Week 6: Completing Castle Rock

Week 6 was the conclusion of the Castle Rock test site installation.

 

PASSCAL has a test site off of one of the hiking trails near a feature known as Castle Rock. We use the test site for short term testing; for instance, huddle testing sensors before handing them over to an experiment, as I've talked about before. We also use the site for longer term tests to evaluate new equipment or systems. This season, we have planned for two long-term tests to evaluate some new batteries, and to test new firmware on one of our commonly-used instruments.

Test #1

The first site will test new rechargable lithium batteries. Normally, PASSCAL Polar sites are powered by either:

• (a) 8 large, 120Ah, lead-acid car batteries, which are recharged using solar panels, but are very, very heavy (75lbs each!); or
• (b) 12 non-rechargeable Lithium batteries, which are lighter-weight, but run out of power after about 2-3 years (so they aren't a permanent solution).
  

The PASSCAL Engineering group has tested some rechargeable 100Ah Lithium batteries, which are much lighter-weight than their lead-acid counterparts -- 25lbs instead of 75lbs each. This saves a Polar Engineer's arms from being tired... but more importantly, it saves on the amount of fuel or number of trips needed to fly these batteries out to our remote sites.

Five 100Ah rechargeable Lithium batteries, with terminals taped and pigtail cables attached.

The Engineering group tested these batteries in the PASSCAL cold chambers, large freezers that can be set to -40C or below and are used to test all electronics before we ship them out to Antarctica or Greenland.

For this next stage of testing, we are going to test if the new Lithium batteries can successfully power a "standard" PASSCAL Polar station throughout the winter, and if they can recharge via solar panels when the sun rises next summer. I put "standard" in quotes because all of our station designs are slightly different, depending on the particular experiment. The electronics for this test will be commonly used versions with thouroughly-tested firmware, with an average-to-high power draw compared with other PASSCAL stations. I also added a few non-rechargeable Lithium batteries to act as a back up (to protect the electronics from cold-soaking) in case the other batteries fail the test.

Electronics and batteries for Test #1. Clockwise: Centaur datalogger (white), rechargeable Lithium battery (red), telemetry modem (yellow), non-rechargeable Lithium batteries (black).

I went out to the Castle Rock test site on Monday of Week 6 with assistance from three members of the TIME team, who were all very enthusiastic about digging.

Emma, Ronan, and Andrew from the TIME team, posing with the newly installed seismometer.

They also helped bury all the test site cables in conduit, and we did some reorganization of the antenna and solar cables.

The three of them digging while I checked on Test #1 with a computer.

The weather was beautiful, and we finished the day having accomplished everything I had intended to and more!

Completed Test #1 installation, powered by 2 smaller solar panels. Electronics are in the orange enclosure, and seismometer is buried in between the two bamboo markers closest to the camera.

My drawing of the site layout so that future Polar Engineers know where to dig it out.

Erebus and Castle Rock picture. I have so many versions of this picture, but I still find it breathtaking every time.

Test #2

On Week 6 Wednesday, I took two more wonderful TIME team members (Meghana and Lucia) out to install the second test.

No PistenBullies were free, so I had to drive the Mattrack :( It was twice as fast, but not as cute...

Test #2 is a simple setup to test new firmware on one of our instruments. At long-term PASSCAL Polar sites, we transmit state-of-health (SOH) data via satellite back to our facility in New Mexico. This SOH data includes voltages of batteries, temperature, and mass positions that give a general idea of the state of the seismometer -- all of which helps us keep tabs on what might be going wrong at a particular station, and helps us plan our seasons.

One of the modems we use recently got a firmware update to allow it to talk to one of our newer dataloggers, the Centaur. We've tested the firmware extensively back in New Mexico, and this is just the final step in the process before we feel comfortable using it in a real experiment. As a control for the test, we also installed one of the modems connected to an older datalogger that has been used in many experiments. Both datalogger/modem pairs are powered by the same power system, so we cannot attribute any differences in their behavior to problems in the power system.

Electronics for Test #2. These are powered by a large, non-standard power system in another box nearby.

Lucia and Meghana installed the accelerometers used as simple, low power sensors for the test while I connected everything up and checked it on my laptop.

Here I am, about to take the previous picture on my phone after confirming the electronics were working on the laptop.

Meghana and Lucia between two large solar panels. The first group of 4 bamboo marks the enclosure, and the group of 4 closest to the screen marks the two accelerometers.

Another drawing of the layout for Test #2. I think it is incredibly important to make a quick sketch of site layouts in case everything is buried in snow when you return.

Other Important Events

I went to the aquarium and looked at the critters in the touch tank this week. The aquarium is a huge area in the science building (Crary) that is used by the biologists studying polar giantism in the sea spiders on the sea floor. The divers that retrieve the sea spiders occasionally bring up other critters, who end up in the touch tank.

I met a cute sea urchin wearing a green cowboy hat.

Cowboy sea urchin with an isopod hanging out just behind.

Also notable from Week 6: Alan and I had costume day. We found this truly terrible costume in a random box in one of PASSCAL's storage locations and Alan thought it would be hilarious if he wore it around for the afternoon. No one was quite sure what the costume was supposed to be.

Is it a belt or ears? Why are the boots fuzzy at the ankles? Why is there a fur stripe down the front? Why is there a brown cape???

So Alan didn't feel lonely as the only one dressed up, I put a piece of foam around my neck. I think I look kind of like a Victorian-era queen with a ridiculously tall collar.

Maybe I'm born with it. Maybe it's Madeline.