Roque de los Muchachos Observatory

Isaac Newton Telescope

USERS' MANUAL

Version 1.0

1991 January

Ed Zuiderwijk

Derek Jones

Barbara Hassall

• Contents
• List of Tables
• List of Figures
• INTRODUCTION
  • Scope of this manual
  • Obtaining copies of this manual
  • Recent information: INT\?NEWS and INT\?BEWARE
  • Getting help
  • Notation
  • Acknowledgements
• THE 2.5-M ISAAC NEWTON TELESCOPE (INT)
  • Introduction
  • Mechanical design and Performance
    • Pointing and Tracking
  • Optics and optical performance
  • Telescope control
    • Control Tasks
    • Pointing Model
    • Engineering Mode
    • Alarms
  • Acquisition and Guiding
    • TV Cameras
    • Autoguiders
  • A Guided Tour of Telescope Control Room and Environs
• PLANNING OBSERVATIONS
  • Acquisition and Guiding at Cassegrain
  • Acquisition and Guiding at Prime
  • Finding charts, coordinates and blind offsets
  • Observation Catalogues
    • Catalogue format
  • System Catalogues
• OBSERVING WITH THE INT: RECIPES
  • Starting up the INT
  • Closing down the INT
  • Startup and Shutdown of the PE3220 Telescope Computer
  • Startup and Shutdown of the PE3210 Instrument Computer
  • ZEROSET
  • Acquiring an object
    • Slewing to an object
    • Using the Handset and Guide Buttons
    • RA/Dec Offsets
  • Single-Star SNAFU at Cassegrain
  • Single-Star SNAFU at Prime
  • Focusing the telescope
    • Using the Handset
    • Via the User Interface
    • From the Engineering Rack
    • Finding the best Focus at Cassegrain
    • Finding the best focus at Prime
    • Using automatic Focus Adjustment at Prime
    • Autoguider Focus at Prime
  • Acquiring a Guide Star
    • Locating guide stars at Prime Focus
    • Locating guide stars at the Cassegrain focus
    • Using guide stars of known RA and Dec (either focus)
    • Acquiring a guide star
  • Beamswitching and Aperture Offsets
    • Using known aperture offsets
    • Setting apertures interactively
  • Blind Offsets at Cassegrain
  • Rotating the Cassegrain turntable
    • Under Computer Control
    • Under Manual Control
  • Making a Hard Copy of a Grinnell TV image
  • Archiving a Grinnell TV image
• STARTING UP THE INT
  • Initial action by Telescope Operator
  • Preparation for observing by the Telescope Operator
  • Summary
• CLOSING DOWN THE INT
  • Closing down Telescope and Dome
  • Control Software and Instrument shut down
  • Logbooks and Magnetic Tapes
• THE PE 3220 TELESCOPE COMPUTER
  • Introduction
  • Checking the state of the telescope computer
    • Control system not working.
    • Running but with disc write-protected
    • No response on the System Console
  • Loading and starting the control software
    • Normal startup
    • Startup using COMPILE option
    • Potential problems
  • Rebooting the computer after a power failure or crash
  • Regular Shutdown
  • Tasks and miscellaneous problems
    • Control system tasks
    • Checking for tasks
    • Problems due to tasks
  • Enquiring and Defining parameter values with INPSCF
  • Summary of startup and shutdown
    • Normal Startup
    • Shutdown
    • Reboot after a power cut or INIT pressed
    • After a change of focal station
• THE TELESCOPE USER INTERFACE
  • Introduction
    • Starting the program
    • How the program deals with input
    • Catalogue entries
  • HELP
  • Summary of User Interface commands
  • Details of individual commands in alphabetical order
  • Examples of working with Catalogues
    • Adding sources to a Catalogue
    • To inspect catalogue contents
    • To enter a parameter for several catalogue entries
    • To save the catalogue in a Disc File
    • To restore a catalogue from disc file
    • To LIST the resident catalogue on line printer
    • To remove objects from a Catalogue
    • To move the telescope
    • To use a catalogue entry as guide star
  • Standard catalogues on disc
    • Catalogue format
    • List of standard catalogues
  • The Information Display
• THE PE3210 INSTRUMENT COMPUTER
  • Introduction
  • Normal Startup and Sign On
  • Starting the Instrument Computer
    • Cold Start
    • Warm Start
  • Stopping the Instrument Computer
  • Problems with the EGLE disc
    • Shortage of Disc Space
    • ``Funny Images'': DMA Transfer Problems and Bad Disc Sectors
• THE TV ACQUISITION CAMERA
  • Introduction and Safety
  • Camera Control
  • Powering up the TV system
  • Normal operation
  • The Grinnell MENU
  • Complete restart of the TV control system
• CALIBRATION TESTS AND QUALITY CONTROL
  • Telescope Pointing
    • Encoder Zeropoints: ZEROSET
    • Software Zeropoint: 1-star SNAFU
    • Software Zeropoint and Collimation Error: 2-star SNAFU
    • SNAFU at Prime Focus
    • Reasons behind the ZEROSET and SNAFU procedures
    • Testing the Encoders
    • Pointing Tests using POINT and AUTOPNT
  • Telescope Focus
    • Focus Drive
    • Focus and Temperature
    • Focusing at Prime
    • Prime Focus Adjustment when using Filters
  • Finder Flop Zeropoint
    • Finder Zeropoint in Cassegrain Mode
    • Zeroing the finder at Prime
  • A&G Box Geometry
    • Geometry at Cassegrain
    • Geometry at Prime
    • Rotator Mechanics
    • A&G box coordinate system
  • The Autoguiders
    • The Autoguider Focus at Cassegrain
    • The Autoguider Focus at Prime
    • Autoguider Gain
  • TV cameras
    • TV scale
    • TV Focus
  • Dome Encoder Zeropoints
  • Servo Constants
• ACQUISITION AND (AUTO)GUIDING
  • Finder telescope
  • The Acquisition and Guider Units
    • Cassegrain A&G Unit
    • Prime Focus A&G Unit
  • Using the Autoguiders
    • Introduction
    • Acquisition modes: Probe or Telescope?
    • Locating guide stars on Sky Survey plates
    • Locating guide stars at Prime Focus
    • Locating guide stars at the Cassegrain focus
    • Using guide stars of known RA and Dec
    • Using guide stars with known probe coordinates
    • Acquiring a guide star
    • Problems with guide-star acquisition
• TROUBLE SHOOTING
  • Checking the Light Beam
  • The telescope is tracking but pointing badly
  • The telescope runs away
  • Autoguider Problems
• LOGGING DATA
  • Logging Observations
  • Reading the ICONA Meteorological Instruments
  • Telescope Focus
  • Seeing Measurements
  • Windspeed Measurements
  • Telescope Operation Logbook
• USER-SUPPLIED INSTRUMENTS
• POWER SUPPLY AND UTILITIES
• The Pointing Grid Catalogue
• Advanced use of the PE 3210 and PE 3220 Computers
  • The Perkin Elmer Operating System (MTM)
    • Compile, Link and Run a FORTRAN program
  • The Perkin Elmer text EDITOR
  • Magnetic Tape Handling on the Perkin Elmer
    • Tape Backup using FASTBACK
    • Reading non Perkin-Elmer Tapes
• About this document ...