Weekly Report for Week Ending November 13, 2008

Past Weekly Reports

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LSC Issues (Reitze)

• The top level program for the December L-V meeting program is available at https://www.lsc-group.phys.uwm.edu/ligovirgo/meetings/LSCVirgo0812; the meeting web site is http://www.physics.umd.edu/GRE/lv2008/.  The focus of the December L-V meeting will be data analysis.
• The LSC-Virgo Data Analysis Council has put together and approved by consensus a procedure for developing collaborations with external groups.  It will be taken up by the LSC Executive Committee at the November meeting next week. The procedure can be found on the DAC web page https://www.lsc-group.phys.uwm.edu/ligovirgo/dac/

LIGO Laboratory Administration (Lindquist)

STATUS OF LSC MOUs (Lloyd)

• For status of MOUs press here.

PROPERTY ACCOUNTING (Luna)

• Completed FY '08 Real Property and Vehicle Reports for LHO and LLO.
• Assisted J. Miller and R. DeSalvo with packing, shipping, and creating a commercial invoice for repair of a laser to Innolight in Germany.
• Assisted G. Billingsley in making shipping arrangements for the pathfinder optic from Richmond, CA to CIT.
• Assisted G. Ogin with packing, shipping and creating a commercial invoice for repair of a laser to Innolight in Germany.
• Assisted L. Wallace with the packing and shipping audio/video loaner system to the University of Maryland.
• Continued working in setting up a new equipment database for LHO.

DOCUMENT CONTROL CENTER (Turner, Mak)

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

• Continued to work on the new docDB system.  Reworked the advanced features page of the wiki.  Tested some of the features to ensure that they worked as described.
• Worked on creating a snapshot of some possible space changes for the upcoming relocation. into Bridge Laboratory  Created comparison showing # of people, square footage, and type of uses between two options.

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

• Additional DocDB testing.
• Processed documentation for upcoming NSF Review.
• Processed/distributed 4 DCNs.

FINANCIAL SYSTEMS (Funaro, Oracion)

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

• For ACCOUNTS PAYABLE HISTORY Press Here.

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

• No report -- Karl has been preparing the end-of-October Financial Reports for LIGO Operations.  This month we will include the reports for the old cooperative agreement, which is winding down, as well as developing new reports for the new cooperative agreement based on the new system, COGNOS, that Caltech is installing for financial reporting.
• Financial reports can be found at: http://docuserv.ligo.caltech.edu/~fireport. (For passwords contact Karl).

SUBCONTRACTS MANAGEMENT (Arvizu, Jasnow, Salone)

>From: Rudy Arvizu <arvizu_r@ligo.caltech.edu>

• The Operations contract for MIT has been completed and will be executed by November 17.
• See Advanced LIGO report.

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

• The contracts with the vendors for LN₂ for LHO and LLO, respectively, are still involved in negotiations with Caltech legal department over the indemnification clause.
• See Advanced LIGO report.

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

• See Advanced LIGO report.

PROPOSALS and REPORTS (Lindquist)

• The end-of-October Monthly LIGO Operations Report is due to the NSF on November 15th.  A draft has been prepared for review.

CHANGE REQUESTS (Lindquist)

• There are no open change requests.

HUMAN RESOURCES (Akutagawa)

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

• The next Staffing Committee meeting is scheduled for Monday, December 8th.
• A Staffing Committee meeting was held on Monday, November 10th.  The minutes and action items have been posted on the SC web page.
• All files for the Staffing Committee are up-to-date and posted on the SC web page.

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Quality/Safety (Tyler)

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

• Recommended some Advanced LIGO and enhanced LIGO safety documents for NSF Review background.
• Made arrangements for some off-campus web programing expertise.  First meeting today (with Dot) was productive, planning to have the safety web page up and running by early next week.

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Computer Security (Singer)

• Finalized draft of privacy policy. This will be issued by the Directorate.

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

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

• Progress in DC readout is captured in these displacement spectra, comparing RF and DC locking at 3.7W into the modecleaner. The broadband performance of DC readout is better than RF above 150Hz (there is a lump at low f that is worse however). Limited central TCS heating was employed for this measurement.
• Power up is the next major step in eLIGO commissioning. Power budgets in the WFS paths were borderline, so the power on ISCT1 (WFS3 and 4) and ISCT4 (WFS2 and POX) were reduced by a factor of 5, via appropriate splitter placement. The IFO currently likes about 6W, but falls out of lock within a minute with 7W of input power. In the process of reviewing REFL paths, the beam was found to be too large on WFS3, so a realignment (with lens swap and repositioning of table components) of the H1 REFL table was made. Power up locking was restored and further measurements ensued.
• The tip/tilt hardware shutter to protect OMC photodiodes, previously slower than the redundant software shutter, is now reinstalled, recommissioned, and faster than the ~1ms software at 700us.

