User's Manual for the 84cm and 1.5m Telescopes
Contents
1. 0 7 Start exposing continuously using the FOCO button on the CAMARA window with about a 200 millisecond exposure time A small window labeled Cancela el foco will open with a button labeled Ok which will eventually be used to stop the exposures Note that ex posure times for the guider are given in milliseconds Find center and focus the star in the guider field Increase the intensifier gain only slowly Note that as the telescope focus changes the guider focus changes in the same manner 1 e if the telescope focus increases so will the guider focus Redefine the centre position Select Opciones Configura from the GUIADOR window Press the Redefine Ceros button then Cancela Stop exposing by selecting Ok in the window that opened when you started exposing Can cela el foco When you stop exposing the last image is written to the camera window on the Linux workstation at the 1 5m It will take some time for the Cancela el foco window to disappear and for the CAMARA window to become active again This is normal and does not require repeat edly clicking the Ok button What is happening is that the last image from the video display is being digitized for display in the CAMARA window s display at the 84cm Immediately both the Cancela el foco window will disappear and the CAMARA window will become active In this case however no copy of the video display is shown in the CAMARA window s display 10 Turn the intensif2. Ifthe guider control computer beeps repeatedly reset it with the button indicated on its case Turn on the guider camera monitor in the control room Press the LINE B button on the monitor If all is well a variety of system messages will appear on the camera monitor the last of which will say La cuestion es cuadrada If not the guider control computer did not boot properly In this case it will perhaps beep repeatedly Pressing the reset button indi cated should reboot the control computer and resolve the problem If not contact the electron ics technician 1 Set the intensifier gain to its minimum Turn on the intensifier 2 Start the guider control program on the Linux workstation by clicking on the Guiador icon in the Instrumentos folder on the Linux workstation desktop The program may be started manually by issuing usr local instrumentacion bin checa si esta ejec guiador sh in any terminal window A control panel will open with buttons with the same labels GUIADOR GSC and CAMARA Select all three buttons to open three windows with these names All of these are shown in Figure 10 At the 84cm First turn on the guider computer beige box on the south side of the telescope and then turn on the camera computer silver box on the southwest side of the telescope Turn on the guider camera monitor in the control room If all is well a variety of system messages will appear on the camera monitor the last of
3. PIO CATALOGO Archivos Buscar NOMBRE 1 NOMBRE 2 JAR DEC EPOCAJINF EXTRA 0001 HR15 00 06 23 30 29 05 26 2000 0 B l pMnHg 12 0002 HR39 00 13 14 20 1511 01 2000 0 B2l 4 MULT 0003 HR264 00 56 42 50 60 43 00 2000 0 BOl ve 7 MULT 0004 HR403 01 25 49 00 60 14 07 2000 0 ASIII IY 7 0005 HR553 01 54 38 40 20 48 29 2000 0 ASV 2 0005 HR622 02 09 32 60 34 59 14 2000 0 ASIII 10 0005 HR936 03 06 10 10 40 57 20 2000 0 B amp V 4 MULT amp MUEVE TELESCOPIO Hola Figure 6 The catalogue interface may be used to save the objects accumulated in this catalogue to a file that may later be used in the CATALOGO page The CATALOGO page of the console interface Figure 6 allows the use of object cata logues The interface includes the object catalogue two menus and a large MUEVE TELESCO PIO button Objects may be selected from the catalogue in use by paging using the scroll bar or by searching using the Buscar Busca por nombre aproximado menu Object cata logues are loaded via the Archivos Carga archivo de disco menu The telescope is moved to the object by pressing the MUEVE TELESCOPIO button Telescope Pointing and Correcting Coordinates There are two hand paddles one in the dome and one at the observing station Both have switches to permit rapid motions though all motions are slow by default On the paddle in the dome rapid motions are activated by pressing the button on the back of the paddle while s
