TOM2 Progress

[Tom Droege <tdroege@veriomail.com>]

Slowly I am getting TOM2 running.  I have put a pipe heater on the I 
lens.  This is the thing you buy in the hardware store to keep pipes from 
freezing.  The one on the TOM2 I lens is 15 feet long and produces 40 watts 
of heat.  This is about right to make it warm to the touch.  There are 
several brands.  This one has a test button on the thermostat.  By using a 
little tape, I could hold the test button closed and keep it on all the 
time.  I think one wants to do this as we want to keep the lens assembly 
above ambient temperature no matter what it is.

This seems to work.  I now longer have rings around the bright 
stars.  Unfortunately, I broke the RA drive in the course of all the 
mucking around.  I will have to repair it, but not tonight.

Last night both telescopes got rained on a little.  They both seem to have 
survived.  Sigh!  I now realize that the weather map I was looking at was 
stuck on old data.  So the front I thought was about 16 hours away was only 
5 hours away.  Jennifer woke me up about 4 am to tell me it was 
raining.  But not too much, and things were mostly dry by evening.

The recommended procedure in case of the electronics getting wet is to 
first turn off the power.  It is electrolytic corrosion that kills wet PC 
boards.  Then dry them out with a hair drier.  But don't let things get too 
hot.  Keep a hand by the PC board.  If your hand can stand it then the PC 
board can.  But remember that water will creep under sockets and the 
like.  So several periods of warming with time in between for the hidden 
water to creep out is appropriate.

Meanwhile TOM1 is taking data.  Last December to February I got no data at 
all.  This year is much different.

The only problem is the Christmas lights.  My neighbor (Bill Haynes) takes 
a bow and arrow and shoots wires up into his Oak trees.  Then he pulls 
strings of lights 100 feet or so up into the air.

Tom Droege