Comparison between Hamamatsu S3399 and Perkin Elmer FFD-100

These are the candidates for the BB PD for the green beat detection as well as aLIGO BB PD for 532nm/1064nm.

FFD-100 seems the good candidate.

Basic difference between S3399 and FFD-100

- S3399 Si PIN diode: 3mm dia., max bias = 30V, Cd=20pF

- FFD-100 Si PIN diode: 2.5mm dia., max bias = 100V, Cd=7pF

The circuit at the page 1 was used for the amplifier.

- FFD-100 showed 5dB (= x1.8) larger responsivity for 1064nm compared with S3399. (Plot not shown. Confirmed on the analyzer.)

- -3dB BW: S3399 180MHz, FFD-100 250MHz for 100V_bias. For 30V bias, they are similar.

I think that the gain ramping time (_TRAMP) should be set to 1 second for all filter modules by default. We don't want them to switch instantaneously except in a few special cases.

So Jamie and I wrote a script (in scripts/general/) which sets all of these fields to 1 for a given system. The name of the system is an argument to the script. e.g.

>  setTRAMP LSC 1

The idea is that we set it once and then from then on, its captured by the autoBURT. Of course, we have to run this script each time we add new filter modules to a model.

Minicircuits ERA-5SM was used for the RF amp of the BBPD. This amp is promising as a replacement of Teledyne Cougar AP389
as ERA-5SM gave us the best performance so far among the BBPDs I have ever tested for the aLIGO BBPD/Green.

The -3dB bandwidth of ~200MHz and the noise floor at the shotnoise level of 0.7mA DC current were obtained.

1. Introduction

The aLIGO BBPD candidate (LIGO Document D1002969-v7) employs Teledyne Cougar AP389 as an RF amplifier.
This PD design utilizes the 50Ohm termination of the RF amp as a transimpedance resistance at RF freq.

However, it turned out that the bandwidth of the transimpedance gets rather low when we use AP389, as seen in the attachment2.
The amplifier itself is broadband upto 250MHz (the transfer function was confirmed with 50Ohm source).
The reason is not understood but AP389 seems dislike current source. Rich suggested use of S-parameter measurement
to construct better model of the curcuit.

On the other hand, the RF amplifiers from Minicircuits (coaxial type like ZFL-1000LN+), in general, exhibit better compatibility with PDs.
If you open the amplifier case, you find ERA or MAR type monolithic amplifiers are used.

So the question is if we can replace AP389 by any of ERA or MAR.

2. Requirement for the RF amp

- The large gain of the RF amp is preffered as far as the output does not get saturated.

- The amplifier should be low noise so that we can detect shot noise (~1mA).

- The freq range of the useful signal is from 9MHz to 160MHz.

The advanced LIGO BBPD is supposed to be able to receive 50mW of IR or 15mW of 532nm. This approximately corresponds to
5mA of DC photocurrent if we assume FFD-100 for the photodiode. At the best (or worst) case, this 5mA has 100% intensity modulation.
If this current is converted to the votage through the 50Ohm input termination of the RF amp, we receive -2dBm of RF signal at maximum.

This gives us a dilemma. if the amp is low noise but the maximum output power is small, we can not put large amount of light
on the PD. If the amp has a high max output power (and a high gain), but the amp is not low noise, the PD has narrow power range
where we can observe the shotnoise above the electronics noise.

What we need is powerful, high gain, and low noise RF amplifier!

Teledyne Cougar AP389 was almost an ideal candidate before it shows unideal behavior with the PD.
Among Minicircuits ERA and MAR series, ERA-5 (or ERA-5SM) is the most compatible amplifier.

Considering the difference of the gain, they are quite similar for our purpose. Both can handle upto -2dBm,
which is just the right amount for the possible maximum power we get from the 5mA of photocurrent.

3. Test circuit with ERA-5SM

A test circuit has been built (p.1 attachment #1) on a single sided prototype board. 

First, the transfer function was measured with FFD-100. With the bias 100V (max) the -3dB bandwidth of ~200MHz was observed.
This decreases down to 75MHz if the bias is 25V, which is the voltage supplied by the aLIGO BBPD circuit. The transimpedance
at the plateau was ~400Ohm.

Next, S3399 was tested with the circuit. With the bias 25V and 30V (max) the -3dB bandwidth of ~200MHz was obtained although
the responsivity of S3399 (i.e. A/W) at 1064nm is about factor of 2 smaller than that of FFD-100.

The noise levels were measured. There are many sprious peaks (possibly by unideal hand made board and insufficient power supply bypassing?).
Othewise, the floor level shows 0.7mA shotnoise level.

The emphasis of this annual safety audit  was on  safe  electrical housekeeping on March 3, 2011

The RF amplifier of the prototype BBPD has been replaced from ERA-5SM to MAR-6SM.
The bandwidth is kept (~200MHz for S3399 with 30V_bias), and the noise level got better while the maximum handling power was reduced.

