Laurence
7dc6119359
The previous commit asserted that the 21 Jul Centaurus A data came back with a saturated nucleus, and booked a short-exposure core set on T32 to fix it. The assertion was wrong. It came from taking the maximum pixel inside a 300 x 300 px box centred on the frame. That measures the brightest thing near the middle of the image, which is not the same as measuring the galaxy. The 65313 ADU belonged to a foreground star 128 px (69 arcsec) from the nucleus, well inside the box. Median filtering the inner 800 x 800 px to remove stars leaves the galaxy peaking at 1944 ADU, roughly a thirtieth of the clip level, with not one star-free pixel above 30000 ADU anywhere in that box. The brightest pixel in the whole frame is at the right-hand edge, 2370 px from centre. The core looked blown in the processed image because of the stretch, not the sensor: the white point sat at the 99.995th percentile, a level set by field stars, so the galaxy's entire range from a 7 ADU sky to a 1944 ADU peak was compressed into the top few percent of the tone curve. Re-rendering the same frames with a second curve scaled to the galaxy recovered the core completely, with no new data. The T32 reservation has been cancelled without running, so it cost nothing. The other three reservations were verified intact afterwards and quota is back to 6:05 of 8:00. plans/hdrcore-t32.txt stays in the repo and on the scope: 47 Tuc and the SMC may genuinely saturate, a dense cluster core being the fastest thing there is to clip, and the ladder is ready if they do. The corrected habit is recorded in CAMPAIGN.md: measure whether a core is saturated before buying time to fix it, filtering stars out of the measurement first. The check takes a minute and would have saved this whole detour. TODO.md also records a second result that affects future planning: the faint outer halo of that stack is limited by the sky-plane subtraction, which absorbed about 17.9 ADU/px of real halo light, rather than by exposure time. More integration alone would not have gone deeper.
218 lines
15 KiB
Markdown
218 lines
15 KiB
Markdown
# Drain campaign: spend 2,638 points, then close the account
|
|
|
|
Decision (2026-07-18): use the full points balance on southern imaging, then cancel
|
|
the membership. Constraints and policy facts that shape the plan:
|
|
|
|
- Balance 2,638 points; Plan-40 renews 12 Aug 2026 (GBP 32). Cancel BEFORE renewal.
|
|
- Points cannot be refunded, and cannot be used without an active subscription
|
|
(support article 142963). So: drain first, cancel last, in that order.
|
|
- **Cancellation target: 10 Aug 2026**, two days before renewal. Cancellation is
|
|
submitted via MyAccount/Cancel.aspx and requires explicit user confirmation on the
|
|
day; Claude must not submit it unprompted.
|
|
- Rates: see the rate card in state/NOTES.md. Billing is per minute of imaging time.
|
|
- Moon: bright nights roughly 24 Jul - 2 Aug (full ~29 Jul); dark again 5-12 Aug.
|
|
Full-moon week includes free access promotions; paid draining focuses on dark and
|
|
grey nights, narrowband carries the bright week.
|
|
- Scope availability is volatile (much of Chile offline as of 18 Jul); re-check the
|
|
status line on go.itelescope.net before every session and substitute freely.
|
|
|
|
## Session ledger
|
|
|
|
Update after every run: date, scope, target, imaging minutes, points charged
|
|
(from account/history.aspx), cumulative spend.