4. Set the right ascension The telescope won t move until the ACT command is issued Set the declination The telescope won t move until the ACT command is issued Change the epoch The telescope won t move until the ACT com mand is issued Move to the position defined by AR DEC and EPOCA and start tracking Move the telescope to the zenith Stop tracking This is useful for taking flats and filling the dewar Force the console computer to set its time This is perhaps only useful at the 1 5m and it s not clear that it still works there Apendix B Opening and closing the dome shutters Figure 11 Left The power supply cable and the switches that open the upper and lower shutters at the 84cm telescope Right The hand paddle that moves the telescope and the dome At the 84cm telescope At the begining of the night 1 Turn on the telescope motors If the telescope oscillates around the zenith do not worry 2 In the dome move the dome to the south with the hand paddle Figure 11 right panel 3 On the landing at the top of the stairs on the south side of the dome plug in the shutter motors the cable is indicated by the number 1 in Figure 11 4 First turn the switch to open the upper shutter number 2 Figure 11 and then hold down the switch to drop the lower shutter number 3 Figure 11 The switch to drop the lower shutter must be held down until the lower shutter is completely open Once the upper
5. User s Manual for the 84cm and 1 5m Telescopes August 2005 Michael Richer and Alan Watson richer astrosen unam mx a watson astrosmo unam mx revised November 2007 Lester Fox lfox astrosen unam mx Summary This manual is designed to provide information for observers using with the 1 5m and 84cm telescopes of the OAN SPM We cover the operation of the telescope console guider and finder since these components are typically used together This manual does not cover the opera tion of the CCDs or instruments since other manuals containing this information exist Additional Useful Information Direct Imaging User s Guide http haro astrossp unam mx telescopios ccd_imaging manual pdf CCD data acquisition with PMIS Spanish http haro astrossp unam mx Instruments ccds pmisman manual es pdf English http haro astrossp unam mx Instruments ccds pmisman manual en pdf Marconi CCD interface User s Guide in Spanish http haro astrossp unam mx Instruments ccds marconi ccds oan e2v pdf Sophia focal reducer for 84cm telescope in Spanish http haro astrossp unam mx Instruments sophia intro_sophia htm Bolitas small Boller amp Chivens spectrograph for 84cm telescope in Spanish http haro astrossp unam mx Instruments bolitas introbolitas htm CCDs page detailed CCD characterization reports including photometric zero points http haro astrossp unam mx Instruments ccds introccds htm 1 5m tele
6. at the guider is confused and it will be necessary to recentre the guider Opciones Ceros Instrumentales see above 4 Start exposing with perhaps a 1 second exposure time Find and center the guide star in the guider field on the video monitor Adjust the focus if necessary Increase the intensifier gain only slowly Stop the exposure The key to finding guide stars is to know the position of the telescope accurately We recommend correcting the coordinates of the telescope whenever its position is known Start another exposure FOCO CAMARA window with an exposure time of 2 5 seconds which determines the correction rate Adjust the gain so that the star is not saturated Stop the exposure At the 84cm Take a single exposure using the CAMARA window s EXPONER button Figure 9 This image will be displayed in the CAMARA window s display At the 1 5m The last image from the video display will be transferred to the CAMARA win dow s display automatically Select the guide star by clicking on its image in the CAMARA window Press AUTO to start guiding A window will open that says Cancela el autoguiado On the guider video monitor a very large scale image of the star and an image of the guider box will appear Stopping Guiding l Press the Ok button in the Cancela el autoguiado window 2 Set the intensifier gain to its minimum Stopping the Guider l At the 1 5m the easiest way to shut down the guider is t
7. e is switched off by placing it at the zenith see below and turning off the three switches on the console cabinet At the 1 5m there isa panic button on the front of the lower telescope support that is the north side of the southern telescope support Figure 3 Also in an emergency switching off the three power switches on the console cabinet will stop the telescope Regardless when stopped in either manner the telescope will be completely lost and must be brought to the zenith manually Figure 3 The panic button at the 1 5 m telescope The Graphical Console Interface Figure 4 presents the main window of the telescope console s graphical user interface The graphical console interface is started by clicking on the telescope icon found in the Instrumentos folder on the Linux workstation s desktop The icon is called Control Telescopio at the 1 5m and Consola at the 84cm In the event that this icon is missing start the graphical interface by issuing home observa instrumentacion bin consola at the 84cm usr local instrumentacion bin consola at the 1 5m Control de Telescopio TELESCOPIO CATALOGO MOVS RELATIVOS INFO UTIL Domo bec 1 0 AH 00 00 00 7 POSICIONADO 2 AUTOMATICO TS 16 41 43 2 TU 02 25 31 0 a AUIHDE DJ 2453603 50 ma 20c AT ACIM 180 0 To EEH N 5 _3 POSICIONES FIJAS INSTRUCCIONES MAS USADAS J Mover Telescopio Graba Objs Figure 4 The main window of the
