The beam of IR for doubling  is clipping on bnc cable to green beam transmitted pd.

Bryan Barr is visiting us from Glasgow for a month. He received 40m specific safety training on Friday.

Mike Caton of Konecranes inspected and loadtested all 3  of the 40m cranes at max reach trolley positions with 1 ton.

 Konecrane representative gave crane operator training in the 40m. Koji has become a qualified, trained crane operator of the 40m lab.

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

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

40m surfs:  Nicole Ing, Iswita Saikia and Sonali Mohapatra received 40m specific safety training  today.

IMPORTANT ELECTRONICS SAFETY LESSON TO FOLLOW

Yesterday, I fried the +15 V power supply rail on one of the Eurocrate extender cards while I was checking out the binary switching in the 1X5 rack.  I will describe what I did it in the hopes that everyone else will be less stupid than me.

I wanted to monitor the voltage across a resistor on the suspension OSEM whitening board.  Since I knew that both sides of the resistor would be at non-zero voltage (including possibly at the power-supply rail), I used a battery-operated scope with floating inputs, so that the scope would not try to pull the probe shield to ground.  That should be OK, although not recommended, as you'll see, because you must be very careful to make sure that the scopes inputs are indeed floating.

Let's call the original signal 'A'.  The trouble came when I then connected another signal (B), whose shield was connected to the ground on the whitening board, to the scope.  Apparently the grounds on the scope inputs are connected, or were in the configuration I was using.  When I connected the signal B, B's ground shorted A's shield to ground, which had been sitting at the +15V rail.  That short circuit then fried the +15V supply line on the extender card I was using (escaping magic smoke was detected).  Thankfully this only blew the extender card, and not the Eurocrate or the Eurocrate power supply or the whitening board or the scope etc, all of which would have been much worse.

The moral of the story is to be very careful when connecting power supply voltages to the shield or ground of a scope.  In short, don't do it.  I didn't ultimately need to, since I could have found other ways to measure the same signal.

Lightwave M126-1064-700 lasers  sn415  at east end of the Y arm and  sn201 at the AP table  are connected individually  to one each EMERGENCY LASER SHUT OFF SWITCH. 

I found baked allen keys on the top of the clean optics cabinet.  Somewhat heavy box that can come down in an earthquake on our heads.

NOTHING SHOULD GO ON THE TOP OF THE CABINETS OR RACKS except  small plastic boxes that storing our clean clothing.

Today I learned some important circuit-building lessons while testing my photosensor circuit box (i.e. how NOT to test a circuit and, conversely, things that should be done instead). 

I blew my first circuit today. The victim is in the photo below (bottom 7805 voltage regulator). The plastic covering fell off after I removed the fried regulator.  After checking various components, I figured out that I blew the circuit because I had forgotten to ground the regulator.  Although this was very unfortunate, I did make an important discovery. While testing the voltage output of the 7805 voltage regulator (I put a new one), I discovered that contrary to the claims of the datasheet, an input voltage of 5V will not produce a steady 5V supply. I found that at 5V, my regulator was only producing 4.117 V. I was using a 5 V supply because I wanted to use only 1 power supply (I was using a two-channel power supply that had a fixed 5V output to produce the +15, -15, ground, and 5 V I need for my photosensor circuit box).  After seeing this, I got a second power supply and am now using 10V to as an input for the regulator to produce 4.961V. I found that from a voltage range of 10V to 15 V, the regulator produced a steady  4.961 V supply. I have decided to use 10V as an input. My newly-grounded voltage regulator did not smoke or get hot at 10V.

After several more debugging trials (my LED was still not lighting up, according to the infared viewer), I learned another painful lesson. I learned DO NOT USE CLIP LEADS TO TEST CIRCUITS!!!! Initally, I was powering my circuit and making all of my connections between the photosensor head (2 photodiodes and 1 LED) with clip leads. This was a BAD IDEA BECAUSE CLIP LEADS ARE UNSTABLE AND IT IS VERY EASY TO SHORT A CIRCUIT IF THEY ACCIDENTALLY TOUCH! I did not realize this important lesson until my photosensor circuit was once again burning. Confused as to why my circuit was once again burning, I foolishly touched the voltage regulator. As you can see on the top voltage regulator in the photo below, my finger left its mark on the smoldering voltage regulator. As you cannot see the wincing on my face as I try to type this long elog, I will painfully type that the voltage regulator left its own mark on my finger (an ugly sore little welt).  Suresh has taught me a valuable lesson: WHEN DEALING WITH SOMETHING OF QUESTIONABLE/UNKNOWN TEMPERATURE, USE YOUR NOSE, NOT YOUR FINGER TO DETERMINE IF THAT COMPONENT IS HOT!!!! 