|
|
|
|
| Date | Scope | Target | Plan file | Imaging | Est. pts | Actual pts | Notes |
|
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
| 2026-07-19 | T33 | 47 Tuc | ngc104-test.txt | 17 min | 0 (free) | DID NOT RUN | reservation 749228 expired unused: no images, no logs on T33 (checked 20 Jul); grid shows reschedule=No despite the flag being set at booking |
|
|
| 2026-07-19 | T59 | NGC 6744 | ngc6744-t59.txt | 180 min | ~240 (0% moon disc. until 21 Jul) | **381** | SUCCESS (txn 851148): ran 00:05:22-03:29:56 SSO, Time Used 3h24m32s, 0% moon disc. Full dataset on scope server: L 15x300s BIN1, RGB 7x300s each BIN2; previews checked, round stars, galaxy clean: no refund case. Effective rate ~112 pts/hr of WALL time (not the 80/hr imaging-time estimate: see NOTES rate correction) |
|
|
| 2026-07-20 | T33 | NGC 6752 | ngc6752.txt | 17 min | 0 (free) | DID NOT RUN | reservation 749229 expired unused: no images, no logs (checked 20 Jul 20:30 UTC, after window) |
|
|
| 2026-07-21 | T32 | Centaurus A | cena-t32.txt | 120 min | ~350 (x1.6 model) | **160** | SUCCESS (txn 851344): ran 18:50:24-21:16:19 SSO local (08:50-11:16 UTC), Time Used 2h25m55s, 25% moon discount. Images present: /images/qisback/T32/NGC5128 on t32.itelescope.net:8032. Came in at 0.46x the x1.6 model, i.e. LESS than the original estimate: see the rate correction below |
|
|
|
|
Cumulative spend: 541. Balance after (verified GetAccountStatus 2026-07-21
|
|
11:40 UTC): **2,097**.
|
|
|
|
**Rate correction (2026-07-21, supersedes the 2026-07-20 x1.6 warning).** Two
|
|
paid runs now bracket the question, and both bill EXACTLY the plan's imaging
|
|
minutes, not wall-clock:
|
|
|
|
| Scope | Plan imaging | Wall (Time Used) | Billed | Points per imaging hour |
|
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
| T59 | 180 min (36x300s) | 3h24m32s | 381 | **127** (0% moon) |
|
|
| T32 | 120 min (24x300s) | 2h25m55s | 160 | **80** (25% moon) |
|
|
|
|
381 = 3.00 h x 127 and 160 = 2.00 h x 80, both to the point. So billing is on
|
|
imaging time as originally documented, and the wall-clock theory is dead. What
|
|
is wrong is the rate card in NOTES.md: it lists T59 at 80/hr (actual 127) and
|
|
T32 at 146/hr (actual 80 even after the 25% moon discount, so a base near
|
|
107/hr). The two look transposed, but two samples cannot prove that. **Do not
|
|
apply a blanket multiplier.** Derive each scope's effective rate from its first
|
|
actual bill, and treat any not-yet-observed scope's card rate as +/-60%.
|
|
|
|
## Planned allocation (~2,600 points, adapt as scopes/weather allow)
|
|
|
|
**Phase 1, dark nights now - 23 Jul (~1,030 pts):**
|
|
- T59 NGC 6744 LRGB, 3 h, ~240 (scheduled 19 Jul)
|
|
- T32 Centaurus A LRGB, 2 h, ~292: early UK-afternoon window while it is high
|
|
- T8 Corona Australis dust complex LRGB, 2 h, ~260
|
|
- T70 (Chile) Scorpius tail / Prawn super-wide LRGB, 2 h, ~238
|
|
|
|
**Phase 2, bright nights 24 Jul - 2 Aug (~440 pts, narrowband only):**
|
|
- T59 NGC 6188 in Ha/OIII/SII 5nm, 3 h total, ~240
|
|
- T8 Ha on the Cat's Paw / War and Peace field, 1.5 h, ~195
|
|
- Plus any full-moon free promotions for clusters (cost 0, not part of the drain)
|
|
|
|
**Phase 3, dark nights 3 - 10 Aug (~1,130 pts):**
|
|
- T8 SMC + 47 Tucanae in one frame, 3 h LRGB, ~390: the signature shot, SMC well
|
|
placed in the second half of the SSO night by August
|
|
- T8 or T59 Large Magellanic Cloud attempt if it clears the elevation limits late
|
|
in the window; otherwise Tarantula on T32, 2 h, ~292
|
|
- Remainder (~450): best-of list: repeat the strongest target for more depth, or
|
|
Chile scopes (T71 106/hr, T73 224/hr) if they return from maintenance: Tarantula
|
|
and NGC 1313 preferred. Aim to land the balance under ~50 points.
