Reports of 63495
AdV-PAY (NI and WI Payloads)
marco ricci, paola puppo, flavio travasso, michele dicorato, antonfranco piluso - 23:15 Thursday 16 July 2026 (69377) Print this report
Status of WI payload assembling on 16/7 evening
The Ring heater and CP were completely assembled on the WI payload.
The payload is ready for integration once the slight damage to the mirror coil cable (from the electrical check) is verified.
Images attached to this report
On-call intervention (General)
Oncall-system - 19:13 Thursday 16 July 2026 (69376) Print this report
On-call intervention

The following report has been submitted to the On-call interface.

On-call events -> Electricity

Title: ENEL GE1 Network Alarm

Author(s): dandrea

Called at: 04:55, 16-07-2026, by: Alarm or monitoring system
Remote intervention: Started: ; Ended:
On-site intervention: Started: 05:20, 16-07-2026; Ended: 06:35, 16-07-2026
Status: Resolved
Operator when issue resolved: Zaza

Details:

I received a call from the alarm system on the power grid about a lack of ENEL grid on the GE1 that powers the central building and the control building.
I intervened on the site and found the rescue generator set in operation, as it did not have the ENEL reference voltage.
A fuse had blown on the control board which I promptly replaced and the system returned to normal operation.

* Note that any files attached to this report are available in the On-call interface.

Detector Operation (Operations Report)
lunghini - 18:20 Thursday 16 July 2026 (69367) Print this report
Operator Report - Daily shift

ITF found DOWN and in UPGRADING Mode.
All times are UTC.
Below the list of actiities comunicated to the Control Room.
07:08 - 07:35 PAY: NI electrical checks with payload integrated with the superattenuator, works on the platform (Gherardini, Pinto, #69369).
07:25 - 10:25 PAY: WI payload assembly in CEB Clean Room (Dicorato, Puppo, Ricci, Travasso).
13:37 - 13:57 Inspection of CEB IR Cameras (Boldrini, Spinicelli, #69375).

Images attached to this report
AdV-PAY (NI and WI Payloads)
boldrini, spinicelli - 16:23 Thursday 16 July 2026 (69375) Print this report
Survey of the PAY camera viewports

We surveyed the NI and WI tower to take note of possible safety issues concerning the viewports used for the PAY cameras.

We restored the position of the NI_Cam and enveloped both the camera and the viewport with a black aluminum sheet. That viewport has been secured and no light from the YAG will be able to exit the tower through it.

For the WI_Cam, the situation is a lot different (pictures 1,2). The camera is fixed on a metal bar, propped against the tower and resting directly on the SLED box. The viewport itself is completely exposed, which will be a safety concern once the YAG circulates again in the WI tower.

We'll take steps to address these concerns as soon as possible.

Images attached to this report
AdV-PSL (Commissioning of SS)
mwas, masserot, ruggi - 15:45 Thursday 16 July 2026 (69373) Print this report
PSTAB 50Hz harmanics feed-forward preparation

A comb of line spaced by 50Hz is present in the PSTAB spectrum, and the projection of those lines in the sensitivity show that the 250Hz line, and maybe some other are dominating the contribution of 50Hz harmonics to the sensitivity. The real solution will be to have fully differential calbing from the PSTAB photodiodes, instead of single ended calbing inside the vacuum as is currently the case. In the mean time, a feed forward of the 50Hz and its harmonics could be tried to reduce those lines. 

https://git.ligo.org/virgo/commissioning/commissioning-tasks/-/work_items/8

Paola has kindly explained how the 50Hz feed-forward into DARM is implemented in the DSP and I have replicated the method in Acl. The environmental channel is bandpassed around 50Hz and then a variable delay+gain filter is applied to the environmental channel with two continuously updated parameters. The filter gain is a simple product by a parameter, and the dephasing is formed by implementing an (s-s0)/(s+s0) filter manually in Acl retaining in a separate channel the previous value of a channel.

