[asac] Notes from the telecon

[John Richer]

Dear All,

A few points in preparation for our meeting in Florence this weekend -
there will probably be one or two emails as well later in the week.

1) I append minutes from the telecon of 6 September.  Please read
   through especially if you missed the telecon.

2) There is a draft agenda at 

   https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/ASAC16Sep06Agenda

which is under development.  It includes the necessary links to the
reading material for our meeting.  Any comments on the agenda will be
gladly received (to Al and myself please). 

3) To aid our review of the calibration documents, I have assigned each
   of the ASAC members to one of the 10 short "Calibration Example"
   documents.  I attach a file containing these assignments.  Please
   find your name in it, and read your assigned document.  Let me know
   if this is a problem. 

4) There is no formal dinner plan for Friday night, but perhaps some of
   us can gather in the lobby of the Annalena - 7:30 to 8pm or so - and
   head out for dinner.

I hope you all have a good journey and look forward to our meeting this
weekend. 

Regards

John


-- 
John Richer      
Astrophysics, Cavendish Laboratory, J J Thomson Avenue, Cambridge CB3 0HE
http://www.mrao.cam.ac.uk/~jsr  Tel: +44-1223-337246 Fax: +44-1223-354599  
-------------- next part --------------

ASAC Telecon  6th Sep 2006, 1430 UT

Emerson, Vila-Vilaro, Beasley, Wootten, Turner, T Wilson, Laing, Richer,
Testi, Schilke and Cernicharo.  + others?

Al confused the time on the ESAC schedule, which was CET, with UT so the
meeting began earlier than advertised.

Apologies from Bally, C Wilson and Blain. 

Tony Beasley gave a rapid project update, some highlights included: 

- Integration of Japan into the project is ongoing. 

- Bicentenario option for Santiago office is still being examined, but
  it will cost 100kEuro to keep the option open for much longer.  We
  don't want to spend this unless there is a reasonable chance it will
  get ESO approval.

- OSF construction contract now signed, significantly later than had
  been hoped.  The 18 month build has begun.  Vertex SEF to start in
  September, nearly the size of the OSF itself.  First Vertex antenna will
  be constructed on the holo test pad.

- 500 people expected to be working at the OSF site soon - enlarging
  polyclinic to cope.

- Communications: a microwave link up to Cerro Chico, then IR laser to
  the AOS TB, provides an interim solution to linking the OSF and the
  AOS.  10 Mbits/s.  The final link will be fibre on poles.

- Power supply: the letter asking for utility companies to consider grid
  power supply is being sent now.  Expect meeting with companies over
  the coming months to see how feasible and costly this is. 

- M3 have designed several possible roads layouts.  Mark Holdaway is
  starting Y+ configuration design based on road plans.

- FE: 1st available in March 07, next in August 07. Where to send them -
  ATF or OSF?  No clear resolution of this issue yet, depends on how
  integration tests roll out at ATF.  Likely to be the ATF under
  current assumptions. 

- Software: new progress reports will soon be available

- SE is ongoing.  AIV temp building under construction, outfitting to be
  finished March 07.  Science IPT focus moving towards commissioning, a
  construction activity which is of concern to your PM.  We need
  targeted responses to needs.  Staffing profile will be hard to
  establish.

- Vertex P2DR approaching.  Alcatel equivalent in December, also final
  DR for transporter.  Some CREs have gone thru.  Also one piece
  subreflector change adopted.

- BE proceeds with lots of testing at PSI.  Slow work.  Move to ATF is
  delayed but the discoveries are best attacked at the AOC.  First
  quadrant correlator is done but its move to Chile needs to be
  accelerated.  

Tony reminded us that he is unable to make the Florence meeting.

Upcoming ASAC meeting

Richer briefly reminded the ASAC of the charges to be considered in
Florence. As well as the three formal charges from the Board, we will
have some discussion of two other issues: Time Allocation, and
operations and ARCs. In this context, it was emphasised that the new
baseline in the operations plan, namely a single TAC/PRC, means single
process and assessment for all proposals.  Frequency of TAC/PRC meetings
is a separate issue for discussion.

Richer will assign reading assignments for Charge 1 by email.

Meeting logistics.  There will be no formal dinner on the Friday night,
but it was suggested people gather in the hotel foyer of the Annalena
(possibly, separately in the Boboli as well?) at around 8pm to meet up.

JSR/AW
-------------- next part --------------

Assignments for reviewing the Calibration Plan (charge 2)

- There are 10 Calibration "Example" documents.  I have assigned pseudo
  randomly each of the 13 ASAC members to one of the documents in the
  list below.

- Please read through the (very short) document (link given) before the
  meeting and be prepared to comment at the meeting. 

- You are of course welcome to comment on *any* of these Calibration
  examples!

- This will hopefully allow us to focus the disucssion on topics which
  need attention or discussion. 

1) Amplitude and Flux Calibration 

https://wikio.nrao.edu/pub/ALMA/CalExamples/AmpliCalStepByStep.pdf

Reviewer: Yamada

2) Phase Calibration  

https://wikio.nrao.edu/pub/ALMA/CalExamples/PhaseCalStepByStep.pdf

Reviewer: Bally + Richer

3) Bandpass Calibration

https://wikio.nrao.edu/pub/ALMA/CalExamples/BandpassCalSteps.pdf

Reviewer: Aalto + Turner

4) Polarization Calibration 

https://wikio.nrao.edu/pub/ALMA/CalExamples/PolCalStepByStep.pdf

Reviewer: Cernicharo

5) Pointing Calibration  

https://wikio.nrao.edu/pub/ALMA/CalExamples/PointingCalStepByStep.pdf

Reviewer: Blain

6) Antenna Location Calibration  

https://wikio.nrao.edu/pub/ALMA/CalExamples/LocCalStepByStep.pdf

Reviewer: Schilke

7) Antenna and Electronic Delay Calibration 

https://wikio.nrao.edu/pub/ALMA/CalExamples/DelayCalSteps.pdf

Reviewer: C Wilson

8) Optics Calibration  

https://wikio.nrao.edu/pub/ALMA/CalExamples/Optics_CalEx.pdf

Reviewer: Yamamoto

9) Primary Beam Calibration  

https://wikio.nrao.edu/pub/ALMA/CalExamples/BeamCalStepByStep.pdf

Reviewer: Testi + Kohno

10) ACA Calibration Issues  

https://wikio.nrao.edu/pub/ALMA/CalExamples/ACACalCoordination.pdf

Reviewer: Mundy + Yamada