Night Log 2012-05-30

SA: Amanda
SO: Siphelo
Others: amanda, charl

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. Clear night with variable humidity and fair to great seeing. A small amount of time lost due to technical issues. Data taken for the following programs:
2012-RSA_OTH-002
2012-1-RSA_OTH-019
2012-1-UNC_RSA_RU-002 (FP)
2012-1-RSA_OTH-008 (one block failed, 2 blocks successful)
2012-1-RSA_OTH-011
2012-1-POL-003
2012-1-RSA-008

Night Log 2012-05-29

SA: Tim
SO: Patrick
Others: amanda a. s. g., siphelo

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strange night weather-wise with wind, clouds and humidity (lost 6 hrs) giving way to dry, photometric conditions with good seeing. got data for:

2012-1-UKSC-006 (partial block due to clouds)
2012-1-GU-003 (success)
2012-1-IUCAA-001 (success i think
2012-1-RH-001

and got CAL_SPST at the end. while closed did a test for ken to check effects of simulating track on flatfieds as well as took some FP calibration data.

Night Log 2012-05-28

SA: Tim
SO: Patrick
Others: anthony, charl

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steady, photometric night with good seeing. all systems ran smoothly with only a few very minor hiccups. even PDET behaved itself. observed and accepted 14(!) blocks. too many to list by hand so refer to the automated list below. mostly long-slit data, but a couple of fabry-perot blocks as well. even managed to get specphot data for all settings at the end.

Night Log 2012-05-27

SA: Tim
SO: Patrick
Others:

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a MUCH smoother night than the previous. big thanks to paul r. for coming up during the day to sort the payload out! niggling issues with PDET instability and some structure/dome errors stopped us for a little while, but it was all science other than that.

cirrus, mostly light, all night, but otherwise stable with decent to sometimes very good seeing down to 1.1" on RSS guider. got data for a number of programs:

2012-1-UNC_RSA_RU-002
2012-1-RSA-009
2012-1-UW_OTH-005 (rejected due to clouds)
2012-1-POL_OTH-001
2012-1-RSA_OTH-004
2012-1-RSA_OTH-006
2012-1-RSA_OTH-010
2012-1-RSA-009
2012-1-RSA_OTH-018

Night Log 2012-05-26

SA: Tim
SO: Patrick
Others: anthony

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the GOOD: had a period of very good seeing and sub-arcsecond IQ as measured with the RSS guider (1.0" EE50). the entire night was calm and photometric. accepted blocks for 2012-1-UW-004 and 2012-1-RSA-009.

the BAD: lost all but 3 hours to problems with the payload (mostly) and the primary mirror alignment system.

Night Log 2012-05-25

SA: Tim
SO: Patrick
Others: anthony

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entire night lost to fog, rain, drizzle. did F-P engineering in the form of phase cubes for 2012-1-RSA_OTH-017, various test images to test out software mods, and some parallelism data to help develop scripts to simplify that task.

Night Log 2012-05-24

SA: Tim
SO: Patrick
Others: anthony, charl

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thick cirrus at sunset thinned enough to allow a fairly productive night, especially in the 2nd half. managed to clean up all of the outstanding CAL_SPST work that needed doing when the cirrus was too thick for science. also accepted 8 blocks for the following programs:

2012-1-RC_RSA-001
2012-1-POL_OTH-001
2012-1-RSA_OTH-006 x2
2012-1-UKSC-005
2012-1-RSA_OTH-003
2012-1-RSA_OTH-011
2012-1-UKSC-003

a few minor niggles, but no major faults. big ups to tech ops for a smooth run so far!

Night Log 2012-05-23

SA: Tim
SO: Patrick
Others: charl, francois, eben

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fairly productive night with 2.5 hours lost to high winds and morning CAL_SPST lost to thick, high clouds that moved in right at dawn. good seeing at times in spite of the wind. timDIMM really struggled with the gusty winds, but the guider reported as good as 1.2" at times. acquired data for the following programs:

2012-1-UNC_RSA_RU-002 (fabry-perot)
2012-1-RU-001 (fabry-perot)
2012-1-DC_RSA_OTH-001
2012-1-HET_GU-001
2012-1-POL-003
2012-1-RSA_OTH-006
2012-1-UNC_RSA_RU-001

Night Log 2012-05-22

SA: Alexei
SO: Fred
Others: BBC team from the evening, Nic, Tim, Martin, Paul, Anthony, Francois, Brent

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=> Cloudy unstable night with bad seeing and low humidity.

