Following the problem with contamination particles observed in the the Leybold thermovac TTR 91, we have taken the following step to clean the gauge:

1. Wipe with IPA-wetted Vectra Alpha: Cover the tip of a ziptide with Vectra Alpha wipe corner that has been wetted with IPA, push the wipe around and remove visible particulates
2. Fill the gauge flange with IPA: (following Jon's recommendation to use Lesker's procedure for cleaning their Pirani gauge), flip the gauge up such that the CF flange points upward, fill the flange with IPA all the way up. Use the tip of a SSTL tweezer to agitate the IPA. Let it sits for 20 minutes, agitate every 5 minutes. After 20 minutes, pour the IPA out then spray with dry pure nitrogen
3. Passive drying : Let the gauge sit inside the flowbench for 3 hours (3:30 pm to 6:30 pm)to ensure all IPA has evaporated
4. Baking : Leave the gauge in oven at 50 degree C for 48 hours (maximum allowed temperature is 65 deg C, we use 50 deg C to ensure we are well below this limit). Baking started at 7pm, should finish on Sunday 7pm and ready for assembling to vacuum chamber on Monday morning

Pressure Measured Before Removing Gauge 2.31 E-7 Torr.

Went in and turned on the heating tape in increments of 30 degC until 120 degC was reached. I will let it equilibrate over night and then asses whether or not the chamber can be raised to 150 degC without having the flange to the turbo pump reach over 120 degC as it is not recommended for that flange to be any hotter.

If it can safely be raised to 150 degC, then only 2 days of baking is necessary. If 120 degC is the bake temperature, a week will be needed.

Below is the procedure we will follow to assemble the FROSTI prototype.

1. Install SS guide rods and bottom Macor spacers in bottom reflector
2. Install AlN elements on top of bottom Macor spacers
3. Install upper Macor spacers on top of AlN elements
4. Feed unterminated power and RTD leads through slots in upper reflector
5. Install upper reflector, using guide rods to slowly lower into position
6. Install vented SS bolts for reflectors; Macor bolts for heater elements
7. Remove SS guide rods
8. Bundle power and sensing cable with PEEK cable ties and SS cable mounts
9. Terminate power and sensing cable bundles with PEEK DB25M connectors

[Luke, Luis, Michael]

cleaning cleanroom and particle count

• 8:30 am: started particle count
  • zone 3:
    • 0.3 u: 1195
    • 0.5 u: 177
    • 1.0 u: 132
• zone 4:
  • 0.3 u: 619
  • 0.5 u: 0
  • 1.0 u: 0
• 9:00 am: began surface check and wipedown, including softwalls
• 9:35 am: started vacuuming the floor
• 9:43 am: finished vacuuming the floor
• 9:45 am: started mopping the floor
• 9:55 am: finished mopping the floor
• 9:56 am: started cleaning the buckets
• 10:00 am: started mopping with IPA wipes
• 10:05 am: finished mopping with IPA wipes
• 10:20m: started particle count
  • zone 3:
    • 0.3 u: 2213
    • 0.5 u: 398
    • 1.0 u: 0
• zone 4:
  • 0.3 u: 1150
  • 0.5 u: 177
  • 1.0 u: 44

Today we started vacuum chamber assembly work

• 10:16 am: Particle count measurement of clean room
• 10:34 am: Particle counting finished: meets ISO 5 standard
  1. Zone 3 :
     • 0.3 u: 3159
     • 0.5 u: 789
     • 1.0 u: 83
  2. Zone 4 :
     • 0.3 u: 498
     • 0.5 u: 41
     • 1.0 u: 0
• 10:45 am: Assemble vacuum feedthrough
• 11:08 am: Finish assembling feedthrough
• 11:14 am: Assemble inverted magnetron pirani gauge
• 11:29 am: Finish assembling magnetron gauge
• 11:31 am: Assemble calibrated Ar Leak
• 11:47 am: Finish assembling Ar leak
• 11:49 am: Assemble up to up-to-air valve
• 11:59 am: Finish assembling up-to-air valve
• 12:00 pm: Break for Lunch
• 1:00 pm: Came back from lunch
• 1:20 pm: Assemble 45 degree elbow [RGA Line]
• 1:35 pm: Finish assembling 45 degree elbow
• 1:35 pm: Assemble Reducing nipple [Pump Line]
• 1:49 pm: Finish assembling Reducing nipple

• 1:53 pm: Attempt to install gate valve [Pump line] but bolts could not fit to the gap between 2.5" reducing nipple (0.95" length, shortest 5/16 bolt is 1.5" in total length).
  Thickness of of CF flange on reducing nipple is 0.75" inch. Ideally, we want to have 0.2" engagement to the gate valve, thus0.95" + 0.25" head thickness = 1.2" > 0.95" gap.
  We thus most likely will need a replacement for the reducing nipple. We decided we would hold up on installing the rest of the pump line until we have got components to fix this problem