8. flexiones Figure 7 Note that this option should only be activated after the telescope has been focused Even with this option we recommend checking the focus if the image quality is important though the automatic focus control should be sufficient for standard star fields and the like San Video Buscador V1 5 Ganancia 1 000 0 5 1 2 3 456 78 I lf Tiempo de Integracion 00 ms Ver imagen en PC _j 256x243 wv VideoA video B Video C Figure 8 The interface to the finder video camera Tu IP es 192 168 0 141 Dome Operation The automatic dome control is part of the telescope s graphical console interface The dome control program positions the dome so that it is very close to the east side of the telescope sometimes alarmingly so though it never appears to occult the telescope In this way the dome movement is minimized while the telescope tracks an object By default dome control is not active when the control program starts To set the dome to follow and track the telescope position select the push buttons for POSICIONADO AUTO MATICO and GUIADO from the telescope console interface Figure 4 While the dome program is running the dome may be positioned manually in a variety of ways However if POSICIONADO AUTOMATICO and GUIADO are activated manual posi tioning is not recommended since the control program will immediately return the dome so that it does not occult the te
9. guiding see below Otherwise significant time will be wasted recovering from the intervention of the hardware protection system The 1 5m The 1 5m telescope is a Ritchey Chr tien with an 1 5m primary mirror It delivers a roughly f 13 5 beam to a Cassegrain focus The edge of the primary is out of figure and so the telescope is stopped down at the secondary to about 1 32m The telescope often suffers from sig nificant astigmatism The telescope has an equatorial mount and can point to declinations be tween 59 40 and 40 and hour angles between 5 and 5 hours If the telescope is not per fectly balanced it can have problems pointing at the northern and southern extremes of declina tion The telescope has a reputation for pointing inconsistently sometimes badly and sometimes well The best that can be expected is about 3 arcmin over the whole sky about 1 arcmin along the equator e g moving between Landolt standard fields and a few arcsec over small dis tances although often the pointing is worse Typical delivered image quality is 1 0 to 1 5 arcsec The telescope is located at a longitude of 115 28 00 a latitude of 31 02 43 and an alti tude of 2790 meters 9150 feet At the 1 5m there are two routes from the warm room to the telescope through the old control room and by the outside walkway To minimize heat leaks into the dome which can de grade the seeing we recommend using the outside walkway The 84cm T
10. he 84cm telescope is a Ritchey Chr tien with an 84cm primary mirror It delivers a roughly f 15 beam to a Cassegrain focus The telescope often suffers from significant astigma tism The telescope has an equatorial mount and can point to declinations between 64 45 14 and 39 degrees and hour angles between 5 and 5 hours If the telescope is not perfectly bal anced it can have problems pointing at the northern and southern extremes of declination Fur thermore the declination gear is slightly oval from wear As a result the declination drive can get stuck going to the extreme northern and southern positions Unfortunately until a new drive system is installed it will be impossible to achieve good pointing in declination and it will not be uncommon to have problems with the pointing at the limits of the declination range The point ing accuracy is about 3 arcmin over the whole sky about 1 arcmin along the equator e g mov ing between Landolt standard fields and a few arcsec over small distances Typical delivered image quality is 1 5 to 2 5 arcsec The telescope is located at a longitude of 115 27 58 a lati tude of 31 02 42 and an altitude of 2790 meters 9150 feet Telescope Opening and Closing Policy The decision to open or close the telescope is entirely at the discretion of the telescope operators Reasons include but are not limited to rain or snow threat of rain or snow snow blowing off the trees wind humidi
