Weekly Report for Week Ending June 5, 2008

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 & Project

Past Weekly Reports

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LSC Issues (Reitze)

• The press releases accompanying the submission of the S5 Crab spindown limit paper has received notice from several news and professional organizations, including the American Physical Society (http://www.aps.org/; under 'Latest News') and   Cosmos Magazine http://www.cosmosmagazine. com/news/2033/whats-slowing-crab-pulsar, Googling 'LIGO' and 'Crab Pulsar' will generate a lot of hits!
• The Caltech version can be found here: http://mr.caltech.edu/media/ Press_Releases/PR13154.html.  A particularly well-written article can be found at http://www.astroengine.com/?p=270.
• The second L-V meeting of the year takes place in Orsay next week.  As of now, there are 88 registered participants.

LIGO Laboratory Administration (Lindquist)

PROPERTY ACCOUNTING (Luna)

• Continued working with A. Koch, Director of Export Compliance in providing proper documentation for the lasers shipped from Germany to LHO and LLO to US Customs.
• Continued working with Property Services in tagging and closing 25 fabrication accounts.
• Continued working on updating LHO's Inventory database.

DOCUMENT CONTROL CENTER (Turner, Mak)

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

• No report.

FINANCIAL SYSTEMS (Funaro, Brambila, Oracion)

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

• For ACCOUNTS PAYABLE HISTORY Press Here.

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

• Routed the MIT package.  Re-writing the package to walk over again.
• Submitted the change order to Venturi.  Re-wrote the package and re-submitted.
• Support Services is still pending receipt of the insurance certificate.
• Closed out the contract with Shanghai.

>From: Karl Oracion <koracion@ligo.caltech.edu>>

• Currently working on various monthly financial reports for May 2008.
• Met with Cindy A. to reconcile Visitors Program account.
• Financial reports can be found at: http://docuserv.ligo.caltech.edu/~fireport. (For passwords contact Karl)

SUBCONTRACTS MANAGEMENT (Jasnow, Salone)

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

• The purchase order for the Northrop-Grumman personnel contract for Advanced LIGO has been placed.  The purchase order for Triad is complete and in the hands of the buyer for release.  The purchase order for Support Services is awaiting resolution of a liability insurance issue.

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

• The revised terms and conditions for the MIT subaward for Advanced LIGO have been submitted by Grace Fisher-Adams of the Office of General Counsel.  All that remains is some minor changes to the SOW that she has requested and the contract is ready to be released.
• The evaluation report for the selection of Heraeus and Corning for providing core optics has been completed.  The award to Corning is below the NSF review threshold and will be made as soon as Corning's exceptions to the Caltech terms and conditions have been resolved.  The latest revision from OGC was sent to Corning on Tuesday, June 3.
• A trip has been planned for June 10 to Tinsley in Richmond, CA, to assess the status of their Pathfinder polishing effort.

PROPOSALS and REPORTS (Lindquist)

The following are in progress:

• Analysis of end-of-April Operating costs and end-of-year projections.  These will be reviewed during the Excomm Meeting scheduled for June 16, 2008.
• Combined Advanced LIGO – Operations Staffing Plan for FY 2009 – FY 2013 was presented Thursday, May 22, 2008.  Copies have been issued to the task managers for a sanity check.  The next step will be to incorporate the adjusted staffing model into the total Operations Budgets for FY 2009-2013 to see if there are any surprises.
• Supporting information the FY 2009 – FY 2013 LIGO Operations Proposal as requested by the NSF.

CHANGE REQUESTS (Lindquist)

There are two new change requests:

• CR-080007 – Increase budgets for Observatory Fabrication accounts 2.8.2 and 3.8.2
• CR-080008 – Remove items in the budget removed column on the deferred list should to meet funding constraints for FY 2008

HUMAN RESOURCES (Akutagawa)

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

• The next Staffing Committee meeting is scheduled for Monday, June 23, 2008.
• Last week I attended classes on Dreamweaver, learning to build web applications.  I plan to get the LIGO Visitor web pages up and running over the next few months.