• 2:05 pm: Assemble gate valve [RGA line]
• 2:15 pm: Finish assembling gate valve [RGA line]
• 2:18 pm: Assemble 4-way cross [RGA line]
• 2:30 pm: Finish assembling 4- way cross [RGA line]
• 2:37 pm: Assemble manual bellow sealed angle valve [RGA line]
• 2:43 pm: Finish assembling sealed angle valve [RGA line]
• 2:45 pm: Assemble inverted magnetron pirani gauge [RGA line]
• 2:55 pm: Finish assembling magnetron pirani gauge [RGA line]
• 2:56 pm: Assemble vacuum hose, thin wall [RGA line]
• 3:04 pm: Finish assembling vacuum hose, thin wall [RGA line]
• 3:45 pm: Packing up for the the day
• 4:00 pm: End-of-date particle count measurement
  1. Zone 3
     • 0.3 u: 1080
     • 0.5 u: 124
     • 1.0 u: 83
  2. Zone 4
     • 0.3 u: 540
     • 0.5 u: 83
     • 1.0 u: 83

[Pamella, Cao and Julian, Shane]

• Particles account
• 10:37 am: Starting the particles account
1. Zone 3:
   • 0.3u: 1662
   • 0.5u: 872
   • 1.0u: 415
2. Zone 4:
   • 0.3u: 831
   • 0.5u: 124
   • 1.0u: 0
• 11:14 am: Start removal of calibrated leak to install 45 deg elbow
• 11:21 am: Elbow installed, re-install calibrated leak back on
• 11:29 am: Finished re-install calibrated leak, start installing gate valve on pump line
• 11:47 am: Finished installing gate valve, start installing reducing cross onto gate valve
• 12:02 pm: Finished installing reducing cross, start installing 90 deg elbow to reducing cross
• 12:17 pm: Finished installing reducing cross, lunch break
• 01:24 pm: Come back to the lunch break.
• 01:26 pm: Start installing vacuum hose to elbow.
• 01:40 pm: Finished installing vacuum hose.
• 01:43 pm: Start installing turbo pump.
• 02:00 pm: finished installing turbo pump .
• 02:10 pm: Start installing standard wall hose from turbo pump to scroll pump
• 02:21 pm: finished installing hose onto scroll pump, start installing lid. Remove lid from chamber, insert viton O-ring. Place lid back
• 02:30 pm: Secure lids with screw. Start installing turbo pump controller cable: Pass cable from outside (controller) up the top of clean tent and connect to 8 pin connector on turbo pump
• 03:00 pm: Installing air cooling unit for turbo pump, found 8 M3 screws for air cooling unit in the C&B cabinet to install the fan bracket onto the back of turbo pump. Fan control cable is routed up to the top of the cleanroom to the controller
• 03:15 pm: Installing full-range gauge cable to the controller outside cleanroom. Ethernet cables 1 and 2 are used. Cable 1 is used on the RGA line gauge. Cable 2 is connected to the main body gauge. Cable1 and 2 are connected controller's channel 1 and 2 respectively.
• 04:00 pm: Finish installing gauges cables. Cables are routed up along the frame to the controller sitting outside the cleanroom
• 04:15 pm: Finished. End-of-date particle count
  1. Zone 3:
     • 0.3u: 3699
     • 0.5u: 1454
     • 1.0u: 872
  2. Zone 4:
     • 0.3u: 1662
     • 0.5u: 706
     • 1.0u: 290

This afternoon I made up a green 10 AWG grounding cable and connected it to the vacuum system.

One end is tightly connected to the bottom flange of the vacuum chamber (photo 1). It is run along and up the table framing to the top of the cleanroom, where it exits into the overhead cable tray in the same location as the other power cables. It drops down from the top of the server rack all the way to the bottom, where the other end is connected to the lab's electrical ground in the rear of the 240 V UPS (photo 2).

The connections were confirmed to be secure, but continuity testing with an ohmmeter remains to be done to confirm that the chamber and tabletop are indeed grounded.

[Cao]

Continuity Test

• Chamber wall to optical table: continuity confirmed, resistance: 0 Ohm
• Chamber wall to ground point connection on chamber: continuity confirmed, resistance: 0 Ohm
• Turbo pump to ground point connection on chamber: continuity confirmed, resistance: 0 Ohm
• Turbo pump to optical table: continuity confirmed, resistance: 0 Ohm
• Optical table to chassis frame outside cleanroom: continuity confirmed, resistance: 0 Ohm
• Front of chassis frame to earth point: continuity confirmed, resistance: 0 Ohm

After Jon's comment yesterday that some of the connection did not seem to have good metal-metal contact, in particular the gate valve connection, I went through the ConFlat connections today and retighten them. I found a lot of the CF connections are not particularly tightened and there were a lot of range left that can be tightened with the wrench. After re-tightening, the copper gaskets are not visible anymore. For example, see the attached images for the difference before and after tightening.