To obtain error signals for those two parameters the PSTAB channel after after adding the  feed-forward correction  is band passed at 50Hz, and multiplied by the environmental channel band passed around 50Hz and filtered by the dephasing filter. After low passing the result this yields the error signal for the gain parameter of the feedforward. 

To obtain the delay parameter error signal, the environmental channel is first filtered by a pole at 1Hz, to dephase it by 90 degrees before multplying it with the PSTAB channel band passed at 50Hz and low-passing. In this way the other quadrature of the demodulation of the PSTAB by the environmental channel is obtained.

To test the Acl implementation Alain has setup a test process Acl17_INJ in the test instance of VPM: https://vpm.virgo.infn.it:40010/main.html?subsystem=Tests&process=Acl17_INJ

To access the data from it one needs to change the Cmdomain using the command "cmdomain CascinaTest" before starting dataDisplay, and then choosing the FbmMainTestUsers online server.

Figure 1 shows that after fixing many mistakes the 50Hz feed-back works in a test, reducing the 50Hz line in the target PSTAB channel by two orders of magnitude. FF_product_I/Q are the two error signals, while FF_gain and FF_z0 are the two variable parameters of the feed-forward filter. The adjustment of those filters is done using a simple pure integrator of the error signals, and the adjustment loop UGF is around 0.2Hz, I haven't tried to increase the UGF further.

One important aspect was to do the demodulation for calculating the FF_product_I/Q error signals after applying the dephasing signal to the environmental channel, so that the loop automatically tunes the demodulation phase. Initially the loop was not working at all, as the 50Hz line in the PSTAB channel was ~90 degree out of phase with the line in the environmental channel, which was swapping the two error signals.

This could be tested at some point on the actual PSTAB, starting from next week, to see if that idea works in practice. The code naming need to be first cleaned up, added into the ISYSnoise process to include it into the existing PSTAB_NOISE channel, and eventually replicated for all of the lines in the 50Hz harmanics comb.

Images attached to this report
AdV-PAY (NI and WI Payloads)
Gherardini, Zaza - 15:17 Thursday 16 July 2026 (69371) Print this report
WI payload electrical check
This afternoon we checked the electrical continuity and insulation towards the metallic frame for the following cables: S1 and S2 (marionette coils); U1 (Ring Heater); U2 (Ring Heater motors); U3 (mirror coils for sensing and PT100 on marionette coil); V1 (mirror coils); V2 and V3 (marionette motors); Z2 (temperature probes on mirror coils and on ring heater).

Everything is fine except a mirror coil cable (UL) that is slightly damaged and it could do short-cut to the ground; it will be checked more carefully on Monday morning.
AdV-INJ (Input Mode Cleaner cavity)
spinicelli, ruggi, lagabbe, gosselin - 15:10 Thursday 16 July 2026 (69370) Print this report
Improvement of the IMC working point

During the recovery of the Injection system in May, we had to search manually for a new alignment of the IMC cavity, in order to continue with the all the other checks.

However, with the chosen position we had quite large offset on both DC QPD (MC transmission) and RF QPD (Dihedron reflection) in addition to the one on the longitudinal lock. Moreover, we usually apply offset on the erorr signals after the sensing matrix (IB_{TX, TY, TZ}, MC_{TX, TY}), thus generally mixing the offset on DC and RF quadrants.

As first step to improve the working point, we tried to zeroing the RF signals (INJ_IMC_QD_{NF,FF}_I_{H,V}) by manually mixing all the AA offset ( IB_{tx,ty,tz}_set and MC_{tx,ty}_set). In addition, we were also brought back the beam on the MC close to the position of last March (looking at INJ_MCT_{h,v}_err). The results are shown in fig. 1: reducing the offset on the RF quadrants reduced the frequency to amplitude coupling (new IMC_SET offset is now -1.5) and clearly improved the alignment of the RFC. In addition, not completely unexpected, there was a change on the PSTAB photodiodes, that induced a small improvement on the PSTAB correction noise.