Quality/Safety (Tyler)

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

• The Livingston annual Safety Audit was successfully completed during the previous week.  There were only a few significant items identified for Livingston action.  (LIGO Caltech also got a few actions items as well).
• Facility modifications, new laser installations and preparations for both Enhanced and Advanced LIGO are going well.  In addition, staff safety training and equipment operation re-certification is in progress.
• As a follow-up to the recent BTE inspection, Livingston has placed in service some "demo" installations of one type of joint repair hardware.  So far, it seems to be performing satisfactorily.
• Included in the audit was a well attended Livingston "all-hands" laser safety briefing presented by laser consultant Ken Barat.
• A draft of the Livingston safety audit report will be distributed next week.

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

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

• Primary eLIGO commissioning activities onsite this week were investigations in the lost power in the PSL/IO chain, and HAM6 ISI commissioning.
• Excess loss in the IO chain (the transmission from the PSL to the REFL table is 0.6) is likely due to the thin-film polarizer and the ongoing, intermittent observation that it can have a poorer-than-normal extinction ratio, see here.
• plenty of progress is being made on the HAM6 ISI commissioning front: see the ilog for more details, but, i) transfer functions were made without cable dressing problems (contact had been observed), ii) damping loops were installed and confirmed to work. Resonances as low as 10Hz are seen in the support structure, probably owing to the gull wings.
• endstation gatevalves were opened Thursday. After ensuring all viewports are appropriately covered, the cornerstation gatevalves were to be opened on Friday, to embark on the first RF relocking of the IFO since eLIGO commissioning began in late 2007.
• Astrowatch report (P. Roberts):
  • The H2 inspiral range has been down to a maximum about 6 MPc, likely due to increased discharge from the Columbia River dams.
  • the science mode duty cycle over the last week was ~38%, while the IFO uptime was an astonishingly good ~72%
  • the TCS chiller temperature was adjusted due to elevated noise in DARM_ERR
  • acoustic tuning of the AS beam on ASPD3 rid us of a peak at 275Hz
• fb0 was brought in line with fb1, so both framebuilders will soon contain the eLIGO ISI and OMC content

LHO Outreach (D. Ingram)

• Fred Raab and PNNL Staff Scientist Michael Scott led a 5/29 discussion of the Spencer Weart book The Discovery of Global Warming as the final installment of the 2008 Mid-Columbia Literary Festival. An audience of 50 actively participated. Columbia Basin College hosted the event.

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

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)

• Upgrade: We met with Rolf and Jay to finalize plans for the 40m controls upgrade. We have "Rolf's big brain" in the lab, it is named "megatron".
• Tobin was visiting and he worked on the svn code repository and other computer-related work.
• Digital camera network: Andrey and Joe have been testing several cameras. They have been taking beam scans, and Andrey wrote beam profile gaussian fitting and displays in matlab. They're finding dead and hot pixels, taking flat-fields, etc.
• Steve is taking measurements of the scattering off his his wedged SS beam traps.

---

Thermal Noise Interferometer (Black)

From Greg:

• This week I worked on writing up my verification of thermorefractive coefficients for Eric Gustafson.  I also worked on hammering out details for a photothermal experiment that would verify partial cancellation of thermorefractive and surface expansion effects, and am currently finishing up the proposal.

---

LASTI (Mittleman)

CIT Science Group (Weinstein)

_______________

Antony Searle:

• Completed Orsay presentation.
• Worked on WIMPORTANCE.
• Began characterisation of sensitivity/accuracy/speed and their trade-offs.

_______________

Kent Blackburn for the Grid Computing R&D Group:

GRID APPLICATION DEVELOPMENT

• Wrote agenda and lead LIGO-Pegasus and OSG-USERS telecon
• Wrote minutes for LIGO-Pegasus telecon, OSG-USERS telecon.
• Attended DASWG, Inspiral Coding, OSG-USERS and INTEGRATION, OSG Area coordination telecons.
• Einstein@Home Running on the OSG:
  • Running E@H application at TTU, BNL_ATLAS_1
  • Trobleshooting at UCSDT2, UWMilwaukee
  • Request some code changes, bug fixes from Robert/Thomas
  • Deploy  code at Nebraska, start test runs
• Binary Inspiral Analysis Group (IHOPE) Activity:
  • Attempts to  run playground and inj of an ihope dag  at CIT_CMS_T2
  • Test Pegasus dynamic cleanup at CIT_CMS_T2
  • Update DASWG pages (weekly status report for E@OSG)

OPEN SCIENCE GRID INTEGRATION AND VALIDATION TESTBED

• Updated VDT components and CA bundle on osg-itb-se box.
• Added an account for Thomas Radke (Einstein@Home developers) on the osg-itb-se box for testing, troubleshooting and development in order to facilitate porting E@H onto the OSG.