MAR-6SM is a monolithic amplifier from Minicircuits. It is similar to ERA-5SM but has lower noise
and the lower output power.

The noise floor corresponds to the shotnoise of the 0.4mA DC current.
Now the mess below 50MHz and between 90-110MHz should be cleaned up.
They are consistently present no matter how I change the PD/RF amp (ERA<->MAR)/bias voltage.
I should test the circuit with a different board and enhanced power/bias supply bypassing.

Discussion on the RF power (with M. Evans)

- Assume 5mA is the maximum RF (~50mW for 1064nm, ~15mW for 532nm). This is already plenty in terms of the amount of the light.

- 100% intenisty modulation for 5mA across 50Ohm induces -2dBm RF power input for the amplifier.

- Assume if we use MAR-6 for the preamplifier. The max input power is about -18dBm.
  This corresponds to 16% intensity modulation. It may be OK, if we have too strong intensity modulation, we can limit the power
  down to 0.8mA in the worst case. The shot noise will still be above the noise level.

- In the most of the applications, the RF power is rather small. (i.e. 40m green beat note would expected to be -31dBm on the RF amp input at the higherst, -50dBm in practice)
So probably we need more gain. If we can add 10-12dB more gain, that would be useful.

- What is the requirement for the power amplifier?

• Gain: 10~12dB
• Output (1dBcomp): +3dBm +Gain (13dBm~15dBm)
• Noise level / Noise Figure: 3nV/rtHz or NF=14dB
  The output of MAR-6 has the votage level of ~7nV/rtHz. If we bring the power amplifier with input noise of ~3nV/rtHz,
  we can surppress the degradation of the input equivalent noise to the level of 10%. This corresponds to N.F. of 14dB.

Search result for Freq Range 10-200MHz / Max Gain 14dB / Max NF 15dB / Min Power Out 13dBm
GVA-81 is available at the 40m. ERA-4SM, ERA-6SM, HELA-10D are available at Downs.

Conversion between nV/rtHz and NF (in the 50Ohm system)

SN1: Connect signal source (50Ohm output) to a 50Ohm load.
Power ratio between the noise and the signal

SN1 = (4 k T (R/2)) / (S/2)^2

SN2: Connect signal source (50Ohm output) to an RF amp.
Only the voltage noise was considered.

SN2 = (4 k T (R/2) + Vn^2) / (S/2)^2

10 Log10(SN2/SN1) = 10. Log10(1 + 2.42 (Vn / 1nVrtHz)^2)

e.g.
Vn: 0 nVrtHz ==> 0dB
Vn: 0.5 nVrtHz ==> 2dB
Vn: 1 nVrtHz ==> 5dB
Vn: 2 nVrtHz ==> 10dB
Vn: 3 nVrtHz ==> 13.5dB

  1064 nm transmison were measured of 40m safety glasses as shown . Their performance did not degrade. They are as good as their labels.

I hope that new daqd code will fix the problem with non-aligned at 16 seconds frame file GPS times.

I have compiled new daqd program under /opt/rtcds/caltech/c1/core/release/build/mx and installed it under

target/fb/daqd, then restarted daqd process on "fb" computer. It was installed with the ownership of user root

and I did chmod +s on it (set UID on execution bit). This was done in order to turn on some code to renice daqd process

to the value of -20 on the startup. Currently it runs as the lowest nice value (high priority).

controls@fb /opt/rtcds/caltech/c1/target/fb $ ls -alt daqd
-rwsr-sr-x 1 root controls 6592694 Jun  2 10:00 daqd

Backup daqd is here:

controls@fb /opt/rtcds/caltech/c1/target/fb $ ls -alt daqd.02jun11
-rwxr-xr-x 1 controls controls 6768158 Feb 21 11:30 daqd.02jun11

Measurement of Schnupp asymmetry

This was done by measuring the relative phase between the sidebands reflected from the two arms while the arm cavities are locked.

The Schnupp asymmetry is measured to be:   L_sa = 3.64 ± 0.32 cm

Description:

As a phase reference we use the zero crossing of the response function for the out-of-phase control signal for the single arm cavity lock [0]. The difference in the RD rotation phase of the response zero crossings indicates the phase difference in the sideband signals reflected from the arms. Assuming the asymmetry is less than half the RF modulation wavelength [1], the asymmetry is given by the following formula:

       \Delta \phi   c   1 
L_sa = ----------- ----- -
           360     f_RSB 2

We use a LSC digital lock-in to measure the response of the arm cavity at a single-frequency drive of it's end mirror.

[0] The locations of the zero crossings in the out-of-phase components of the response can be determined to higher precision than the maxima of the in-phase components.

