Fully Operational Death Star

Stephane gets the squeeze beneath the instrument

The last two days have seen a great deal of progress in preparing the instrument for flight. We think we will have a "hang test" on Thursday, in which we simulate the conditions of flight by hanging from the crane, relying solely on radio communications, then declare "flight ready" directly afterwards.  I then foresee hanging around for about  a week being trained to operate the instrument during flight and getting in some of the last minute visits to places around here that I have thus far been too busy to do: climb Castle Rock again, go on a pressure ridges tour, and go skiing one more time.

We managed to fix a bothersome problem with the veto calibration system.  The signal from an LED pulser was not bright enough to fire our phototube detectors, so we had to figure out how to make it brighter. After much sleuthing, we discovered that an attenuator (ie piece of dark plastic) had been put along the light path to purposefully dim the signal earlier. We removed that (at great danger to Stephane's physical well-being) and are now fully calibrating.  We still have one nagging problem-child phototube which sometimes works, sometimes doesn't. We need to figure it out in the coming week.  Loose cable? Cold solder joint?  Bad PMT? The mystery continues.

Fully operational Death Star, sunbathing with friendly neighbor

Today the weather was spectacular. We are getting warm (35 F) sunny days again.  McMurdo is again McMuddo, and a river runs through it.  Out at the hanger, we rolled CREST out into the sun to test its solar panel system.  It passed with flying colors, and we are now ready to see what this armed and fully operational Death Star can accomplish.  In the photo you can also see our neighbors (STO) had their instrument outside as well, waiting for the Sun to appear around the corner of our building in order to use it as a target to help align their multiple telescopes.

Getting a Clue in the Coffee Bar

To relax, we have been playing games in the Coffee Bar, or playing music. Last night we had reserved the bandroom, and played together for about three hours.  I've heard better, and I've heard worse.