=> Data were taken for some programs:
2012-1-UNC_RSA_RU-001
2012-1-UW_OTH-005
2012-1-HET_OTH-001
2012-1-RSA_OTH-006 (x3)
2012-1-GU-003

Night Log 2012-05-21

SA: Alexei
SO: Fred
Others:

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=> No observation tonight, because Y drive slew clutch problems.

Release of PySALT v0.40

We are pleased to announce the release of PySALT v0.40.  The latest version of the software includes a number of improvements to the basic reduction package and the introduction of the SALTSPEC package for longslit spectroscopic reductions. The package also includes updated line lists for SALT spectroscopy and updated data files, a pyraf wrapper for the Fabry-Perot reduction code, and the slottools package.  Please see the RELEASE NOTES for the full update of the package.

The new package can be download from the PySALT user page

Additional information about installing the packages is available and also on the wiki
We appreciate all feedback on the project and please let us know if you are interested in making any contributions.   Likewise, if any help is needed in installing the package, please contact us.   Feedback, comments and questions can be sent to salthelp@salt.ac.za.

Night Log 2012-05-20

SA: Alexei
SO: Fred
Others:

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=> Another cold night with high humidity.

=> Data were obtained for the following programs:
2012-1-DC_RSA_OTH-001
2012-1-UW-002
2012-1-UNC_RSA_RU-001

Night Log 2012-05-19

SA: Alexei
SO: Fred
Others:

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=> 2012 Ice Hockey World Championship: Russia - Finland 6:2 !!!!!!!!!!

=> Very unstable night with high humidity, low temperature and generally bad seeing.

=> Data were obtained for the following programs:
2012-1-RU-005
2012-1-RSA_OTH-030
2012-1-HET_GU-001

Night Log 2012-05-18

SA: Alexei
SO: Fred
Others:

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=> Heavy clouds and high humidity.
No observations tonight.

=> Also have problems with tracker. The investigation was done by stand-by
with conclusion that with very high probability the Y-gear box clutch slips.
The motor has to be tested in the lab. The day crew will start to unmount
and test it in the morning.

Night Log 2012-05-17

SA: Alexei
SO: Fred
Others:

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=> Night with strong wind and bad seeing.

=> Data were obtained for the following programs:
2012-1-DC_RSA_OTH-001
2012-1-RSA_OTH-006 (x3)
2012-1-GU-004

Night Log 2012-05-16

SA: Alexei
SO: Fred
Others:

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=> Clear photometric night with good seeing during the first half of the night and worse
during the second.

=> Made burst mirror observations for the throughput analysis

=> Data were obrained for the following programs:
2012-1-UW-002
2012-1-UW-003 (x2)
2012-1-UNC_RSA_RU-001
2012-1-HET_GU-001 (x3)
2012-1-RSA_OTH-032
2012-1-POL-009

Night Log 2012-05-14

SA: Paul
SO: Siphelo
Others:

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- did not open due to high humudity

Night Log 2012-05-13

SA: Paul
SO: Siphelo
Others:

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- did not observe tonight. opened briefly after 00:00 but had to close due to high humidity.

Night Log 2012-05-12

SA: Paul
SO: Siphelo
Others: Keith at the start of the night

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- thin clouds at the start of the night, which got worse and forced use to close after 00:00.

- attempted the following programs:
2012-1-RSA_OTH-003

- obtained data for the following programs:
2012-1-UNC_RSA_RU-001 (rs0588 & rs0999)
2012-1-UW-003

Night Log 2012-05-11

SA: Paul
SO: Siphelo
Others:

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- clear and stable photometric night.

