Instrument Status

Current and Past Announcements

Status Summary by Subsystem

This is an attempt to summarize the status of various sub-systems of the instrument. Each sub-system name is color coded to indicate the status at a glance: green means functioning normally, orange means mostly normal, but with some caveats or minor issues, and red means the sub-system is compromised in some way.

Last Status Update: 2025-08-15

  • Detector Noise: Starting in November of 2024, additional pattern noise has been present on the detectors. We have been working on eliminating the spurious nose, but we have been unable to completely remove it. As of late-April 2025 the read noise in the various amplifiers is between 12 and 13.5 electrons.
  • LFC: Currently unreliable.
  • Etalon: Operational.
  • Detector Cooling Systems: Both detectors are now cooled with closed cycle refrigerators (CCRs). The green side CCR has some lingering problems and has very little overhead on maintaining temperature and has occasional deviations which affect the detector. Red side is performing well.
  • Detector Errors: The red and green detectors suffer from occasional “start state errors” in which the affected detector remains in the start phase and does not produce a useful exposure. The observing scripts detect this, abort the current exposure (with read out) and start a fresh exposure on both cameras. No action is necessary on the part of the observer. The occurrence rate is such that around one in every 180 exposures is affected by one of the two detectors experiencing this error.
  • Ca H&K Detector: The CA H&K detector is operational.
  • Exposure Meter Terminated Exposures: Operational.
  • Tip Tilt Corrections: The tip tilt axis are currently correcting as expected.
  • Double Star Observations: Operational.
  • Simultaneous Calibration (SimulCal): Simultaneous calibrations are supported.
  • Nod to Sky Observations: For observations which need a sky measurement other than the built in sky fibers, nodding away to a sky position can be accomplished manually by running separate OBs for the target and sky and asking the OA to offset the telescope as appropriate. We plan to build a separate Nod To Sky observing mode which will accomplish this within a single OB, but that is not yet available.
  • Off Target Guiding: Not yet commissioned. Currently, the tip tilt system must be able to detect the science target in order to position it on the fiber.