Reports until 13:46, Thursday 24 July 2014
H1 PSL (PSL)
indigo.doll@LIGO.ORG - posted 13:46, Thursday 24 July 2014 (12968)
Work Summary
Considering it is my last day, I decided I should write up a summary of what I have been doing this summer.

Summary:
The lid of the laser was put on too early, alarm should be put in place at 70% relative humidity inside the laser to warn of a leak.

Details:
In the laser room, there was a leak on 7/1. When I looked into it, there were no clear indicators in the Laser Room temperatures or relative humidity levels, but I finally found the right channel inside of the laser box. The relative humidity inside the laser box usually stays around 40% has never gone over 60% in the last two years until this leak, when it spiked at about 85%. After the initial leak, the humidity went way down to about 35% because we removed the lid and really dried it out, but once we replaced it, the humidity jumped way back up again. We must have put the lid on too early, but it is slowly drying out. Today, the humidity is sitting at about 60%.

In the attached photos, the first one is a plot of the relative humidity in the laser box over the last two years, and you can see it only gets close to 60% one time (excluding the leak). The second picture is from the leak until now. You can see in this one the first peak is the leak, then it goes way down because we dried it out, and suddenly peaked again. My guess is that we put the lid back on too early, and it may still need to dry out more.

I believe the slow up and down trends in the humidity are due to the changing seasons. It tends to be more humid in the summer and less humid in the winter.

Summary:
In order to reduce temperature differences between commissioning mode and science mode, we should keep the temperature in the laser room at about 22.8 degrees C to keep it consistent with science mode temperatures which are much harder to change.

Details:
In the most recent switch from commissioning mode to science mode at 2:00 PM on 7/14, there was a difference of about 3 degrees C in the Laser Room, which is better than previous switches which have had a 4-5 degree difference. The changes are more significant on the temperature sensors on the table than the ones in the air conditioner. My assumption is that this is because the air conditioner keeps them cooler most of the time until they are shut off during science mode. The temperature inside of the laser only changes by less than 1 degree C, and seems to only be slightly affected.

The third picture attached is a plot of the four temperature sensors in the Laser Room during a transition from commissioning mode to science mode. The two graphs on the left are in the air conditioning units in the Laser Room, and the two on the right are on the table. I think the sensors on the table should be moved to the floor to prevent other factors from affecting them.

I also believe the names for the PSL environment sensors may have been mixed up, the thermometer on the south side of the table is closer to the laser box and generally is a few degrees warmer, but it is labeled as north, so this should be looked into.
Images attached to this report