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Daily Reports

Oct 29th, Tuesday

10:30; Federico De Luca, Stefano Andreon and Angel Bongiovanni at the telescope. Juan Macías can join in remote mode. Adverse weather: snow/electrical storm, strong wind gusts. A bolt stroke apparently affected the power supply of the anemometer at the station (to be checked after storm; spare part is prepared).

15:30-23:00; Federico, Angel: The syntheziser of array 1 was substituted by NEEL's unit and everything (cryostat health, noise traces, etc.) has been checked by Dave. The instrument is ready for observations. Telescope stopped, deicing on. Weather forecasts are adverse at least until midnight.

23:00-24:00: Juan, Angel: Bad weather continues. Wind gusts, despite tau_225GHz ~0.5. Deicing still on.

Oct 30th, Wednesday

00:00-07:00: Juan: Wind, snow.

07:00-15:00; Stefano: Still stopped. Wind, light snow.

15:00-23:00; Federico: Strong wind gusts. Snowing at intervals.

Oct 31st, Thursday

00:00-07:00: Juan: Strong wind (~25 m/s according to OSN anemometer) at midnight, dropping speed over the shift. Snowing until ~04h and tau_225GHz > 1.2 all the time. Deicing off at ~05:30. Snowing again since ~06h. Cloudy at dawn.

07:00-15:00; Stefano: Bad weather (strong wind, low visibility), yet better than previous days.

15:00-23:00; Federico: Anemometer repaired (~15:10). Wind speed about 10m/s, but it's a cloudy afternoon (tau~1). Waiting for better weather condition. At 17h the weather is much better. Starting scientific observation with EMIR, project 058-24. After first calibration, we moved to test account to check if all is ok & pointing and focus. tau_225 is continuously dropping. All ok, at ~17:30 started scientific obs. of 058-24, NOTF6V, NOTF7H, NOTF7V done. tau-225~0.6 for all the observation. Spindle error during NOTF7H, script interrupted and launched again. After NOTF7V, larger instability in tau and anomalous refraction evidence in pointing. Starting monitoring the weather under test account. Resumed observation of project 058-24, NOTF8h (21:55h). Then changed project to 017-24. Juan takes over with Angel.

Nov 1st, Friday

0:00-06:00: Juan, Angel: taking over from Federico. Two repetitions on B5_HSEdge, project 017-24 (EMIR backup). Opacity increased up to tau225GHz ~ 1 after that. Several wind alarms in the middle. Switch to project test at ~01:00 for monitoring. Anomalous refraction evidence in ponting scans. Wind speed raised to 26 m/s at 01:45. Telescope stopped. Bad weather till 05:30.

Juan resumed at 05:30. Three additional repetitions on B5_HSEdge for 017-24. Then move to project 009-29 (EMIR backup). Opacity is dropping to 0.3-0.4. Atmosphere apparently more stable.

Stefano from 6:00-15:00, Angel from 6:30: Weather conditions improving. Pointing on 0736+017 (weak) then on Mars. At 6:30 swapping to NIKA2. No source available for beam map, post-posed to a later time (on 1226+023). DAQ started at 07:00, run 80, total power; bad KIDs: 28, 4, 33 (ar1, 2, 3), sky-illuminated. Pointing on Mars. Software problem with the analysis of the pointing after a couple of tries.: QL doesn't work with run 80. Angel and Jean patched it. Switching to run 79, total power. DAQ restarted at 08:50; bad KIDs: 32, 2, 34 (ar1, 2, 3). Pointing (-4.8 41.8) and focus (1.3) on Mars. Strong wind (20 km/s peak), tracking errors (small, +-2" on data, larger, 3-4" peak from Grafana monitor), large apparent homology errors. Calib_1scan. Several tracks to fix homology errors. <AB>: after a JLS's consultation to IR, these large homology errors are only apparent. They are caused by the non-zero lateral focus corrections adopted for NIKA2. Pointing on Mars, then skydip. Weather is borderline for the scientific programs, switched to polarimetry to catch possible problems and make some flux/pol. calibrations. DAQ restarted with HPW in the optical path at 10:45, run 79, polarimetry, bad KIDs: 31, 3, 34 (ar1, 2, 3). Pointing, focus, and calib1_scan on Mars, then pointing and calib1_scan two strongly polarized sources (0851+202, 0716+714), then again Mars, then 1226+023=3C273 (with focus at 11:58), and 3C286, then closing the NIKA2 session with pointing, focus (at 12:27 and 12:51) and calib1_scan on 1226 again. Opacity is increasing, switching to EMIR at 13:15. Program 085-24 (WSw). Pointing on 1226+023. Problems with E150 tuning. Focus at 14:15 on 1226+023