- attempted the following programs:
2012-1-IUCAA-002 (block J1436)
2012-1-RSA-003
2012-1-POL-003 (block V972 Oph)

-obtained data for the following programs
2012-1-UNC_RSA_RU-001
2012-RSA_OTH-023
2012-1-RSA_OTH-012
2012-1-RSA_OTH-018
2012-1-IUCAA-002 (block J1321_b)
2012-1-POL-003 (block FH Ser)

Night Log 2012-05-10

SA: Paul
SO: Siphelo
Others:

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- the night started out cloudy but conditions were stable enough to work in. had a wind direction change after 23:00 which caused the seeing to blow up. things settled again just before 03:00

- obtained data for the following programs:
2012-1-DC_RSA_OTH-01
2012-1-RSA_OTH-027 (P0)
2010-1-RSA_UW-001 (as part of ongoing MOS commissioning)
2012-1-RSA_OTH-011
2012-1-POL-001
2012-1-RSA-004 *ran out of track time

- attempted the following programs:
2012-1-RSA-011
2012-1-POL-003

Night Log 2012-05-09

SA: Paul
SO: Siphelo
Others: Lucian, Chris and Martin

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- not a fun night's observing. had a strong wind hampering good alignment and the cloudy weather combined with the bright moon did not make things easier.

- attempted the following programs:
2012-1-UNC_RSA_RU-001
2012-1-UW-003
2012-1-UKSC-005
2012-1-UW_OTH-005
2012-1-RSA_OTH-011
2012-1-POL-003

- obtained data for the following programs
2012-1-IUCAA-002
2012-1-RSA-010

Night Log 2012-05-08

SA: Encarni
SO: Siphelo
Others: Martin right at the beginning. Paul. Charl for a visit.

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Beautiful probably photometric night with variable seeing.

Science data for:
2012-1-DC_RSA_OTH-001
2012-1-UW_OTH-001
2012-1-UNC_RSA-004
2012-1-UKSC-001
2012-1-POL-001
2012-1-RSA-021

Night Log 2012-05-07

SA: Encarni
SO: Siphelo
Others: Charl at 3am to help with paylaod problems.

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The night started with clear conditions but fast-moving scattered clouds soon appeared from the North

Data taken for the following programs:
2011-3-POL-005
2012-1-POL-001
2012-1-RSA_OTH-026
2012-1-RSA-010
2012-1-IUCAA_RSA_OTH-001
2012-1-RSA-021

Night Log 2012-05-06

SA: Encarni
SO: Siphelo
Others: Charl as operator until Siphelo arrived. Eben to help with structure pad heights.

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Beautiful clear night with worsening seeing through the night.

Data taken for:
2012-1-DC_RSA_OTH-001
2012-1-IUCAA_RSA_OTH-001
2012-1-RSA-003
2012-1-RSA_OTH-027
2012-1-RSA_OTH-011
2012-1-RSA-004

Night Log 2012-05-05

SA: Encarni
SO: Patrick
Others:

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Telescope again offline, completing the repairs.

Night Log 2012-05-03

SA: Encarni
SO: Patrick
Others:

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Night lost due to rain, clouds and wind.

Night Log 2012-05-02

SA: Encarni
SO: Patrick
Others: Charl and Lisa for a while.

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Cirrusy night with relatively decent seeing at the beginning, which took a turn for the worse when the wind picked up just before midnight. Closed up due to high winds at 2:45am

Science data for:
2012-1-POL-007 (x10)
2012-1-RSA_OTH-027

Night Log 2012-05-01

SA: Petri
SO: Fred
Others: Encarni, Charl

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Battled with clouds on this first night of the
new season 2012-1. Some data for:

2012-1-RSA_OTH-011
2012-1-DC_RSA_OTH-001
2011-3-RSA_OTH-024

Night Log 2012-04-30

SA: Petri
SO: Fred
Others: Charl, Valerio

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So far this week have had rain, cloud, and humidity prohibiting
observations. Now added high winds too, and later fog and
drizzle took over when winds died down.

Period 2011-3 is now officially over, ending with a whimper..
but hopefully useful data have been gathered over the months,
and looking forward to see the papers :)