Session Notes for rd1003 Prepared by K. Baver, NVI, Inc./GSFC Schedule date: 2010-Apr-07 In 2009, four R&D sessions, RD0907 through RD0910, tested a proposed, new strategy for scheduling the IVS-INT01 sessions that provide rapid, preliminary UT1 estimates. The purpose of the proposed strategy was to improve the precision of these estimates. In 2010, a second series of R&D sessions will supplement the initial testing of the strategy. Details are given below. The new series started with RD1001, and RD1003 is the third session in the series. We divide the seven stations in this session into two subnets which are scheduled independently: 1.) The first subnet is the intensive network of Kokee-Wettzell. This will start at 19:11, after the conclusion of the IVS-INT01 session on April 7, and end at 17:11 on April 8. 2.) The second subnet is NyAlesund, Onsala, Tigo, Tsukuba, and Westford. This runs from 17:30 on April 7 to 17:30 on April 8. The Kokee-Wettzell network is scheduled as a series of 22 consecutive, independent intensives using alternating strategies. A) STANDARD INTENSIVES. The intensives that start within even hours (e.g., 20:11, 22:11, 00:11... etc) are scheduled using the standard intensive sources and scheduling strategy. B) TEST INTENSIVES. The intensives that start within odd hours (e.g., 19:11, 21:11, 23:11, 01:11, ... etc) are scheduled using an enlarged source list. Unlike 24 hour sessions, which can observe the whole sky, intensives can observe only a small slice of the sky, and this slice varies depending on when the intensive starts and the time of the year. Because of this, the results from the sessions might depend on what part of the sky is observed. In the first series of R&D sessions, RD0907 through RD0910, the start times were chosen so that the intensives would be consistent between sessions. The STANDARD INTENSIVES always looked at a part of the sky sampled by STANDARD INTENSIVES in other sessions. The TEST INTENSIVES looked at a part of the sky observed by TEST INTENSIVES in other sessions. To control for the fact that each of the STANDARD and TEST INTENSIVE series observed only half of the sky in the previous series, we swap things around in the new series. Each STANDARD INTENSIVE will observe a slice of the sky previously observed by a TEST INTENSIVE, and vice-versa. The five station network observes independently and serves as an independent external check on EOP. The GSFC analysis center will analyze the 22 pseudo intensive sessions with a view towards determining if one of the scheduling strategies is better in terms of things like: lower formal errors; better agreement with independent measures of UT1; and robustness of the schedule. The schedule uses the standard R1 256 data-rate. =========================================================== ----- Parameter listing -------------------------------------- Experiment: RD1003 Description R&D-03 2010. Intensive test Scheduler: NASA Correlator: WASH Start: 2010-097-17:30:00 End: 2010-098-17:30:00 Current yyyyddd: 2010097 (2010.27) ( 15294 MJD, WED. 7APR.) Greenwich sidereal time: 6:33: 0.00 (17:30: 0 UT) Sun's RA and DEC: 1h 5.6m 6d 58.8 =========================================================== First observations Observation listing from file ./rd1003.skd for experiment RD1003 Source Start DURATIONS name yyddd-hhmmss Kk Ny On Tc Ts Wf Wz 0134+311 10097-173000| 500 500 500 500 | 2000+472 10097-173925| 70 86 30 86 | 0804+499 10097-174256| 85 167 47 167 | 1958-179 10097-174506| 72 72 | 1739+522 10097-174717| 37 79 30 79 | 2229+695 10097-174928| 62 119 45 119 | 1357+769 10097-175220| 101 131 39 131 | 0602+673 10097-175712| 99 198 83 198 | 0059+581 10097-180130| 36 68 34 68 | 2356+385 10097-180242| 36 36 | . . . 1800+440 10097-191100| 40 40| 0307+380 10097-191259| 120 120| 0059+581 10097-191359| 36 68 38 68 | 0014+813 10097-191550| 52 52| 2307+106 10097-191552| 500 482 500 | 0134+311 10097-191738| 200 200| NRAO512 10097-191739| 32 32 | 0641+392 10097-192015| 122 122 | 0059+581 10097-192142| 99 99| 1520+437 10097-192426| 175 175| 2229+695 10097-192459| 63 121 46 121 | 0134+311 10097-192755| 500 500 500 500 | 1617+229 10097-192759| 167 167| 1357+769 10097-193141| 76 76| 3C418 10097-193344| 40 40| End of listing. =========================================================== Last observations Observation listing from file ./rd1003.skd for experiment RD1003 Source Start DURATIONS name yyddd-hhmmss Kk Ny On Tc Ts Wf Wz 0059+581 10098-165931| 95 95| 2356+385 10098-170143| 103 103| 1739+522 10098-170416| 37 77 30 77 | 1739+522 10098-170435| 58 58| 1418+546 10098-170613| 40 40| 0059+581 10098-170756| 96 96| 0134+311 10098-170801| 500 500 500 500 | 2356+385 10098-171009| 103 103| 0458-020 10098-171725| 500 500 500 500 | 2214+350 10098-172706| 77 116 30 116 | 1958-179 10098-172828| 72 72 | End of listing. =========================================================== SKED Summary from file ./rd1003.skd for experiment RD1003 (all scans with at least one subnet station) Average number of obs. per baseline per source(normalized by up-time) = 2.1 Min = 0.0 Max = 78.5 (Baseline Kk-Wz on 3C274 ) RMS = 6.9 Total time: 1440 minutes ( 24.0 hours). Key: Kk=KOKEE Ny=NYALES20 On=ONSALA60 Tc=TIGO Ts=TSUKUB32 Wf=WESTFORD Wz=WETTZELL Kk Ny On Tc Ts Wf Wz Avg % obs. time: 58 56 70 52 16 67 58 54 % cal. time: 6 4 3 1 3 3 6 4 % slew time: 20 19 21 3 9 14 11 14 % idle time: 14 20 5 43 70 14 23 27 total # scans: 553 329 274 117 246 284 553 336 # scans/hour : 23 14 11 5 10 12 23 14 Avg scan (sec): 91 148 222 388 57 205 91 171 # data tracks: 16 16 16 16 16 16 16 # Mk5 tracks: 16 16 16 16 16 16 16 Total GBytes: 1818 1748 2191 1632 507 2099 1818 1688 Total GB(M5): 1616 1554 1948 1451 451 1866 1616 1500 # of tapes : 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 0.1 1.0 1.0 tape change times (hhmm): Total number of tapes: 6.1 Total GBytes (M5) recorded: 10500.3 # OF OBSERVATIONS BY BASELINE | Kk Ny On Tc Ts Wf Wz StnTotal --------------------------------------------- Kk| 0 0 0 0 0 553 553 Ny| 259 83 230 253 0 825 On| 96 161 247 0 763 Tc| 11 106 0 296 Ts| 165 0 567 Wf| 0 771 Wz| 553 Number of 2-station scans: 633 Number of 3-station scans: 71 Number of 4-station scans: 218 Number of 5-station scans: 1 Number of 6-station scans: 0 Number of 7-station scans: 0 Total # of scans, observations: 923 2164 ===========================================================