trap

LLO mail summary for 10 May 2007 - 17 May 2007:

Rejected: 6,750(162 containing virus)Accepted: 4,741

Total: 11,491

Hanford(Christine)

Lockheed Martin has moved the LIGO backup network circuit between LHO and PNNL to new fiber for part of the circuit. This shortens the distance by 3 kilometers and removes one patch from the circuit. I've sent an email to ESnet Trouble requesting test time for next Tues.The current disks holding the home directories are all at 85% to 99% full. I'm still moving home directories off the old disks and on to the new RAID system.Found a free Windows compatible file encryption program. It's called Security Manager 99. It has a nice easy to use password protected GUI, encrypts files or folders on any disk system mounted to the computer.
Still installing the Matlab patches on the Solaris computers so Matlab 2007a will run on them.

CIT(Mike)

Finished up moving all user account over to our new server.Configured a Wireless Access Point for the 2nd floor on West Bridge.Worked in B/A Server room setting up another server. I loaded this with Solaris. I'm getting this ready to replace one of our old servers that are due for an upgrade. This is an on going project.Worked on Solid Works setting up new users to connect to the PDMWORKS Vault. I also fixed some permission issues while I was in the Vault.
Other user support an sysadmin tasks.

(Veronica)

LIGO: A DVD project of LASTI installation demo for Ken Mailand: Compressed the rest of the footage, did post-procession editing, and authored a DVD. Tutored Ken on how to digitize VHS tapes. There are other edits that need to be made to the DVD, so this is an ongoing project. Set up a website for the upcoming AdvLIGO NSF review. Tweaked the roster database, assisted Cindy with its use. Other misc. web updates.LSC: Made a few modifications to the MOU database, updated the html that generates the MOU webpages. Updates of the database of technical papers.
CaJAGWR: User support. Recorded/processed for streaming the video of the 5/15 talk. Website updates.

(Christian)

Greer Scarborough-Configured new system with the engineering Ligo image for Greer.Florence Kaufman- replaced old monitor with new 24² LCD monitor.40 Meter- Replaced Drum cartridge on HP2550 printer.Re-imaged laptops that were returned to the loaner pull this week.Minor tweaks to new WSUS server before it goes live.
Other misc.: Continued onsite software/phone support.

(Larry)

Worked a number of procurement issues. Still working on purchases for a few new workstations. Finished up reconciliation.Worked with the different construction workers on the different rooms and labs that are being renovated. The additional cooling unit is now being installed in the basement computer room. It should be wrapped up by the end of next week.Worked on a variety of DCC items. Presently, going through some of the configuration documentation.Worked a number of e-mail issues and still trying to debug a new server.Added a few more accounts and cleaned up a couple of accounts. Mike has finished moving the home accounts to the new server and we will be taking the old server off-line next week once we have gone through everything to make sure we've not missed anything.Took care of a couple of different machines that had crashed. The SUN box and one of the pc's crashed because of local (office) power disruption.Assisted a number of users with misc. items.
Working on the logistics for the SURF and visitors that we will have shortly.

Advanced LIGO and Supporting R&D (Shoemaker)

Advanced LIGO Systems

Modeling and Simulation

From: Hiroaki Yamamoto hiro@ligo.caltech.edu

AdvLIGO LSC/ASC design using FP arm model with quad suspension (Osamu)

Osamu is now in Japan, working at NAOJ with Seiji.
Yoichi Aso of Columbia Univ. is interested in the AdvLIGO SPI, because he worked on SPI for his thesis topic.
Osamu has provided information to Yoichi based on his advLIGO arm locking study using e2e and Mike Barton's quad suspension model.

Static IFO simulation (Hiro)

Coupled cavity simulation code is almost done together with the locking, and signal is going to be injected to the locked cavity to quantify the mirror curvature effect on the signal. The first result will be available next week.

Stray light (Hiro)

As an extension of my old calculation of the noise induced by scattered lights injected into various ports, I helped Mike Smith to finish his documentation.
Mike uses a simple beam shape based on the ray tracing code. I am going to double check some of his calculations using my FFT calculation, which includes the effect that the field is resonating in the dual recycled Michelson cavity.

Modeler - e2e simulation engine, ALFI : e2e front end (Hiro, Bruce, Melody)

Final clean up and finishing touch of the UDP support in modeler/alfi is going with the target release date of June 15th.