Astrowatch (A. Mullavey)

• The uptime for H2 over the last week was 52.0%. It was in science mode 16.6% of the time
• The week started with H2 up 60-70% of the time, however high winds around the Hanford area and more computer problems over the last few days has brought this number down

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

General Operations (Rusyl Wooley)

• We received the final drawings from the architect for additional office space in the staging building as well as relocation of the LDAS tape robot. A P.O. was issued to Cangelosi - Ward for the aLIGO facility modifications. We put HAM2 and HAM3 annulus spaces back on their ion pumps and began pump down of the HAM5 and HAM6 annulus space.  Mike Fyffe and Carl Adams have been working with Peter King to build us a spare ISS board.  David Kinzel is working on a back up power proposal as part of our emergency preparedness plan.  Pending a certificate of insurance from the waterproofing contractor, we will be issuing a P.O. number in order to begin Beam Tube Enclosure joint repairs.  We have been interviewing SolidWorks drafters this week and have chosen who we want.  I am in final negotiations with the recruiter with hopes of having someone on board within the next two weeks.

CDS Computing (Keith Thorne)

Sys-Admin:

• Corrected IOC startup on pickerel.
• Fixed bug preventing use of web-based ilog admin.
• Completed RAID install on llo1 backup, started data copy.

Commissioning Support:

• New test-point lib, awgstream for ISI transfer-functions. (Jeff Kissel)
• Added channels for noise budget. (Josh Smith)
• OMC code re-built to allow OMC/LSC operation. (Tobin Fricke)

Upgrades:

• OMC, ISI front-ends moved to new hardware now in MSR.
• New Linux-based frame-builder hardware, software installed.
• New gateway to LDAS-based disks installed.
  • Moved disk arrays from LDAS to CDS for future expansion
• All new components are in operation.
  • Control room tools can access data from new servers

LLO Outreach (Kathy Holt)

• LIGO Staff Science Staff spoke at the BREC Observatory.
• Conducted final docent training for 6 docents - cohort 2.
• Prepared for school visits and teacher workshop.
• Conducted to School visits for total of 126 students.
• Conducted teacher workshop in St. Tammany Parish for 8 teachers (middle school).
• Prepared new quantitative activity for teacher training - Math and Science Connection using exhibits.
• Purchased supplies for the Sally Ride Science Festival at LSU.
• Designed and produced "All Star Astronomy" card for Sally Ride Festival and to be used to promote women scientist.

Safety & Security (Rich Riesen)

• Burned 2 copies (by request) of our Laser Safety CDs, sent one set (3 CDs) to Bill Tyler and the other set to Doug Cook.
• Continuing Laser Safety document updates.
• Erica Forsi, Keith Thorne, and Carl Adams have completed their requirements for Laser Operator access.
• Updated our web site and in-house binders with the new LIGO Laser Safety Program.

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 also Advanced LIGO

Controls and Data Systems (Bork)

See Advanced LIGO

40-Meter Interferometer (Adhikari)

• The Ranger seismometer had a bad connection to the DAQ. This was repaired.
• The performance of MISO Wiener subtraction for removing seismic noise from the Mode Cleaner was evaluated. It seems that this feedforward system would not need to be adaptive. There is no observed degradation in the residual noise spectrum over ~5 hours with a static set of FIR filters.
• The prototype LM34 based BSC temperature sensor was installed on the MC1/MC3 table. We will now start monitoring the trends and also the drumhead frequencies of the MC optics to make a long term absorption sensor. If this seems OK, we will fabricate more of these to install at the sites for the science run; one for each test mass chamber.

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Thermal Noise Interferometer (Black)

• A short has developed in the interlock of the phothermal probe laser (800mW NPRO), and after determining that the problem was on the circuit board and not in a more accessible connector or line, Greg contacted the manufacturer and is sending it back to be repaired.
• We met with the TNI advisory board on Wednesday and discussed plans beyond the upcoming doped-optimized coating measurement.

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LASTI (Mittleman)

No report.

CIT Science Group (Weinstein)

____________________

Antony Searle:

• Worked with Chad Hanna on localization for CBC followup.
• Extended localization C code to help with triggered followup, clustering and production of robust detection statistic.

____________________

Cristina Valeria Torres:

• Prepare for SEC sponsored workshop presentations to be given as part of the upcoming Sally Ride Science Festival in Baton Rouge (K. Holt, S. Caudill & myself).
• Continue to work on tracksearch trigger database refinements for multi-dimensional glitch classification algorithm as S6 on-line detchar tool.
• Continue to work on CBC follow up document, working cooperatively with Romain Gouaty and Sarah Caudill.

