[Escoordminutes] ES Division Coordination minutes for June

[Lew Serna]

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.