20 Questions for New and Visiting Instrument Designers
Well-planned and well-prepared visiting and new commissioning instrument runs at APO have been very successful in the past. To help facilitate your planning for the upcoming new instrument runs, our experience has shown us that you need to consider the following:
- supply answers to the following interface and support questions, and also note the house rules and guidelines,
- designate an ARC-affiliated point-of-contact (POC) / sponsor who becomes the conduit for information exchange between Bill Ketzeback at the site and your instrument team. This person needs to be empowered to make technical decisions about your observing program,
- plan to send this person to the site a month in advance of your observing run to run down the checklist of interface and support issues with us,
- your equipment and personnel should arrive at APO at least five working days prior to your actual observing run,
- and do not bring any unnecessary personnel to APO, as on-site housing is extremely limited.
- The ARC POC (or another delegated ARC-affiliated member) shall accompany the visiting instrument and instrument team for scheduled observing time and visits. This person is ultimately responsible for liasing between the visiting team and observatory staff concerning safety issues, instrument handling, efficient use of on sky time (for the visiting team and other ARC users) and providing clear communications in the event there are translation issues.
Bill Ketzeback is the designated APO point-of-contact for visiting instruments, and has prepared the following questions and guidelines which must be addressed prior to your observing run:
**** Visiting instruments questionnaire and guidelines ****
- Provide a summary of your project. Include purpose, objectives and a schedule for preparations prior to the actual observations date(s).
- Submit a text overview of your instrument including basic operation and design, detector/pixel size, and filters available. Also include a description of the interface between your instrument and its control and data collection equipment.
- Note instrument weight and center of gravity constraints--when mounted on the Nasmyth rotator, instruments must be balanced in rotation to within 50 in-lbs. Maximum unsupported weight on the port is 500 lbs.
- Provide power requirements on the observing level, intermediate level, control room or other location--specify voltage and amperage. List separately UPS and utility power requirements. Specify special connectors and/or isolation requirements.
- Special utilities and consumption/pressure requirements (e.g., LN2, N2, Compressed air, liquid helium, etc.). The site provides LN2, compressed air, bottled N2. Other cryogenics and expendables are the responsibility of the instrument team to provide.
- Location of control/data collection equipment during observing. Operation on the Observing or Intermediate level is recommended only for first "proof-of-concept" runs, and require advance site approval.
- Estimate the heat production of your equipment, especially items located near the telescope. For any equipment located on the observing level, removal of excess heat (>50 watts) is an issue and needs to be negotiated.
- Provide a dimensioned drawing of instrument (If APO is providing the mounting fixtures then a detail design drawing will be required).
- List of support equipment with size, weight, and installed location that you will be bringing. Note equipment that cannot be hand carried up the two flights of stairs leading to the observing level must be lifted by a crane. Maximum size is 45" w x 84" l and maximum weight is 1 ton. Attachment points for hooks or straps must be provided.
- Shipping information both in and out, must be provide if shipped common carrier 1 week prior to arrival/departure. We do not recommend using T&H Services out of El Paso, check with your carrier to see whose shipping service they use. All packing and shipping labor and costs are the responsibility of the instrument team. Limited storage of equipment and packing materials at the site is possible if instruments are planned to be used repeated over time.
- Specify cables or telecommunication interface that APO must supply. (e.g., RS232, Ethernet, video, etc.)
- Other support requirements, e.g., vacuum pump (vacuum fitting must be either KF40 or KF25), computer access, lab/office space, special tools, etc.
- Describe the plan to install and remove your instrument on/from telescope. Currently instruments are loaded from lift carts. Manual loading of single instrument pieces over 50 lbs is not allowed. APO has an extra cart that may be used temporarily.
- Provide names of people that will be coming to the site, and schedule. Also please provide exact itinerary on our accommodations page in the WWW documentation at least 30 days prior to arrival.
- Provide a description of any human or instrument health and safety items or risks. If unusual chemicals are used, provide corresponding MSDS sheets.
- Specify when you will need access to your instrument, its equipment, and the telescope outside of scheduled observing time--the observing area of the telescope is available only during limited times, and the telescope itself can be operated only with APO staff in attendance.
- Ensure your optics/chip location matches the port's nominal focus +/- .5 inches. Most visiting instruments are mounted at Nasmyth Port #2 (aka NA2). This is very important to ensure full focus travel with various temperatures
- The first on sky night will be used to get an instrument block (required for accurate pointing) This will take at least 2-3 hours before being able to go to science observing. Please plan for this in your scheduled time request
- The telescope and the building (ie observing floor) can move independantly by a small amount with respect to each other. Care should be taken to design your instrument cart to seperate and be retracted (or have retractable wheels) from your instrument after it is mounted to the telescope. There shall be no coupling of the telescope to the building while it is operating to prevent collisions of the two.
Other restrictions can be found in the document NA2 rotator and instrument restrictions
Additional information for first time users of the 3.5-m Telescope can be found here