____________________

Kipp Cannon:

• Continuing work on low-latency inspiral analysis techniques.
• Worked with Duncan Brown on some tools related to the inspiral pipeline.
• Worked with people from the AEI on some LSC software issues.
• Prepared materials/documentation related to on-going s4 cosmic   string cusp search - telecons:  s4 string cusp review, inspiral, inspiral-code, daswg.

____________________

Diego Fazi:

• Found and fixed a bug in the banksim code which yields an error when trying to make random non-spinning injections.
• Found a new bug with the banksim code which causes the SNR to be outputted instead of the match. Working on tracking it down.
• Kept working on implementing a chi-square veto for PTF.

____________________

Kent Blackburn for the LIGO Grid Computing Team:

GRID APPLICATION DEVELOPMENT

• Wrote agenda and led LIGO-Pegasus and OSG-VO-Group telecons.
• Wrote minutes for this telecon.
• Attended Inspiral, DASWG, OSG-Production and  OSG-VO-Group telecons.
• Attended and led monthly Einstein@Home on the OSG troubleshooting telecon .
• Attended newly formed weekly Einstein@Home on the OSG telecon to address concerns from the OSG Production/Facilities Team about the scientific merits of the Einstein@Home jobs running on the OSG.
• Update DASWG pages with new information regarding Einstein@Home statistics.

EINSTEN@HOME ON THE OSG ACTIVITIES

• Troubleshooting the UCSDT2 site deployment.
• Troubleshooting the RCAC site deployment. Seeing Error 2: architecture issue which has been traced to the cluster being made up of both 32 bit and 64 bit hosts. Will need to find a way to constrain the build and node mapping in the job submission and job execution.
• Troubleshooting the Error 106 at RCAC, CIT, SPRACE: preemption with signal 9 is suspected and may be due to the batch system not providing sufficient time for jobs to store state info.
• Make minor changes and test cleanup script, add 3 new error codes to the cases which require cleaning.
• Modifying submission script to prevent job fail at preemption and currently testing.

BINARY INSPIRAL ON THE LDG AND OSG ACTIVITIES

• Troubleshooting lalapps-ihope followup job failure, the followup job does always fail, will test using the -U flag.
• Testing newest pegasus nightly build 11-11.
• Tested new pegasus-get-sites in, needs additional fixes from USC-ISI.
• Tested Adam's patch, now implemented and working correctly.
• Changed SPEW dax workflow to link inspiral output correctly.

OSG INTEGRATION AND VALIDATION TESTBED ACTIVITIES

• Received the new vertical rails and installed into the rack.
• After installing the vertical rails, installed the 1U rack kits   and 13 of the 15 1U servers. The other two were take over to   Millikan. Was not able to power up the 13 nodes as a new power   rail is needed and on order.
• One gatekeeper and one worker node are now up and running in the   computer room on the 6th floor of Millikan.
• Attending the OSG Site Administrator's Meeting at SLAC this week.

GRID COMPUTING MANAGEMENT

• Presented recent changes and results of the changes to the OSG Project Manager regarding improved accountability of the Einstein at Home jobs running on the OSG. The BOINC accrediting system is now uniquely recording jobs run on the OSG, no longer blending   these with DGRID jobs.
• Met with the OSG Project Manager to discuss elements of LIGO use of OSG in preparation for the January OSG review by the DOE and NSF.
• Scheduled OSG Council Telecon, wrote the agenda, and recorded the   minutes on the OSG Council Website. Contacted Ann Chervenak of ISI and CDIGS to discuss having the recently released document, "Perspectives on Distributed Computing:..." presented and discussed at the next OSG Council Meeting. Lisa Childers of ANL was contacted by Ann and has agreed to be on hand at the next OSG Council Meeting to discuss.
• Worked with the OSG All-Hands Program Committee to sort out some   minor issues and to plan a second program committee telecon for   this Friday. Worked out a suitable registration payment plan with Bonnie.
• Provided requirements for a new RSV probe to support LIGO's use of WS-Gram sites on the OSG. These requirements went to the RSV team and the OSG security officer.
• Updated the CompComm on the various OSG involvements:
  • Dates set for Joint NSF/DOE Review of OSG
  • OSG All Hands Meeting will have half a day of talks on LIGO
  • Recent issues with accounting for E@H job credits on OSG
  • Status of condor backfill on OSG
  • Status of removing PSU as an OSG site
• Assisted several users of the LDG with issues with certificates, LAMS and the LDG software this week.
• Worked on a collection of options for improving the web browsing   experience of the LSC community for the SCAT and CompComm. A large component of the report on this collection of options involves the   expense, usability and security each option brings to the LSC users   community.

