From lserna at nrao.edu Thu Apr 10 17:54:50 2008 From: lserna at nrao.edu (Lew Serna) Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 15:54:50 -0600 Subject: [Escoordminutes] ES Division Coordination Meeting minutes- April 8 Message-ID: <47FE8CAA.8010409@aoc.nrao.edu> Minutes for the ES Division Coordination Meeting held on Tuesday, April 08, 2008, at 10:30 am, in the LL CB conference room. Attending were Lew Serna, Brent Avery, Charley Chavez, Ramon Gutierrez, Bob Broilo, Chuck Thompson, Guy Stanzione, James Sullivan, Doug Whiton, Skip Lagoyda, Gene Cole and Jon Thunborg. BUDGET ?Site & Wye Track budget is over $40K short but an effort to replace the $40K is being made. 4500 RR Ties have been ordered. Track will have to wait for more funds to order further track material. Funds to purchase a Bus engine and core at approx $20K are still being sought. Spending may continue under the assumption that you have last years operating budget. Stock Proposal- Skip Lagoyda introduced a service whereby a company, Fastenal, can provide a shop stock of products that they sell, in bins at individual VLA shops. The idea is that an inventory of products used in a shop can be maintained by a Fastenal representative. The representative would visit the VLA on a regular basis taking inventory and restocking his bins. The respective shop would then be charged on items removed from the stocked bin. This idea is attractive to the warehouse since this would reduce the cost of warehousing a large inventory. This may also be a good idea for maintaining certain products in different shops as well. A meeting will be set between with Fastenal and Supervisors/leadmen to see if this is a service we can use sometime in the near future. VLBA -- Tiger Team visits to OV, NL will be planned for 2008. St Croix will take an extended mechanical maintenance visit in the fall to replace Subreflector, Elevation Bearing, finish painting, install platform and possibly change out one Azimuth wheel assembly. Antenna mechanics should ensure we have one wheel assembly ready for each site being visited except Los Alamos. The paint on the HN subreflector was deteriorating and its surface contour will require some work to get in final spec. The reflector will need to be prepared in time for the SC maintenance visit. A more robust box to ship the subreflector will be needed. TT Visits for this year are NL 4/30/08-5/07/08, OV 8/18/08-8/25/08. The Elevation bearing was replaced at FD without a spare pillow block. This method will require refinement but is desirable for future Elevation bearing replacement since it would save in time and material plus we feel it would make the operation safer than removing the complete pillow block to replace the bearing. It is believed that EL Bearing failures are due to excessive axial loading of the elevation bearings due to the axial alignment being set prior to loading the elevation axle. The BR foundation will require repairs in the near future due to deterioration at an approximate cost of $15K. MK dish panels that were damaged were replaced. The damaged panels need to be repaired for spares. AZ BEARINGS ? Next Bearing replacement will occur in summer of 2008. An estimated three weeks in the AAB are required before a bearing change can occur. Parts from the bearings removed from antennas are needed for measuring and fitting of new parts and should be stored until they are scheduled to be shipped to Rotek for repair. Antenna 14, 16 & 18?s bearings have been shipped to Rotek for refurbishment. There is a 12-18 week lead time for delivery on a refurbished bearing due to factory backlogs. Delivery of these bearings should be June of 2008. If possible bearing replacement will occur at a rate of one per year in order to maintain the EVLA outfitting schedule. There is one good Azimuth bearing on hand. One spare bearing should be maintained at all times in the event a catastrophic failure occurs. Grease samples show that antennas 28, 10, 20, are good candidates for the next bearing changes. Large metal pieces were recently found on Antenna 28?s AZ bearing grease so Antenna 28?s bearing will be scheduled to be replaced in July/August of 2008. PROJECTS: Control building Stairways? The Control Building Stairways are being replaced due to their rapid deterioration. The stairways will be replaced with an improved design conforming to ADA. The western stairway is complete. A new concrete landing will have to be poured at the base of the eastern stairway and the steps replaced. The eastern stairway is deemed hazardous and is currently barricaded to prevent its use. Work on the eastern stairway will continue as the workload permits. No further progress. ST Croix Maintenance Visit? St. Croix Antenna has undergone extensive repair and painting work due to its severe corrosion problems. Work began on September 10 through December 21 completing 99 % of the painting. Some topcoat painting remains at the base of backup structure. In addition the AZ Wheel Assy, Subreflector and elevation bearing replacement work will be completed. This work along with finishing the painting is tentatively scheduled to occur in October 2008. The warehouse needs to make sure that there are enough parts to prepare for ST Croix and to maintain a spare (2ea). This St. Croix Trip is expected to last about 3 weeks. VLA ANTENNA FOUNDATION MOVEMENT? A problem with north arm antenna foundation movement needs to be addressed. It appears that the two rearward station pillars have been slowly separating over the years at BN3 and BN5 with BN5 being the worst. They have separated