15:30-23:00; Federico: Started observation with EMIR of proj. 071-24. Done tuning, pointing and focus on K3-50A, then started scientific observation with line calibrator. Continued with OTF maps for beta/lambda directions, subscans 6, and beta direction of subscan 7. Source starts declining and low in el (~21deg), changed project to 058-24. Calibration, focus and pointing on NGC7027. Started observation of NOTF8v, but backends not connected properly (~20min lost). Scans cancelled and tuning redone. Continued observation with NOTF8v and NOTF9 (horizontal and vertical). At ~19:30 switched to NIKA2. DAQ restarted, run 79, total power at ~20h; bad KIDs: 32, 2, 34 (ar1, 2, 3). Opacity is ~0.45 (tau225 GHz), but stable. Taking advantage of this limit for a NIKA2 pointing session. Summary:

(*)After new focus

During the pointing session we did also 4 @calib_1scan to NGC7027 (20241101s187), CRL2688 (s188), MWC349 (s189), NGC7538 (s200), a focus on NGC7538, and then another @calib_1scan to uranus (s206)

23:00-07:00; Juan: taking from Federico.

• Start with skydip, move to Uranus for beammap-99 (20241101s219) including pointing, focus and calib1scan (20241101s216). Tau around 0.4 and stable during beam map (20241101s219).

• 091-24: pointing on nearby source and observe 1 rep PSZ2G113 s221 -- 20241102s1 , which is at about 60 deg in elevation. PIIC indicates s223 is corrupted for 2 mm but fine at 1 mm. Large atmospheric fluctuations and tau rising so we stop.

• Focus (20241102s5 -- s9) and calib1scan (20241102s11) on Uranus to wait for stability and sources to rise up.

• 011-24: Pointing on 0458-020 and then 1 rep on Orion B for @ ~/011-24/observe-orionb-1 (s13, 33 minutes) and @ ~/011-24/observe-orionb-2 (s14, 33 minutes). Tau ~ 0.35, Fluctuations baseline @ 2mm of +- 5 Jy/beam

• 090-24: Pointing on 0923+392. Observe PSZ2G186 (3 rep) with tau ~ 0.32 , fluctuations baseline @ 2mm of < +- 5 Jy/beam

• 091-24: Pointing and focus on 0851+202 (at 6:30). Resonances reworked at 06:55 (LT), still on run 79, total power: bad KIDs: 29, 2, 33 (ar1, 2, 3). One repetition on PSZ2G210 started at 7:00

Nov 2nd, Saturday

7:00-15:00; Stefano: Program 087-24: Pointing on 0836+710, 1 repeat (2 rounds) on id303. Sunrise at ~8:45. Pointing and focus on Mars (9:30). Pointing on 0836+710. Cirrus coming, hopefully stay away from pointing direction. 2 repeat (2 rounds each) on id303, pointing on 0836+710, half repeat on id303. Pointing and failed (weather degrading fast) focus on 1803+784. Pointing and focus on 0923+392. Huge weather (tau) instability (thick clouds passing over) during the focus of 0923+392. Tau>1 at ~13:00, observations suspended.