____________________

Amber L. Stuver:

• Presented the weekly public lecture at the Highland Road Park Observatory (in Baton Rouge) giving an overview of gravitational waves, their sources, how LIGO works and the potential of gravitational wave astronomy.  Approximately sixty people attended.
• Wrote a draft web page documenting the source location package using detection delays only (I am currently calling this package delaySource) and added it for consideration by the CBC group to be used in their follow-up work.
• Continued bringing myself up to speed on the state of the MDC review from the available documentation and making sure that the current installation from the CVS works as it should on my local computer.
• Presented a 1 hour workshop (in Baton Rouge) on the algebraic derivation of time dilation at the Louisiana Association of Teachers of Mathematics.  The activity can be found here.
• Conducted docent training for about 10 docents.
• Gave control room tours to ~50 high school freshman and ~75 5th graders.
• Met with Lisa Szechter from Tulane to discuss the educational research that is being done in the SEC.
• Accepted an appointment to the AAPT Committee of Graduate Education in Physics with a term ending in 2012.
• Accepted an assignment from Fred to survey the climate of the collaboration of the LIGO Diversity Committee.
• Proposed to the FGSA that we make formal proposals to the APS Committee on Education and the FED to open lines of communication and to coordinate common efforts.  The executive committee agreed and I am in the process of drafting the formal proposals.
• Agreed to be part of a committee to redesign the LIGO web pages and to serve as the LLO outreach representative in the group.

____________________

Joseph Betzwieser:

• Started 2nd Half of S5 wide parameter search for the Crab pulsar.

____________________

Anand Sengupta:

• Following up hardware injection with poor param accuracy.
• Banksim exercise for spin waveforms.

____________________

Chad Hanna:

• I have been investigating spinning injections for the high mass search.  I found a few common failure modes for the kludge waveforms and am testing them with the failure modes removed.
• I held the IMR call this week and we started a discussion about S5 publications and time lines for searches that are looking for IMR sources.
• I presented work I did with kipp on low-latency coincidence at this weeks code call. - I have also been preparing with Adrian for his talk next weekend.

____________________

Pinkesh Patel:

• Quit astrowatch this week.
• Working on OMC commissioning. Wrote a little script to automatically phase rotate in a dither loop.
• Joe found an error in the resampling code. It was not normalizing correctly. Fixing that.

____________________

Drew Keppel:

• Review for the S5 First Year Low Mass CBC Search.
• Editing the S5 First Year Low Mass CBC Search Paper.

Laboratory Computing (Anderson)

LDAS Software Systems (Maros)

• Progress has been made in two important areas this week. First has been in the area of creating an RPM to ease the installation process of lsync. Although incomplete, substantial progress has been made and an RPM is expected to be made available early next week.
• The second area is with implementing the Version 8 Frame Specification. The core infrastructure has been proven to work. The effort now is in implementing the differences between this version and version 7.
• System testing of LDAS was done using version 1.11.21. Lsync failed. Current speculation is that there is an error in the test script. It is being investigated. Also, 8 of the regression tests failed. This has not yet been investigated.

LDAS System Administration (Anderson)

Caltech

(Dan Kozak)

• Weekly check of frame files in CIT cluster showed found a bad frame (/data/node204/frames/S5/L1/LLO/L-RDS_R_L1-85538/L-RDS_R_L1-855380032-64.gwf) on a node which had fan problems.  Replaced the bad frame with a good one from /archive.
• Checked that an LDAS patch had fixed the problem of writing the same md5sum for all files.
• Generated list of tapes for shelf storage at LHO.
• Assisted in adding another JBDO tray to LHO's fb0_frames 3511 and ran samgrowfs on /fb0_frames.
• Assisted with work at LLO: 3510 disk replacement, rebuild RAID sets on old /home 3511s, build new /frames.
• Attended CIT 101 orientation.

MIT

(Fred Donovan)

• Some more issues with pcraids (pcraid9 esp.).

Livingston

(Igor Yakushin)

• The reconfiguration of LDAS servers, required by changing fb1 platform and doubling the size of /frames, was completed.
• Batteries were replaced in 3 USPes.
• New 24-port GiGe switch for internal ILOM and raid array management network is installed.
• 3 bad disks were replaced in 3510-2 and 3510-3.
• A second controller was installed in 3510-2.
• New raid arrays and servers were added to LDAS@LLO support contract.
• FC cards were exchanged between dataserver (that no longer needs high bandwidth access to /frames) and ngateway.

Hanford

(Greg Mendell)

• Updated the astrowatch Disk2Disk script at LHO to keep track of where it last found data on the framebuilder filesystem, to remove the long start-up time the script was taking to find data each time it started on a new astrowatch segment.  We automatically archive H1 and H2 UP time at LHO, and recently there have been large numbers of H1 and H2 segments to archive.
• I am still working to arrange the move of the LDAS tape library system.