We then modified the AA loop on ACL in order to better take into account the offset on the DC quadrant ({NF,FF}_AC{h,v}_SET, MCT_{h,v}_SET) and recomputed the AA matrix accordingly. We closed the AA in full bandwith at the end of the work (fig.2).

 

Images attached to this report
AdV-PAY (NI and WI Payloads)
Gherardini, Pinto - 10:33 Thursday 16 July 2026 (69369) Print this report
Comment to NI payload integration with the suerattenuator (69360)
This morning, after the NI Payload intergration, we checked the electrical continuity and insulation towards the tower for the following cables: S1 and S2 (marionette coils); U1 (Ring Heater); U2 (Ring Heater motors); U3 (mirror coils for sensing and PT100 on marionette coil); V1 (mirror coils); V2 and V3 (marionette motors); Z2 (temperature probes on mirror coils and on ring heater).

The test was successful: no electrical discontinuities or short circuits towards the tower were found.
AdV-PAY (NI and WI Payloads)
P. Puppo, M. Ricci, Piluso, MichelPG, Travasso, majorana - 9:02 Thursday 16 July 2026 (69368) Print this report
Status of WI payload assembling on 15/7 evening
This is the status of WI assembly as left yesterday.
The rear part of the payload cage will be assembled today.
Images attached to this report
AdV-PAY (NI and WI Payloads)
majorana, Pinto, Ruggi - 21:38 Wednesday 15 July 2026 (69360) Print this report
NI payload integration with the suerattenuator
Some work related to the balancing of actuation cage, mirror and maironette has been performed in the afternoon until 19:30.
The work is not complete, meaning that some further effort should be still done before releasing the suspended payload to the VAC crew.
However we are quite close to finish.
The target was to close the OpLev Local Controls, and this step was not performed. Anyhow, the weight and the correct position was identified. Given the anomalous unbalance appeared on the suspended marionette+mirror system, and the needed mass redistribution needed to compensate it, the work was more demanding than expected.

Given my absence during Thu and Fri, the needed manual balancing steps will not be done and will wait for next Monday. We expect one day. If everything goes properly on Monday afternoon we can release to VAC.

The system was left free to oscillate under the standard clean-air flow.
Comments to this report:
Gherardini, Pinto - 10:33 Thursday 16 July 2026 (69369) Print this report
This morning, after the NI Payload intergration, we checked the electrical continuity and insulation towards the tower for the following cables: S1 and S2 (marionette coils); U1 (Ring Heater); U2 (Ring Heater motors); U3 (mirror coils for sensing and PT100 on marionette coil); V1 (mirror coils); V2 and V3 (marionette motors); Z2 (temperature probes on mirror coils and on ring heater).

The test was successful: no electrical discontinuities or short circuits towards the tower were found.
Safety (Laser Safety)
majorana - 19:37 Wednesday 15 July 2026 (69365) Print this report
Comment to NI vacuum chamber (69355)

in the afternoon I worked again in the NI. I left at 19.30 LT

Detector Operation (Operations Report)
gherardini - 16:33 Wednesday 15 July 2026 (69363) Print this report
Operator Report - Daily shift
Below the list of the activities communicated in control room:

INJ: mode matching measurement and reduction.
PAY: NI payload balancing, in progress.
PAY: WI payload assembly.
AdV-DAQ (Calibration)
vanhove - 15:57 Wednesday 15 July 2026 (69362) Print this report
NCal Temperature offset tuning and rotor restarted

Between 11:00 and 13:00 utc, I tuned the offset of NCal temperature probes to have all of them at 22.5°C+-0.1°C when all rotors are off.

Then around 13:50, I switched all rotors ON to their default lines and closed the loops. 

Details:

Strictly speaking we shoud tune the parameters inside  /virgoData/VirgoOnline/SNEB_Fb.cfg and SWEB_Fb.cfg which set the parameters of the volts to temperature function.