Mechanical Simulation for advanced LIGO (Sany and SLU team)

Continued working on the frequency control loop of our AdvLIGO e2e model by feeding the error signal back to the phase port of the laser model. My interpretation that reported last week that the side band phase must be adjusted (in the side-band gen primitive) by splitting the frequency control error signal to the laser model was incorrect. The side-band phase is automatically shifted as the error signal controls the laser's phase. After fixing this problem, the control servo seems to start working although the lock is much less robust than the previous case when the frequency control was faked by an instantaneous adjustment of MC2 position (by bypassing the suspension).

CDS Prestabilized Laser

From: Peter King <pking@ligo.caltech.edu>

The latest revision for the AdL PSL laser safety plan was circulated out to members of the group. I haven't heard any loud grumblings yet and so will submit it a step higher for approval. Hopefully we then can sign off on one part of the safety aspect.
A test of some old laser safety eyewear lenses with the 35-W and 140-W laser were conducted. The tests were certainly an eye opener! I am waiting to get the material type from Doug before writing up a short little report. A video was taken. I made a minor alteration to the PSL laser safety plan as a result of the tests.
More problems with fibre bundles occurred at LZH. Last week there were three fibre bundle meltdowns. The reason for which is not clear. The build procedure is the same as that used for the original set, which lasted more than 2 years. The ends of the fibre were inspected with a viewer to see if scattering off the cladding was a possible mechanism for the fibre heating up - no scattering was observed. It is hoped that the new Macor fibre bundle holders won't suffer as badly as the current Teflon ones but the problems with the current set are a mystery at the moment.

Control and Data Systems

From: Rolf Bork rolf@ligo.caltech.edu

PSL Controls

Alex and I were recently at AEI to install the latest software revisions and final electronics associated with their PSL test systems. The install went relatively smoothly and they were able to lock the length of thier diagnostics breadboard cavity by the end of the week.

AdL SUS Noise Prototype

The layout and redesign of the UIM coil Driver and monitor boards is complete and has been sent back to the UK for review and manufacture.
Preliminary design of the noise prototype system and rack wiring is complete.
Design of the whitening and interface boards will be started following OMC and Tip-Tilt.

OMC Suspension

The system wiring diagram and rack drawings are complete.
The rack has been moved to room 56 and installation of electronics is complete. The operator workstation have been received and will be installed shortly.
The timing slave and a master has been requested from LHO. In the meantime, a software trigger mode for the system can be used for initial test and checkout.
The IO chassis is assembled and ready.
A draft of the controls requirements document has been written and reviewed by Norna.
Simulink model of the software is complete.
The network will not be ready in the basement for another few weeks. We can run without it, but it will be awkward.

Tip-Tilt equipment for ANU

The equipment needed for ANU includes:

2 ea AA chassis- boards, parts and panels redesigned and on order. Boards sent out for stuffing.
3 ea AI chassis- boards, parts and panels redesigned and on order. Boards sent out for stuffing.
3 ea Sat Amp- boards ready for test
2 ea SUS receiver- boards and parts in house
8 ch Coil Driver- boards stuffed, chassis need assembly
IO chassis components- boards and parts ordered for ADC adapter, DAC adapter, Timing Interface.
Components shipment has been delayed due to work on the OMC SUS, noise prototype, AdL ISI systems and parts procurement issues. A new delivery date has not been established.

AdL ISI

The AA and AI filter boards for ISI installation at LASTI are stuffed. Chassis assembly is nearly complete. Testing will begin next week.
The test stand at Stanford is operational. The Dspace controls are now being translated into a simulink diagram that can be used to generate front end code.
ISSUE: Now have request for AA/AI chassis to support the Stanford system. The availability and priorities are being worked.
We are now working the Lasti BSC ISI controls installation plan and schedule. We should have that by next week.

Seismic Isolation

From: Ken Mason kmason@ligo.mit.edu

BSC Assembly and Test

Riccardo Desalvo has visited Galli & Morelli to check on the cleaning and baking of the large plates. An FTIR test kit was sent so that Riccardo could witness the test sampling.
The actuators are being cleaned by Kyle Ryan in Hanford. Several problems have been encountered meeting the cleaning requirements.

