ISAR04 SERVICE INFO

ISAR S/N 04 History and Service

This page provides information on service issues related to ISAR s/n 04. This instrument was fabricated at the National Ocean Center, Southampton and delivered to University of Miami, RSMAS, in September 2005.

SERIAL NUMBERS

electronic circuit card: BNL Jan 2005 ISAR board
KT 15: 5339

050906 -- : Arctic Cruise: Minnett & Key on the Kapitan Dranitsyn Arctic cruise. Acceptance trials in cold weather conditions. The following problems were identified: (a) An occasional drop out of the measurement of thermistor 1, black body 1 (V1bb1) occurs at all temperatures. This drop out was noted during testing at NOCS and seems to be a problem still. (b) It seems that ISAR has a cold (< -5 C) temperature failure. (c) A sensitivy to input power voltage.
051128: Repair at RMR Co. We measured Vref on ISAR-04 board. (BNL Jan 2005 ISAR board) RE directed me to measure between the ground central loop and TP3, under J8. Vref = 5.090 volts. When measured using the 12 bit adc and using the equation Vref(12bit) = C / 1000 * 2 = 5.092. So the 12bit adc works just fine.
051218 -- 051220: RSMAS Checkout Noted dropout that BB2 T1 was erratic and had considerable drop out. Also the ORG reading is not working. We opened the unit and checked the voltages from the Impule connector to the pins of the Adam-4017 and they were good. There seems to be something wrong with the 4017. Problem with ADC12--channel 4, kt15 therm, outside case temp, is locked at 4095, max count.
060313 -- 060317: NOCS & RMRCO evaluate ISAR-04 at RSMAS. ISAR-04 was given a cold temperature test with an insulated chest and dry ice. The system operated very well to temperature less than - 20 C. Alignment was checked. The V1bb1 analog-to-digital drop out continues. The power supply problem is identified. The electronic circuit board was sent to RMR Co. (Ray Edwards) for resolution of the electronics problems. The instruments falls onto the floor from a height of about 0.7 m, while cold. The KT15 was not operating and was sent to Heitronics for repair. The electronic circuit board was sent to RMRCO-NY for repair and modification of the power circuit.
060421: ISAR power circuit modification The power circuit problem has been deetermined. The repair is outlined in the modification document (Our Procedure 05 ) which has been sent to NOCS for review and implementation.
060615 -- 060626: ISAR-04 at RMRCO, NY. (a) Install modified circuit board. (b) Traced the V1bb1 problem to a faulty Adam 4017. With the new module the problem goes away. (c) New configuration file, I04V01C.ICF, for calibration. d Align the scan drum and reset the encoder. (e) Complete optical bench alignment using the alignment tube. (f) Verify optical alignment with "paper alignment test."
060630 -- 060705: Cal060630 Ran five bath temperatures (10,25,35,18,25). Results for ISAR-04 suggest a slope correction of 1.025 works best and is repeatable. Results.
060706: Configuration file I04V0255.ICF (45 deg view). Configuration file for the Explorer of the Seas deployment. The view angle might change.
Explorer of the Seas, Intercomparison with M-AERI

060709 -- 060714: Explorer of the Seas Intercomparison of the system with the M-AERI. ISAR-04 was deployed with the M-AERI on the Explorer of the Seas for intercomparison on the trip to bermuda and return. The three figures below show the experimental setup and some results from the first leg of the cruise, from Port Liberty NJ to bermuda and return rom 9 July 2006 to 14 July 2006.