11. he dome control the finder camera the guider and the secondary mirror focus The Linux workstation has an Instrumentos folder on the desktop that con tains the icons that start the various instrument control programs The Linux workstation also hasa Paquetes Astronomia folder on the desktop that contains the icons that start various data analysis packages e g IRAF an image display ds9 SAOtng Ximtool supermongo etc By default images are stored in home observa imagenes though this can usually be modified easily Given the number of components controlled from the Linux workstation we recommend using several desktops to conveniently display their program windows There is a second Linux workstation in the observing room that may be used for more de tailed data reduction and data archiving This workstation also has the same Paquetes As tronomia folder as the data acquisition workstation Again the images are found in home observa imagenes by default The observing account is observa on all computers The passwords will be indicated in the observing room Operation of the Telescope Console The three switches on the console cabinet switch on the console computer telescope mo tors and exhaust fan The telescope is assumed to be at the zenith when the console computer boots Nevertheless the telescope coordinates will have errors typically larger than the field of the CCD but smaller than the field of the finder The telescop
12. ier gain to its minimum Starting Guiding l Enter the coordinates and epoch of the center of the field in the appropriate boxes If you entered the coordinates using the coordinate editing window Figure 5 the telescope console sends them there for you If your object is not centered in the field and you wish to use the telescope coordinates remember that the epoch of these coordinates is the current epoch Se lect BUSCA EN GSC A representation of the stars available for guiding will appear Select a guide star by pressing on the colored blocks on the right of the GSC window or by clicking on the star in the image of the guider field Press the button OFFSETS AL GUIADOR to send the coordinates to the guider window The guider offsets will appear in the boxes marked DESEADAS in the GUIADOR window At the 84cm the guider mirror will automatically go to these coordinates At the 1 5m send the guider camera to this position by pressing the button MUEVE AR DEC in the GUIADOR window Note that the eventual coordinates in the boxes marked REALES will be somewhat different from the DESEADAS Even so make sure that the actual coordi nates REALES approach their desired values DESEADAS without reversing direction for instance Typically the declination coordinates REALES and DESEADAS agree better than the right ascension coordinates The latter often differ by 50 units If coordinates do not ap proach the desired values it is likely th
13. imul taneously pressing one of the directional buttons on the front of the paddle On the paddle at the observing station rapid motions are activated by pressing the button above the joystick 1 5m or the arrow buttons 84cm while simultaneously moving the joystick arrow buttons It is much better to pulse the hand paddle than to hold the switches down continuously Neither telescope points especially well over the whole sky Errors of up to three or four minutes are possible Therefore after a large slew you may need to find a bright star in the al manac and correct the telescope coordinates INSTRUCCIONES MAS USADAS CORRIGE COORDENADAS If your object is well centered in the CCD it is worthwhile to correct the telescope coor dinates before moving after a long exposure If the Telescope Becomes Lost If the telescope is completely lost normally because the console program was stopped with the telescope at some position other than at the zenith c 1 5 CIEI H 800 2 POSICION Movimiento incremental 1 800 140 Dn Up F INCREMENTO Movimiento absoluto Mover Corrige por flexiones M Aire 1 0 Foco corregido 600 2 0000 Coeficiente 32 2 Figure 7 The graphical interfaces used for focusing the 1 5m telescope left and 84cm telescope right 1 Move the telescope to the zenith under the control of the console or hand paddle You may have to lie about the desired right ascension and decl
14. ination Use the level normally hung on the wall of the observing floor on a horizontal part of the guider or filter wheel to verify that the telescope is vertical 2 Close the graphical console interface and turn off the telescope console computer Switch the telescope console computer on and start the graphical interface 4 Find a bright star in first the guider and then the CCD and correct the telescope coordinates If the Telescope Reaches its Hardware Limits If the telescope runs into its hardware limits the technicians should be called In some circumstances the telescope operator at the 2 1m if none is assigned to the 1 5m or 84cm may be able to help Recall that the technicians are on call only until midnight Telescope Focus The telescope focus may be controlled with the hand paddles but it can also be controlled via a graphical interface on the Linux workstation Figure 7 We recommend that the Linux workstation be used as movements with the hand paddle are very coarse In the former case movements less than 1 unit will not move the secundary mirror The limiting positions of the secondary mirror are Telescope upper limit lower limit 84cm 3871 40 1 5m 1154 0 To start the telescope focus control program on the Linux workstation click on the Secundario icon in the Instrumentos folder on the Linux workstation desktop If the icon is not present start the focus control program by issuing usr local instr
