MDM Observatory 2.4m Telescope Observing Report for 2009 Jul 18

Observer(s): John Thorstensen
Institution(s): Dartmouth

Instrument: modspec+echelle; Andor guide cam

Worked for 6 hours (most of the night)
Conditions were Mixed most of the night.
No equipment or software problems were encountered.

Seeing and Weather:
   Clouds all night.
   Beg: Seeing 1 arcsec, Patchy Clouds, Winds Light & Variable
   Mid: Seeing 1 arcsec, Patchy Clouds, Winds Light & Variable, could smell smoke
   End: Seeing 1 arcsec, Cirrus, Winds Light & Variable

Observing Summary:

San Juan fire is still raging on W and N side of mtn, but pretty
safe here.  Access to the mtn is very limited -- there's a 
skeleton crew up top.  I was the only observer working.

Winds mostly carried smoke well away from MDM.  Night
was pretty decent, with some cloudy intervals; also closed for a 
couple hrs in the middle of the night because I could smell 
smoke (and I really needed a nap, having awoken very early to 
convoy up with the morning shuttle).  It was very close to 
photometric for the last hour or so.

Testing loaner Andor guide camera, using it as a slit viewer with
modspec.  It's considerably more sensitive than the image tubes, 
and infinitely better cosmetically.  There is some read noise; 
binning 2x2 and using the second-fastest readout speed and highest
amplifier gain seemed to help this.  At one point I acquired a 
19th magnitude star without undue trouble, but I had to up the
integration time to over 5 sec.  

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Submitted on 2009 Jul 19 [5:32:58]