	The photograph shows the ISAR and its mounting frame attached to the outside of the M-AERI chassis. The ISAR viewing angle was 45 degrees from nadir (configuration file: I04V0245.txt). The system worked without fail throughout the cruise. The ISAR output strings were read by the SCS (Scientific Computer System) and were collected with computer time stamps. The PC was located inside the M-AERI chassis and each day chassis was opened the SCS data files were copied to a portable memory for processing.
	The raw (5-sec) data records defined by ISAR5 were processed with a PERL program that averages all temperatures and radiometer readings over (in this case) 30 minutes averaging period. The M-AERI MTL files were read with a MATLAB program that bin-averaged all M-AERI SSST records (about 10-min sample period) into contemporary 30-min averaging periods for comparison with ISAR. There were several rain periods and the ship was in port for about 36 hours. Ocassionally, a computer communication problem caused M-AERI to fail and a reboot was required to get it to function again. All data from these time periods-port time, reboot, rain-were removed from the comparisons. For the good data, the mean difference (ISAR-MAERI) was 0.025 degC and the standard deviation of the difference was 0.36 degC. The standard deviation was somewhat large. Examination of the time series plots for the two instruments indicates that the M-AERI exhibited a high variability while ISAR was fairly steady.
	The route of the Explorer of the Seas was directly through the Gulf Stream as shown by the AVHRR SST map here. We show here a few spot times during the cruise. The date and hour are shown with the SSST from ISAR.

ISAR-04 was left operating on the ship and plans are to remove it in mid August.

060723: New Explorer of the Seas power for ISAR-04. We will the Soniel Model 1205SRD battery charger in the following configuration:

M-AERI AC --> SONEIL --> 12V BATTERY --> ISAR

This will be small enough to fit in the M-AERI chassis. The M-AERI AC will continue to power the laptop as before.

Shutter Belt Jam, Electronic Repair Required

060811 : Mechanical Problem A the end of the Explorer of the Seas deployment, the shutter drive became locked up. The shutter jammed in the closed position and the internal optics were protected. See the email to NOCS that describes.

The belt slipped and bunched up which jammed the shutter gear mechanism. The end stops (blue) in the new system are very hard and these made it difficult to manually rotate the shutter past the stops. The belt was glued into the groove, but the glue seems to have failed. The belt was easily pulled from the groove and there was a black powder remaining.

During this time the belt was re-glued and the system checked in good working order.

060810 -- 060905: At RSMAS for Calibration. The ISAR-04 was transported to RSMAS in Miami for calibration before the check the system and calibrate prior to shipping to Japan. However, serious electronic problems prevented the calibration. The encoder failed to point the drum properly. A power chip failed. As a result, the calibration was aborted. Because the intercomparison with M-AERI was successful the pre-cruise calibration was not absolutely necessary.
060912 -- 060919: At RMRCO for extensive repair. The ISAR was shipped to RMRCO for repair. Several serious problems were corrected. Most importantly, the Conxall plug that connects to the drum electronics was poorly wired, no tension relief of heat shrink, so the wires broke in the plug and shorted. This blew out the power chip and made the drum circuit faulty. Also, a nut inside the encoder came off of its bolt and was rattling around inside. We had to disassemble the entire drum-encoder assembly in order to make the repair. Note: these are problems in quality that came from the fabrication of the instrument and need to be addressed.
MISMO CRUISE

060929 -- 061004: Install on the R/V Mirai. The system was installed on the R/V Mirai. At this time (060930) it is operating properly and the Iridium SBD messages are being received properly.

The R/V Mirai bow, showing the Foremast on which the ISAR system is mounted.

Detail of the Foremast top platform. The ISAR is mounted on the right, facing the port side of the ship. The Iridium Junction box is mounted on the ISAR fram and is mounted inside. The iridium antenna is mounted on the front rail of the platform on the port side (right in the photo here).

The Junction Box (Jbox) is mounted on the same ISAR frame.

The inside of the Iridium Jbox. The system is powered by ship AC power (orange wire) 100 VAC, 50 Hz. The battery provides backup power for ISAR in the event of power loss. The battery will power ISAR for at least two days. The black module is the NAL iridium SBD modem and the "Adam" modules convert between RS232 ans RS-422 for long distance serial connections between the foremast and the meteorology lab in the ship.