15. interface is shown in Figure 8 The slider bar allows changing the camera gain The desired exposure time may be entered in the text box The default gain is 1 0 and the default integration time is 100 ms These values are sufficient to easily see 6 mag stars The Integrar button starts integrations while the Detener button stops them The Salir button closes the program The signal from finder video camera is fed to a monitor in the control room At the 84cm the monitor is dedicated to the finder At the 1 5m the monitor is shared with the tele scope guider To see the signal from the finder video camera at the 1 5m press the LINE A but ton on the video monitor in the control room When you are looking at a star with the small telescope finder in order to see it in the monitor in the control room you have to place the star in the center of the cross seen through the eyepiece of the small telescope finder at the 84 cm telescope At the 1 5 m telescope you have to place the star at the point of the needle seen through the eyepiece of the small telescope finder Telescope Guider Operation Although the guiders at the 1 5m and 84cm telescopes are very similar their user inter faces differ in some important details Unfortunately no detailed discussion of either guider is available online The guiders use intensified CCD cameras that can be degraded and damaged by excessive saturation from too much light combined with too much gain Therefore
16. lescope once the manual dome movement is released possibly severely jarring the dome If these options are not activated it is possible to move the dome using a e1 ther of the hand paddles at the telescope or in the control room b the arrows below the win dow indicating the dome azimuth see Figure 4 or c positioning the cursor over the window indicating the dome azimuth clicking with the right mouse button specifying the desired azi muth in the window that opens and finally selecting this window s MOVER button The control program does not rotate the dome when the telescope is sent to one of its fixed positions zenith filling Finder Operation The telescope finder video camera is controlled using the Buscador icon in the In strumentos folder The program itself is located at home observa Colorado Buscador run_buscador ARCHIVOS CATALOGO USUARIO Principal Configuracion an p ep epo pec afa 3 1 Sj O Buscar en asc oar foo opecfo0 gt Offsets a Guiador 1 999 skank Ok a eal Guiador 0 64M ACCIONES MOVER ACTUALES PALETA Camara Guiador o A e s Opciones Instrucciones DEG 751 69 E 0 0 _o TIN a STe Foco aso n joio S ESC PLACA 18 26 _ roco_ Exponer f RDI Foco f RAPIDOS FUERA SFOCO aa J en no e eee Ty SEC F 7 5 Figure 9 The three windows used for telescope guiding at the 84cm at both telescopes The user
17. nates and epoch are entered Figure 5 To move the telescope to these coordinates accounting for precession and the pointing map click MUEVE TELESCOPIO PRECESA ETC Should you not want to correct for precession or the telescope pointing map probably a poor idea click MUEVE SIN CORRECCIONES This window may be left open while working with other windows b The POSICIONES FIJAS button opens a menu from which fixed telescope positions may be selected Currently the only fixed positions defined are the zenith ZENITH and COORDENADAS DESEADAS X MUEVE TELESCOPIO PRECESA ETC MUEVE SIN CORRECCIONES CIERRA ESTA VENTANA Figure 5 The window used to enter object coordinates the position for filling the dewar PONER LONA At the 84cm this position is also used to cover the telescope with a tarpaulin in case of rain or snow see Apendix C c The INSTRUCCIONES MAS USADAS button opens a menu with several options e CORRIGE COORDENADAS sets the current telescope coordinates to the coordinates most recently entered at the coordinates window or selected from the object cata logue This is the most commonly used option e CORRIGE ZENITH informs the console that the telescope is at the zenith and resets the coordinates appropriately Be careful not to select this button by mistake e DESACTIVA GUIADO deactivates telescope guiding e ACTIVA GUIADO activates telescope guiding This only works at the 84cm At the 1 5m