@11 SB: fixed the DAFs for the new sweep (Cryo Run 80) and tested them online with Angel on scans 20241101s32,33,34. They work now. Sorry for the inconvenience.

15:30-23:00; Federico: Bad weather, tau>1.5 and we're surrounded by clouds. It's also lightly snowing. Waiting for better conditions.

Federico and Angel (~16h, LT): DAQ restarted, run 80, total power: bad KIDs: 146, 14, 109 (ar1, 2, 3); quite cloudy, only valid for testing the PIIC-QL performance with run 80. Jean kindly restored new imbFITS creation after fixing the DAFs by SB; the same was done for the old imbFITS. So, starting from scan 20241102s89 (scan 20241102s88 was cancelled due to NCS problem), next scans will be carried out with run80.ini (TP or POL). Two pointing tests on Venus, fully QL-reduced. Ready for continue the pool with run 80.

Before continuing, let's summarize the calibration scans obtained this week with run 79:

• Standard calibrations:

• OTF maps (i.e. Calib_1scan) in polarization mode:

(*) Recently observed with SMAPOL.

Switching to EMIR, backup project 033-24. ~17h-17:30: Due to unstable weather conditions, used test account for pointing and focus. No valid pointings and focuses on sources nearby 033-24 targets (used 1757-240) or at higher elevations (1633+382). Waiting for better weather conditions to attempt new focus. At ~18:10h, we finally have good weather for pointing and focus. Done on test account on 2251+158. Then started obs. of L6942, scan A, setup 2 and also 1 repetition on L429, scan A, setup 1. Moved to proj. 058-24, done NOTF10 and NOTF11, both horizontal and vertical.

Tau_225 start to be much more stable at ~0.35. Switch back to Nika2. DAQ restarted, run 80, total power at ~22h; bad KIDs: 24, 3, 36 (ar1, 2, 3). Calibration session: pointing and focus on NGC7027, then @calib_1scan to NGC7027 (scan 20241102s172), CRL2688 (s173), MWC349 (s174), Neptune (s177), Uranus (s180).

23:00-00:00; Juan: Take over from Federico with a focus on Uranus and a pointing

• Beammap-99 on total power, run 80: Uranus (s187) + skydip (s188)

Nov 3rd, Sunday

00:00-7:00; Juan: continue

• Change to polarization, run 80 -- Beammap-95 on Uranus (tau ~ 0.23): When starting polar acquisition we found 26,4,33 bad kids, pointing (20241103s1) + beam map pol (20241103s2).

• Back to Total Power 26,3,30 bad KIDs; project 091-24 (tau about 0.21): pointing and then observations of PSZ2G113 (1 rep).

• Project 090-24 (tau ~0.21): pointing and then observations of PSZ2G186 (1 rep).

• Project 087-24 (tau ~0.16, fluctuations from +/-2 to +/-10 Jy/beam on the maps): pointing and focus on a relative bright source (0851+202), 1 rep. on id303.

7:00-15:00 Stefano: program 087-24, aborted repetition on id303 because of wind. Observations suspended at 7:00. Wind speed goes down, with tau about 0.3 and increasing. DAQ restarted, run 80, total power at ~22h; bad KIDs: 28, 5, 32 (ar1, 2, 3). Resuming observations under nikas-24 account at 10:30. Checking beam shape/size after ~3h of exposing M1 to Sun radiation while the telescope was parked. Pointing and 2x focus on Mars (first focus was bad). Focus on 0851+202 (11:00), calib1_scan on Mars. FWHM about 17.9x18.3 at 2mm. Program 087-24: started half repetition on id303. Conditions are worsening with large instabilities. Cancelled one exposure and moved to EMIR. Started under project test, but conditions are too unstable to successfully do focus and pointing (on 1226+023), suspended observations.