Note for future installation of CF

• After tightening the bolts/ screws in jumping order (to provide uniform torque) and there is resistance appearing in further tightening, start going through each screw/ bolts in a direction, each time applying a small torque until it resists to further tightened
• After each time going all the bolts/ screw and returning to the starting point, one will find they can further tighten the screws/ bolts. Repeat the process until no further tightening can be achieved
• The copper gasket should not be clearly visible at the connection

[Julian, Cao]

• 03:00 pm: Particle count
  1. : Zone 3
     • 0.3 um: 498
     • 0.5 um: 124
     • 1 um: 124
  2. : Zone 4
     • 0.3 um: 748
     • 0.5 um: 457
     • 1 um: 374
• 03:32 pm: Installing Pirani gauge onto pump line
• 03:51 pm: Finish installing Pirani gauge, start installing RGA probe
• 04:03 pm: Finish installing PRGA probe, start routing cable from gauge controller to Pirani gauge
• 04:30 pm: All ethernet cables are routed and connected to gauge controllers
• 04:48 pm: Power gauge controller up, all gauges are recognised and readout shows atmospheric pressure as expected (1000 mbar)
• 04:51 pm: End-of-work particle count
  1. : Zone 3
     • 0.3 um: 1413
     • 0.5 um: 872
     • 1 um: 623
  2. : Zone 4
     • 0.3 um: 374
     • 0.5 um: 166
     • 1 um: 166

[Jon, Cao]

1. Re-routing of cables

We re-routed the connections between the turbo pump and its fan to the controller. Instead of going through the side of the server rack, they are now routed along the the cable tray and came down from the top of the server rack.

2. Planning for vacuum assembly re-configuration

• Move the entire RGA arm to the mirrored CF port, where the Up-to-Air valve is at
• Move the Up-to-Air valve to the calibrated leak port
• Move the calibrated Ar leak the main chamber full-range gauge port
• Move the full-range gauge to the RGA line port

3. First test pump-down

1. With all valves closed, we started scroll pump, pump line quickly got down to 6.08 mbar from atmospheric 1000 mbar (measured by Pirani gauge, channel 3 on controller )
2. We open Lesker angled valve and let the RGA arm pumped down, Pirani gauge read 6.3 mbar while the full-range guage on RGA line reads 4.9 mbar ( channel 1 on controller )
3. We open the pump line gate to expose the pump to the main volume, all gaugues readout immediate rise back up 1000 mbar. After 3 minutes, we started to see channel 3 slowly dropped down. A minute later channel 1 and 2 (main body) also dropped down. The slow pressure dropping speed and 6.3 mbar measured earlier got us suspected that there is some large leaks
4. We proceed to tighten all the ports as the vacuum is pumped down. In particular, we found that large feedthrough port still required a lot of tightening up
5. As we tighten up all the ports, after 40 minutes, the gauges are now
   • Channel 1 : RGA line full-range gauge: 2.55E-1 mbar
   • Channel 2 : Main chamber full-range gauge: 2.60E-1 mbar
   • Channel 3 : Pump line Pirani gauge: 2.94E-1 mbar
   Compare this to the scroll pump manual , Table 1, page 3, the ultimate pressure of the scroll pump is 2.5E-1 Torr (3.3E-1 mbar), we thus managed to achieve scroll pump ultimate pressure
6. Turn on turbo pump : Change turbo pump controller from REMOTE to FRONT PANEL mode by pressing both "COUNTERS" and "MEASURE" buttons at the same time, select "MODE=FRONT"
7. Shorting interlock pin: since we do not have an interlock signal for the controller, use the provided DB-9 connector that has pin 3 and 8 shorted and connect this to the P1 IN connection at the rear of the controller (see attachment 1 )
8. Press "START" on the controller to start the turbo pump
9. The pressure readout from the gauges quickly dropped down. After 3 minutes, the Pirani range is maxed out at 0.5E-3 mbar. After 20 minutes, we recorded the following values:
   • Channel 1 : RGA line full-range gauge: 1.50E-5 mbar
   • Channel 2 : Main chamber full-range gauge: 1.89E-5 mbar
   • Channel 3 : Pump line Pirani gauge: 5.0E-4 mbar
   This is Medium vacuum , we want to further reduce this by 2 orders of magnitude. However, we can run RGA test + helium leak test at this pressure
10. Turn off turbo pump, wait for 10 minutes, turn off scroll pump, open Up-to-Air valve, all pressure gauges indicated pressure returned back to atmospheric pressure

3. To-do actions

• Run RGA test to get information about contamination status of vacuum
• Implement suggested changes in section 2
• Check and modify suspected poor connection: Pirani gauge on pump line. A gap can be seen between connection. There's no good way to tighten it with the screw. Maybe use threaded pin + hex bolt?
• Controller communications

Today we started re-configuring the vacuum chamber components.