18. o close the guider control panel Figure 10 This will close all of the other guider component windows At the 84cm select ACCIONES Salir from the GUIADOR window Figure 9 Set the intensifier gain to its minimum Switch off the intensifier Switch off the camera monitor At the 1 5m switch off guider power strip At the 84cm turn off the two computers started earlier Apendix A The following commands generally work for a the command line interface to the con sole computer at the 1 5m and b the INSTRUCCIONES MAS USADAS INSTRUCCIONES EN LINEA button menu from the graphical interfaces at the 84cm and 1 5m However the commands should be given in upper case for the command line interface at the 1 5m and the graphical interface at the 84cm The commands should be given in lower case for the graphical interface at the 1 5m Command variables are shown in italics All of these commands are com pleted using the RETURN key AH hh mm ss s FIJO DEC dd mm ss Shift AR hh mm ss DEC dd mm ss EPOCA yyyy y ACT ZENITH NGUIA LEE RELOJ Set the hour angle Telescope guiding is deactivated This is use ful for taking flat fields and filling the dewar Set the declination Telescope guiding is deactivated This is use ful for taking flat fields filling the dewar or positioning the tele scope to cover it with a tarpaulin Stop the console program at the 1 5m Not used at all with the graphical interfaces
19. orient the dome to the north with either the hand paddle or the switches on the wall see right panel Figure 12 3 On the landing at the top of the stairs on the north side of the dome connect the power supply number 1 Figure 12 4 First turn the switch to open the upper shutter number 2 Figure 12 Second press the switch to drop the lower shutter number 3 Figure 12 Hold the switch until the lower shutter is completely open Once the upper shutter is completely open it is a good idea to close it slightly Return the switch to its central position 5 Disconnect the power supply number 1 Figure 12 6 Open the primary mirror shutters in the order indicated on the switches Figure 12 right 7 Remove the covers of the finder telescopes At the end of the night 1 Send the telescope to the zenith POSICIONES FIJAS CENIT from the telescope control interface 2 In dome close the primary mirror shutters in the order indicated on the switches Figure 12 right Replace the covers of the finder telescopes 3 Orient the dome towards the north and connect the power supply number 1 Figure 12 4 First lift the switch to close the lower shutter number 3 Figure 12 Hold this switch until the lower shutter is completely closed Then turn the switch to close the upper shutter number 3 Figure 12 Once the upper shutter is completely closed return the switch to its central posi tion 5 Disconnect the power sup
20. ply number 1 Figure 12 6 Turn off the telescope motors Apendix C Covering the telescopes with a tarpaulin At the 84cm telescope 1 Send the telescope to Poner lona 2 Cover the telescope with a tarpaulin 3 Send the telescope to the zenith Be sure that all the electronic devices are covered properly with another tarpaulin see Figure 13 4 Orient the dome to the north east The telescope should look like the figure Figure 13 This photo shows the telescope and its electronics covered with tarpaulins At the 1 5m telescope 1 Send the telescope to a large northern declination e g with FIJO DEC 55 00 00 from the telescope control interface INSTRUCCIONES MAS USADAS COMANDOS EN LINEA 2 Cover the secondary mirror with a tarpaulin see Figure 14 It may help to use the wooden pole that is usually leaning against the dome wall to properly position the tarpaulin 3 Send the telescope to the zenith and cover the primary mirror with another tarpaulin It is safe to step on the mirror cell the square ish orange structure at the bottom of Figure 14 4 Orient the dome towards the north east Figure 14 This photo shows the 1 5m telescope covered with tarpaulins
21. scope page in Spanish http haro astrossp unam mx telescopios 15mt html 84cm telescope page in Spanish http haro astrossp unam mx telescopios 84cm html filter catalogue in Spanish http haro astrossp unam mx Instruments filtros introfiltros htm OAN SPM site characteristics http haro astrossp unam mx sitio caracteristicas_intro htm Telescope Characteristics Automatic dome rotation is available at both telescopes Nonetheless it is prudent to oc casionally check that the dome is not occulting the telescope This is particularly so at the 1 5m because the dome shutter is not much wider than the telescope itself Both telescopes are equipped with two finder telescopes The finder with the smaller field of view has a video camera attached This camera is viewed and controlled from the con trol room L 17 10 2007 15 04 KG a Figure 1 The finder telescopes at the 84 cm left and 1 5 m right telescopes Both telescopes are equipped with software and hardware protection systems that limit the telescope s motion and protect them from being driven to dangerous orientations If one at tempts to move the telescopes beyond the software defined limits the telescope console simply ignores the requested motion If while guiding the software limit is violated eventually the hardware protection system will brake the telescopes motors It is wise to respect the hour an gle and declination limits while