General Computing (Wallace)

MIT

(Fred)

• Some purchasing research re: opteron vs xeon vs core 2 for solidworks machine.
• Fixed ligo/lasti wiki (ligowiki.mit.edu).
• ilog-work: redid css (appearance).
• Working on 'replace' entries feature.
• Disk issues Ken's machine - set up new usb hdd temporarily.
• Reworking nagios (smartd/backup monitoring).

Livingston

(Dwayne)

• Continued development of parts management UI and testing.
• Installed defect tracking software.
• Created a mysql database instance for Shannon.
• Replaced GC tapes.
• Gave Doug a quick once-over on maintaining the nodes and my cluster_mon utility.
• Numerous usual/unusual user support requests.
• Cleared spam trap daily.

Hanford

(Larry)

• Assisted a couple of users with environment changes.
• Modified alias list.
• Working on a couple of procurement items, maintenance contracts and a license renewal.
• Regular user assistance via phone.

Caltech

(Mike)

• Continued work on Primavera server, trying to configure the 64 bit OS. I have no choice but to upgrade to the latest release P6 SP2. There are some changes that need to be taken care of on the p5 sp4 database before I make this upgrade. This required us to update our maintenance contract with Primavera to download the latest software. I work on the other ADVLIGO package  "Prism Project Manager" which is now configured and running on this server.
• Worked on Linda Turner's laptop, due to a hardware issue. The hard drive and monitor seem to be dying "laptop is out of warranty". Between Christian and myself we got it running again. There was also a problem with Internet Explorer, which required me to update to IE 7.
• Larry and I installed another GigE switch in our server room 18. We also moved over some connections from the 10/100 switch to the new GigE switch.
• Finish up loading a Engineering workstation for an all hands meeting that is taking place in SCR. I now have this computer setup in SCR as well.
• Took a look at a problem "500 server error" accessing DocDB using IE. I found that there are a few "Security" default options that need to be unchecked, located under the Advance properties in IE.
• Look into some issues on DCC. Their was some problems with the nightly process server.
• Training on P-card.
• Other onsite/phone user support, plus other misc sysadmin tasks.

(Veronica)

• NSF Review - support of the dry run and the upcoming review.
• Addressing QA issues - working on a standard QA template.
• Updates of various webpages and applications on ligo.caltech.edu and ligo.org.
• Installed patches on the EVO loaner laptop.
• Videotaped and processed for streaming a seminar for CaJAGWR, updates of the group's website.

(Christian)

• Riccardo Desalvo - Cloned and replaced Riccardo's old lab workstation with new system.
• Tested the latest Microsoft security patches. All Windows server are patched.
• Toner cartridge replacement - 6 floor Millikan and 3 floor W/Bridge.
• Surplus old monitors and cpus this week.
• Re-imaged laptop that was returned to the loaner pull this week.
• Other misc.: Continued onsite software/phone support.

(Melody)

• Changed the DocDB interface per Linda/Calum/Dennis/Stuart's suggestions.
• Worked on an Apache error (500) when the Internet Explorer is used.
• Worked on a feature to use preexisting DCC numbers in DocDB.
• Added a few more journals options in DocDB's database.

(Larry)

• Worked and still working multiple procurement items. New purchases, tracking of existing items and getting paperwork for reconciliation.
• Worked with the GC group and others on the logistics for the NSF review. There are now a couple of other meetings taking place that we have also worked out some of the logistics. This will also give us the opportunity to test a few things out before the March LSC meeting.
• Some assistance with the DCC. Some changes made to accommodate a new request and debugging the system to take care of the change took a little time. Some minor work on debugging of the new DCC.
• Worked with Christian and Mike on some EVO items. The new setups for EVO in the conference rooms are working well. We've received a number of positive comments on the new systems.
• Worked a couple of network items. Installed a new GigE edgeswitch with Mike. This has helped take some of the load off of other boxes and help all around. Did some debugging of a couple of network items for end users. So far a bad connection and a bad cable have been the culprits.
• Moving of data for different users. Everything from a few files to directories.
• Some minor work on backups. Still some shuffling and automation to take place.
• Regular user requests and modifications.