Particle count
• 10:45 am : Starting the particle count in the clean room.
• 11:13 am : Finished the particle count in the clean room.
• Zone 3 :
  • 0.3 u: 2535
  • 0.5 u: 1413
  • 1.0 u: 789
• Zone 4 :
  • 0.3 u: 457
  • 0.5 u: 290
  • 1.0 u: 207
  Starting the reconfiguration.
  • 11:21 am: Started removing up-to-air valve
  • 11:30 am: Finished removing up-to-air valve.
  • 11:33 am: Started removing calibrated Ar Leak and the elbow.
  • 11:35 am: Finished removing calibrated Ar Leak and started assembling the up-to-air valve.
  • 11:47 am: Finished assembling up-to-air valve.
  • 11:48 am: Started removing magnetron gauge.
  • 11:55 am: Finished removing magnetron gauge.
  • 11:57 am: Started installing the elbow and calibrated Ar Leak and started removing the RGA probe
  • 12:13 pm: Finished installing the elbow and calibrated Ar Leak.
  • 12:20 pm: Break for lunch.
  • 01:25 pm: Come back from lunch break.
  • 01:30 pm: Started removing RGA line.
  • 01:39 pm: Finished removing RGA line.
  • 01:39 pm: Started removing gate valve [RGA line] and finished removing gate valve.
  • 02:00 pm: Started installing gate valve in the new position.
  • 02:08 pm: Fished installing gate valve [RGA line].
  • 02:09 pm: Checked the screws in the elbow to gate valve. [RGA line].
  • 02:28 pm: Finished checking the screws in the elbow to gate valve [RGA line].
  • 02:29 pm: Started installing RGA line.
  • 02:39 pm: Finished installing RGA line.
  • 02:50 pm: Started installing magnetron gauge.(In this part we assembled gauge with the used gasket)
  • 03:02 pm: Finished installing magnetron gauge.
  • 03:04 pm: Started installing RGA probe [RGA line].
  • 03:13 pm: Finished installing RGA probe [RGA line].
  • 03:15 pm: Connected the cables to the magnetron gauge.
  • 03:20 pm: Started the testing in the vacuum chamber.
  • 04:30 pm: Started installing the RGA 200 and connected the cables (power cable and DB9 cable).
  • 04:52 pm: Finished installing the RGA 200 and connected the cables (power cable and DB9 cable).
  • 04:53 pm: Started testing the RGA connections. Logrus is able to recognize and connect to RGA unit. We are leaving the turbo pump on for a few hours before checking back for pressure readouts.
  • 05:00 pm : Starting the particle count in the clean room.
    1. Zone 3 :
       • 0.3 u: 2244
       • 0.5 u: 997
       • 1.0 u: 207
    2. Zone 4 :
       • 0.3 u: 2993
       • 0.5 u: 1579
       • 1.0 u: 498
  • 05:30 pm : Finished the particle count in the clean room.
  • 05:34 pm: Test pressure readout from the gauges.
    1. Channel 1 : 1.06E-5 mbar
    2. Channel 2 :8.89E-6 mbar
    3. Channel 3 :5.0E-4 mbar
  • 05:59 pm: Test pressure readout from the gauges.
    1. Channel 1: 9.09E-6 mbar
    2. Channel 2: 7.75E-6 mbar
    3. Channel 3: 5.0E-4 mbar

[Aiden, Cao]

1. Helium leak test

• 2:00 pm: Uninstall regulator from nitrogen gas tank and move to helium gas tank. Place helium onto cart and move to the rear door of the clean tent. With the tank remaining outside, feed hose through the flexible wall to use in clean tent - See attached image
• 2:25 pm: Start Helium leak test: At each CF connection, He gas is sprayed while its level is monitored with the RGA in leak detection mode. A constant flow of helium is maintained until the level of helium detected by the RGA plateaus out.
  • All connections show low helium leak detected (< 3e-11 Amp)
  • The connections with highest leak detected are from reducing cross to flex hose and cross to RGA. They are on 2 - 3e-11 Amps. All other connections are less than 8e-12 Amps. We verified tightness of these two connection but they cannot be tighten any further

2. Argon calibrated leak test

• We opened the Ar calibrated leak. Upon opening the valve to allow Ar to flow through, we can see a surge in pressure measured by the gauges from 6.7e-7 mbar to 1.2e-6 mbar. This is then drop down and stabilised around 8.9e-7 after 5 minutes.
• Upon the the equilibrium is reached, we ran RGA scan twice in Analog mode with the following settings:
  • Points Per AMU: 10
  • Start Mass : 1
  • End Mass : 100
  • Focus Voltage: 90 V
  • Channel Electron Multiplier (CEM) : On
  • CEM Voltage: 1060 V
  • Unit: Amps (ion current)
  The settings is saved as rga100amu_scan.rga RGA application file in C:/Users/controls/Documents/Vacuum/VacuumChamber/RGA. The data file is saved in Data folder as ArLeak_230512.txt. This file contains the current values for corresponding AMUs. Using this dataset, we can obtain our chamber outgassing rate.
• Using RGA_scan_process.py , which is adapted from Mike Zucker's Matlab code E2000071, and the Ar calibrated leak posted in elog 95 we can compute the outgassing rate to be 150.5E-10 Torr l/s . Our outgassing rate is 37.5 times higher than the required (4.00E-10 Torr L/s per E080177)
• See image attached for the spectrum and the hydrocarbon (HC) tracer masses used to evaluate outgassing
• All codes and data are stored in Vacuum git repo . I'll qrite up an instruction to use the code and post it on our wiki page.

After finishing with Ar cal leak test, we close Ar valve, disconnect and turn off RGA. The He tank is moved back to the wall mount. The chamber is ready for baking installation

I set up the new Windows 10 laptop (pictured below), which arrived yesterday. This laptop is intended to be used for running lightweight Windows-only programs, such as the Thorlabs beam profiler software or the SRS RGA client. However, none of that software is installed yet.

Configuration details

As usual, the computer is configured with one shared account (username: controls) and the standard password. Note that it is connected to the campus wifi (UCR-SECURE).

If a connection to the lab's local network is required, then the laptop must be connected by an Ethernet cable to the switch in the top of the server rack.

Today I fixed the final bit related to the nitrogen gas tank, which is to apply sealing tape to M-NPT connector of the hose to prevent leakage (file: AirGunSealed.jpg)
After application of the tape, no audible leak can be heard from connection between the hose and the air gun.