[1] f_RSB = 55 MHz,     c/f_RSB/2 = 2.725 m

Procedure:

1. Lock/tune the Y arm only.
   
   • We use AS55_I to lock the arms.
2. Engage the LSC lock-in.
3. Tune the lock-in parameters:

lock-in freq: 103.1313 Hz
I/Q filters:  0.1 Hz low-pass
phase:        0 degrees

4. Set as input to the lock-in the out-of-phase quadrature from the control RFPD.  In this case AS55_Q->LOCKIN.
5. Drive the arm cavity end mirror by setting the LOCKIN->Y_arm element in the control matrix.
6. Note the "RD Rotation" phase between the demodulated signals from the control PD (AS55)
7. For some reasonable distribution of phases around the nominal "RD Rotation" value, measure the amplitude of the lock-in I output.
   • Assuming the Q output is nearly zero, it can be neglected.  In this case the Q amplitude was more than a factor of 10 less than the I amplitude.
   • Here we take 5 measurements, each separated by one over the measurement bandwidth (as determined by the lock-in low pass filter), in this case 10 seconds.  The figure above plots the mean of these measurements, and the error bars indicate the standard deviation.

The data and python data-taking and plotting scripts are attached.

Error Analysis:

To to determine the parameters of the response (which we know to be linear) we use a weighted linear least-squares fit to the data:

y = b X

where:

X_0j = 1
X_1j = x_j              # the measurement points
y = y_i                 # the response
b = (b₀, b₁)     # line parameters

The weighting is given by the inverse of the measurement covariance matrix. Since we assume the measurements are independent, the matrix is diagonal and W_ii = 1/\sigma_i² The
estimated parameter values are given by:

\beta  =  ( X^T W X )^-1 X^T W y  =  ( X'^T X' )^-1 X'^T y'

where X' = w X, y' = w y and w_ii = \sqrt{W_ii}.

The X' and y' are calculated from the data and passed into the lstsq routine. The output is \beta.

The error on the parameters is described by the covariance matrix M^\beta:

M^\beta = ( X^T W X)^-1 = ( X'^T X')^-1

with correlation coefficients \rho_ij = M^\beta_ij / \sigma_i / \sigma_j.

The x-axis crossing is then given by:

X(Y=0) = - \beta₁ / \beta₀

References:

Valera's LLO measurement
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weighted_least_squares
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linear_least_squares_(mathematics)#Weighted_linear_least_squares
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Error_propagation

I have made my transfer function model and posted it to the suspension wiki. Here is the link to my model!

Bode Plot Model

Please let me know if there need to be any adjustments, but I have posted the bode plots, a model image, and an explanation of why I think it's right! ^ ___^ V

I am currently working on the photo sensor circuit for the displacement detector. So far, I have gotten the infared LED to light up! ^ ___^ V

I am now trying to get a plot of forward voltage versus current for the LED. HOPEFULLY it will match the curve provided in the LED datasheet.

I'm using the bread board circuit box and when I'm not working at the bench, I have signs posted. PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE THE CONNECTIONS! It is

fine to move the bread board circuit box, but please do not disturb the connections > ____<

Here is a photo of the workspace

I started on the 16th with a very intense lab tour & was fed with a large amount of data (I can't guarantee that I remember everything....)

Then... did some (not much) reading on filters since I'm dealing with seismic noise cancellation this summer with Jenne at the 40m lab.

I'll be using the Streckeisen STS-2 seismometers & I need to use the anti aliasing filter board that has the 4 pin lemo connectors with the seismometers & its boxes that require BNC connectors. I spent most of the time trying to solder the wires properly into the connectors. I was very slow in this as this is the first time I'm soldering anything.... & till now I've soldered 59 wires in the BNC connectors....

NOTE: The potentiometers on the bread board circuit box (the one I have been using with the signal generator, DC power, LED displays, and pulse switches) is BROKEN!

The potential across terminals 1 and 2 (also 2&3) fluctuates wildly and there dial does not affect the potential for the second potentiometer (the one with terminals 4, 5, and 6).

This has been confirmed by Koji and Jaimie.  PS I didn't break it! >____<

NEVERTHELESS, using individual resistors and the 500 ohm trim resistor, I have managed to get the current versus forward voltage plot for the Hamamatsu L9337 Infared LED

Kiwamu and I have started to put together a vent plan on the 40m wiki:

http://blue.ligo-wa.caltech.edu:8000/40m/vent/201107

We will keep working on this (there's still a *lot* to fill in), but please help fill in the plan by adding questions, answers, procedures, preparations, etc.

I put a paper Peet's bag with half of the Mini-Moos into George.

I have updated the TT suspension wiki to include a new page on my transfer function model. In this new page, an introduction and analysis of my transfer function (including a comparison of the transfer functions for a flexibly- and rigidly-supported damper) are included.  This page contains linear and logarithmic bode plots.  Here is a link to the transfer function page.

I have also updated my photosensor page on the TT suspension wiki so that the experimental data points in my current versus voltage plot are plotted against the curve provided by the Hamamtsu data sheet. I have also included an introduction and analysis for my mini-experiment with the forward voltage and forward current of the LED. Here is link to the photsosensor page.

 Summary for the week ending June 26th.  (Number of elog entries = 53)

Update of Week 3 Work:

-I've finished reading The Art of Electronics Ch 1, 2, and 4.