GRID COMPUTING MANAGEMENT

• Attended LIGO-OSG collaborative meeting attended by OSG Executive Director and OSG PI, and by a significant portion of the LSC Computer Committee to discuss progress since our face to face meeting in Chicago ~6 weeks ago. Presented more accurate metrics on the use of OSG for Einstein@Home and recent progress with binary inspiral workflows. Discussed advancement of OSG technology to support LIGO needs.
• Attended OSG Council subcommittee on "At Large VO Representation" in which three VOs without Council representation were interviewed about their needs and how they see their VO evolving. Posted minutes to the meeting on the OSG Council website.
• Attended weekly OSG Executive Team meeting.
• Reviewed metrics reports being sent to the funding agencies and made suggestions for additional content which reflected LIGO benefits from OSG through software development.
• Worked with Caltech HR to get Grid Admin position posted on three job posting websites used for IT positions.
• Finally, got a commitment from Pegasus developers to remove server side dependencies for Pegasus executibles. Should see this enhancement in about two weeks.
• Informed CompComm Packaging subcommittee of suggestion to have some form of update mechanism to facilitate getting newer versions of Pegasus Toolkit within  LDG distributions on timescales much less than the current multi-month roll-out.
• Worked closely with OSG and the GermanGrid CA to identify the status of that CA's inspection of user certificates with weak encryption certificates.

_______________

Gregory Mendell:

• Nothing significant to report this week.
• I plan to finish work on the Condor test DAG for the CW group soon.

_______________

Amber L. Stuver:

LIGO Research

• Continued working on the h(t) validation for review.  I have completed and tested my application of SLOPE on the FFT(h(t))/h(f) spectrograms (previously, SLOPE was only applied to one dimensional time series; this application needed adaptation to function on two dimensional time-frequency domain data).  I have completed running SLOPE one all of the H1 S5 data and am currently collecting the results and analyzing them.  I have presented preliminary results to the reviewers this week.  These results can be seen at: http://touro.ligo-la.caltech.edu/~stuver/research/hoft/slope/resultsH1E1.html.
• This shows that the strongest events identified by my SLOPE method are similar to the strongest pixel method events that are being produced by Chad.  On the level that we both agree on what we consider to be strong events, I am confident that this SLOPE method is valid in its application.  So far, the strongest events identified by both our methods can be identified with glitches in other data channels (therefore not a calibration issue but a data quality one).  I am currently working on investigating events that are not among the strongest. Since my method uses excess energy (summing the excess strength of the SLOPE triggers within each time bin) versus a strongest pixel method, I hope to identify any possible issues with the time domain calibration that may exist since multiple slightly significant pixels can combine to merit larger significance.

SEC Work

• Gave the public tour to ~10 visitors.
• Gave control room tours to ~25 professional development teachers.
• Completed draft of the gravitational wave/LIGO article (target audience: educators and policy makers) for the PhysTEC program.
• Discussed a some ideas regarding a grant proposal with Lisa Szechter and am aiding her in getting the biographical sketches from the rest of the SEC staff in NSF format.

_______________

Diego Fazi:

• Compared trigger rates for one month of S5 playgronud data from the first inspiral stage for PTF and SPA.
• Started a new injection run with highly spinning injections to compare PTF and SPA efficiencies in the high-chi parameter region.
• Followed up missed injections at low effective distance for PTF.

_______________

Kari Alison Hodge:

• I am still working on my python script that will automate the ranking of potential GW events by using the multivariate classification random forest method. I am also working on a new plot for displaying the efficiency of this method.

_______________

Anand Sengupta:

• EOB Injections with band passed templates <http://www.lsc-group.phys.
• uwm.edu/cgibin/enote.pl?nb=iags5tdfindchirp&action=view&page=73>.
• EOB Band Passed Injections and templates <http://www.lsc-group.phys. uwm.edu/cgi-bin/enote.pl?nb=iags5tdfindchirp&action=view&page=74>.

_______________

Kipp Cannon:

• Continued working on a radio interferometry paper.
• Did a paper review for CQG.
• Trying to get metaio and glue in shape for a release this friday.
• Preparing for SGR Flare review presentation at burst f2f meeting in Orsay.