The general operating procedure for the gas tank is as following:

1. Turn the regulator (blue handle) anti-clockwise still it's loose
2. Turn the valve on nitrogen as tank anti-clockwise, immediately the RHS meter of the regulator would jump to approx 2000 psi. This is the standard pressure for high pressure gas tank
3. Turn the regulator clock-wise slowly until the pressure one the LHS meter face reads approx 60 psi. This is sufficient for drying parts with. At this point, the flow pressure still should register zero
4. Press the trigger on the air gun, a high pressure air flow should come out and the flow meter should increase
5. When finished, close the gas tank valve, turn the regulator anti-clockwise, then press the air gun trigger to release gas left in the hose/gun

Jon, Cao

Today we raised the height of the shelf overhanging the cleanroom laser table by 8 inches. This was done to create more vertical clearance between the top-loading vacuum chamber and the bottom of the shelf. The added clearance should make both removing the chamber lid and inserting large parts easier.

The procedure required unmounting the shelf and removing all eight vertical support posts (1" x 1" x 18.5" pieces of 80/20 unistrut). The support posts were taken to the machine shop and cut, retapped, and cleaned (coarsely, with IPA wipes) prior to reinstallation. We took care to minimize the contamination introduced into the cleanroom, but some amount of particulate from disturbing the shelf was unavoidable.

This work is completed, and the cleanroom is now ready for final cleaning (HEPA vac, mopping, and wiping down of all surfaces including the softwalls).

The Linux workstation (ws2) that used to sit on the blue workbench (now inside the cleanroom) has been mounted on a mobile cart, as pictured below. This is intended to be a clean cart that will be housed inside the cleanroom.

The cart is currently dirty and will need to be throughly wiped down (along with the computer monitor and peripherals) prior to being moved into the cleanroom. Once the cleaned cart has been moved inside, it should never be brought back outside the cleanroom and should never be touched with ungloved hands.

I also upgraded the OS to Debian 11.6 and upgraded the CDS workstation tools.

Jon, Cao, Peter

This morning Facilities delivered and installed two new cabinets with sliding glass doors.

The smaller of the two (36" W x 13" D x 84" H) has been installed in the Clean & Bake area adjacent the flow bench. The larger one (48" x 16" D x 84" H) has been installed in the back of the room next to the electronics bench. Both cabinets have been securely anchored to the wall in two places each for earthquake safety.

We also installed the sliding glass doors and leveled them. However, we have not installed any of the shelves yet because the cabinets are quite dirty from the installation. Everything needs to be wiped down with IPA wipes, and it will be easier to do that before the shelves are in place.

Jon, Cao

In effort to try to reduce the noise level inside the cleanroom, we have dialed all four HEPA fan-filter units (FFUs) down from HIGH to MEDIUM speed. These dials can only be accessed from inside the cleanroom, by bringing in the large ladder and opening adjacent ceiling tiles.

We tested three configurations, in each case with all the FFUs on either HIGH (initial state), MEDIUM, or LOW. We measured the ambient noise in each configuration.

Going from HIGH to MEDIUM yields the largest improvement, reducing the ambient sound intensity by 6 dB (i.e., by a factor of 4, corresponding to a ~35% reduction in perceived volume).

An additional 3 dB of noise reduction can be achieved by further reducing the fan speeds to LOW. However, even after allowing some extended settling time (few hours), we found the particle counts to be fluctuating right at the threshold zone for ISO Class 5. Thus we dialed the fan speeds back up to MEDIUM with the expectation that this will be sufficient for Class 5 performance.

The cleanroom now needs to be recertified with a fresh round of five-zone particle count measurements.

Today I brought in a fresh supply of zip ties (we now have 1500 in the tool chest) and used them to permanentize the cable routing for the gauges, pumps, and RGA.

I also brought and installed a 3-foot 15A extension cable for powering the scroll pump. Installing the cable required shutting down the pumps, which I did and then reverted via the following procedure:

1. Close the 4.5" gate valve, 2.75" gate valve, and the bypass line angle valve.
2. Shut down the turbo pump.
3. Shut down the scroll pump.
4. Unplug the scroll pump and install the extension cable.
5. Power on the scroll pump.
6. Power on the turbo pump.
7. Open all three valves.

Incidentally, before I started, I noticed that the pressure in the main volume had reached 7E-7 torr, which is lower than the pressures seen last week. The system quickly returned to this pressure after I restarted the pumps.

For future reference, the calibrated Argon source has a leak rate of 7.55E-8 atm cc/s, or equivalently 5.74E-8 torr L/s. This can be used to calibrate RGA scans to units of physical leakage (outgassing) rate.

The display resolution of the logrus has been 1064x768 and has been the only option, which is not great. While remote access to logrus using rdesktop allows rendering a virtual display of user's chosen resolution, it is not fast when using graphic-intensive program. NoMachine allows user to take over and control the machine remotely and thus appears as the same machine. However, NoMachine cannot render a virtual display like rdesktop. This has been limiting the resolution of using logrus via NoMachine.