To make my circuit-testing safer, upon the suggestion of Suresh, I have since removed the clip leads and inserted a 12 pin IDC component (pictured below). There are 12 pins for the 6 inputs I will get from each of the 2 photosensor heads. I have requested orders for a 16 pin IDC connector, 15 pin Dsub male part, 15 pin Dsub feed-thru, 9 pin Dsub male part (2), and 9 pin Dsub feed-thru (2). After receiving these components, I should be able to safely test my circuit.

 In the meanwhile, I can explore SimMechanics and try to figure out how to use the accelerometer

There is should be a few IDC connectors in the lab (and some ribbon cable) using which you can proceed with the testing of the circuit, if you prefer.  If not we can get them from our ever helpful electronics division at Downs.  In any case there is no need to lose time waiting for parts to arrive.

Our surf student Manuel Marchiò received 40m specific safety training today.

The hazardous waste people are moving chemicals around outside our door, and have roped off our regular front door. 

Please go around, and use the control room door to enter and exit.  It is currently unlocked, although I'll lock up when I leave for LIGOX.

Paul, Mirko and Katrin visiting grad students received the 40m basic safety training.

First aid kits are located close vicinity of entry doors and under circuit breaker panels.

Bob, Callum and Daphen noted that our keeping a JDSU HeNe (max power <4mW) is against somebody's SOP.  So I cleared everything that relates to 40m SOS suspending to the bottom shelf of the 2nd cabinet in the cleanroom (the back set of cabinets nearest the flow benches).  The door has a nifty label.  Things that are in there include:

HeNe

HeNe mount

QPD and micrometer mount

microscope and micrometer mount

iris

Al beam block

Magnet gluing fixture

dumbbell gluing fixture

The electronics that we use (HeNe's power supply, 'scope, QPD readout) are still on the roll-y thing under the flow bench.

It started with fire alarm test yesterday at 14:50 All alarms are  functioning VERY loud and their flashers are bright. Evacuation drill followed. We assembled at north west corner of the 40m building and counted 6 heads.

Nobody was left sleeping inside. Bob carried the success report of the drill to PMA office immediately.

Emergency exit lights were inspected:  2 out of 13 batteries have to be replaced

One of the Halon fire extinguishers needs to be recharged out of 8

Please do participate in preparation for the upcoming safety audit on Feb 28

 Batteries replaced and cylinder recharged. Please clean up your experimental set up if it is blocking breakers or entry way etc.

I will start the final clean up 2pm today.

Correction list by visiting safety committee, Haick Issaian is not shown:

1,  update laser, crane operator list and post it

2,  check fire extinguishers monthly, date and initials must be on the tags

3,  move drinking water tower so it does not block fire extinguisher

4,  post updated crane doc at cranes

5,  post present phone lists at IFO room phones

6,  emergency laser shutoff at the south end must be mounted without C-clamp

7,  use heavy cable tie to insure position of  mag-fan on cabinet top

Additional to do list:

a,  safety glasses to be cleaned

b, let the electrical shop fix Rack-AC power to optical tables at the ends

c, measure transmission of  laser safety glasses

d, update  IFO outside door info signs

e, update laser inventory and post it

f,  schedule annual crane inspection and renew maintenance contract

g, PSL enclosure  inner shelf needs a good clean up so it is earthquake safe

Today I've attended the laser safety seminar.

ETMY sus damping was disabled. Green locking laser and associated electronics turned off. Computers and power supplies turned off at rack 1Y4

The electricians picking up ac power from 1Y4 manual disconnect box and installing conduit line to ISCT-ETMY east end optical table.

There will be no more daisy chaining this way. 

 The power is back on at ETMY . c1iscey has not been restarted.

Now I'm turning ac power off at ETMX for the same job to be done.

Bob cleaned all safety glasses in 10 % Liquinox soap in water solution first.  The  transmittance of glasses were checked at 100 mW 1064 nm S polarization, beam diameter  0.5 mm at 0-20 deg incident.