-The mechanical stage for the horizontal displacement measurements is set up.

-I've opened up the circuit box for the quad photodiode and am currently working on the circuit diagram for the box and for the quad photodiode sensors.

Later this week, I plan to finish the circuit diagrams and figure out how the circuits work with the four inputs. I also plan to start working on my first

progress report.

I have finished drawing the circuit diagrams for the quad photodiode boxes. Here are copies of the circuit diagram.

There are three main operation circuits in the quad photdiode box: a summing circuit (summing the contributions from the four inputs),

a Y output circuit (taking the difference between the input sums 3+2 and 1+4), and an X output circuit (taking the difference between the

input sums 3+4 and 1+2). I will complete an mini report on my examination and conclusions of the QPD circuit for the suspension wiki tomorrow.

[Jenne, Koji]

We have tested the LSC whitening filters. In summary, they show the transfer functions mostly as expected (15Hz zerox2, 150Hz pole x2).
Only CH26 (related to the slow channel "C1:LSC-PD9_I2_WhiteGain. VAL NMS", which has PD10I label in MEDM) showed different
phase response. Could it be an anti aliasing filter bypassed???

The 32 transfer functions obtained will be fit and summarized by the ZPK parameters.

Method:

The CDS system was used in order to get the transfer functions
- For this purpose, three filter modules ("LSC-XXX_I", "LSC-XXX_Q", "LSC-XXX_DC") were added to c1lsc
in order to allow us to access to the unused ADC channels. Those filter modules have terminated outputs.
The model was built and installed. FB was restarted in order to accomodate the new channels.

- Borrow a channel from ETMY UL coil output mon. Drag the cable from the ETMY rack to the LSC analog rack.
- Use 7 BNC Ts to split the signal in to 8 SMA cables.
- Put those 8 signals into each whitening filter module.

- The excitation signal was injected to C1:SUS-ETMY_ULCOIL_EXC by AWGGUI.
- The transfer functions were measured by DTT.
- The excitation signal was filtered by the filter zpk([150;150],[15;15],1,"n")
   so that the whitened output get flat so as to ensure the S/N of the measurement.

- For the switching, we have connected the CONTEC Binary Output Test board to the BIO adapter module
   in stead of the flat cable from the BIO card. This allow us to switch the individual channels manually.

- The whitening filters of 7 channels were turned on, while the last one is left turned off.
- We believe that the transfer functions are flat and equivalent if the filters are turned off.
- Use the "off" channel as the reference and measure the transfer functions of the other channels.
- This removes the effect of the anti imaging filter at ETMY.

- Once the measurement of the 7 channels are done, switch the role of the channels and take the transfer function for the remaining one channel.

Result:

- We found the following channel assignment

• The ADC channels and the PDs. This was known and just a confirmation. 
• The ADC channels and the WF filter on MEDM (and name of the slow channel)

- We found that the binary IO cable at the back of the whitening filter module for ADC CH00-CH07 were not connected properly.
This was because the pins of the backplane connector were bent. We fixed the pins and the connector has been properly inserted.

- CH26 (related to the slow channel "C1:LSC-PD9_I2_WhiteGain. VAL NMS", which has PD10I label in MEDM) showed different
phase response from the others although the amplitude response is identical.

Summary of the channel assignment (THEY ARE OBSOLETE - SEPT 20, 2011)

ADC                    Whitening Filter
CH  PD                 name in medm   related slow channel name for gain
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
00  POY11I             PD1I           C1:LSC-ASPD1_I_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
01  POY11Q             PD1Q           C1:LSC-ASPD1_Q_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
02  POX11I             PD2I           C1:LSC-SPD1_I_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
03  POX11Q             PD2Q           C1:LSC-SPD1_Q_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
04  REFL11I            PD3I           C1:LSC-POB1_I_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
05  REFL11Q            PD3Q           C1:LSC-POB1_Q_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
06  AS11I              PD4I           C1:LSC-ASPD2_I_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
07  AS11Q              PD4Q           C1:LSC-ASPD2_Q_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
08  AS55I              AS55_I         C1:LSC-ASPD1DC_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
09  AS55Q              AS55_Q         C1:LSC-SPD1DC_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
10  REFL55I            PD3_DC         C1:LSC-POB1DC_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
11  REFL55Q            PD4_DC         C1:LSC-PD4DC_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
12  POP55I             PD5_DC         C1:LSC-PD5DC_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
13  POP55Q             PD7_DC         C1:LSC-PD7DC_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
14  REFL165I           PD9_DC         C1:LSC-PD9DC_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
15  REFL165Q           PD11_DC        C1:LSC-PD11DC_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
16  NC (named XXX_I)   PD5I           C1:LSC-SPD2_I_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
17  NC (named XXX_Q)   PD5Q           C1:LSC-SPD2_Q_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
18  AS165I             PD6I           C1:LSC-SPD3_I_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
19  AS165Q             PD6Q           C1:LSC-SPD3_Q_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
20  REFL33I            PD7I           C1:LSC-POB2_I_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
21  REFL33Q            PD7Q           C1:LSC-POB2_Q_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
22  POP22I             PD8I           C1:LSC-ASPD3_I_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
23  POP22Q             PD8Q           C1:LSC-ASPD3_Q_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
24  POP110I            PD9I           C1:LSC-PD9_I1_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
25  POP110Q            PD9Q           C1:LSC-PD9_Q1_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
26  NC (named XXX_DC)  PD10I          C1:LSC-PD9_I2_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
27  POPDC              PD10Q          C1:LSC-PD9_Q2_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
28  POYDC              PD11I          C1:LSC-PD11_I_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
29  POXDC              PD11Q          C1:LSC-PD11_Q_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
30  REFLDC             PD12I          C1:LSC-PD12_I_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
31  ASDC               ASDC           C1:LSC-PD12_Q_WhiteGain. VAL NMS
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