Single Stage HAM Design and Fabrication

Andy Stein has joined the SEI team at MIT. He is a mechanical engineer with design and analysis experience. He has started the design of the HAM test stand and modifications to the SAS installation tooling for use with the single stage HAM.
The purchase request for the fabrication of two HAM prototypes has been sent to the NSF for approval.
We have received a CD from HPD with the solid model, analysis files and some of the fabrication drawings. The remaining fabrication drawings are scheduled to be delivered on 5/22/07.
The requisition for the GS-13 seismometers along with a noncompetitive cost justification has been sent to Caltech purchasing. There is a 4-5 month delivery on these parts.
We have received the quotation for the actuators from PSI. We are updating the requirements document to include with the purchase order.
The bellows quote from Senior Aerospace is due on 5/18/2007.
We have received one of the quotes for the support tubes and spherical bearing assemblies.

From: Brian Lantz <BLantz@stanford.edu>

Notes from the SEI telecon, Friday May 11, 2007

Single stage HAM ISI: paperwork to go out to NSF today or monday (note, it was sent to NSF on 5/11, due to arrive Monday 5/14).
Ken working of quotes for the LIGO side of the procurement: lots of quotes in support tubes, bearing, bellows, and actuators. GS-13 quote in. ADE not yet.
HPD will not deliver complete drawing package until May 22. Most drawings will be ready May 15.

BSC status

First parts out of airbake at G&M Riccardo will check on the FTIR testing
3 loads coming back together in a single shipment
LASTI getting ready to receive the parts

moved granite table closer to test stand.
need to clean and cover test stand
also getting ready for quad prototype.

Cory and Mike L. to help with BSC assembly. Cory mid june, Mike end of June.
Bob Taylor keeping up with cleaning small parts, have more trim masses.
The coated locking sleeves have arrived. Coating has passed RGA test, still waiting on cavity ring down. Pretty soon we will have to install, ring down testing or not.
Still not sure how to clean the ADE capacitive sensor heads

BSC Sensors at LLO

Brian O shipped STS-2 Al feet to Bob Taylor for cleaning. Last load of pods in the oven for baking. L4Cs assembled, still need neon. GS-13 together, 2 have to come apart because of problems. Problem seems to be the connector board which attaches the cable inside to the pod to the GS-13 instrument. The connector is attached with two bolts, w/ plastic standoffs. But the plastic standoffs are too long, so the pins on the connector board are not mating well with the pins on the instrument.
5/10 shipped 3 STS-2s back to quanterra should be back in 8-10 weeks, with report as to what was wrong.
Should all be up to MIT mid june.

Stanford

Vertical seismometer: getting good coherence with vertical S13 from 0.2 Hz to about 20 Hz. noise characterization underway to understand the measured contributions.
SPI: improved noise performance about 10 Hz by remounting IFO on a 2x2 foot table set on sorbothane feet, and put central optics on a 6"x8"x1/2" thick stainless steel base to reduce tilt motion of mirror posts. noise perf now well below req's. next step is to look at frequency noise.
Control machine: Alex and Jay to visit on May 14-15 to help setup new borkspace computer. We're very excited.

Suspensions

From: Norna Robertson <nroberts@ligo.caltech.edu>

Major item - preparing for and chairing second Enhanced LIGO review which took place on Wed 16th. Working on report.

From: Janeen Romie <janeen@ligo-la.caltech.edu>

Enhanced/Advanced LIGO

The OMC prototype was assembled at Caltech for the first time Friday. The SUS team is working on pitch and roll issues now. The Birmingham osems are in the lab, but the cables are not ready. Rich is chasing that design and procurement. Double-checked the cable lengths with him this week. I will be reviewing the drawings from Calum for the second dummy bench, which will more closely resemble the real bench on order. He's designed the bench/wire interface and I will review those drawings as well. The Recycling Mirror suspension work has started up again from 2003. Two new engineers at Caltech are supporting this work: Bob Kirsner and Greer Scarborough. I've been traveling to Caltech to kick off and coordinate that work. Norna has updated/reviewed the Matlab parameters for the suspension and answered questions from Bob about the Matlab model vs the Solidworks model. In future, Bob, Greer and I will have a weekly RM meeting on Mondays at 10am PT and Norna and maybe Calum will join us for another weekly RM meeting on Thursdays at 1pm PT. While Norna is on travel, we will meet this Friday at 8am PT.
Last week, had a discussion with Dennis and Norna on fabrication accounts & went over budgets. I will be updating my spreadsheet and submitting it to Dennis soon.
Suppporting procurement of the prototype ELI EQ stops for Mike Zucker. Helena has ordered the silica tips. I'm having more trouble with the BeCu screws but will persevere.
Forwarded a box of McMaster Carr hardware to Tim Hayler at RAL. Got a price for one seat of CosmosWorks for Caltech.

