OBSERVING INSTRUCTIONS: 
GETTYSBURG COLLEGE 
OBSERVATORY


     
  1. In ACE, look at the algol.tof file for something interesting and double click on it, or just enter the coordinates if you have them.
  2. Press "Go To" and don't forget to answer 'move the telescope' to the prompt it gives.  Then turn on the dome light to make sure the telescope is ok (i.e. doesn't hit or catch on anything) while it slews, and don't forget to turn it back off when the telescope is finished.
  3. In Ace, turn on dome tracking under dome > autodome. 

    4. *NOTE* Dome tracking does not work too well when near the zenith, since the RA changes too quickly.
  4. To focus the telescope, first, in the PMIS image window, user > focus position, enter the dome temperature (from the small thermometer readout under the CCD computer monitor) which then gives you the focus position number.  Then in the focus window opened earlier in Ace, enter the focus position number and press "Go To Focus".

    5. *NOTE* The telescope should be refocused whenever the temperature changes by about +/- .3 or .4 degrees Celsius.
  5. Change to the I filter under PMIS > user > I filter.  When the CLi> prompt appears, the filter's in place.
  6. To take a test image, acquire > expose, for 15 secs
  7. To center the image on the object of interest, find the offset using, in the PMIS image window, user > cursor 1 and click on the center command.  This gives the RA and Dec offset, which can then be entered in the OFFSET area in Ace.
  8. To use telescope tracking, on the autoguider STV_Remote, click "image" once and click "value" to set the exposure time for 4 secs, or long enough to see stars. 

    9. *NOTE* The display for this option is in seconds.
    *NOTE* Try a shorter exposure time if the autoguider is not tracking well.
    Then press "track" under guide.  The mode should read "full menu" and can be changed with the buttons below "value".  Press "track" again to turn on the tracking.  This should bring up the 'select guide star' option.  The autoguider will take two images and select the brightest star in the field.  Once it selects a star, click "value" to accept its choice. 
    *NOTE* To move the telescope manually, click "track" once to turn tracking off, move the telescope, and then press "track" again to begin the process of selecting the guide star again.
  9. On the telescope control computer, under "instruments", click "autoguider on". 

    10. *NOTE* To move the telescope manually, the tracking must be turned off and on in ACE as well as in STV Remote.
  10. When taking exposures to be saved to file, make sure 'RA object' tab is visible in the telescope control.  This allows the CCD computer to access the object information which it saves in the image headers.
  11. There are two methods for taking images:
    1. In PMIS, use the USER1 menu on the PMIS Tools (bar at top, or possibly the side of the screen) and enter the length of exposure.
    2. In PMIS, use the user > Configure BVRI Sequence command in the PMIS image window.  To skip a filter in the sequence, enter zero for the exposure time.  Then use the user > Run BVRI Sequence command to take the images.
  12. Object file names should have only 8 characters, with a form such as H683I001.FIT where H683 is the first four letters of the object name and I is the filter.  001 indicates that it is the first image taken of the object, and the .FIT indicates that the image has not been processed yet. 
  13. When using the sequence commands, you will only be prompted for the base file name, which is the first four letters of the object name.  The number of exposures is the number of times you want to cycle through the four filters.  The delay between sets is the time you want to wait between each cycle through the four filters. 
  14. When you are finished observing, follow the shutdown instructions.


copyright Laurence A. Marschall, Gettysburg College