On Friday, I found that even though we had NVIDIA Quadro P600 graphic card installed, we were not actually using it. The monitor has been connecting to the the integrated VGA display connector. This uses Microsoft Basic Display Adapter which limits the the resolution. Today I got a HDMI to Mini-display cable to connector the monitor to the Nvidia graphic card. Then in Display settings, go to Graphic settings, then enable Hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling. After restarting the machine, the machine recognised the Display 2using the Nvidia Quadro P600. In multiple displays field, selected "Show only on 2" and remove the VGA connection to the monitor. Logrus is now set at Nvidia Qadro P600 native display resolution of 1920x1080. This is now also the display resolution in NoMachine.

Heating system installation

• Today we started installing the equipments for the heating system.
• First: Started installing the heating cable on the top lid and covered it with aluminum tape.
• Second: Started installing the insulation cover on top of the chamber lid.
• Third:Started installing the heating cable from under the vacuum chamber and covered with aluminum tape.
• Forth: Started installing the insulation cover under the vacuum chamber
• Note: The under part of the chamber vacuum was very difficult to cover, so we spent a little time on it and we couldn't finish the whole installation today. So tomorrow we should be able to keep doing the installation.

Fuse replacement

• Replace blown 10A fuse in ucontroller outside cleanroom
• Replace 10 A fuse in main power connection slot of the controller unit inside cleanroom
• Pamella wiped down unit outside cleanroom.
• Controller units turned on and temperature setpoint set to be 80 deg C
• Temperature settle in approx. 15 minutes(as recorded by the RTD). No problems with fuses observed
• Recording of pressure gauges (in Torr) :
  1. Before turning heater on :
     1. Gauge 1(main chamber): 3.73E-7
     2. Gauge 2(RGA line): 3.65E-7
     3. Gauge 3(Pump line): 3.8E-4
  2. After 15 minutes :
     1. Gauge 1(main chamber): 7.07E-7
     2. Gauge 2(RGA line): 6.12E-7
     3. Gauge 3(Pump line): 3.8E-4
• Reduce setpoint temperature to 60 deg C due to Pinrani gauge (Gauge 3) temperature limit
• Upon returned to lab to reduce temperature (35 minutes after turned on):
  1. Gauge 1(main chamber): 1.22E-6
  2. Gauge 2(RGA line): 9.98E-7
  3. Gauge 3(Pump line): 3.8E-4
• Once temperature has settled to 60 C (approx 20 mins after changing setpoint), pressure readout showed:
  1. Gauge 1(main chamber): 1.37E-6
  2. Gauge 2(RGA line): 1.10E-6
  3. Gauge 3(Pump line): 3.8E-4
• Heater left on for the whole afternoon, pressure readout upon returning to lab at 5:30 pm:
  1. Gauge 1(main chamber): 3.43E-6
  2. Gauge 2(RGA line): 2.61E-6
  3. Gauge 3(Pump line): 3.8E-4

TL;DR:

Full version:

20 June 23:

• Turn off heater (short term testing) Close valves to RGA line and main volume. Pressure (Torr) readout:
  • Gauge 1 (main volume): 3.43E-6
  • Gauge 2 (RGA line): 2.61E-6
  • Gauge 2 (pump line): 3.8E-4
• Turn off turbo pump, let vacuum line vent
• Connect high temperature control unit to main power, power up, set setpoints:
  • Temperature setpoint: 150 deg C
  • High temperature setpoint (to switch off) : 175 deg C
  • Hysteresis: 10 dec C
• change setpoint of PID control unit to 150 dec C, with high alarm set at 165 deg C
• Connect power output of high temperature control units to PID temperature control units, ensuring both are off
• Turn off scroll pump
• Replace Pirani gauge in front of turbo pump with blanks (see image)
• Pump the vacuum line back down
• Open up valves and wait until pressure of full system drop back down to 1E-6
• Install the high temperature controller thermocouples onto the chamber (see images):
  • One thermocouple is installed on the other side of the cross before the turbo pump
  • One thermocouple is installed on the main volume next to the PID controller RTD
• Attempt to remove electronic box and magnetic shield of full range gauges:
  • Electronic box is easily removed with an Allen key
  • Magnetic shield cannot be removed since the gap between the vacuum flange and the gauge bolt is too short for a spanner to go in. This is mainly due to the bolt washers are in the way (see images)
  • To remove the magnetic shield, the main volume has to be vented and the gauges need to be readjusted.
• Attempt to power heaters (but only heat to 80 deg C):
• Leaving the gauges intact, the high temperature controller + PID controller are turned on to test heating the chamber
• At this point, both of the high temperature controllers are connected to the same power strip (Vacuum chamber end of the table)
• After heating up to 65-70 deg C range, the powers turned off on both controllers + the lights on one end of the table
• Upon inspection, the power strip has turned itself off, I don't know what the model of the power strip but we should check its current limit
• For a quick test, I connect one of the two heater controlling system to the power board on the work desk while leaving the other running off the same power strip: The heaters appeared to be function ok and able to reach 80 deg C, at which point I turned it off and left for the day

21 June 23:

The goals of today was to remove the electronic boxes and magnetic shields on full range gauges to enable high temperature bakeout