22. shutter is com pletely open it is a good idea to close it a bit Return the switch to its central position 5 Disconnect the power supply cable number 1 Figure 11 6 Send the telescope to the position for filling the dewar POSICIONES FIJAS PONER LONA from the telescope control interface Remove the telescope cover 7 Send the telescope to the zenith POSICIONES FIJAS CENIT from the telescope control interface Remove the covers from the finder telescopes At the end of the night 1 Send the telescope to the zenith and put the covers of the finder telescopes 2 Send the telescope to the position for filling the dewar and put the cover on the telescope it self 3 Orient the dome to the south and connect the power supply cable number 1 Figure 11 4 First lift the switch to close the lower shutter number 3 Figure 11 Hold the switch until the lower shutter is closed Then turn the switch to close the upper shutter number 2 Figure 11 Once the upper shutter is closed set the switch back to its central position 5 Disconect the power supply number 1 Figure 11 6 Turn off the telescope motors i 1 E Figure 12 Left The power cable and the switches that open the upper and lower shutters at the 1 5m telescope Right The switches that open the primary mirror shutters and that move the dome At the 1 5 m telescope At the beginning of the night 1 Turn on the telescope motors 2 In the dome
23. telescope console s graphical interface at the command prompt in any terminal window The graphical interface opens the window shown in Figure 4 There are two tabs TELE SCOPIO and CATALOGO The TELESCOPIO page is the console interface proper while the CATALOGO page is used to manage object catalogs Upon starting a default catalogue contain ing very bright stars as well as Landolt standards Landolt 1973 1983 1992 is loaded home observa default cat Object lists of stars arranged by magnitudes can be also loaded from home observa Catalogs It is also possible to load an object list with the coor dinates for your objects See the default catalogue for the file format To move the telescope to a catalogue object select the object and then click on the MUEVE TELESCOPIO button In most cases the user will interact primarily with the telescope console window TELE SCOPIO tab This window is divided into four vertical panes 1 The left most pane is used for relative telescope motions MOVS RELATIVOS There are two boxes in which offsets in arcseconds may be typed one for each of right ascension and declination Below these are buttons for each direction north south east west The largest offset that may be entered is 60 2 The second pane the widest of the four displays the telescope coordinates and the buttons that are used for telescope movement a The EDITAR COORDENADAS button opens a window in which object coordi
24. ty and smoke Do not argue Do not complain Do not pester As regards the policy for closing due to high humidity you should close if the relative humidity is rising and attains 85 You may open once the relative humidity begins to drop and falls below 90 see http haro astrossp unam mx resast noticias bol12000 htm for the offi cial policy document in Spanish If there is any condensation on the porch roof in front of the 1 5m dome or on the metal sides of the catwalk at the 84cm dome or the outside dome walls at either telescope the dome should be closed regardless of the level of the relative humidity If rain or snow is likely the telescope should be covered with a tarpaulin see Apendix C If in doubt inquire with the telescope operator at the 2 1m The Telescope Control Environment Observers deal primarily with two computers the telescope console computer and the Linux data acquisition workstation Figure 2 The telescope console computers at the 84 cm left and 1 5 m right telescopes The telescope console computer is located in the console cabinet Normally one inter acts with the telescope console computer via the graphical interface running on the Linux work station At the 1 5m only one may interact directly with the telescope console computer but this is rarely necessary see Figure 2 The Linux workstation serves as the interface to all telescope related observing opera tions the telescope console t