         MC1    MC2    MC3    ETMX   ETMY   ITMX   ITMY   PRM    SRM    BS     mean   std
Pitch   0.671  0.747  0.762  0.909  0.859  0.513  0.601  0.610  0.566  0.747  0.698  0.129
Yaw     0.807  0.819  0.846  0.828  0.894  0.832  0.856  0.832  0.808  0.792  0.831  0.029
Pos     0.968  0.970  0.980  1.038  0.983  0.967  0.988  0.999  0.962  0.958  0.981  0.024
Side    0.995  0.993  0.971  0.951  1.016  0.986  1.004  0.993  0.973  0.995  0.988  0.019

There is a large amount of variation in the frequencies, even though the suspensions are nominally all the same. I leave it to the suspension makers to ponder and explain.

Summary of the week ending July 3rd.  Number of elog entries = 44 

- SUS

- LSC

- MC work

- CDS

- ABSL

- Fiber experiment

- TT characterization

- Configuration and other topics

I have fit all of the LSC whitening filters using vectfit4.m

All the data is in my folder ..../users/jenne/LSC_WhiteningTest_29June2011/

The zpk info is saved with each plot of the fit.  The pdfs are kind of huge to stitch together (or rather my computer doesn't want to do it), so I'll just post a representative one for now.

During the daytime either tomorrow or Friday I'll adjust the actual dewhitening filters to match the measured zpk values.

 I made a handy-dandy table showing the zpk values for each whitening filter in the wiki: New whitening filter page

Next on the whitening filter to-do list: actually put these values into the dewhitening filters in foton.

A copy of my summer progress report 1 has been uploaded to ligodcc 7/711 and I have just added a copy to the TTsuspension wiki

PDF copy of Summer Progress Report

Today I tested the photosensor head combination (2 Hamamatsu S5971 photodiodes and 1 Hamamatsu L9337 LED). I discovered that I had burnt out the LED and the photodiodes when I soldered them to the PCB board.

After looking up soldering information on Hamamatsu photodiodes, I learned that I need to solder at least 2 mm away from the head. I checked the pins of my burnt-out photodiodes and I had soldered 1.5 mm away from the head. To prevent this problem from happening again, Suresh suggested that I clip a lead onto photodiode/LED pin while I solder on connections to help dissipate some of the heat.

Today I was able to get a single photodiode (not attached to the PCB) to measure light emitted from an LED and I observed how voltage fluctuated as I moved the photodiode around the LED.

Suresh and Jamie also helped me to fix my photosensor head design (to make it more electrically-stable). Originally, I had planned to solder the LED and photodiodes onto a PCB and to mount that PCB to the front of a small metal Pomona Electronics box (with a whole cut out for the photodiodes and LED) using spacers, screws, and nuts.  However, the PCB I am using to solder on the LED and photodiodes has metal connections that may cause problems for the LED and photodiodes lying on the surface. Now, the plan is to have the LED and photodiodes mounted to the PCB with an insulatory PCB in between. Below is an explanatory picture.  I will determine the placement of the LED and photodiodes after making screws holes in the two PCBs to attach to the metal face of the box. I want to attach the screw holes first to make sure that the PCBs (and attached photosensor) are centered.

Rotate the PDs and the LED so that you can put them as close as possible.
This is to increase the sensitivity of the sensor. Think why the closer the better.

Nicole: I thought we had decided to use teflon as the insulator between the PCB (yellow) and the LED/PDs?  I don't think you should use another circuit board with copper on it.  The copper will short the LED/PD heads to the metal box, which might be problematic.

Otherwise the design looks pretty good.  I think the PDs have three leads each, yes?

 Ah! I see! Thank you!

I should put the LEDs and photodiodes closer together so that more of the reflected light falls on the photodiodes and the photodiodes have a higher response.

Also the reflectivity of the mirror will be optimized if the incident light is normal to the mirror surface. We will be setting up the photosensor and mirror so that the LEDs

emit light normal to the mirror surface.  During displacement, this light may be slightly off-normal but still close to normal incidence. We want the photodiodes to be close to the LED since we want

them to detect light that is close to the path of normal incidence (small angles of reflection). [Thanks to Jenne for helping me figure this one out!]