From: k mailand kmailand@ligo.caltech.edu

Adv. LIGO

All LASTI installation tooling assemblies including Ian's frame, have been shipped.
Rod Luna made arrangements for trucking, and will email
Ken Mason and Myron re. expected arrival dates.
A video document has been made describing the operation of each assembly, this needs to be edited, and should ready to be sent to the DCC by 5-18.
I'm working on a layout of the faraday assembly suspended in an LOS for Mike Smith, also a pick off telescope, and p o mirror task, and a picomotor steering task.

Core Optics

From: Helena Armandula ahelena@ligo.caltech.edu

Advanced LIGO Coatings

The LASTI test mass has been coated and it is on its way back.
From Laurent Pinard at LMA:

"The characterization of the LASTI mirror is finished and the performances are quite good (I send you the final characterization report as soon as it will be finished) : abs 0.3 ppm, scattering <10 ppm in the center part (40 mm), T<20 ppm, Rar=210 ppm."

Rod Luna is tracking the shipment.

Adv. LIGO SUS

The reaction mass has been delivered to Navitar for coating. They expect to be able to deliver it coated within 5 weeks.

Auxiliary Optics

From: Michael Smith smith@ligo.caltech.edu

SLC

I completed the scattered light calcultions using the Matlab file Dave Ottaway started. Hiro provided much valuable assistance in helping to finish it. Using the Matlab scattered light model, I determined the requirements for 1) the BRDF's and reflectivities of the baffles and beam dumps , 2) the seismic attenuation requirements for the suspended cryopump baffle and the Faraday isolator, 3) the minimum size of the beam dumps. The AOS portion of the scattered light uses 0.5 the total scattered light budget.
In order to meet the reflectivity requirements of < 1%, the beam dumps and baffles will be made of black glass with a cavity design to trap the light. The Faraday isolator and the Cryopump baffle will be suspended with a simple pendulum.
Luke Williams is in the process of designing elliptical baffle and arm cavity baffle prototypes for hanging with the quad SUS at LASTI in Sept.

From: Phil Willems willems@ligo.caltech.edu

In collaboration with Alessio Rocchi and Viviana Fafone at the University of Roma Tor Vergata, I have made several improvements to the analysis of the test mass frequency shifts due to laser heating. In particular, they have showed me that the frequency dependence of the Poisson ratio makes a significant correction to the result, about 20%. I am developing a script-based analysis of the data so that I can implement such changes to the material parameters and see the effect on the result without personally haveing to rerun the code numerous times.
While here, I have assisted Alessio and Viviana on developing a conceptual design for TCS in Virgo. It seems clear now that the noise requirements on their projector are within reasonable technological limits, and that the interior layout of the Virgo input mirror chamber has enough capacity to allow for a fairly simple design of the necessary in-vacuum steering optics.

Input Optics

From: David tanner@phys.ufl.edu

Muzammil Arain:

Work on Advanced LIGO optical layout is progressing. The possibility of using two lenses in the recycling cavity to realize unfolded stable power recycling cavity has been evaluated and seems promising. The ROC tolerances for the proposed lenses have been evaluated and they do not seem achievable. Modeling the time constant of the TGG crystals from isolation measurements in vacuum.

Luke Williams:

inspected FR magnets
created cost summaries for eligo FI and EOM

Rodica Martin:

Worked on modeling the time constant of the TGG crystals(+system) from isolation ratio measurements in vacuum. Determined the effective magnetic field inside the two TGG crystals from present field maps and a temperature dependence of the Verdet constant for our TGGs.

All

Recieved the report on the PDR from the review committee, with many very useful comments. Members of the IO group are working on this.
We are discussing with the Institute of Applied Physics the schedule for replacement TGG and other optical components for the eLIGO Faraday isolators.

For additional information about this report, contact Albert Lazzarini or Phil Lindquist