From lserna at nrao.edu Mon Jun 30 09:28:12 2008 From: lserna at nrao.edu (Lew Serna) Date: Mon, 30 Jun 2008 07:28:12 -0600 Subject: [Escoordminutes] ES Division Coordination minutes for June Message-ID: <4868DF6C.6000607@aoc.nrao.edu> Minutes for the ES Division Coordination Meeting held on Tuesday, June 25, 2008, at 10:30 am, in the LL CB conference room. Attending were Lew Serna, Charley Chavez, Bob Broilo, Guy Stanzione, Gene Cole, James Sullivan, Chuck Thompson and Jon Thunborg. TAILGATES--Supervisors and leadmen should conduct tailgate sessions daily. BUDGET ?Site & Wye Track budget is over $40K short. The shortfall cannot be made up however, 4,500 RR Ties have been ordered. Funds for ordering parts to overhaul the blue and yellow bus engines are spent from the ops budget which will likely overrun the Vehicle Maintenance Budget. Several pieces of equipment need to be replaced due to being worn out such as the Steam Cleaner ($3-4K), Band Saw ($6K) and Break. Charley is the point of contact for surplus equipment and will make a request to Brent to search on surplus to replace these items. Hydraulic cylinders for the track mobile were replaced at a cost of $6K. Additional funds have been added to various ES budgets to compensate for early overruns, keep a close watch and order critical items only. Stock Proposal- Skip Lagoyda introduced a service whereby ?Fastenal? can provide a stock of products they carry, in bins at individual VLA shops. The idea is that an inventory of specific products used in a shop would be maintained by the local (Albuquerque) Fastenal representative. The respective shop would be charged on items removed from the stocked bin only. This idea is attractive to the warehouse since this would reduce the cost of warehousing and stocking a large inventory. Skip has arranged a meeting between Fastenal and Supervisors/leadmen to see if this is a service we can use. Supervisors and Leadmen do not believe it is something they can use and have declined the offer. L Serna will notify Skip. VLBA -- Tiger Team visits to OV, NL are planned for FY 2008. St Croix will take an extended mechanical maintenance visit early in FY 2009 (the fall) to replace Subreflector, Elevation Bearing, finish painting, install platform and change out one Azimuth wheel assembly. The visit to North Liberty is complete. Antenna mechanics should ensure we have wheel assemblies ready for Owens Valley and St. Croix. We will maintain spare parts for one complete AZ wheel assembly in the warehouse and expense this assembly if ever it is installed. PT AZ32 wheel assembly failed and was replaced on 6/6/08. The platforms are finished at PT. The paint on the HN subreflector is deteriorated and its surface contour will require work to get it 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. Remaining TT Visits for FY 2008 is OV 8/18/08-8/25/08. The Brewster and North Liberty foundations will require repairs in the near future due to deterioration at an approximate cost of $15K each. MK dish panels that were damaged were replaced. The damaged panels need to be repaired for spares. AZ BEARINGS ? Next Bearing replacement for Antenna 28 will begin around July 9, 2008 till mid August. Bob Broilo is the Bearing Change Supervisor for antenna 28. 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. Delivery of these bearings should be June of 2008. If possible bearing replacements 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 however; we are reasonably assured that the 3 refurbished bearings will arrive this summer so we will use the spare for antenna 28 if necessary. Grease samples show that antennas 10, 20, are also good candidates for scheduled bearing changes. It is possible that the gearboxes will need to be moved in on antenna 28 which would add approximately 3 days to the overhaul. 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. The warehouse reports that there are enough El Bearing parts to prepare for ST Croix and to maintain a spare (or 2ea). This work along with finishing the painting is tentatively scheduled to occur on October13 to October 26. Need to make sure this is enough time to complete work. 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. The plates from BN5 have been removed for modification in the machine shop. No change was observed between loaded and unloaded measurements. Measurements should continue throughout the year. 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. This project was completed at a cost of $13K and a savings of $9K/year will be realized. The warehouse is stocked with energy efficient bulbs and ballasts. 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 has been put on the funding wish list. POWER MONITOR? A plan to install power monitoring equipment in the Hatch gear will require a power outage lasting 2 days. 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 hatch gear PM will also be performed. This work is scheduled for 9/19/08-9/20/08 (Fri. & Sat.). The following Friday and Saturday are being held as a backup option. EVLA; Civil? Correlator Room: A preventive measure to test batteries and lubricate the Correlator Door will be implemented by the ES Electrical group. Cable tray layout is coordinated and is being installed. The cleaning underneath the computer flooring will follow installation of cabling. Half of the correlator racks have been installed. The other half should be installed by the end of July. Several groups are involved with the rack installation and work continues hooking up power and signal cables. There is some question about when Back End Racks and other miscellaneous racks will be installed. Correlator entry restrictions will be in effect by 9/9/08. EVLA Antennas? Feeds: All L band feed build work is complete and an L- Band completion celebration is being planned for July. 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 is built. VSWR tests will be made to several feeds later this summer. It is desirable to install as many feeds as possible while in the AAB. Some S-band feeds will probably need to wait until the antennas are back in for overhauls. In the event remaining VLA antennas are shut down after the 22^nd EVLA antenna is complete it would be desirable to remove power and complete some of the outfitting tasks in the field for some groups. SAFETY REPORT : No accidents reported in May. Reminders to employees to be sure and use PPE equipment properly for example make sure lanyards are properly attached to harness and anchoring points. Oil Storage is full and James Sullivan will make arrangements take waste oil off site. The use of ?Report Unsafe Condition? forms are encouraged as a way of reporting conditions, acts or procedures that have the potential for causing accidents. ANNOUNCEMENTS: PEP? May-June 30-- Supervisors complete forms and conduct interviews July 7--- All PEP?s due in HR OTHER: Filehost Folder For VLA Drafting?A need to simplify access to current drawings is needed for ES Division generated drawings. A method similar to what Electronics Division is desirable since the drawings will be backed up continuously and are organized and the latest revisions are readily accessible. Guy and drafting will investigate how Electronics Div is accessing their drawings.