|
|
|
|
## Booked reservations (all with plan attached + reschedule flag)
|
|
|
|
| ID | Scope | Night of (SSO/obs local) | Slot | Plan | Est. pts | Status (2026-07-20) |
|
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
| 749227 | T59 | 19 Jul | 00:05-03:45 | ngc6744-t59.txt | ~240 | COMPLETED, billed 381 |
|
|
| 749228 | T33 | 19 Jul | 00:05-00:50 | ngc104-test.txt | 0 | EXPIRED unused (no run, no auto-reschedule) |
|
|
| 749229 | T33 | 20 Jul | 00:05-00:50 | ngc6752.txt | 0 | EXPIRED unused (no run, no auto-reschedule) |
|
|
| 749230 | T8 | 26 Jul | 21:35-23:55 | catspaw-t8.txt | ~146 (25% moon disc.) | still booked |
|
|
| 749302 | T32 | 21 Jul | 18:50-21:50 | cena-t32.txt | ~350 (x1.6 rate, 25% moon disc.) | COMPLETED, billed 160. EVENING slot: T32 has a 35 deg elevation floor and Cen A culminates ~17:10 before dark, sinking to 11 deg by the old 00:35 slot (which could never have run). Ran 18:50-21:16, finishing 34 min early (plan complete, not a fault); images landed under /images/qisback/T32/NGC5128 |
|
|
| (id not captured) | T8 | 22 Jul | 21:45-00:45 | cra-t8.txt | ~250 | booked + MySummary-verified 2026-07-21 11:45 UTC. This is queue #2 finally placed: see the resolution note below. Runs 11:45-14:45 UTC 22 Jul |
|
|
| (id not captured) | T32 | 22 Jul | 18:50-19:50 | hdrcore-t32.txt | ~25 | **CANCELLED 2026-07-21 ~15:00 UTC, never ran, 0 points spent.** Booked to fix a saturated Cen A nucleus; the nucleus is not saturated (see the correction below). Deleted from MySummary with the other three reservations verified intact afterwards; quota back to 6:05/8:00 |
|
|
| 749314 | T33 | 21 Jul | 00:05-00:50 | ngc104-test.txt | 0 (free) | booked + grid-verified 2026-07-21 08:55 UTC. 47 Tuc first-light retry, third attempt. Runs 14:05-14:50 UTC 21 Jul. Reschedule flag again No (free scopes never rebook) |
|
|
|
|
The T33 first-light test is now on its THIRD booking (749314); the two prior free
|
|
reservations expired unused. If this one also fails to run, the problem is not the
|
|
booking but the auto-start on free scopes: escalate to walk-in (POST plan.asp per
|
|
plans/README.md) or drop the free-imaging objective.
|
|
|
|
## Booking queue (blocked by the rolling 8-hour reservation allowance)
|
|
|
|
Book in order as quota frees (a session completing releases its hours). Exact
|
|
New.aspx parameters; all plans already uploaded and verified on their scopes.
|
|
Verify every booking via Edit.aspx?id= probing (sequential ids), NOT the grid.
|
|
|
|
| # | Scope id | start | end | start sel | end sel | Plan | Est. pts |
|
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
| 1 | BOOKED as 749302 (see table above); the original 00:35 slot was an error, Cen A is an EVENING target (35 deg floor on T32) | | | | | cena-t32.txt | ~350 |
|
|
| 2 | BOOKED 2026-07-21 for the night of 22 Jul, 21:45-00:45 (see table above); the 01:35 slot was blocked by hajo and low anyway | | | | | cra-t8.txt | ~250 |
|
|
| 3 | GRAS059 | 2026-07-25T20:35:00 | 2026-07-25T23:55:00 | 8:35 PM | 11:55 PM | ngc6188-haoiii-t59.txt | ~120 (disc.) |
|
|
| 4 | GRAS059 | 2026-07-27T20:35:00 | 2026-07-27T23:05:00 | 8:35 PM | 11:05 PM | ngc6188-sii-t59.txt | ~90 (disc.) |
|
|
| 5 | GRAS008 | 2026-08-08T02:35:00 | 2026-08-08T06:05:00 | 2:35 AM | 6:05 AM | smc47tuc-t8.txt | ~390 |
|
|
| 6 | GRAS032 | 2026-08-09T03:05:00 | 2026-08-09T06:05:00 | 3:05 AM | 6:05 AM | tarantula-t32.txt | ~365 |
|
|
| 7 | (T70, blocked: server unreachable) | night TBD before 5 Aug | ~2.5h | | | scorpius-t70.txt (in scratch, re-upload needed) | ~238 |
|
|
