Tech Staff Meeting Notes March 3, 2009

The top priority is always repair of down stations.

The task list updated February 6, 2009 needs to be updated again. Note that everyone is still needed to work on essentially all tasks. There is however, a single person who is primarily responsible for each one. Mitch of course, is ultimately responsible for everything.

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Priorities

Osceola repeater

Ft Payne station

SM trigger upgrades

SM sample rate fix

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James' funding runs out in April. He and Chris will work together to schedule one or a couple Davis Brain Dump seminars to prepare for the GPS transition. The "analog" parts will become the responsibility of Chris et al. and the "digital" parts will pass to Steve and Al. Data transfer, processing, etc will continue to be done by Bob Smalley and John Paul.

Bill Meiser is no longer a UM employee. Michelle Smith is initiating the process to fill the position.

There may be funds available this year for an upgrade to 5 stations (3 nmad broadbands and 2 et stations).

Holly's list:
Repeater Down
BFAR, DLAR & HOVM

Out
MIST.EHE
TNMT.EHN
MTAR
LRAR.EHE

Unusable for small events
CHRM
PLAR.EHE
PLAR.EHN
NBNT.EHN

Isis Oxidation Problem
MCAM.EHN

TRYN: the forest service wants to remove the tower. John is looking into options.

Horton and Mitch are working with the AR Geological Survey to install a 6 station AR broadband network.

NetOpsIII will be in Menlo Park on May 4-5, 2009. It will be primarily focused on transitioning free field NSMP stations to RSN's.

There is still significant interference with PWLA that seems to be greatest during the work day.

We need a plan for adding strong motion to SWET. Will a CMG5TD fit in the vault with the CMG3? AC power will be expensive and difficult; Mitch needs to nail down the hardware so we can figure out how much solar we need. Should we switch to ethernet radios (currently have serial) and have a dual-port terminal server? Should we use the intuicom radios they use at UUSS? Can there be simplification and hardening of the current path through the bell tower? Can we move the PC in Bran's office to someplace more secure and inaccessible?

Steve will contact telecom to order dsl for the three NMSZ nodes.

The gcf2ew processes on shakeworm are now replaced with scream/scream2ew on rhydra1. CVTN is still on gcf2ew pending the switch in the firewall to the rhydra ip:port. SEAR was moved back to gcf2ew because it doesn't reconnect after an outage for some unkown reason.

Now that CMG5 triggers actually contain data, we need to tune the trigger level. Mitch will sent explanatory info and guidelines to Al and Steve to tune.

Jim's Priorities (these are from December and need to be updated)

BHT needs to be moved.

The retaining pond for the old generator doesn't seem to fill up with water anymore. Either someone is being diligent about draining out rainwater or there is a leak.

Several of the stations can get improved telemetry by transmitting directly to the node. The original configuration changed enough so that there is room in the band. Jim will investigate.

Charging circuitry at RCGA is old and primitive and in need of an upgrade. Box needs a vent.

CCRT - Needs a rebuild after a bad lightning strike.

GFM - Fixed the bad channel but still needs some work to repair storm damage. The NC state park service is purchasing GFM. We already have a couple permissions from them and John initiated the paperwork for the GFM permission.

GMG - Need battery box solar reg mounting plate and need to fuse the battery.

Steve and Al are setting up a feed of Oklahoma data to be forwarded to the NEIC. The scream2scream connection didn't seem to be all that stable and OKGS could use a better way to archive events before they leave the buffer. Steve will help them get ew going and then we'll use the ew export. We need to make sure to add relevant channels to the NEIC export when available and contact DAn McManus dmcmanus) at USGS Golden when they're going.

Rotational sensor is feeding an earthworm but needs a Steiner ADS2 unit to control noise and knock down crosstalk (esp the IRIG bleed).

The truck is in service. Mac needs to decide which truck he wishes to decommission (old surburban 148 or the blue pickup). Its a painful thing to watch--its as if we asked him to sacrifice a child.

Replace batteries in all XLAK clocks (only lnxt and aztn remain). Need to be careful so that earthworm doesn't see time jump around.

Most of the strongmotion stations can run at 100 sps without any modifications. We will install a router on the few that have problems (RDST will be the test case).

Need to complete firmware upgrade on ASAR, SEAR, GILT, and CVVA.

Need a new bottom air conditioner for mkta. Need new RF preamps, radio align, etc, etc at MKTA.
Need to swap out the old node computers at AZTN. Will XP do netbui with the bridge recorders (if so we could lose the windows 98 box at aztn)?

GPS
Need to get Portageville back online.

John found a good host for a Ft Payne broadband. There is AC (or rather the host is willing to run power). The ISP is also willing to provide free bandwidth though this may not last long. There is a second possibility where we could telemeter to Jacksonville State (jsu.edu).