Thank you for the suggestion ^___^

 You are right Jamie! Thank you for the correction! I will now use the Teflon sheet instead of the PCB piece.

The photodiodes do have three legs, but I imagined the third one lying on a different plane, since it is spaced apart from the two I have drawn.

I should include this third leg in my drawing?

Since last week Wednesday, I have since found a Pomona Electronics box (thanks to Jenne)

to use for my photosensor head circuit (to house the LED and 2 photodiodes). Suresh has

shown me how to use the 9-pin Dsub connector punch, and I have punched a hole in this box

to attach the Dsub connector. 

Since this past entry regarding my mechanical design for the photosensor head (Photosensor Head Lessons),

I have modified the design to use a Teflon sheet instead of a copper PCB and I have moved the LED

and photodiodes closer together, upon the suggestions of Jamie and Koji.  The distance between

components is now 0.112" instead of the initial 0.28".  Last night, I cut the PCB board for the LED

and photodiodes and I drilled holes onto the PCB board and Teflon sheet so that the two may be

mounted to the metal plate face of the Pomona box.  I still need to cut the viewer hole for and

drill screws into the face plate.

I have also been attempting to debug my photosensor circuit (box and LED/photodiode combination).

Since this last entry (Painful Votlage Regulator and Circuit Lessons), Suresh has helped me to get the parts

that I need from the Downs Electronics lab (15 wire ribbon cable, two 9 pin D-sub connectors M,

one 15 pin D-sub connector M, one 16 pin IDC connector). Upon the suggestion of Jamie, I have

also made additional safety changes to the circuit by fixing some of the soldering connections

so that all connections are done with wires (I had a few immediate lines connected with solder).

I believe the the photosensor circuit box is finally ready for testing. I may just need some help

attaching the IDC connector to the ribbon cable. After this, I would like to resume SAFELY

testing my circuit.

I have also been exploring SimMechanics. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to run the

inverted pendulum model by Sekiguchi Takanori. Everytime I attempt to run it, it says

there is an error and it shuts down Matlab. In the meanwhile, I have been watching

SimMechanics demos and trying to understand how to build a model. I'm thinking that

maybe once I figure out how SimMechanics works, I can use the image of his model

(I can see the model but it will not run) to construct a similar one that will hopefully work.

I have also been attempting to figure out the circuitry for the pre-assembled

accelerometer (made with the LIS3106AL chip).  I have been trying to use a multi-meter

to figure out what the components are (beyond the accelerometer chip, which I have

printed out the datasheet for), but have been unsuccessful at that. I have figured out

that the small 5 pin chip says LAMR and is a voltage regulator. I am hoping that if I can

find the data sheet for this voltage regulator, I can figure out the circuitry. Unfortunately,

I cannot find any datasheets for a LAMR voltage regulator. There is one by LAMAR, but

the ones I have seen are all much larger. Does anyone know what the miniature voltage

regulator below is called and if "LAMR" is short for "LAMAR"?

Find Frank and ask him about those components.

Koji and Haixing,

We did a tolerance analysis to specify the conner frequency for passive low-pass filtering in the AA filter of Cymac. The
link to the wiki page for the AA filter goes as follows (one can have a look at the simple schematics):
http://blue.ligo-wa.caltech.edu:8000/40m/Electronics/BNC_Whitening_AA

Basically, we want to add the following passive low-pass filter (boxed) before connecting to the instrumentation amplifier:

Suppose (i) we have 10% error in the capacitor value and (ii) we want to have common-mode rejection
error to be smaller than 0.1% at low frequencies (up to the sampling frequency 64kHz), what would be
conner frequency, or equivalently the values for the capacitor and resistor, for the low-pass filter?

Given the transfer function for this low-pass filter:
    
and the error propagation equation for its magnitude:

we found that the conner frequency needs to be around 640kHz in order to have
with
 

This is sort of OK, except the capacitor connects across the (+) terminals of the two input opamps, and does not connect to ground.

Also, we don't care about the CMRR at 64 kHz. We care about it at up to 10 kHz, but not above. The sample frequency of the ADC is 64 kHz, but all of the models run at 16 kHz or less, so the Nyquist frequency is 8 kHz.

And doesn't the value depend on the resistors?

>> This sort of OK, except the capacitor connects across the (+) terminals of the two input opamps, and does not connect to ground:

>> Also, we don't care about the CMRR at 64 kHz. We care about it at up to 10 kHz, but not above.

In this case, the conner frequency for the low-pass filter would be around 100kHz in order to satisfy the requirement.

>>And doesn't the value depend on the resistors?

Yes, it does. The error in the resistor (typically 0.1%)  is much smaller than that of the capacitor (10%). Since the resistor error propagates in the same as the capacitor,
we can ignore it.