far enough in about 33 years that 2 bolts (one on each reward pad) can no longer be used to secure the antenna pads to the foundation pillars. Markers have been set for taking measurements to try and see which pillars are actually moving and at what rate. If it becomes obvious that the plates need to be repositioned, this work is in progress. Measurements need to be re taken while the stations are without antennas. VLA LIGHTING- All high mercury content light bulbs should be eliminated from stock. A plan to replace all ballasts and bulbs to efficient electronic ballasts is initiated. In addition to removing the high mercury content bulbs the savings in kilowatt usage would payback the initial cost in less than 2 years. Skip is funding this energy project. The Control Building is complete and the Tech Services building is now being converted. GENERATOR REPAIRS? Minor leaks were noticed at the engine rear seals and it is desirable to install a better fuel filtering system. A bearing on the generator unit also should be replacement as a PM. This work would cost around $15K and will be put on the funding wish list. VISITOR CENTER? This project was complete by March 15. The visitor center theater has been remodeled. Basically the step seating was replaced with theater type seating and the movie equipment was upgraded. New carpet and tile was also be installed. This project was funded by the EPO and Business divisions. Check it out. POWER MONITOR? A plan to install power monitoring equipment in the Hatch gear will require a power outage lasting 2 days. The preferred time for installation would be the fall when the weather dry and calm. Perhaps the work can be scheduled on a weekend (or double maintenance day). The power monitoring equipment is very useful in determining our power quality needs and will keep operations informed of power status at all times. A time will need to be determined by operations. EVLA; Civil? Correlator Room: A preventive measure to test batteries and lubricate the Correlator Door will be implemented by the ES Electrical group. The design for cable support in the Correlator Room will be provided by ES Division. DC Power supply Cable Tray layout will be coordinated in conjunction with Electronics Division data cables installation. The cleaning underneath the computer flooring will follow installation of cabling. FM 100 training is scheduled for August 8. HVAC testing is underway along with testing for required hearing protection in the Correlator room. Rectifier and Battery PM?s are being done. Mock Correlator racks will arrive so that a dry run on installation can be made to prepare for rigging and installing the real racks around May 15. Several groups will be involved with the rack installations and Guy Stanzione will coordinate the effort. EVLA Antennas? Feeds: Contracts for casting S-band and laminating of the S-band are finalized. S-Band rings are being cut in preparation for assembly. For efficiency S-band feeds will be laminated two at a time every 8 weeks. The second S-Band Christmas tree will built using L-Band Christmas tree parts once the L-Band lamination work is complete. This should happen around May. Out of 18 L Band feeds tested, there are 3 that remain on the on the shelf that have been tested. VSWR tests will be made to several L Band feeds later this summer. SAFETY REPORT : *Site Safety Meeting: T*he last meeting was held on March 27^th , 2008. There were 25 employees in attendees. The topic was Haz-Com and the training was conducted by Chuck Thompson. *Next Site Safety Meeting:* The next site safety meeting will be on May 1^st @ 3:00pm in the VLA Cafe. *Other Up-coming training: * Supervisor of CDL drivers (Required) April 9^th at 10:00 AM Caf? Conference Room CDL drivers (Required) April 10^th at 3:00 PM Caf? Conference Room Supervisor/Manager training tentatively scheduled for April 28^th . *Training Conducted: * Pesticide Training Conducted on March 12^th training conducted by Tom Dean. Haz-Com Training, Conducted on March 27^th training conducted by Chuck Thompson. * * *Inspections Conducted: * Site emergency lighting, March 6^th and 7^th NFPA 25, Fire extinguisher, Sprinkler, and pump inspection was conducted on March 13th. Site exit signs, March 13^th and 14^th Site emergency eye wash/ shower inspection, March 20^th *Up-Coming Inspections:* OSHA inspection of VLA site (tentatively scheduled for April) *Medical Exam:* Audio metric screening (For New and Current employees) Employees covered under the hearing conservation program are employees in one of the following areas; Transporter Shop, Antenna Mechanics, Track Crew, Auto Shop, Grounds group, HVAC, and Machine Shop *EMS** News:* EMS Conference in Ruidoso, NM on April - 21 thru April - 23, Members that will be attending are Dominic Zamora, Paul Savedra, Ben Ramer, Richard Murillo, Matt Metevier and James Sullivan ANNOUNCEMENTS: PEP?April-- Solicit self appraisals May 15? PEP Training for Supervisors/leadmen May-June 30-- Supervisors complete forms and conduct interviews July 7--- All PEP?s due in HR OTHER: TRAINING: Asbestos Training- Removal of Asbestos is very expensive and it is desirable to have selected VLA personnel trained to do this since the training is not very expensive. Much of the VLA flooring contains asbestos and will require special trained personnel for removal or modification. We need to decide if it is cost effective to train personnel to accomplish this task. If so, we need to decide when the best time to do the training is. TAILGATES--Supervisors and leadmen should conduct tailgate sessions daily.