_______________

Pinkesh Patel:

• I am visiting Xavier for the week and have been working on resampling.
• Preparing slides for presenting at the face to face ( will be presenting remotely).

_______________

Joseph Betzwieser:

• Updated the noise comparison code that is currently running on the CIT cluster to compare h(t) and h(f) for validation of all of S5.

Laboratory Computing (Anderson)

LDAS Software Systems (Maros)

• Most of the frame structures described in version 3 and version 4 of the frame specifications have been added back to the frameCPP library. This effort is expected to be complete by early next week.
• Several problem reports were generated this past week. They all focus on short comings of LDAS not handling the reading of version 3 and 4 frame files. Efforts are under way to resolve these issues so LDAS gracefully reports errors instead of crashing the frameAPI.
• All of the test systems have been upgraded to DB2 9.1.5. This version of DB2 is under evaluation for the next release of LDAS. At least one issue is being investigated.

LDAS System Administration (Anderson)

Caltech

(Phil Ehrens)

• Cluster node fans are beginning to fail at a faster rate than formerly noted. Since these fans have spun ~10^10 cycles, and that is the magnitude of the MTBF for them, we can probably expect to see accelerating fan failure rates as time passes.
• I have been contaced by Neil Bautista, the Liebert contract negotiator, regarding a service contract for the Liebert and McQuay AC units in 215A Synchrotron.  He asked for the serial numbers of the units, and said that he will provide a quote once he has those.  I will try to get them today, since we are currently running with insufficient humidity in the lab.
• Settled on the data file format to be supplied by Directory Services to be used in the production of Attachment Z for yearly MOU reporting.  I am working on the generator script for the form now.
• Various certificate and hardware related user services, including setting up a cvs repo for Vern Sandburg, and the migration of several cgi scripts used by the direcorate to a new server.
• MCE Errors - node323 is showing a large number of correctable errors. Affinity of errors is for "CPU 2 4 Northbridge".

MIT

(Fred Donovan)

• One disk replacement; no other news

Livingston

(Igor Yakushin)

• Moved tape robot monitoring scripts that run under SMF from dataserver to opterondata-llo; had to learn SMF for that.
• Found L1 S5 Science frames (less than 1%) that were not present at the nodes.
• The new x4600 has arrived.
• Replaced 46 tapes
• Dwayne and Doug installed GC switch in LDAS room.

Hanford

(Greg Mendell)

• The major work for the past week was to move the LHO LDAS cluster home directories from qfs to new zfs filesystems, on a new fileserver.  I am continuing to work on the next release of LDG.

General Computing (Wallace)

MIT

(Fred)

• Installing linux/xp on four machines, for use by summer students.
• Some additional work on Ken's machine.
• Scavenging parts (ram, dvd's) for above.
• Rec' mac for AH.

Livingston

(Dwayne)

• Kantech controller installations and programming with Chuck this past Saturday.
• Moved a few KVM stations in the control room, assisted by Mike Fyffe for the KVM cable moves.
• Decommissioned an old printer in the control room.  multi-homed a newer printer in the control room.  ran new network cables from control room to MSR.
• OS patches and reboot kantech server.
• Demo of Inventory Control System to Albert and others.
• Moved kantech server to new network.
• Moved operator PC to new network.
• Moved Rich's PC to new network.
• Memory had come loose in a Macbook.  Sleep light would blink twice. Re-seating memory fixed.
• SURF student arrival. created system accounts and various software installs.
• Installed fans in one rack in the CUR.
• Found an error in the groups on our LDAP... only one group migrated correctly from NIS+.
• Moved the old FI400 from the Communications Room to LDAS. In conjunction with the fiber patch panel recently installed, this will provide GC network connections.
• Installed new VM on our VM host.  to become our list server.
• The building controls PC in the OSB had lost graphics and communication with the end stations.  had to re-mount a local shared drive and restore what was thought to be an unnecessary network connection.
• Moved several monitors and old equipment to SURPLUS.
• Replaced ink in two printers.
• Other usual/unusual user support requests.
• Cleared spam trap.

Hanford

(Larry)

• Worked on mail filters. Cleaned up some of the aliases, removing some bad ones and fixing typos on others.
• Worked with Mike on trouble-shooting some of the computers at the Observatory.