Advanced LIGO and Supporting R&D (Shoemaker)

Advanced LIGO Management

From Carol Wilkinson

Project Controls

• The project office has created a form for Level II change requests in addition to the Level I form already in use. These forms are used for minor budget and schedule adjustments within a single subsystem. They cannot be used to request contingency or if other subsystems will be impacted.
• Advanced LIGO Change Requests (ACR) in process:
  • The ACR for delay in PSL delivery schedule of 200 W lasers by 6 months will be processed and implemented in December. Uses schedule float and does not impact project schedule for installed units. Spares will be delivered after the install date.
  • An ACR to add HEPI units to the output readout HAMs per request by the ISC subsystem is in preparation, pending a RODA that HEPI is the isolation of choice. Budget in ISC for seismic isolation of these chambers will be transferred from ISC to SEI HEPI. No significant change in budget or schedule milestones anticipated.
  • ACR to consolidate the clean and bake activities in the assembly staging activity in Facility Mods. and Prep is in preparation, with expected implementation in November. Labor in the individual subsystems will be collected and moved to FMP. Expectation that more labor hours will be needed.
  • ACR to increase staff at the various sites to help technical leads with procurement and documentation preparation is being prepared. The intention is to bring some site assembly folks on early and to hire temporary drafters at each of the four sites. Project contingency will be used where appropriate. Some of the drafters will also help with development activities paid from operations accounts.
  • An ACR to add optical tables to the SUS assembly tooling has been prepared and will be circulated to the subsystems leads for discussion and comment at the next Monday meeting. Tables at an estimated cost of $80K were left out of both FMP and SUS budgets.

Staffing

• Ads/job descriptions are out for draftspersons at LLO, CIT, and MIT to help with AOS, SUS, and SEI drawings. These are temporary contractors. LLO has identified a candidate and will proceed with negotiations.
• Ads are also out for an optical scientist and a technician. Both contract and term CIT employee options are being explored.

Procurements (includes activities from previous week)

• For Bert:
  • Working on procurement plan for FY2009 and presentations for NSF Annual Review of LIGO Lab in November. 
• For Ed:
  • On Wednesday, November 12, the NSF approved the contract with Cangelosi Ward for the LLO warehouse improvements.  Notice to Proceed was issued on November 13, and the contract will be sent out on November 14.
  • Preparations are being made for a presentation of the Procurement Group at the Advanced LIGO All Hands meeting to be held on November 20.
  • The Office of Sponsored Research has been requested to obtain a waiver of the requirement for bonds on construction of over $100,000 and to accept the Caltech requirement of bonds on construction contracts over $500,000.  This will save a significant amount of money on future construction contracts.  
• For Gina:
  • The RFQ for additional HEPI parts was released on November 13, with bids due on December 3.
• For Rudy:
  • The Notice to Proceed for the Staging Building modifications at LHO was released November 13 to the Apollo Company.  The contract will be released on November 14.
  • Agreement has been reached on a standard set of terms and conditions.  They have been approved by both the Purchasing Services Department and the Office of General Counsel.

NSF Acquisition Approvals

• On Wednesday, November 12, the NSF approved the award package for the LLO warehouse improvements with Cangelosi Ward

Progress Updates

• Time verification reports for the current pay period are due by Friday, November 21.
• Progress reports for November are due on Monday, November 25. Please note that this is Thanksgiving week. If you plan to be away form work that week, please submit your reports before Nov. 25th.
• Variance reports for the month of November are due by Friday, December 5.

Meetings & Reviews

• The next Monthly Progress Reporting Meeting will be on Thursday, December 11 at 8:30 AM PT. Subsystem leaders or their delegates need to attend.
• Advanced LIGO will be reporting project and development status in the NSF Annual Review of LIGO held at CIT Nov. 18-20. Presentations will be made on Wednesday, November 19, by David Shoemaker, Carol Wilkinson, Peter Fritschel, and Dennis Coyne.
• A ‘many-hands’ meeting for Advanced LIGO staff will be held at CIT on November 20. Topics include updates on project and development status, a tutorial on procurement processes, and updates on technical issues such as the final optical layout for the stable recycling cavity geometry.
• Several face-to-face meetings between project management and subsystem leaders are planned to take place during the week of the NSF review.

Advanced LIGO Systems

Modeling and Simulation

From: Hiroaki Yamamoto hiro@ligo.caltech.edu

Mechanical Simulation for Advanced LIGO (Sany and SLU team)

• For the best combination of the frequency and length control servos for our AdvLIGO Input Mode Cleaner model, took the open loop transfer function. The obtained transfer function indicates that the crossover frequency is 25 Hz and the dc gain of the total open loop transfer function is around 300 dB. Further analysis is planned.

Safety

From: David Nolting   dnolting@ligo-la.caltech.edu

• AdL Safety is preparing a Laser Safety presentation for the “many hands” meeting on 11/20/08 at CIT.
• The AdL Safety Wiki page continues to be updated with useful information to support the Advanced LIGO project.
• Participating in the Triple Suspension PDR.
• Continuing to develop safety support documents for AdL, to be later identified by a control number and placed on the AdL Safety Wiki page.

Quality Assurance

From: Mick Flanigan flanigan_m@ligo-wa.caltech.edu

Parts Database:

• Progressing to a demo for 11/20 to team in Caltech.