25. umentos bin secundario at the 1 5m wishx home observa secundario secundario5 tcl at the 84cm from any terminal window Basically you should take a sequence of images varying the focus between each and measuring the FWHM with imexam in IRAF There are also focus macros in the CCD control software that may be useful for this task if you are using the PMIS software see the relevant manuals In all likelihood as the secondary passes through focus the telescope s astigmatism will cause oval distortions to twist by 90 degrees At the 84cm It is best to always focus by raising the secondary which corresponds to increasing the focus read out by pressing the upward pointing arrow Figure 7 At the 1 5m It is best to always focus by raising the secondary which corresponds to decreasing the focus read out by pressing the Dn button Figure 7 The telescope focus at the 1 5m depends sensitively on the position of the telescope several detailed reports are available starting from http www astrossp unam mx resast sec1 5m foco2003 html The focus changes because the support structure for the secondary mirror deforms as the telescope is elevated to wards the zenith requiring the secondary mirror to be raised as the zenith distance decreases The program that controls the secondary mirror has been modified to correct this systematic ef fect automatically This correction is implemented as an option To use it click the push button Corrige por
26. which will say La cuestion es cuadrada If not the guider control computer did not boot properly If so try booting the guider computer again If that fails contact the electronics technician l 2 Set the intensifier gain to its minimum Turn on the intensifier Start the guider control program on the Linux workstation by clicking on the Guiador icon in the Instrumentos folder on the Linux workstation desktop The program may be started manually by issuing home observa instrumentacion bin guiador84 sh in any terminal window Three windows will open GUIADOR GSC and CAMARA as shown in Figure 9 Centering the Guider 1 Select Opciones Ceros Instrumentales from the GUIADOR window Then select the most appropriate instrument by double clicking on its name This process takes three minutes during which time a window appears to indicate the progress of this process Pro ceed once this progress window disappears Put a magnitude 5 or 6 star roughly in focus in the center of the CCD field Move the guider mirror into the field of the CCD by pressing the button next to ESPEJO so that its label changes to DENTRO Move the guider focus to an approximate focus value 40 at the 84cm and 2200 at the 1 5m In the CAMARA window select Opciones Configura and verify that the various pa rameters have their proper values Parameter 84cm 1 5m FACTOR DE BINNING 4 2 TAM CAJA GUIADO 60 60 VALOR KP 1 0 20 ZONA MUERTA 1
27. you should increase gain only slowly and not use the intensifier while there is light in the dome or while the sun is up At the 84cm telescope guide stars should only be chosen in the upper half of the guider s field of view Choosing guide stars in the lower half will result in a donut or partial donut of dif fuse light being thrown into the field of view of the science CCD For reports in Spanish see http www astrossp unam mx Instruments guiador84_nuevo donas donas htm or its update Aug 2007 at http www astrossp unam mx Instruments guiador84_ nuevo donas_ago07 donas2 pdf AM V O GI Di 5M 4 J UT Opciones Opciones Instrucciones DESEADAS T int ACTUALES E 2 AR 22 90 0 00 N 8 EXPONER DEC 26 40 0 00 FOCO FOCO RDI 2700 RAPIDOS FOCO MUEVE ARIDEC LIMS BF ESPEJO FUERA SFOCO MUEVE FOCO AUTO CENTRO AR DEC CANCELA CAMARA Normal CONT 0 F BINNING 2 GS Archivos 8 02 cae a aes a cms 9 29 9 73 10 21 10 54 19 0 51 0 0 2 Ge sdorlsot 7 AR 0520500 OFSET AR OFSET DEC x DEC AL GUIADOR crocs ms 000 00 0000 00 Eca asc AR BUSCA EN GSC Figure 10 The four windows used to control the guider at the 1 5m Starting the Guider At the 1 5m Check that the guider power strip located on the south east side of the mirror cell is turned on
28. you must point to another object to begin tracking again e INSTRUCCIONES EN LINEA opens a command line window at which console commands may be typed in uppercase at the 84cm lowercase at the 1 5m The most useful of these are given in Apendix A 3 The third pane INFO UTIL lists the object hour angle airmass and azimuth as well as the universal and sidereal times and the Julian date 4 The right most pane includes the controls for automatic dome control There are two push buttons POSICIONADO AUTOMATICO and GUIADO Selecting POSICIONADO AUTO MATICO will cause the dome to position itself at the telescope position each time the tele scope is moved GUIADO will cause the dome to track the telescope position while observ ing an object There is also a display of the dome azimuth and two arrow buttons The arrow buttons may be used to position the dome to a specific azimuth GUIADO must be deacti vated if the dome is to remain at these manually selected positions Across the bottom of the TELESCOPIO page Figure 4 is an object catalogue interface with two buttons Mover Telescopio and Graba Objs All object coordinates entered using the EDITAR COORDENADAS window Figure 5 are stored here for future use In theory selecting an object from this list and pressing the Mover Telescopio button sends the tele scope to the object position However this works only erratically The Graba Objs button San Control de Telescopio TELESCO
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