MDM Observatory 1.3m Telescope Observer's Report for 2003 Oct 28

Observer(s): M. Bureau, P. Kamphuis
Institution(s): Columbia, Groningen

Instrument: Echelle f/7.6 Direct Imaging

Worked for 11 hours (all night)
Conditions were Non-Photometric most of the night.
Problems were encountered, see the separate trouble report for details.

Seeing and Weather:
   Clouds all night.
   Beg: Seeing 1.4 arcsec, Cirrus, Winds Calm
   Mid: Seeing 1.8 arcsec, Cirrus, Winds Calm
   End: Seeing 1.4 arcsec, Clear, Winds Calm

Observing Summary:

We continued our program of imaging of early-type galaxies from the SAURON survey. Thin cirrus were present during most of the night, except perhaps the last third, so we simply lengthened our exposures (typically by about 50%). We also reobserved the galaxies done yesterday under rather bad conditions. The seeing was 1.3-1.5  during most of the night, except for about 2 hours at 1.8 .

No major problem to report, except that:
1) The focus button in the control room is  sticky , i.e. it often moves by 10, 15, or even 20 units even if barely touched.
2) The directional buttons in the control room hand paddle do not react very well, especially the North-South buttons which often take many seconds to yield any movement, or need to be  hit  pretty hard.
3)At some point, using the slew button in combination with the North-South buttons did not work, either on the control room hand paddle or the dome console. But this seems unreproducible!

Note that these problems do not prevent us from observing, they are simply a nuisance...

*Also, the rubber hose on the dewar needs to be shortened a bit as it is starting to leak near the junction with the metal pipe.

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Submitted on 2003 Oct 29 [6:41:06]