| 8 | WITHDRAWN: booked then cancelled 2026-07-21, premise was wrong (see below) | | | | | hdrcore-t32.txt | 0 |
|
|
|
|
### CORRECTION (2026-07-21): the Cen A nucleus was never saturated
|
|
|
|
An earlier entry here claimed the 21 Jul Cen A data came back with a saturated
|
|
nucleus, and booked a short-exposure core set on that basis. **The claim was
|
|
wrong and the booking has been cancelled without running, at a cost of zero
|
|
points.**
|
|
|
|
The 65313 ADU figure came from taking the maximum pixel inside a 300 x 300 px
|
|
box centred on the frame. That measures the brightest thing near the middle of
|
|
the image, which is not the same as measuring the galaxy: it was a foreground
|
|
star 128 px (69 arcsec) from the nucleus, sitting inside the box. Median
|
|
filtering the inner 800 x 800 px to remove stars leaves the galaxy peaking at
|
|
**1944 ADU**, about a thirtieth of the clip level, with **not one star-free
|
|
pixel above 30000 ADU**. The core looked blown in the first processed image
|
|
because of the display stretch, whose white point was set by field stars, and
|
|
re-rendering the same data with a second tone curve scaled to the galaxy
|
|
recovered it fully.
|
|
|
|
**The habit that IS worth keeping, in corrected form:** before booking extra
|
|
time to fix a saturated core, *measure whether it is saturated* - median-filter
|
|
the inner region to remove stars first, and check where the frame's bright
|
|
pixels actually are. The check costs a minute. 47 Tuc and the SMC (queue #5)
|
|
may still genuinely saturate, a dense cluster core being the fastest thing there
|
|
is to clip, so run the same measurement on their data before assuming either
|
|
way. plans/hdrcore-t32.txt stays in the repo (and on T32) as a ready-made
|
|
ladder if one of them turns out to need it.
|
|
|
|
### Session 2026-07-21 ~08:55 UTC (booking round run early, before Cen A ran)
|
|
|
|
Done this session: free T33 47 Tuc retry booked as 749314 (grid-verified). NOT
|
|
done, both correctly deferred:
|
|
- **Cen A verify**: 749302 had not run yet (starts 08:50 UTC, this session ran at
|
|
08:48). Verify after 11:50 UTC.
|
|
- **cra-t8 (#2)**: blocked twice over. (1) Quota: Cen A holds 3h until it
|
|
completes ~11:50 UTC; with Cat's Paw (2h20m) + Cen A (3h) + T33 (45m) held,
|
|
under ~1h55m is free, not enough for a 3h slot. (2) Conflict: user hajo holds
|
|
T8 00:25-02:25 SSO local (res 749207), overlapping our planned 01:35-04:35.
|
|
|
|
**cra-t8 resolution options** (pick with a live grid re-check when quota frees):
|
|
- (a) Shift to 02:25-05:25 after hajo. Downside: Corona Australis culminates
|
|
~22:30 SSO local, so by 02:25-05:25 it is 4-6.5h past meridian and low; poor.
|
|
- (b) PREFERRED: move cra-t8 to the NEXT night, 2026-07-23T01:35-04:35 (night of
|
|
22 Jul SSO), same clock time, avoids hajo, keeps decent altitude. Re-check that
|
|
night's T8 grid first. One night's slip is fine inside the drain window.
|
|
- (c) Earlier slot 21:25-00:25 (before hajo) is astronomically best but starts
|
|
11:25 UTC, before Cen A releases quota at 11:50; not bookable in time.
|
|
|
|
The scheduled 12:13 UTC job (ae3af497) fires after Cen A completes: it should
|
|
verify Cen A + bill, then book cra-t8 by option (b) unless the grid has changed
|
|
(hajo may cancel, opening option (a)/original). At corrected (x1.6) rates the
|
|
full remaining queue runs ~2,530 vs 2,257 balance (~270 over): once actual bills
|
|
for Cen A and CrA land, trim Phase 3 (shorten Tarantula #6 or the SMC slot)
|
|
to land the balance near zero.