(Mike)

• Continued work on managing DHCP server.
• Working the mail services. I cleaned up more mail aliases that were bouncing, and added some new aliases.
• Made some DNS cname entries.
• Setup multiple new user accounts.
• Loaded XP Workstations for CDS.
• Mounted a Solaris x2200 in server room and loaded latest ver of Solaris. "There are some hardware issues with this server, I called it in to sun and am ran many diagnostic tests." This looks like a mother board issue.
• Many other misc. user support and sysadmin tasks.

Caltech

(Mike)

• Loaded a computer for 40 meter. This PC had a bad hard disk.
• Continued work on loading additional sun replacement servers.
• Ran some new network/KVM cables to connect additional servers.
• Other misc. sysadmin tasks.

(Veronica)

• LIGO: A new lead story on the homepage. GWIC website assistance to Stan. Misc web updates.
• LSC: Ongoing work on the ligo.org redo. Updates of the database of technical papers and the website of publicaitons review papers.
• GC: Dealt with an aftermath of a malware infection. The anti-virus s/w took care of the problem.

(Christian)

• Marilyn Wright - Finished transferring all of Marilyn's files and data to new laptop.
• Alastair Heptonstall (MIT) - Configured PowerBook and shipped to MIT for Alatair to use.
• Toner cartridge replacements- 3flr W/B and 6flr Millikan.
• Testing Mac mini running XP with EVO this week.
• Continued testing Windows 64 bit system this week.
• Other misc.: Continued onsite software/phone support.

(Melody)

• New DCC: Working on the content search for the new DCC.   Looking into htdig as a possible solution.

(Larry)

• Worked a number of procurements. Still working on a couple s/w licensing contracts. Ordering more notebook computers for different people.
• Spent a good part of a day celebrating with others here at CIT in recognition of our service awards.
• Added a number of new users. Still have a couple that need to visit me to finalize their accounts.
• More EVO testing. Received a number of suggestions from different people to get the MAC units working better.
• Worked a couple of web issues for different people. Mostly configuration setups for their particular work.
• Time working on mail services. Trying to track down what is causing one of the servers to start running services in a loop mode. It has been intermittent making it difficult to track down.
• Some maintenance and more cleanup in the computer room.
• Regular user assistance.

Advanced LIGO and Supporting R&D (Shoemaker)

Advanced LIGO Management

From Carol Wilkinson

Project Controls

• A request for a cost transfer from operations to project accounts to correct inaccuracies in the time reporting for project activities has been submitted to LIGO accounting.
• In process is a change request (ACR) to delay the production of SEI BSC internal isolation system (ISI) while the actuators are redesigned and tested. The HAM ISI final design period is being shortened due to a need for only minimal design updates and the HAM production will move forward in time to maintain overall project schedule. This change request will require NSF approval since major milestone dates called out in the AdL Cooperative agreement are affected.
• A second change request to incorporate the changes due to the decision to go to a stable recycling cavity is in process. NSF will be notified of the changes.

Procurements

• The contract for MIT sub-award has been awarded.
• Both Seismic Isolation HEPI procurements and Suspensions procurements has started for those awards below the NSF approval threshold.
• CIT legal counsel has produced a set of standard terms and conditions (T&C) for Advanced LIGO procurements that meet the flow down requirements in our new cooperative agreements. This removes one of the hurdles that have been slowing down the preparation of RFQ’s/RFP’s. These standard T&C’s will be used for all commercial contracts for the project, including contracts with universities.

Progress Updates

• Project updates for the month of May have been submitted for processing into the monthly report. The report will be submitted to NSF by June 15.
• The project is currently ~2 weeks behind schedule and $38K under budget. Schedule delays are primarily due to slowness in getting large procurements approved by NSF, our internal review process, and the CIT procurements and legal counsel. The delays are symptomatic of the project start-up and are not expected to continue in the future.  Cost under runs are from under utilization of labor - missing new hires, staff remaining on critical development work, or procurement approval delays. Estimate at completion and project end date are still on baseline.

Meetings & Reviews

• The next monthly status meeting will be on Thursday, July10 at 8:30 AM PT.
• Advanced LIGO will report to the PAC at the meeting June 23-25.

Advanced LIGO Systems

From: Dennis Coyne <coyne@ligo.caltech.edu>
From: Peter Fritschel <pf@ligo.mit.edu>

Operations Activities

• Nothing sinificant to report.