061004 -- 061015: MISMO experiment Ship the ISAR-04 system to Sekinihama, Japan. Install the system with SCS on the R/V Mirai and operate during the passage from Sekinihama to Singapore.
061015 -- 061128: MISMO mr06-5-1 Operate the system during the MISMO main experiment. Depart Sekinehama Japan, 2006-10-4. The system operated without fail for the entire cruise but failed on the final day. The shutter belt failed. Belt repairs were made and the ISAR was re-installed. Chief scientist disembarked at Male, Maldives Islands.
061129 -- 061217: MISMO mr06-5-2 From Màle to Singapore. ISAR-04 operated in autonomous mode. Data indicates the black body heater had failed.
061219 -- 070117: End MISMO cruise. Mirai returns to Sekinehama, Japan. The ISAR-04 and related hardware were removed and returned to RMRCO.
20070120 -- MAINTENANCE Major repairs were required. Replaced the shutter belt. Repaired the heater wire.
20070513 -- TESTING Major repairs were required. The ISAR-04 is under test at RMRCO, Brookhaven NY.
20070306 -- Ready to deploy. The ISAR-04 is fully operational.
20070513 -- Iridium SBD upgrade. Move the laptop PC into the junction box. Upgrade the PC software with Expect software. Burn-in.
070802 -- CALIBRATION AT RSMAS
The ISAR-04 was shipped to RSMAS and placed in front of the bath. This calibration was unique because it uses the real-time data collection program called "G".
The Configuration File is read by ISAR during its startup.
The Setup File is used by the averaging program during the real time operation.
The figure to the left shows the results from the real-time processing. The bath was allowed to settle to the target temperature. During the time of the calibration points, bath changes are of the order 0.001. By altering the calibration parameters, Acorr and CalOffset, an optimum fit to the calibration bath data is achieved.
Acorr = 1.008, Offset = 0.08 C.
20070809 -- JINGU MARU INSTALLATION The Iridium Real-time system and ISAR-04 was installed on M/V JINGU MARU in Newark NJ. Michael Reynolds, assisted by Elliot Peper, boarded JMU with a the repaired and calibrated ISAR-04. It was misting rain and this made work on the deck very difficult. It was just enough that the ORG was turning on and off. We noticed that there was significant moisture in the ORG IR source, the little box held away from the main housing. We removed the ORG and opened the source box. All moisture was wiped out and the box resealed. It might be a good idea to give the ORG major maintenance in the very near future.
The IBM T30 laptop was installed in the SBD case. The expect program G version 07 was installed. Everything was working well except that the ORG voltage never dropped below the threshold. The ISAR configuration file had a rain threshold of 60 mV. The ORG was always above this level. We were running out of time and the mist increased. Therefore we took a chance that all was well and as soon as the rain stopped the ISAR shutter would open. We disembarked at about 4pm, just before the ship sailed.
As it turns out, the ORG output never dropped below the 60 mV threshold. Therefore, on this entire cruise the iridium system reported ship position each 30 min very reliably but the ISAR never opened to take a sea temperature. This cruise was lost.

20071009 -- JINGU MARU SERVICE ISAR-04

The trackline of the JINGU MARU since the last update of the Iridium transmissions. Transmissions occur each half hour and the success rate on all attempted packet transmissions is of the order

20071119 -- JINGU MARU SERVICE ISAR-04, Portland OR
Michael Reynolds (with jeremiah Reynolds) visited the ship in Portland OR. Minimal service was required. A crashed program (isrtsb.pl) was rebooted and it seems to be working well. The Captain was instructed in the procedure to reset the software. Trip Report
20080124 -- REMOVE ISAR04, Portland OR
The ISAR04 was removed and returned to Seattle for post calibration after checkout. The instrument was in good outward condition.
20080131 -- System checkout and calibration
ISAR04 was checked in the lab and found to be in good condition. One issue is that the unplugged ORG voltage is 0.56 V, too high. Usually it is of the order 0.05 V.
20080203 -- CALIBRATION AT APL