Defect Tracking System:

• Defect tracking system has been substantially modified, and several of the future users are now setup with accounts and are able to enter the system and test features. Will continue to develop for demo on 11/20
• Am scheduling a training session for administrators with the software supplier for the week of 12/8/2008, 4 hour session. Topics will cover the setup of the system, customization, and access control. General user introduction to the system and training will be given in January when full roll out is ready.

Training:

• Attended CPR training/recert this week.

Travel Schedule:

• Nov 16th-17th: San Luis Obispo: Supplier Meetings
• Nov18th-20th: Caltech
• Nov 21st: Minneapolis: Supplier Meetings
• Dec 2nd to 5th: MIT
• Vacation: Thanksgiving week I will be out of office (Nov 23rd to 30th)

Facilities Modifications and Preparations

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

• LHO - Bids for the Staging Building Modifications were opened on Tuesday. Three bids were presented and the low bid was from Apollo Sheet Metal, Inc at a value that which was acceptable. Apollo is very familiar with our site as they did all the mechanical work on our original buildings. The also provided craft labor for the PSI Vacuum work.
• LLO - The Warehouse Renovation contract has been approved by the NSF.

Seismic Isolation

From: Ken Mason kmason@ligo.mit.edu

SEI Project Activities

• Brian O'Reilly and Joe Hanson visited PSI to witness the winding of the actuator bobbins. They are inspecting the quality of the bobbins with the new polyimide coating and talking to them about their testing procedures.
• The STS2 Interface, DAC Interface, and 8 channel Valve Driver are ready for order.  The schematics, PCB, bill of materials, etc. are in a file repository, waiting for my go-ahead for the order placement.  The Pier Interface has been re-designed (again).  This time, to incorporate the Inductive Position Sensor inputs and their passthrough electronics.  It is also in the file repository, ready for order, but I want to take one last look at it next week before I'm confident about its suitability.  This now leaves the Pump Servo to be designed, and a small Anti Alias Interface board to be drawn up, and the electronics will be ready for order.
  ~Ben A.
• HEPI Pump Station--Some parts arrive--assembly underway.  See Photo. HEPI Actuator--Sensor decision made, drawings checked; shop continues programming and material acquisition.
• Ken and Mick will be visiting Next Intent next week to go over there QA/QC program, schedules, and procedures.

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:

• Documentation completed for large and small triple PDR (thanks to various SUS team members) and posted to wiki site.
• Worked on budget needed to complete R&D work for HAM suspensions.
• Nickel plating update - Test small blades came out looking mottled on the first attempt. For the large blades, they are going to try to scrub the blade surfaces before they go through the cleaning process and see if it helps. The vendor suspects that there might have been some build-up on the surface of the blades that the cleaning process didn't remove.

BSC Suspensions for Advanced LIGO:

• Draft of  BOSEM report summarizing the resolution of outstanding items from the final design review was circulated for comment.
• Alastair Heptonstall is back at LASTI working on fibre pulling machine and associated hardware and on welding tests.

Project-Funded Activities

• Monthly variance report completed.
• Prepared list of key dates in the quad schedule leading to first monolithic installation.

Core Optics

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

• Polishing specifications are in final review.  I hope to go out with an RFP next week.

Auxiliary Optics

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

ADLIGO

Work Under Project Budget

• OPTICAL LAYOUT: Luke is working on the optical layout for the folded IFO.

Work Under Operations Budget

TCS:

• Muzammil investigated several IR cameras for use in calibrating the TCS system. TCS needs to purchase an IR camera to have on hand at the LLO site. This item is not in the TCS budget.

ETM TELESCOPE SUS:

• Ken has completed the design for the ETM Telescope suspension test prototype. Some of the parts have been fabricated and the remaining parts for the assembly are expected to be fabricated by 11/21/08.
• Mike is trying to design a broadband achromatic refractive ETM Telescope that works with 532 and 1064 nm wavelength. An off-axis parabolic mirror reflective design similar to the initial LIGO PO telescopes may be the simplest solution.
• Aidan and Phil will determine the thermal defocus stability requirements of the telescope for the ETM Hartmann beam. Mike is looking into transmitting the reflection from the ETM AR surface through the ETM telescope as a reference surface for calibrating the ETM Hartmann beam.

OPT LEV:

• Eric B. analyzed the servo system requirements for damping the IFO using the optical lever beams to read the orientation of the penultimate mass. The voltage noise requirement of the optlev QPD signal appears to be only one order of magnitude lower than the currently obtainable voltage noise of the LHO QPDs. It should be possible to redesign the QPD electronic circuit by biasing the QPD (rather than operating in photovoltaic mode) and reduce the voltage noise by at least a factor 10. However, at the moment it does not appear possible to place an optical lever beam on the penultimate mass through existing viewports without using additional steering mirrors within the BSC chambers.