AdL Project-Funded Activities

Reviews:

• IO long lead procurement review support. For a list of reviews, see the main AdL wiki page.

Technical Review Board (TRB):

• Gold coated TM TRB:
  • continued working on calculation of modal damping to compare to UWA calculations.
  • Held 1st meeting of the TRB -- a number of follow up actions required to resolve whether to adopt gold coatings on the test masses.
• Arm Length Stabilization TRB: Held 1st meeting of the TRB to evaluate the three schemes.
• see the TRB log.

Vacuum Review Board (VRB):

• Nothing significant to report.

Configuration Control:

• Nothing significant to report.

Design:

• Continued worked on calculations for the effectiveness of frequency dependent acoustic mode damping techniques to suppress parametric instabilities.
• To complete Evans' new calculation of coating thermo-optic noise, this week we included the finite mirror size correction factor for the thermo-refractive term, found in a paper by Braginsky and Vyatchanin. For our parameters, the correction turns out to be very small -- a couple of percent.
• Along the way, Sam Wald, the summer undergrad who evaluated the calculation, discovered that the finite-size calculations for substrate thermal noise in Bench contained an error; these calculations all involve sums of bessel functions evaluated at the zeros of J_1, and the algorithm that calculated the latter returned a completely wrong value for the first value. Correcting this increases the substrate thermal noise terms by some tens of percent, though the impact on total thermal noise is negligible since substrate thermal noise is relatively small.
• Gathering information on the feasibility and benefits of separated HAMs 1/2 (7/8) and 5/6 (11/12) for H1/H2 (H2). Improves access for installing the HAM crossbeams, increases HAM support structure stiffness which improves HAM-ISI performance. However the cost for a thicker septum plate/spool is not insignificant.

Interfaces:

• Working on definitive SPI interface definition for the quad suspension.
• Drafted RODA M080085-00, "Orientation of ITM & ETM AR Surfaces with respect to Cylindrical Axis" for review/approval.
• Revised RODA M080300-02 (draft), "No reaction chain on beamsplitter and folding mirror suspensions". Held impending design review on the BS and FM.
• See the RODA status page and the Interface Control page.

Modeling and Simulation

From: Hiroaki Yamamoto hiro@ligo.caltech.edu

• Nothing special to report this week.

Facilities Modifications and Preparations

From: John Worden <worden_j@ligo-wa.caltech.edu>

• No report this week.

Prestabilized Laser

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

Operations

• Bits and bobs for the optical table enclosure have arrived from the various vendors.

Project

• I finished up a draft proposal for a new laser incident threshold, after taking into account a number of worst case scenarios.
• A two day meeting was held at the AEI with LZH.  Issues discussed were where we were in relation to the global schedule at the moment along with getting an up to date status on the laser progress.
• In preparation for the EnL laser installation at LLO, I've have been going through the steps involved in installing the TwinCAT software (a licensed copy, not the demo one).  I think I've uncovered a bug in the installation script whereby the SystemID reported by the installation program keeps changing thereby making the issued registration key invalid.  The work around is to install a demo copy and then register it afterwards.

Control and Data Systems

From: Rolf Bork rolf@ligo.caltech.edu

AdL SUS (Jay)

• Continued to develop the requirements for the SRM and PRM triple suspensions. Preliminary estimates of the noise requirements for the bottom stage of the smaller SRM show them to be very difficult. Smaller magnets may be needed.
• Continued designs for the BSC test stands for LHO and LLO.
• Started design of the RM test stand for CIT.
• Presented a "new" satellite amplifier design for use in the test stands and possibly for the AdL HAM Aux suspensions. It may also be used in the ELIGO OMC suspensions. This new design incorporates whitening into the PD signal path and can be built in a 4 channel field box or 8 channel rack mount chassis. The first prototype should be ready by July.

AdL DAQ

• Connection to I/O chassis over 100m cable is operational using the new Sun x86 computers (doesn't work with computers installed for ELigo to more than 50m). Will try to check for differences in BIOS settings to see if the ELigo computers and Suns are set differently.
• PDR documentation continues.

