Reports until 08:47, Tuesday 24 October 2023
H1 PSL
jason.oberling@LIGO.ORG - posted 08:47, Tuesday 24 October 2023 (73684)
Remote PMC Beam Alignment Tweak

This morning I remotely tweaked the beam alignment into the PMC.  With the ISS OFF (note, the diffracted power % was ~3.1%, a little high, so I adjusted this later), I started with PMC Trans of ~108.8 W and PMC Refl of ~16.1 W.  Using the picomotor-controlled mounts I tweaked the alignment to max the PMC Trans and minimize PMC Refl.  Once done, still with the ISS OFF, we now have a PMC Trans of ~109.0 W and a PMC Refl of ~15.7 W.  I turned the ISS back ON and, seeing the higher than normal diffracted power % noted earlier, I adjusted the ISS RefSignal to get the diffracted power % back to ~2.5%; this necessitated a RefSignal change from -1.97 V to -1.99 V.  With the ISS ON we now have a PMC Trans of ~109.4 W and a PMC Refl of ~15.7 W (moving between 15.7 W and 15.8 W).

While I was hoping for move improvement in PMC Trans and Refl, I was only expecting the small change I was able to achieve.  To my mind this means it's getting close to time to adjust the operating currents of the amplifier pump diodes.  Will continue to monitor.