HDBR
The recorder disks should be reformatted as a routine maintenance task next time access is available. The constant read/write to the fat file systems lead to fragmentation. Don't ya just love dos?
Lost contact with recorders 1, 3, and 6. Number 5 is unstable. Can reset all 7 recorders which implies the equipment enclosure at each node has power and that at least the reset radio and telemetry are working.

HDAR
Drilling is complete and awaiting final cleanup.
Greg has all the parts he ordered. Steve has the uds 2100's and an 8 port hub. Jim has the accelerometers. Dave will mail all that and a donut to Greg.
Need to order the fans, drill the cabinet holes, and build the enclosure. Note from January:
I think this note is obsolete and we're back to simpler comm path again:

The communications path got complicated again. We need to install a wireless link to 2nd street (this is new hardware). We need hardware there to get on the TDOT fiber. Then we need hardware to make the link from Boswell to richardson. That link will be part of the CERI microwave network so we shouldn't need anything extra at Richardson other than the additional antenna and aironet (and power, yada, yada).
As of February we no longer need the second street link and can plug in directly via cat5 at the weigh station (woohoo). It isn't clear yet if we can NAT to the public internet at the TMC at Boswell or if we need to radio to Richardson.

HDBT
Mud Island vertical array is operational. Not really, functional is a better word until we can get it online to qc/vet data. Trigger levels on the strongmo need to be adjusted because the flash fills in about two weeks. One dm24 is at Guralp for repair. The sensor is in 3904/215E.

CVTN optical isolation. Need to upgrade to year 3 hardware. Hardware is ready.

Couldn't get the NWS cable modem to cooperate at NAIT (firewall?). Dean was going to ask comcast about it and maybe get a new modem. Steve will follow up.

Lenox Agreement. Jim obtained contact info for the person Mitch needs to call>

FDL. CMG6 instructions are complete.
New firewire cables in progress.
New bags for CMG6 acquired.

There is SOH info superimposed on the pII gain channel. Jim and John will get the codes to Mitch who will investigate the feasibility of decoding software. Mitch looks at this for a day. It can be done but won't be easy to do robustly. Some of the documentation appears contradictory and it isn't clear which bit is what.

PEBM and HENM sometimes have telemetry fades. Should reevaluate comms.

Need to gather up a contact list (e.g. everyone's home phone, power companies, etc) and put it on webworm (password protected).

The aluminum enclosure with the GPS breakout board at CPCT is corroded, fragile, and needs replaced. Need to re-work lighting and pest chaser. John has a pest chaser and will use some landscape or pool hardware for the lighting.

3876 Power The power for the new lighting on the east side of the general parking lot to the west of CERI is coming from 3876. Chris will check it out to assess the added lightning hazard and see if anything can be done about it. Might be hard to do without the wiring diagram. Chris will make one if needed as time permits.

3890 Power Chris is going to make a diagram for 3890. Good luck son.

Inventory Apparently other networks are resisting and INV is only fully functional at NEIC. The dataless seed generation works well if you already have the ascii dataless and not at all if you don't. We might use datascope for this instead (talk about full circle--withers started that in 1997).
In a related effort, John is developing an access database and queried the anss-netops mail list. The summary he posted to the list:

Hello,

It sounds like everyone is interested in some type of database solution to track inventories, station info, and visits.

Here is a summary of solutions.

INV - Tracks inventory, responses, creates SEED volumes. But does not track visits

Request Tracker - Tracks service visits, but not inventory.

Access Database - Can track everything, but must be built from the ground up.

E-Mail/Web Page - Simple and accessable, but not a database.

Mitch Withers has said he can probably set up an anonymous ftp site for us to share our different solutions as long as it isn't too big. I will be glad to share my little database if anyone is interested and I know I would like to see what all of you have done.

When we get the ftp site going, I'll let you know.

Thanks,
John

Ooops, Mitch never did anything with the ftp site.

Pink Palace is working with Gary and Michelle on a new perc-like display area. We'll pull the receiver etc, when they start pulling out the old display (or sometime earlier if an opportunity arises).

The Transportable Array (TA) component of the U.S. Array observatory of the Earthscope Facility will be installed in the NMSZ in 2011 and permissioning in AR and MO will be the summer of 2009. Jim and Chris made contact lists and Mitch passed them on.

(Old note from January) Mitch briefly reviewed the desired 106x6 network of desireable TA stations to adopt. These are the 106 TA stations within the ANSS RSN footprint for the NSMZ and WVSZ and the ETSZ and CSZ. The "by 6" implies three components for broadband and three of strongmotion. Considerable funds must be secured for the capitalization costs and for the long term operation and maintenance.