MDM Observatory 2.4m Telescope Observer's Report for 2006 Feb 14

Observer(s): Statler, Watanabe, Haas
Institution(s): Ohio Univ.

Instrument: Direct/Echelle

Worked for 7 hours (most of the night)
Conditions were Mixed most of the night.
Problems were encountered, see the separate trouble report for details.

Seeing and Weather:
   Clouds from 6pm until 10pm.
   Beg: Patchy Clouds, Winds Light & Variable
   Mid: Seeing .9 arcsec, Clear, Winds Moderate
   End: Seeing 1.2 arcsec, Clear, Winds Moderate

Observing Summary:

Opened around 10pm after clouds cleared, observed one asteroid for
4 hrs, SN2006X, the another asteroid until problem occurred.

First symptom was that the autoguider guide box could not be used
to  drag  a star; it became apparent that the tvguider was
computing the x and y moves correctly but it was not driving the
telescope. We rebooted the guider PC but this didn't help.
TCS monitor reported  Dec encoder not responding  and
later,  RA and Dec encoders not responding . We shut down the TCS
system on the PC; this sent the telescope into an uncontrolled
slew, we think in RA. We hit the STOP button quickly, then
rebooted the TCS. It came up but reported very incorrect RA and
Dec. We manually brought the telescope to the stow position
with the tiltmeters, at which point the Dec read somewhere around
38 N. We then again shut down the TCS and rebooted the computer.
We also exited xtcs and xmis, and restarted and initialized
them. At the end of this we found that the telescope had, on
its own and unnoticed by us, slewed about 30 degrees south.
Again we brought it to vertical using the tiltmeters, which
left the TCS reading a Dec of +66. Since we didn't know what to
do at this point and there was little to be gained by further
troubleshooting (it was after 5 am), we closed up.

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Submitted on 2006 Feb 15 [5:38:34]