But in good approximation, it is OK to modify the offset of the ADC to Volts conversion in /virgoData/VirgoOnline/SWEB_dbox_rack.cfg and /virgoData/VirgoOnline/SNEB_dbox_rack.cfg

For a 0.1V offset in these configurtation files we observe the following temperature changes in the sensor outputs:

For 0.1 V offset NNN NEN NSN NWN WNN WEN WSN WWN
box_T offset (°C) 3.52

5.18

5.21 5.41 5.165   5.05  
motor_T offset (°C) 2.51 3.37 3.40 3.48 3.385 2.45 3.31

2.429

The final offsets used in cfg files are then:

dbox_rack.cfg offsets NNN NEN NSN NWN WNN WEN WSN WWN
box 0.11 0.045 0.051 0.077 0.04   0.025  
motor 0.165 0.074 0.058 0.13 0.061 0.044 0.037 0.021

 

AdV-INJ (Optical setup for ITF reflection (SIB2))
ruggi, spinicelli - 14:29 Wednesday 15 July 2026 (69361) Print this report
PR parking position and SIB1 bench temperature

Since the re-opening of the IB-PR valve and the lock of the IMC, the temperature of the SIB1 bench started to increase. This is a known effect which is due to the warming of the optics by the main beam and, when the PR is parked in a "bad position" (see for exemple here and here), also to the back reflected beam from the PR, that stops on some optics/bench part instead of an apposite beam dump.

After few months of non-lock, the position of the PR could have drifted. With Paolo, we tried to bring back the PR close to its last good position and look at the SIB2_B2 photodiode to asses the aligned position (see fig. 1). We found out that the vertical position was quite off, but even after replacing the PR_Y DoF we could see any signal on B2.

However, looking at the MIR and MAR DoFs of the PR (see fig. 1), we see that for the same MAR_TX position, MIR_TX was off by ~ 150urad. This is probably due to the PR which slid on the wires during some of the test done in May. The back reflected beam was then touching the surface of the bench its, rising up its temperature.

Once found the aligned position, we left the PR with the usual misalignment and stored its new position on the PR Metatron node.

 

Images attached to this report
AdV-INJ (Electro optical modulation system (EOM))
lagabbe, nocera, spinicelli, melo - 12:33 Wednesday 15 July 2026 (69359) Print this report
exchange of the 2 LNFS devices that generate 6 MHz and 56 MHz

Starting from Saturday 11 july, the measured amplitudes of the 6 MHz and 56 MHz lines became noisy for an unknown reason. The 2 signals became noisy at the same time so we suspected a problem with the LNFS box that generates the two lines, while the 22MHz, generated on a different synthesizer (LNFS_2) doesn't show the same problem. 
69359_1784109159_2026-07-15_EOM_sidebands_freq-amp-phase_noise.png

In order to test this hypothesis, on July 15 at 9:00 UTC, the two LNFS boxes were exchanged, and the rms on the measured signal amplitude returned to normal. The rms of the 22MHz signal amplitude remained unchanged, and did not increase after the intervention.

69359_1784108529_2026-07-15_EOM_sidebands_freq-amp-phase.png
At this point, we don't know exactly what causes the signals to become noisy.  A similar phenomenon has been already observed in the past, when the problem was associated to a temperature problem in the INJ IER. The temperature in IER rose by a few degrees and became more unstable since last month. This might be an explaination for the problem even if there is not a direct correlation observed at the moment.
 
69359_1784110618_2026-07-15_piscina_temperature.png
The two LNFS boxes may be exchanged again in the future or swapped with one spare.
 

Images attached to this report
AdV-INJ (Input Mode Cleaner cavity)
spinicelli, gosselin, mantovani, melo, lagabbe - 11:56 Wednesday 15 July 2026 (69358) Print this report
Investigation on the longitudinal offset of the IMC lock

Since few week ago, after the intervention on INJ/ALS, the IMC longitudinal error signal shows a quite big offset (~ -1.8V), compared to the past( {-0.25, 0.1} ), visible as frequency to amplitude coupling on the INJ_PMC_TRA_DC_FMOD_COUPLING signal.