Coherent FieldMate power meter measured T= < 1 mW of all glasses.

 Completed with the exception of d and g

Masha, Eric, Yaakov, Liz and Sasha received 40m specific basic safety training.

Caltech security called me at 1am Sunday. Control room emergency exit door was found unlocked!

It is your responsibility to lock door if you unlocked it !

I unlocked the door on Tuesday in order to move the red cart.
After that I confirmed that the door was locked.

Koji just found the emergency exit door unlocked again.  NOT GOOD.

We have determined that if you use the emergency door to enter the lab, it leaves the door unlocked, unless you go back outside and deliberately lock it.  This means that someone has been using the emergency exit as a regular entrance. 

It's fine to leave by that door, but you should make a habit of entering through the regular door.  Using the back door as an entrance is a special case situation, when they have the main door blocked.

 Rijuparna Chakraborty and Elli Elenora King received 40m specific  basic safety training in the 40mLab

Eric Quintero and Mike Jenson received 40m specific basic safety training.

Den Martynov received 40m specific safety training.

[Evan, Jenne]

We were sitting trying to lock MICH (hooooorraaaayy!!!), and the emergency lights above the control room door came on, and then ~1 minute later turned off.  Steve, can you see what's up?

Ayaka Shoda, visiting graduate student received basic 40m specific safety training today

Charles Blakemore  our new undergrad help received 40m specific safety training today.

Cameras must be immediately anchord to avoid a possible collusion with the view port !

The fire department weighted and pressure checked our units today. Surprisingly they found one powder filled can. We can only use HALON  gas in the lab.

Evan got 40m specific safety training today.

Did someone unlock the back door by the (unofficial) bike storage lately?  Out of habit, I checked the door behind me while about to leave, and it is unlocked. 

Please recall that if you leave through that door, it should automatically lock behind you (if it was locked already), however if you unlock and enter through the back door, it stays unlocked until someone locks it again.

(Obviously, I'm locking the door before I actually go).

                                                 Recommended correction list:

1,  refill- upgrade first aid boxes

2,  maintain 18" ceiling to bookshelf clearance so the ceiling fire sprinklers are not blocked: room 101

3,  label chilled water supply & return valves in IFO room

4,  calibrate bake room hoods annually

5,  update safety sign at fenced storage

              40m still to do list:

1,   clean and measure all safety glasses

2,   annual crane inspection is scheduled for 8am March 19, 1013

3,   make PSL encloser shelf earthquake proof

Do you see something that is not safe? Add it to this list please.

Chloe Ling, Max Horton and Annalisa Allocca have received basic 40m specific safety training.

 All safety glasses were cleaned in soapy water by Bob. I measured their transmission at 1064 nm, 150 mW,  beam diameter 1.5 mm  They are in working order, no transmission.

 Inventory:

10 pieces of KG-5, fit over, from Laser Safety

 4 pieces of KG-5, std size, from Drever Lab, best visibility

 1 piece of KG-5 coated for visible, std size, from Kentek

15 pieces of green-plastic LOTG-YAG, fit over, from UVEX

 7 pieces of green-plastic B-D+S 137, std areo fit, from Sperian

 3 pieces of green-plastic, old Thorlab, fit over

 2 pieces of green-plastic, fit over, from Laservision

 8 pieces of braun- plastic, fit over, for green & IR protection, from UVEX & Thorlabs

Professional crane inspector: Fred Goodbar found two small leaks at the Vertex trolley as he was conducting the annual inspection of the 40m cranes.  Otherwise the cranes are in safe condition.

PDA255 at the MC transmission end is missing and whoever had removed it earlier has left the beam undamped.

It could be less than a mW beam...but it is still not acceptable to leave it that way.

On the other note, I have cleared up the unwanted optics from the same table.

 Albert, our new undergrad work force received 40m specific- basic safety training last week. Please read and sign 40m procedures booklet.

Can't find hostname 'fb40m'

it only lasted a few hours

BLACK   - raw ground motion measured by the Guralp
MAGENTA - motion after passive STACIS (20 Hz harmonic oscillator with a Q~2)
GREEN   - difference between ground and top of STACIS
YELLOW  - EUCLID noise in air
BLUE    - STACIS top motion with loop on (60 Hz UGF, 1/f^2 below 30 Hz)
CYAN    - same as BLUE, w/ 10x lower noise sensor