• Upon returning to the lab, the gauges readout of vacuum pressures were:
  • Gauge 1 (main volume): 3.31E-7
  • Gauge 2 (RGA line): 3.40E-7
• Venting the both main volume and RGA line
• Remove the two full range gauges from their flanges
• Electronic boxes and magnetic shields were removed according to the gauge manuals (see images)
• Mount the gauges (with only its probing volume) back onto their respective flanges, ensuring that the flange washers do not block access to the magnetic shield screws
• Only remount magnetic shield + electronic box for one gauge (gauge 2: RGA line) for monitoring chamber pressure
• Turn on scroll pump and let the chamber pump down
• Rearrange heater controller connections while waiting for pumping down:
  1. Controllers for bottom + pump & RGA line heaters remain the same: connected to power strip on vacuum end of the table
  2. Controllers for lid + upper chamber main volume: connected to power strip on clean&bake end of the table
• Once the pressure readout by gauge 2 reached 3 Torr, the turbo pump was turned on and left to run for 45 minutes
• Upon returning to the lab, pressure on gauge 2 read 5E-6 Torr and was still decreasing
• Disconnect the ethernet cable to gauge 2, remove its electronic box and magnetic shield
• Turn on heater controller units and let them drive the heaters to get up 150 deg C
• At 95 degree range, I could see smoke at some locations, mainly the RGA and pump lines where the insulation do not fit properly and the velcros are likely to be overheated
• Upon reaching 90 degree range (measured by sensors), the powers turned off on both sides of table (including heaters, lights and scroll pump)
  • Turn off both heaters controllers and unplug them from power strip. Attempt to switch the power strip back on but nothing happened
  • It is now not the power strips problem and must be further down the line from outside the tent, most likely the power supply that these strips connected to: What is the power supply model + current limit?
• The heater controllers left unplugged, I temporarily plugged scroll pump to the desk power strip so it can still run

The electrical overload problem encountered in ELOG 130 has been resolved. The two heater controllers, which draw up to 14.1 A each, overloaded the UPS and tripped one of its circuit breakers, shutting off power to both power strips mounted above the optical table.

I reset the circuit breaker and rerouted the two heater power cables instead to two separate 20 A outlets in the overhead cable tray outside the cleanroom (both on the LP3B 6 circuit). The two high-limit temperature controllers are now permanently positioned, as shown in the photos. For now, the PID controllers have been left sitting at the table level. I am ordering extension cords that will enable us to move those up to the overhead shelf, as well. I ran the heaters in their new configuration for several minutes without issue. Thus we should be able to now proceed with baking the chamber.

For future clarity, I added labels to power strips around the lab indicating which ones are powered by the UPS. To avoid overloading the UPS, only sensitive electronics or devices that could be damaged by a sudden loss of power should be connected to these.

With the new change in wiring configuration described in elog 136, we tried to power up the heaters for baking the vacuum chamber again.

1. Evidence of smoke originating from CoolSkin insulation

We then removed most of the CoolSkin insulation on the Pump and RGA lines ( apart from the one around the flexible bypass line connecting the two ) (see image Pumpline_afterRemoveInsul and RGAline_afterRemoeInsul) . Upon removal of the insulation, we noticed that the insulating foam melted onto the heating tape (see image MeltedInsulation1 and MeltedInsulation2). This is the first indication that the smoke had most likely coming from the insulating foam itself

Once we started baking, upon reaching 80 degree range. We observed no smoke at the location that we removed the insulation. However, We observed smoked coming from underneath the insulation around the flexible pipe, and not from the velcro areas.

2. The heaters still trip our power

Summary : We resolved problems with heaters tripping power and were able to proceed with chamber baking

1. Circuit connection adjustment

After yesterday elog 137, today we resolved most of these issues. After Jon contacted Facilities, the LP3B 6 circuit was reset and the cleanroom filter & light panels resumed to work as normal.

Regarding the connection of the heaters. we made the following adjustments:

• High-temperature controller powering lid + upper volume heater: connect to LP3B 8 circuit (clean room sides, 2 outlets)
• High-temperature controller powering bottom + lower volume heater : connect to LP3B 4 circuit (workstation side, 2 outlets)

2. Replacement of vacuum nipple insulation

We had also received new insulation pieces from Worbo today to replace the existing insulation with the new ones (see images). These cover the 2 4" tubes (for 6" flanges ) and the 4 1.5" tubes (for 2.75" flanges). The new insulations fit perfectly on these tubes. I also placed all insulation taken off from the last elog back onto the chamber ( these are insulations for the pumps and RGA lines).

3. Baking

• Starting set point: 40 deg C
• Step increase: 10 deg C up to 80 deg C, 5 deg C from 80 deg to 120 deg C
• At each step, the temperature readouts show approx. 2.1 deg C overshooting, wait to settle back to approx 1.5 deg C overshoot before increase the set point again

The temperature of the chamber reached as stable 120 deg C without any power issues at 3:45 pm. I waited another 15 minutes to verify its stability and the official baking duration started at 4:00 pm Jun 29 2023. Since we are baking at 120 deg C instead of the standard 150 deg C for Aluminium, the duration for the bake will be over three days until Monday morning, upon which we will slowly ramp down the the temperature.

