LWS Passes "Readiness Review"

LWS conducted a review of the detector upgrade project on 16 Oct 98. The review committee chaired by Gerry Neugebauer of CIT unanimously agreed that LWS was ready for commissioning on the Keck I telescope. Other members of the committee include Robert Pina of U. Florida, and Ed Wishnow of UC Berkeley, SSL. Also on the committee were several CARA personnel including Fred Chaffee, Chris Shelton, and Greg Wirth. The instrument was deemed ready for commissioning in part due to the performance of it's new detector, a Boeing 128² As:Si BIB Moderate Flux Device.

• The detector was shown to have good performance in all areas tested, including linearity, dynamic range, sensitivity, noise, dark current, and operability.
• The noise of the data acquisition system was should be background limited.
• The temperature control of the detector was shown to perform to specifications.
• The dewar hold time, although sometimes problematic, was shown to meet the goal of 24 hours in the lab environment.
• The software was shown to be adequate to operate the instrument with more improvements planned during commissioning.

Detailed Test Results

• Linearity, well size, DQE
• Dark Current (Stray Light)
• Bad Pixel Map
• Noise vs Chop Frequency
• Filter Band Pass using HRES grating

Commissioning Schedule

• 19 Oct 98: Pack and ship electronics and dewar to summit
• 21-23 Oct 98: Install IRE and Dewar into Forward Cassegrain Module
• 26 Oct 98: Begin Cool Down Sequence
• 28 Oct 98: Cold Tests of Instrument on Naysmith Deck
• 30 Oct 98: Optically align instrument in telescope (coarse align)
• 31Oct 98 - 01Nov98: Night tests in telescope:
  • Fine tune alignment
  • establish pointing coordinates
  • measure telescope and sky background radiation
  • gather optical quality data
  • verify chopping operation
  • verify nod operation

---

Go to: LWS Home Page - Instruments Home Page - Keck Home Page

---

Last modified: Tue Feb 2 14:45:16 HST