MDM Trouble Report for 2013 Dec 12

Telescope: 2.4m
Observer(s): Frank (OSU)
Instrument: OSMOS

Problem(s) Encountered:
After getting to my first target (3C48, RA 01h37 , DEC 33 degrees)
around 8pm, and starting a longer exposure (25 min), I decided 
to have a quick bite in the kitchen area.
Upon my return ca. 10 min later, I found the telescope - that had 
been tracking, pointing and was on the guider perfectly fine 
before -- way over near the Southern horizon. Both RA and DEC values 
on the Hiltner TCS monitor were completely off the real situation,
and the green start button was not illuminated anymore.
All the normal attempts to bring the telescope upright again via 
the handpaddels failed at first -- until with the help of
Eric on the phone, we power-cycled the TCS computer and power itself.
Even when back at the zenith (using the tiltmeters), the TCS
gave a garbage telescope position (Hour Angle around 18 hours, DEC at 
-40). Had to undergo the point-go-next-bright-star-and-check for 
consistency check three times before it got back to the 
normally very good pointing, after the RA and DEC encoders had been 
set. 

Later during the night, at various occasions, the power would go
out for the TCS switch panel (green light going blank) for a brief
second or two, but came on by itself, except during
one 5 minute spell, when I had to keep it manually pressed down to
continue tracking / guiding (all of these instances occured
when far far away from any limits). 

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Submitted on 2013 Dec 13 [6:31:05]