After leaving the the chamber to bake at 120 deg C from Thursday 3:41 pm. Today I started to cool the chamber down to room temperature at 11:30 am (total bake duration: 91 hours 49 minutes). Ideally, this process should be ramped down slowly, approx. 6 degree per hour. However we had no ramping function with out controller. The only method to tune this cool/ heat rate is to tune the PID parameters, which are:

1. Pb : Proportional band, this quantity is inversely proportional to the P-gain
2. ti : Integral time. Increasing integral time makes the output response slower to error, thus the opposite effect of increasing integration gain
3. td : Differential time

1. Pb : 50
2. ti : 100 s
3. td : 25 s

1. Pb : 200
2. ti : 800 s

To access and control the Red Pitaya using Python locally on a machine within the local network, one should follow these steps:

1. Start the SCPI server. This is achieved by first log onto the Red Piatay page

   rp-xxxxxx.local/ 

2. Go to Development >> SCPI server and turn the server on. (Note : The server is currently running)
3. Communication with Red Piataya is done through PyVista, install PyVista with:

    sudo pip3 install pyvisa pyvisa-py 

   This has been installed on Chimay. Ensure that you have pip3 install, if not, you can install it using:

    sudo apt-install python3 pip 

4. To start talking to the RedPitaya, ensure you have the scipt

    redpitaya_scpi.py 

   in your local folder. This is the standard class that you will import to your code to establish connection with the Red Pitaya. This code can be found in directory

    ~/RedPiatya 
    or this link
   

Cao and Aiden put the RGA back on to the chamber and measured the outgassing rate after the chamber has cooled down from its first bake. The figure attached shows the RGA measurements with the Argon leak open.

Also put the Full Range Gauge #2 [RGA line] back onto the system to measure the pressure and got a reading of 2.78 E-7 Torr. We believe it is actually lower as the chamber temp is still at 28 degC rather than the 24 it was previously measured at. The gauge also may have needed more time to equilibrate.

I delivered new NEMA 5-15 (120V / 15 A) power cables to the lab for the following items:

• WS2 (cleanroom) cart - 10ft cable
• Electronics workbench overhead LED - 10ft cable
• Both PI heater controller sets - (2) 6ft cables

I installed the new cables on the WS2 cart and the workbench myself, and left the two 6ft cables (as pictured below) for Aiden to install on the PID controllers after the current bake is finished.

[Jon, Tyler, Aiden, Luke]

On Friday we completed assembly of the new stainless steel-topped benches in 1129. We then moved the clean and bake equipment from 1119 to its new larger space in 1129. This included the HEPA flow bench, ultrasonic washer, deionized water drum, nitrogen tanks, and forced-convection oven. The oven was re-anchored to the wall with earthquake restraints in its new location.

The power cords still need to be permanently routed, but the new clean and bake lab is otherwise ready for use.

Update: I have completed permanent routing of the electrical cables. I also ran the ultrasonic washer's drain line to the sink drain (the current hose does reach). The new clean and bake lab is now fully operational.

[Jon, Tyler, Aiden, Shane, Pooyan, Michael, Cynthia, Luke]

On Wednesday, we completed long list of work towards making the new lab (1129) fully operational and enabling the next phase of FROSTI testing. 

Cabinet Installation

Three new VWR cabinets with sliding glass doors were installed in 1129. Each unit measures 48" (W) x 22" (D) x 84" (H) and sits along the back wall (see attachment 1). The 350-lb. cabinets were laid in place by Facilities on Monday and permanentized on Wednesday. Work included:

• Earthquake anchoring to the masonry wall
• Sliding glass doors leveled
• Shelving installed
• Wiping down of interior and exterior surfaces with IPA wipes

Server Rack Installation

A new Tripp Lite 42U open-frame rack was laid in place in 1129 and anchored to the floor (see attachment 1). This rack will house all of our general-purpose and simulation computers, which will be relocated from the 1119 rack at a later time.

Lab Clean-Up

Following installation of the new cabinets and rack, we proceeded to organize and clean both labs. Work included:

• Moved parts and equipment into permanent storage in 1129 cabinets
• Wiped down surfaces in 1119 and 1129 with polypropylene IPA wipes
• HEPA-vacuumed floors of 1119 and 1129
• Mopped floor in 1119 with Liquinox solution
• Installed new sticky mats in 1119 and 1129
• Regular cleanroom cleaning and particle counts (see 302)
• Positioned new stainless steel gowning bench outside the cleanroom (see attachment 2)

At this point, the only piece of lab equipment still to be delivered is a HEPA garment cabinet for reusing our (semi-disposable) bunny suits. It is schedule to arrive in mid-February and will sit outside the cleanroom in 1119, in the former location of the HEPA flow bench.

On Thursday we installed the power conditioning/distribution equipment and networking equipment in the new 1129 rack. The hardware is identical to the setup in the 1119 rack and includes:

• Tripp Lite SU5KRT3UTF - 208V, 5kVA on-line UPS with 120V transformer
• CyberPower PDU20M2F12R - metered power distribution unit, (14) NEMA 5-20R
• Ubiquiti USW-Pro-48 - 48 port 10Gbps network switch

The UPS is connected to a 208V NEMA 6-30R outlet in the overhead cable tray, which is on the building's "standby" (backup power) circuit. An 8-ft L6-30 extension cord has been ordered to permanently run the power cable through the cable tray.

The network switch will be connected to a Cat6 cable that was recently run by ITS from the 1119 rack, allowing the lab's LAN to be extended into 1129. This Ethernet link remains to be tested.