AdL SEI (ben)

• Rich was having one of the ADC channels disappear every now and then.  He thinks that he traced the problem to an Anti-Alias Chassis, so I tested, and sent him a new Anti-Alias Filter board to swap out for the board in the AA Chassis.
• I'm making a new STS-2 cable to replace the Livingston cable that I cannibalized to install the ISI system at LHO.  Brian O'reilly reminded me of his need for it, so I'm expediting it for him.
• I've been spending a lot of my time making a new Capacitive Position Sensor Satellite box at the request of Rich Mittleman.  He wants to use it to test ADE modules without climbing onto the chamber.
• I've finally received some connector samples from PSC Electronics.  They are isolated stacked BNC connectors that have been unobtainable for a while.  If these connectors were not isolated, I would have had to re-do the STS2 Interface chassis PCB.  Since they were as I hoped, the board is now ready for production.  I'm now just trying to find an account number in Pcard accounts to charge it to.

Seismic Isolation

From: Ken Mason kmason@ligo.mit.edu

• SEI Activities and Progress at LHO: Very good looking transfer functions were taken and damping loops designed showing good damping.  Problems with the first data taken were caused by the HAM door covers touching the optics table. ~ Jeff K.
  
  
• BSC SEI Documentation and Design: We have a design for the large actuator assemblies and starting on the small. Now it looks like the large will need to be tweaked further to accommodate the small. We plan to test both the large and the small together when the chamber opens in October rather than a test of the large alone in July.~ Stephany F.
  
  
• HAM SEI Crossbeam redesign: The design is finished and a final report has been posted on the SEI log. Once approved we will start fab drawings.~ Andy S.
  
  
• SEI Electronics Design and Fabrication: Rich A. was having one of the ADC channels disappear every now and then.  He thinks that he traced the problem to an Anti-Alias Chassis, so I tested, and sent him a new Anti-Alias Filter board to swap out for the board in the AA Chassis.
  
  A new STS-2 cable was made to replace the Livingston cable cannibalized to install the ISI system at LHO.  Brian O'reilly reminded me of his need for it, so I'm expediting it for him.
  Making a new Capacitive Position Sensor Satellite box at the request of Rich Mittleman.  He wants to use it to test ADE modules without climbing onto the chamber.
  
  We have received connector samples from PSC Electronics.  They are isolated stacked BNC connectors that have been unobtainable for a while.  If these connectors were not isolated, I would have had to re-do the STS2 Interface chassis PCB.  Since they were as I hoped, the board is now ready for production.  I'm now just trying to find an account number in Pcard accounts to charge it to.   ~ Ben A.
  
  
• SEI Project Activities: We have requested a schedule change to PM to procure and build the HAM ISI before the BSC ISI. The HAM is ahead of schedule and will be ready for a preliminary design review by the end of August.  ~Ken M.

Suspensions

From Janeen Romie and Norna Robertson
(romie_j@ligo-la.caltech.edu, nroberts@ligo.caltech.edu)

Operations Work

HAM Suspensions for Advanced & Enhanced LIGO:

• OMC: Blades for the LHO OMC SUS and the RM SUS prototype are due at LLO for characterization today. The engineers hope to have that complete and to get them to Caltech for a creep bake by early next week. It is known that the blades do not meet the dimensional tolerances. Other parts are being cleaned and baked. The structure has been sent out for Brite Dipping. The magnet flags, fused silica EQ stop mechanical parts and the tablecloth are still due from the machine shop, hopefully by next Friday. Helicoiling of the structure and parts is still upcoming and non-trivial in schedule.
  
  OMC SUS eLIGO in-situ test plan and associated documentation has been submitted to the DCC.
  
  
• RM: Both engineers are having Solidworks database corruption issues that they are working with our reseller. Part drawing review is ongoing. A decision was made to go to thinner gussets and thicker wall tubing for the top horizontal crossbeams to support manufacturing. It is assumed this may cause a small hit in the first resonance goal.
  
  
• IMC: Electronics requirements for the small triple ( formerly IMC) are being developed. Jay has circulated a draft. Peter F has given comments.

BSC Suspensions for Advanced LIGO:

• RAL engineers were at LHO earlier this week & at Caltech now to review facilities, especially clean & bake facilities. Interface with them at LHO and Caltech has been fruitful.
• Norna has been visiting MIT this week. Useful discussions with Brett, Alastair, Peter F. Brett got all 12 degrees of freedom damping nicely on the quad (6 in each chain) ready for closing the BSC tank up. The tank is now closed and being pumped. The quad will now sit there while ISI tests are carried out. Meanwhile Alastair is continuing wok on getting the pulling and welding systems ready for the monolithic assembly. He has a summer student (David) recently started working with him. Also Gregg Harry has offered to help. The first thing which will be "hung" is a test suspension using 40 kg metal masses with inserts on the sides holding silica pieces to which fibres can be welded. This should take place early July.

