Basic instruction for PISCO Observation

Mail du 29 février 2012 de Dominique Naef à Chris Helminiak (Obs Chilien)

Data:

=====

They are stored in the following night directory: /gls/PISCO/data/raw/YYYY-MM-DD/

Calibrations:

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1. Biases:
   Right after the last CORALIE calibration OB, insert "CALIBRATION_PISCO"
   (you will find it in the menu of the Insert button. This will take 5 biases.
   
2. Flat fields:
   The only way to get them is to take ECAM flat-fields with the corresponding filters:
   (if ECAM is KO, ---> Flat Pisco lorsque Ecam est KO )
   
   PISCO  ECAM
   BB       BG
   VB       VG
   RB       RG
   IB         IC
   ZG      ZG
   
   To take ECAM skyflats:
   Open the flat field catalogue:  Catalogs -> Utils -> flat.rdb
   For the evening: select "FF soir MM" en send it to the edp
   For the morning, you would use "FF matin MM".
   Once the OB is in the EDP. Edit the field "flatlist" to set the filter list
   

For example:

1. flatlist=BG,VG,ZG,RG,IC
   will produce 3 flats of the following PISCO filters: BB,VB,ZG,RB,IB
2. flatlist=VG,RG,RG,RG
   will produce 3 VB and 9 RB.
   

In the mornig, you need to reverse the sequence: flatlist=IC,RG,ZG,VG,BG

Start the flats one hour before the beginning of the nautical night.

It will end early enough to give you time to switch back to CORALIE and take a THA2 before starting your observations.

Science frames:

===============

First, you need to define the sequence you want to get.

Suppose you want to take:

• 1 60 seconds VB exposure and 2 30 seconds RB exposure.
  In the sequence field put: VB/60,RB/30,RB/30

The field "piscotyp", you can define the way your sequence will be executed.

I suggest you use only the "one" or the "max"

1. one: takes the defined sequence once at the beginning of the CORALIE exposure.
2. max: takes the defined sequence as many times as possible during the CORALIE exposure.
   

Note that you can set the PISCO behaviour in your catalogue. You will need to add the following fields: piscotyp and sequence.

For example:

in rdb format, this would be:

piscotyp    sequence

--------       --------

one           VB/60,RB/60,RB/60

Focusing:

=========

This is the non user friendly part :)

1. In the upper left monitor, locate the following windows (in the bottom tool bar) and open them:
   PISCO
   PROMPTER-PISCO
2. You can send manual commands to PISCO by typing the in the PROMPTER
   and you will see the result in the PISCO window.
3. To see the actual M2 position, type in the prompter
   focus /stat /echo
   The position is given in microns and in encoder units
4. To modify the position
   focus /position=150000
   This will move the M2 to the position 150000 microns
   

Before touching the M2, you should check the image quality.

There is now an automatic display but I don't know what you can do with it.

If this is an ESO-RTD, then you can use the "pick-object" function to measure the psf size.

When the focus is correct, the psf size is between 2.5 and 3 pixels on both axes at he center of the field.

The pixels are big (0.86'') so some defocus will help you to boost the signal-to-noise.

If the psf size you get is below 5x5 pixels, you should avoid to touch the focus (safer :) )

Otras informaciones importantes:

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gain = 1.51
readout noise = 14.0