Saturday at Tass

[Tom Droege <tdroege@veriomail.com>]

Dan finished up the frame to mount TOM2 in the dome.  The day was spent 
mostly putting fixes into MIKE  and trying yet another fix for the mystery 
bad data problem.  We would have started putting TOM2 in the dome today but 
the power supplies I ordered from Allied came in as big transformers.  Sigh!

I now have a theory that makes sense.  The problem is that every time we 
work on the problem it goes away.  My present theory is that the fast 
amplifier that I use to drive the ADC is oscillating.  Probably at a couple 
of hundred MHz which is out of the range of my scope.  I have a lot of 
experience with this kind of problem.  You put your scope probe on it and 
it quits.  So you have to think.

I mount this amplifier in a socket, and one should not do that with such 
fast amplifiers.  One more fix is in place.  Some capacitors soldered right 
to the chip leads.  I will just have to wait to see if the problem comes 
back.

If the clouds hold off long enough I will have another shot at Aaron's star 
tonight.  One thing is as good as another to test.   I was able to locate 
stars in last night's data and get numbers to put into the WCS positions so 
that it will be easier to find stars in the images.

I am trying to dry out the cameras.  It has been humid for weeks.  So I 
have lots of ice crystals in the cameras.  Sigh!

Tom Droege