15:30-23:00; Federico: As yesterday, started session with bad weather. At ~16 tried to resume observations with EMIR, but a new cloud front arrived. At 17:40 better condition. Started under account test to check if the weather is enough stable for scientific targets. At ~18 get a good focus on 2251+158. Started observation of Proj. 033-24, 1 repetition on L429-A, setup 1, but weather become again unstable. After a poor pointing, waiting for better conditions. At ~20h still large instabilities, even if tau_225<0.3... No good pointing (or focus corrections) even at 80deg in el.

At ~22h, still bad weather, but using this time for testing the wobbler. In particular, considering pointings, onoff scans PSw and WSw, and recording low level data with Scope.

23:00-00:00: Juan, Federico: Wobbler test finished. No stable conditions for scientific targets. Waiting.

Nov 4th, Monday

0:00-05:30: Juan, Federico: At ~2:15am LT good focus and pointing with EMIR. After culmination, starting observation of target B5_HSEdge, project 017-24. Done 10 repetitions.

5:30-15:00 Stefano: project 009-24, pointing and focus at about 5:40, four maps, pointing on 0727-115. Move to 042-24 at around 8:00. Pointing and focus on Mars, pointing on 1803+789. At about 8:30 the PI (Alexandre) takes the lead. Done map4. Pointing on Mars. Weather is bad, observations suspended at 11:00. Observations restart at 14:50, project 056-24. Pointing on K3-50A

15:30-23:00; Federico: Taking over from Stefano. Got a pointing and focus on K3-50A, but successive pointings where not good due to high weather instabilities. Observations interrupted. Operation resumed at 17:30h, after some attempt in test account to monitor the weather. Good focus for E90/E230 on 2251+158 at ~18, continued observation of Proj. 058-24, EMIR, target M16-MDC. Pointing done on 1730-130, then executed for setup2 (receivers2) OTF PSw lambda 1, 2, 3, 4 scans. Spike in tau_225 for lambda4, but lines still visible in the quick look. Changed to project 058-24 after some weather instabilities (tau_225>1). Problems loading the scientific backends for initial calibration and for pointings. Switched to project test to solve the problem, pointing to K3-50A. Solved the problem (and after a focus), moved to NGC7027 for a pointing and then done NOTF12 (horizontal and vertical), and NOTF13 horizontal. At ~22h starting preliminary operation for Nika2 projects. DAQ restarted, run 80, total power at ~22:20h; bad KIDs: 26, 3, 33 (ar1, 2, 3).

22:30-00:00: Juan, Federico: Tried pointing and focus on NGC7027 and Uranus, but wind rose and high tracking deviations do not allow us to proceed. Moreover, it's the entire day that tapas is very slow, does not reply, or shows errors 500, runtime internal server error, or 504 Gateway timeout (the server didn't respond in time). To be reported tomorrow morning.

Nov 5th, Tuesday

00:00-7:00; Juan, Federico, Angel: Too much wind speed, stopped operation at 00:30 and telescope parked. We tried to resume the observations at 02:00. We launched a pointing on Uranus. Still having large tracking deviations likely due to high wind speed (25.9% records with too high tracking deviations). New pointing on Uranus (20241105s3). The Scope facility was activated to monitor and record ACU parameters, just in case. More than 60% (!!) of the records lost due to high tracking deviations, despite max. wind speed was below 16 m/s:

d

Wind speed increasing even more (wind gusts up to 24 m/s). Telescope parked again at 04:45.

7:00-: Stefano. Tapas still not working. Wind goes down around 8:00, restarted observations. Tau~0.3 and stable, use NIKA2. DAQ restarted, run 80, total power at ~22h; bad KIDs: 28, 3, 34 (ar1, 2, 3). nika2 project to check if it is feasible to restart. Pointing, focus (8:25), pointing on 1226+03, pointing on Mars (bad shape), focus again, calib_1scan on Mars (s32). Project 087-24. Pointing and 1 round on id303.