Note that we only specify the conner frequency (=1/RC) instead of R and C specifically from the tolerance analysis, we still need to choose appropriate
values for R and C with the conner frequency fixed to be around 100kHz, for which we need to consider the output impedance of port 1 and port 2.

 Summary of the week ending July 10th.  Number of elog entries = 21

- SUS

 + The cutoff frequency of the high pass filters for the damping were set to 30Hz.
 + Turned off all the BounceRoll filters.
 + The BS oplev was checked and seemed healthy.
 

- LSC

 + All the measred data of the LSC whitening filters were fit.
 + All the zpk parameters are recorded on the wiki.

- ABSL

+ The setup completed.  
 + The freqeucy-lock of the ABSL laser was achieved with UGF of ~ 40kHz.
 + The temperature of the ABSL laser was adjusted to be 47.25 deg
 

- ALS

 (Fiber experiment)
 + The I-P curve of the ETMY laser was measred.
 + The current set point is 1.8 [A], which used to be 1.5 [A], corresponding to the output of power of 197 [mW] and 390 [mW] respectively.
 

Summary of the week ending July 17th.  Number of elog entries = 20

Summary of the week ending July 24th.  Number of elog entries = 45

- LSC
 * Check of LSC WF switching
  -> some were switching, but the majority were not.

- SUS
 * Ran activateDQ.py for seeting some DQ channels of Oplevs
 * Turned ON all the offset buttons on the OL1, etc.
 * Rebuilt and restarted c1msc, c1sus, c1scx and c1scy as an update.
 * ETMY's shadow sensors look bad. Unknown noise below 3 Hz, which is higher than the usual floor by factor of 10.

- ABSL
 * The frequency lock was down.
 * The laser power into the RFPD had been too big, so it was reduced

- OAF
 * Seismometers were connected to the AA-board on 1X6
 * Most of the channels were acquired to the ADC, but some were not.

- Mode Cleaner
 * Gain of quadrants were checked.
 * Due to the SUS model update, the MC locking trigger hasn't worked correctly. This was fixed by changing ioo.db file

- Misc.
 * Virtual box was installed on Rossa. Altium is now available on Rossa.

Given this new setup, we realized that the previous tolerance analysis is incorrect. Because the uncertainty in the capacitance value
does not affect the common mode rejection, as two paths share the same capacitor. Now only the imbalance of two resistors is relevant.
The error propagation formula goes as follows:


We require that the common-mode rejection error at low frequency up to 8kHz, namely
with , one can easily find out that the corner frequency needs to be around 24kHz.


 

Since last week, I've been working on building the photosensor head and have been making adjustments to my photosensor circuit box.

Changes to photosensor circuit (for box):

1) Last week, I was reading in the two signals from the two heads through a single input. Now there are two separate inputs for the two separate photosensors

2)During one of my many voltage regulator replacements, I apparently used a 7915 voltage regulator instead of a 7805 (thanks, Koji, for pointing that out! I never would have caught that mistake X___X)

3)I was powering my 5V voltage regulator with 10V...Now I'm using 15 V (now I only need 1 power supply and 3 voltage input plugs)

I have also began assembling my first photosensor head. Here is what I have so far:

Here is what needs to be done still for the photosensor head

I need to find four Teflon washers and nuts to rigidly attach the isolated PCB (PCB, Teflon sheet combination) to the box. I already have the plastic screws in (I want to use plastic and Teflon for electrical isolation purposes, so as to not short my circuit).

I need to attach the sheath of my signal cable to the box of the photosensor head for noise reduction (plan: drill screw into photosensor head box to wrap sheath wires around)

I need to attach the D-sub to the other end of my signal cable so that it can connect to the circuit box. So far, I only have the D-sub to connect the cable to my photosensor head

Yesterday, Suresh helped to walk me through the photosensor box circuit so that I now understand what voltages to expect for my circuit box trouble-shooting. After this lesson, we figured out that the problem with my photosensor box was that the two op-amps were saturated (so I fixed the feedback!). After replacing the resistor, I got the LED to light up! I still had problems reading the voltage signals from the photodiodes. I was reading 13.5V from the op amp output, but Koji explained to me that this meant that I was too close to saturation (the photodiodes were perhaps producing too much photocurrent, bringing the output close to saturation). I switched the 150 K resistor in the feedback loop to a 3.4K resistor and have thus successfully gotten displacement-dependent voltage outputs (i.e. the voltage output fluctuates as I move my hand closer and farther from the photosensor head). 

Now that I have a successful circuit to power and read outputs from one photosensor, I can begin working on the other half of the circuit to power the other photosensor! 

We kept reading about digital filtering

We tested the seismometer last friday

Jan came and tested again the seismometer last monday

We wrote a simulation of the stacks transfer functions, and of the distance between the mirrors.

The vent will start from 1 st of August ! !