Project-Funded Activities

• Nothing significant to report.

Core Optics

From: GariLynn Billingsley <Billingsley_G@ligo.caltech.edu>

Project

• Chilled water and electrical power for the 30W laser was installed in the new scatter and absorption lab. 

Development

• Resolved - we can have exact right angles in Test Masses if we need.  This would scatter at 1/10 if the SRD  of 10^-20 m/ \/ Hz.
• Mike Smith will generate a RODA on asymmetric wedges.  Mike Smith will pursue clarify all wedges with Justin.
• On UK suspensions, Dennis/Gari will clarify wedges with Janeen on US suspensions.
• Mask manufacture - the ESD Mask for LASTI Compensation Plate is complete, we still need alignment pins.  We plan to coat the CP barrel up to, but not including the bevel, except for a mask for the suspension standoff prism.
• We need special permission to uncover a viewport to take pictures of the test masses.  We would like at minimum the 2K ETM, to see if we can find chipping from EQ stop.  We would also like to establish a scatter baseline with the newly cleaned optics.  This will help us monitor the vacuum environment near our most sensitive optics.  Cheryl Vorvick has submitted a proposal to carry out this work at the viewports.

Auxiliary Optics

From:   Michael Smith <smith@ligo.caltech.edu>

ADLIGO

Work under Project budget:

• IFO Layout: Mike revised the layout of the folded IFO and sent the COC coordinates to Luke and Tanner for checking. He developed a Zemax model of the output Faraday isolator using birefringent calcite prism pairs. Rodica will use a similar approach to model the IO input polarizers

Work under Operations budget:

• ETM Telescope Suspension: Riccardo recommended some design changes to Chris' eddy current damping structure for the ETM Telescope suspension. Chris has the ETM and the ETM Telescope mounted in the correct location in the end chamber. There is plenty of room to mount the suspension to the optical table.
• TCS: Aidan and Phil tested the rotating polarizer wedge-correcting device. The device works as designed and enables the axicon pattern to remain invariant while the power control polarizer is rotated. A prototype CO2 laser TCS bench is being assembled at CIT to test further discrepancies in the installed LHO and LLO ELIGO TCS tables. The LHO ELIGO CO2 laser TCS will be installed during the week of June 16, and the LLO ELIGO CO2 laser TCS will be upgraded during the week of June 23.

ELIGO

SLC:

• Most of the parts for Ken's Eligo flat manifold baffle have been manufactured and are awaiting final oxidizing. Ken took the support ring stock to the rolling vendor on 6/5/08 to form the ring. Ken in still analyzing the shape and magnitude of the vibrations of the manifold baffle. It is relatively simple to add stiffening rings to the inside and outside diameters of the baffle if necessary.
• Steve Vass measured the relative scattering power from the LA Super8 polished ss material that we will use for the baffles and found < 30% variation for all azimuthal orientations of the sample. Therefore, the polishing marks are relatively isotropic and it is not necessary to orient the sheets in any particular way when we fabricate the louver baffles.
  The AOS group suggested some changes to the mounting method for Luke's HAM5 baffle.
• Luke expects to finish the drawings for the ETM baffle and the HAM5 baffle by 6-5-08. His parts should in fabrication by 6/12/08.

Table Beam Dumps:

• Ken is making small black glass cavity beam dumps for Sam Waldman.

OMC:

• Ken is making parts for an OMC fixture.

AOS General

• Ken is spending some time identifying and clearing out the CES area, and moving AOS materials to the synchrotron mezzanine.

Input Optics

From: David tanner@phys.ufl.edu

All Development

• eLIOGO Comissioning: The RBS servos at LLO have been recommissioned. They are now engaged in the upscript of the ifo control systems. (Antonio)
• Adv LIGO Design: Modifications are being made to the EOM design for aligo Mach-Zehnder layout. (Luke)
• A ZEMAX model for the IO Faraday isolator is being developed to track down stray light from IO components. (Rodica)

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For additional information about this report, contact Albert Lazzarini