Previous: Station Reports
Up: Station Reports
Next: Jodrell Bank
Previous Page: Station Reports
Next Page: Jodrell Bank

Bonn Correlator

Burgess asked how many hours the MkIII heads had been in use. Graham replied around 0.5 years continuous use (4000 hours). Apparently the rate of head wear depends on the humidity of the working environment. Orfei confirmed a similar lifetime for heads in Italy. Spencer asked how many play-back units were now in use at the correlator and was told there were 6. A standby play-back unit was waiting for new heads. Burgess noted that three recorders were on order for the geodesy correlator and Schilizzi asked how much they had cost but this was not known. Burgess enquired about the error rates on Penny & Giles playback units as compared to the Mk4 drives. Graham replied that originally they were comparable but that the Mk4 drives had now been optimized. However, the P&G drives could probably be improved likewise.

Porcas reported that 7mm was difficult to operate on the Effelsberg telescope but that improvements were on the way. Schilizzi enquired how long it might be before it became more reliable but was told that no fixed date was known. Spencer asked if 408MHz was available and was told by Graham that the answer was yes but it needed more work. Schilizzi noted that 327 and 408MHz were surprisingly clear of interference at least at night. Foley explained that at Westerbork much of the problem was due to aircraft training flights. The bands were clear during lunch as well as at night!