MEZZANINE LAB:

• The accelerometers for the SUS mezzanine Lab have arrived. Ken ordered tools  thru tech-mart. He is creating signs, lighting, and is moving equipment to prepare the mezzanine Lab.

Input Optics

From: Rodica Martin <rmartin@phys.ufl.edu>

ELIGO Commissioning (LLO)

• PSL power measurements and ISS checkout. (Antonio)

Preparation for high power in the IFO: (Kate)

• Found best TCS settings for input powers of 6, 7, and 8 W.
• Improved RBS servo with new sensing and control matrices.
• Measured power budget of POX path in preparation for high power.
• Measured ASC sensing matrices at 7W; implemented new control matrices.
• Set AS_I phases.
• Re-phased WFS.
• Fixed pointing into MC.
• Installed Delrin riser blocks on REFL1 PD to provide RF insulation.

ALIGO Design

• We have developed a solution for the coupled cavity Eigen-values in the modal model picture. We think that this modal model will help in evaluating the performance of the Advanced LIGO cavities. A technical note about this would soon be posted. (Muzammil)
• We have tested a low cost (less than 5,000 US$, Fluke Ti25) IR thermal imaging camera and it looks like a very nice tool to have. It would help a great deal is checking various windows and components for thermal problems.  (Muzammil)
• Measurement analysis of thermal lensing in AdvLIGO modulators. (Volker)
• Work on parallel modulation MZ experiment. (Volker)
• Working on folded aligo layout. (Luke)
• Modifying the drawings according to recommendations from SUS for asymmetrical wedge. (Luke)
• Tweaking specifications for AdvLIGO IO substrates. (Rodica)
• Writing a technical document on light scattering in the Input Mode Cleaner. Reading about feedback loops and control electronics in AdvLIGO. (Rodica)

ALIGO Acquisition

• Adjustments on the bid package for mirror polishing so it includes instructions and notes to clarify and expedite the acquisition process. We expect RFQ for the first batch of substrates go out in about a week. (Rodica)

Prestabilized Laser

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

Operations

• Nothing significant to report.

Project

• The spare ISS at LLO has been modified to be the same as the unit actually operating on the table.  There was some initial confusion because the board revision because the spare unit is a different board revision than the unit on the table.  Documentation was generated to bring the previous revision board to the current version of the servo.

Control and Data Systems

Vern Sandberg <sandberg@ligo-wa.caltech.edu>

Observatories

LHO:

• Worked on I&Q Epics monitors on H1, verifying cabling and modifying the MEDM screens.
• Installed new SUS Coil Driver on OMC tip/tilt, with modified dewhite filters. An initial check indicates all is well.
• Cleaned out old electronics from LHO warehouse.

LLO:

• Corrected IOC startup on pickerel. Fixed bug preventing use of web-based ilog admin. Completed RAID install on llo1 backup, started data copy.
• New test-point lib, awgstream for ISI transfer-functions. Added channels for noise budget. OMC code re-built to allow OMC/LSC operation.
• OMC, ISI front-ends moved to new hardware now in MSR. New Linux-based frame-builder hardware, software installed. New gateway to LDAS-based disks installed. Moved disk arrays from LDAS to CDS for future expansion.

Sub-System Reports

ELigo DAQ:

•   Install of new system at LLO:
  • Took FB1 off line.
  • Installed data concentrator, NDS computers and LDAS gateway.
  • Installed infiniband and gigE networks to support new computers.
  • Installed new software for above.
  • New system is now on line and writing data to LDAS disks.
  • FB0 was not changed; still being used as Frame Broadcaster for DMT machines. This machine will be changed out sometime in January.

ELigo Controls:

• Installed new Sun 4600 computers to replace OMC/ISI computers. This allowed us to mount the computers in the MSR and use fiber links to connect to the I/O chassis in the high bay. As built drawings being completed.
• Rebuilt the OMC/ISI front end code against the latest CDS software versions.
• Loaded new libtestpoint.so software, as modified last month at LHO. Since the update, the ISI multiple, long awgstream sessions have been running through to completion (was a problem before the update).

AdvLigo DAQ:

• In process of laying out the details for the site test systems. To be documented in a brief tech note, which should be ready for circulation in a week or so.
• Also preparing a document on the ADC/DAC timing and diagnostics details.

Timing:

• Received the revB DuoTone interface boards, tested the boards and related test document. Received revB Master/Fanouts, test in progress. This provides most of the hardware needed for the 40m installation. Converging on iterating timing design for the 40m installation. Converging on the "Quick-start Guides" to accompany the hardware.

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For additional information about this report, contact Albert Lazzarini