 ++++ Task List for the vent preparation ++++

  + Preparation of beam dumps (Jamie / Steve)

  + Health check of shadow sensor and measurement of the cross-coupling  (Steve)

  + Measurement of the arm Lengths and estimation of the required precision (Kiwamu)

  + Alignment of the Y green beam (Suresh)

  + Alignment of the incident beam axis (Jenne)

  + Measurement of the MC spot positions  (Suresh)

  + Loss measurement of the arm cavities (Kiwamu / volunteers)

 ++++ Task List for the post-vent activity ++++

  + 3f RFPDs (Koji / Rana)

  + EOM resonant circuit (Kiwamu)  

  + Sophistication of the LSC model (Yoichi)

  + DRMI commissioning (Keiko / Anamaria)

 Required arm length = 37.7974 +/- 0.02 [m]

This is a preliminary result of the estimation of the Arm length tolerance.

Figure.2  A sensing matrix of the 40-m DRFPMI while changing the position of ETMX/Y by \sigma = 2 cm.

Status update for the vent preparation:

The punchline is : We can not open the chamber on Monday !

##### Task List for the vent preparation #####

  (not yet) Low power MC

  (not yet) Measurement of the arm lengths

  (not yet) Alignment of the Y green beam (#5066)

  (not yet) Measurement of the MC spot positions

  (80% done) Estimation of the tolerance of the arm length (#5076)

  (done) Preparation of beam dumps (#5047)

  (done) Health check of shadow sensors and the OSEM damping gain adjustment (#5061)

  (done) Alignment of the incident beam axis (#5073)

  (done) Loss measurement of the arm cavities (#5077)

wow. This Monte-Carlo matrix is one of the most advanced optical modeling things I have ever seen. We never had this for any of the interferometers before.

Summary of the week ending July 31st.  Number of elog entries = 53

- SUS
 + ETMY-LR sensor looked strange. Something wrong.
 + Responses from the DC alignment bias to the shadow sensors and the oplevs were checked.
   --> ETMY shows the response with the opposite sign. Wired.
 + ETMY shadow sensors were examined in terms of the spectra.
   --> WF, AA and ADC noise looks reasonably low and not high enough to explain the low frequency noise.
 + Adjusted all the OSEM gains

- LSC
 + MICH noise budget is ongoing. WF filter needs to be greater than 21 dB to have dark noise of the PD greater than ADC noise
 + The arms became lockable

- CDS
 + modified and re-ran activateDQ.py.
 + c1iscex crashed for unknown reasons and we physically rebooted it.

- ALS (Fiber experiments)
 + PMC trans is sampled for the fiber beat-note measurement on the PSL table.
 + The beat-note signal between PSL and X end laser were obtained.
 + Some optics in the ETMY table were rearragend to have the Y green light aligned.

- ACS / ASS
 + incident beam axis has changed a lot.
 + X arm and Y arm ASS were reactivated.
  ---> The sign of some of the control gains had been wrong.
 + The incident beam axis and X/Y arm were re-aligned

- IOO/MCWFS
 + Some medm screens fixed.
 + Adjustment of the demodulation phase on each quadrant on WFS1 and WFS2 are done.
 + The sensing matrix (from optics to WFS sensors) were measured.

- OAF
 + c1pem was modified
 + plugged a seismometers to ADC through an AA board.
   --> channels are coming to the digital land
 
- Preparation for the invac work
 + 7 pieces of beam traps are available
 + Tolerance of the arm length is estimated to be +/- 2 cm.


- PSL/RefCav
 + ABSL is injected into the reference cavity. some flashing happened but no locking.
 + eddited the psl.db file to set EGUF and EGUL
 + turned RefCav heater and servo back on

I have updated the 40m public calender.

Main change :

  + The vent starts from 3rd of August

  + Keiko and Anamaria (LSU) come from 13th of August

This week I have determined the linear region for my photosensor. I have determined the linear region to be -14.32 V/cm in the region 0.4cm 0.75 cm.

In order to obtain this voltage plot, I used a 287K resistor to set the max voltage output for the photodiodes. This calibration was obtained using a small rectangular standing mirror (not the TT testing mirror that Steve has ordered for me).

I have also been working on the second half of the photosensor circuit (to power the LED and read out voltages for the second photosensor head). I have assembled the constant-current section of the circuit and need to do the voltage-output section of the circuit. I also need to finish assembling the second photosensor head and cables.

I submitted my Second Progress Report on Tuesday.

I have attached the mirror to the TT suspension. We are using 0.006 diameter tungsten wire to suspend the mirror. I am currently working on balancing the mirror.

This morning, I realized that the current set-up of the horizontal shaker does not allow for the TT to be securely mounted. I was going to change the drill holes in the horizontal slider base (1 inch pitch). Jamie has suggested that it is better to make a pair of holes in the base larger. The circled holes are the ones that will be expanded to a 0.26" diameter so that I can mount the mirror securely to the horizontal slider base. There is a concern that a bit of the TT suspension base will hang over the edge of the horizontal sliding plate. We are not sure if this will cause problems with shaking the mirror evenly. Suggestions/advice are appreciated.

I vote for making an adapter plate between the sliding plate and the bottom base.