|
|
|
|
### Session 2026-07-21 ~11:40 UTC (Cen A verify + cra-t8 booked)
|
|
|
|
Ran ahead of the 12:13 UTC scheduled job, after Cen A had finished at 11:16 UTC.
|
|
|
|
- **Cen A verified**: completed, billed 160, NGC5128 images on the scope server.
|
|
Ledger and rate model updated (the x1.6 model is withdrawn: see the rate
|
|
correction above).
|
|
- **cra-t8 booked**, but on a better slot than the deferred option (b). Probing
|
|
New.aspx for the original 01:35-04:35 returned "Conflicting reservation. Start
|
|
time must be later than 2:25 AM" (hajo, as predicted), confirming that option
|
|
(a) was all that remained on the night of 21 Jul, and it puts Corona Australis
|
|
3.5-6.5 h past the meridian. Instead the run went to the EVENING of the next
|
|
night: **2026-07-22T21:45 - 2026-07-23T00:45 SSO local**, which brackets the
|
|
~22:30 culmination, so the whole 115 min of imaging happens near the zenith.
|
|
This is option (c)'s geometry on option (b)'s night; the reason (c) was
|
|
unbookable earlier (quota held by Cen A) had expired by the time Cen A
|
|
completed. Grid probing showed no conflict on either side of the slot.
|
|
Verified in Reservation/MySummary.aspx; quota now 6:50 / 8:00.
|
|
- Moon on the night of 22 Jul is ~57% illuminated, the last usable night before
|
|
the bright-week narrowband phase. LRGB on a dust complex under a half moon is
|
|
a compromise, but the alternative is slipping a Phase 1 broadband target into
|
|
the bright week, which is worse.
|
|
- Reservation id NOT captured: the confirm response carries only
|
|
`ModalStatic.result("OK")` and MySummary does not print ids. Nothing depends
|
|
on the id unless the booking must be edited or deleted, in which case find it
|
|
by probing Edit.aspx?id= around the current sequence (749314 was issued
|
|
~08:55 UTC on 21 Jul).
|
|
- Budget: 2,097 left, 19 nights to 10 Aug. Remaining queue at card rates is
|
|
roughly 1,300, which UNDER-spends by ~800. With the x1.6 model withdrawn, the
|
|
next planning session should add work rather than trim it: candidates are a
|
|
second narrowband night on T59 (observed 127/hr, the only scope with a
|
|
trustworthy rate), or extending the Phase 3 SMC and Tarantula runs, both of
|
|
which have the sky time to absorb longer plans.
|
|
|
|
Substitution rules: if T71 returns to service, move #2 and #7 to T71 (faster
|
|
f/2.8 optics, cheaper 106 pts/hr; re-cut the plans for 1.55"/px). If T70's
|
|
server returns, book #7 as-is. Check the go.itelescope.net status line before
|
|
each booking round. After #6, allocate the remaining balance (~450 pts) to a
|
|
final deep session on the best-performing scope, sized to land under 50 pts.
|
|
|
|
**10 Aug: verify balance is near zero, download ALL data from data.itelescope.net,
|
|
then (with explicit user confirmation) cancel via MyAccount/Cancel.aspx.**
|
|
|
|
## Operational notes
|
|
|
|
- Sessions are now RESERVED, not walk-in: upload the plan to the scope, then book
|
|
it at reservations.itelescope.net with the plan attached (procedure in
|
|
plans/README.md); iTelescope auto-starts the plan at reservation start and the
|
|
reschedule flag retries weather losses. Claude sessions monitor rather than
|
|
drive. T59 moon discount correction: 0% until 21 Jul, 25% from 22 Jul.
|
|
- Cron jobs live only in an open Claude session; if a day's session has no live
|
|
session to fire it, the user prompts "run today's drain session" and any session
|
|
picks it up from this file plus state/TODO.md.
|
|
- Bad-data protection: iTelescope refunds points for weather-ruined runs on
|
|
request; check each session's images before marking the ledger final.
|
|
- Final data sweep before cancellation: everything on data.itelescope.net AND the
|
|
per-scope /images/qisback/ folders.
|