We began the post-calibration at UW APL calibration bath (Jessup).
Acorr = 0.950, Offset = 0.12 C.
20080328 -- Maintenance at RMR Co. We were preparing to deploy on the icebreaker Polar Sea but at the last minute the drum froze. The encoder was suspected but the problem turned out to be salt buildup and corrosion in the rain shield that clamps over the drum.
20081010 -- Maintenance at RMR Co. Undertake a complete service in preparation for Polar Sea cruise.
(1) Remove end caps, shells, and threaded rods.
(2) Condition of scan drum and shutter motor trains: the unit is clean and has no apparent damage.
__Remove gear housing to expose the blackbodies and the scan drum. __Remove CompactFlash. The current size of ISARDATA.DAT is 60.5 MB. Copy and clear data file.
(3) Connect the terminal and power on. __Verify the operation of the shutter and scan drum. __Quit and go to the proto111 program. __E command check alignment: 280, 325, 0, 180 degrees.
20081014 -- CALIBRATION AT APL

The calibration bath was cycled between 5-30 degC in 2 deg steps. The plot here compares the bath temperature with the computed temperature from the real-time averaging program G08d. The best results use an interpolation coefficient of 1.012 and a final offset of 0.08 degC.
Acorr = 1.012, Offset = 0.08 C.

20081015-17 -- Install ISAR04 on the USCG Icebreaker POLAR SEA


The USCG Polar Sea. ISAR is mounted on the bridge roof. It is above the top rail, just to the right of the port satelite radome.	The ISAR is mounted well above the bridge roof apron with a view forward, approximately 30 degrees left of forward.	The ISAR and junction box are mounted on two steel unistrut rails that are attached to the front apron.	The laptop controls the ISAR and operates the Iridium modem in the Junction box. Two serial lines, to the ISAR and to the Iridium SBD modem, are converted from RS232 to RS422 balanced serial for long line connections. The Linux PC is running an Expect program that coordinates running applications including Kermit for serial communication and a PERL program for averaging the ISAR data to 10-minute averages.

20081022 -- FINAL VISIT TO POLAR SEA The rain shroud over the scan drum was installed. RMR gave training to MST1 Aquino. The data averaging setup file was updated. The interpolation parameter is 1.012 and the offset is 0.08 degC.
20081023 -- POLAR SEA SAILS AT 0930 APPROX.
20081202 -- Belt jams The data indicates the belt jammed. Too bad. The belts are a major problem.
20090813 -- ISAR04 repair at RMR Co. We expect to deploy this unit on the M/V Andromeda Leader in two weeks. I am in a panic to get a new belt and get the calibration at APL. The belt is an ongoing problem. The belt clearance is of utmost importance.

20090826 -- CALIBRATION AT APL

The calibration bath was cycled between 5-35 degC in 5 deg steps. The plot here compares the bath temperature with the computed temperature from the real-time averaging program G08d. The best results use an interpolation coefficient of 1.008 and a final offset of 0.08 degC.

Acorr = 1.010, Offset = 0.100 C.

20090910 -- ISAR04 QA check

The figure here is a comparison between ISAR 04 reported data and the best SSTs from Buoyweather.com.

20090916, 0515112 -- ISAR stops reporting At position 31.993436 -171.845955 we received the last transmission from Andromeda Leader.

20091018 -- Visit Andromeda Leader in Jacksonville RMR drove down from Charleston to Jacksonville to meet Andromeda Leader. Third Officer Greatwin Sodsai Santhiya and Chief Officer Anil discussed their excellent care of the instrument. Apparently the PC stopped communicating with the ISAR and the NAL modem after a huge rain event.

PC was rebooted and all system came on line in good order. DATA folder was downloaded. Time check showed PC time error < 1 sec. Available HD space was 15.4 GB.

The drum angles were bad. Something had altered the encoder settings. Lightning? After some testing it seems the encoder was in error by exactly 180 deg. The file ISARCONF.ICF file was downloaded to the PC. The then encoder reference (line 75) was set to 180 deg and modified file was uploaded back to ISAR. The data now seem to be good although it is impossible to confirm an exact alignment without having the system open on the bench.

Begin full operation at approx 1800Z.

20100207 -- Crockett CA Remove I04 from Andromeda Leader RMR met AL in Crockett (near San Francisco) to remove and replace with Isar01. The shutter was in the open position. Otherwise all looks good. I04 was operating properly but the IBM thinkpad had failed. Probably due to faulty battery. After a charge the computer came on.

20100304, Seattle WA -- Service notes.
We are focussing on the shutter mechanism. Hugh Milburn visited RMR Co., to review the mechanical design and specifically to address jamming in the shutter mechanism. Overall the design was rated very good. There is a problem with the shutter where in that the situation of aluminum sliding over aluminum is not good. Given any opportunity the shutter ring can bind - and that is exactly what happens.

On any rain event two things occur: the scan drum rotates into the housing to protect the viewing hole and the shutter slowly closes. We decided that we will try one cruise without the shutter motor connected. MAERI has operated quite well for years at a time without a shutter, but with regular service and mirror replacement.

We will calibrate I04 as is and put it on AL for two round trips. The shutter will be hand operated. Instructions for operation of the shutter will be developed.

20100311 -- CALIBRATION AT APL

The isar was calibrated at the APL bath. Isar made 10-min averages, the bath made on average of 30 min. Acorr = 1.008, Offset = 0.015 C.

20100716 -- ISAR04 Calibration at Univ. Wash. APL, Bad BB thermistor readings.
I04 was taken to UW-APL (Jessup) bath for a second confirming calibration. However, the test was aborted because we found that the BB thermistor readings were inconsistent. It might be a problem with bad contacts. The system was returned to RMR Co. and opened up. Connectors were examined and tightened down.

I04 was set aside for a thorough clean and preparation for the next deployment on September 23.

20100915 -- ISAR04 COMPLETE CHECKOUT, REPAIR SHUTTER GEAR.

Andromeda is coming to Newark on Sep 23-24. ISAR01 is operating on the ship and seems to be happy. It was decided to skip this visit. We now have time to give ISAR04 a complete review.
1. Inspect all cables and connectors.
2. IRT alignment test with the pin hole tube. No adjustments needed.
3. Through scan drum alignment test with a paper wrapped around the shutter slot.
4. Modified the shutter gear, see below.

On a hunch I had our machinist cut the shutter gear width from 8.5 mm to 5 mm. Before, the gear width was barely less than the belt slot. I decided that the reason the shutter jammed was that with the barest cant the gear would jam against the wall of the slot. A thinner gear gives some lateral clearance. The modification was a success and now the shutter operates perfectly.

20100915 -- NEW FIBERGLAS FRAME

We have fabricated a new fiberglas frame for the isar system.

20100915 -- NEW DATA ACQUISITION SYSTEM -- DAQ3

We have developed a new data system for ISAR on VOS. The new design is ethernet based and includes a GPS.

20101009 -- CALIBRATION AT APL

The isar was calibrated at the APL bath. Isar made 10-min averages, the bath made on average of 30 min. Acorr = 1.0175, Offset = 0.060 C.

20101013 -- SECOND CALIBRATION AT APL

The isar was calibrated a second time at the APL bath. This time the isar made 10-min averages and the bath produced 5 min averages over a 30-min period. Acorr = 1.0175 and Offset = 0.060 C.

20101018 -- CALIBRATION SUMMARY

I went back over all calibrations, used the same software techniques, and produced the following table.

DATE	ACORR	OFFSET	MEAN	STD	DESCRIPTION
070802	1.008	0.000	0.015	0.060	RSMAS.
080203	0.950	0.120	0.011	0.023	APL.
081014	1.012	0.080	0.002	0.016	APL.
090826	1.010	0.010	0.009	0.011	APL.
100311	1.008	0.015	0.003	0.011	APL.
100714					RSMAS. Failed. Bad ADC.
101009	1.0175	0.060	0.008	0.049	APL.
101013	1.0175	0.060	0.004	0.026	APL.

Last Edit: 20101018

Explorer of the Seas, Intercomparison with M-AERI

Shutter Belt Jam, Electronic Repair Required