On Monday, we started to investigate the reason why this offset appeared.
We first checked whether the choise of the  22Mhz frequency modulation, used to lock IMC cavity, could itself be the cause of the offset. As we see in fig. 1, we started by putting at zero the IMC_OFFSET and scanning the 22Mhz on the LNFS up to few kHz of frequency shift. This resulted only in very small variations of the coupling channel.

Thus, we moved to investigate the way the beam enter the IMC cavity by acting on the BPC (with IMC_ON on 0, i.e. the BPC using its DCQPDs). As a result (fig. 2), the changes on the beam alignment improved the inejction into the RFC (visible on RFC_TRA signal), without changing the offset on the IMC longitudinal error signal.

Images attached to this report
Environmental Monitoring (Environmental Monitoring)
Lunghini, Fiori - 10:58 Wednesday 15 July 2026 (69357) Print this report
WEMeteoStation issues with external Humidity and Temperature

Since July 8, 2026, the WEB external humidity and temperature sensors of the wheater station are producing wrong data.
First we did a restart of the VPM process BcMeteoWe (Detector s Environment Monitoring > Environment > BcMeteoWe) but it did not solve the issue. Then, today we went to WEB to check the console of the station, we looked at the cabling, disconnecting and reconnecting them, we also restarted the module. None of theese actions were usefull to restart the acquisition and no values of external temperature and humidity are read by the device, external pressure and wind parameters are correctly collected.

An inspection of the sensor placed on top of the building must be scheduled.
 

Images attached to this report
Safety (Laser Safety)
majorana - 9:11 Wednesday 15 July 2026 (69355) Print this report
NI vacuum chamber
I am going to turn on the SLED of the Local Control @ NI

EM

Comments to this report:
majorana - 19:37 Wednesday 15 July 2026 (69365) Print this report

in the afternoon I worked again in the NI. I left at 19.30 LT

AdV-PAY (Assembly Structure for Monolithic Payloads (NI,WI,NE,WE))
paola puppo, marco ricci, eugenio benedetti, ettore majorana, flavio travasso, michele dicorato, antonfranco piluso, manuel pimto - 19:59 Tuesday 14 July 2026 (69354) Print this report
WI disassembly
The disassembly of the WI payload is complete.
During the operation we had several black outs, fortunately lasting only a few seconds.
The new WI test mass (IM01) has put in position under the marionette. During this last action there were no more black outs.

Photo 1: old WI
Photo 2: New WI in the box
Images attached to this report
AdV-PAY (Assembly Structure for Monolithic Payloads (NI,WI,NE,WE))
majorana, pinto - 19:58 Tuesday 14 July 2026 (69353) Print this report
Comment to NI Payload in tower. Full disassembly WI Payload (69343)
NI payload integrated. Left with the full load on the fibers. The Marionette is free but totally unbalanced.
Tomorrow the activity of weight checks and balancing.
Full availability of VAC and Clean Operation crews.

Infrastructures (Electrical installation)
D'Andrea, Carbognani, Marano - 18:01 Tuesday 14 July 2026 (69351) Print this report
Comment to Technical Bulding 500 KVA diesel generator (GE 1) (69340)

The swap to the emergency generator has been completed and a final test  with a sequence ~30 sec ENEL interruption -> generator intervention -> ENEL back -> generator offload has been satisfactorily performed.

Electrical situation is then back to default one.

A longer term solution for having the 2nd generator (GE 2) being able to serve both "UPS Central Building + UPS Computing Room + IPS  Central Building UTAs" and "IPS Central Building Chillers" is currently being planned (this solution is basically the first part of the generators parallelization that was already foreseen). 

Detector Operation (Operations Report)
lunghini - 18:00 Tuesday 14 July 2026 (69342) Print this report
Operator Report - Daily shift

ITF found DOWN and in UPGRADING Mode.
All times are UTC.
Below the list of activities comunicated to the Control Room:
07:41 - 10:03 Works in TCS Room (Ciardelli).
07:48 - 11:06 PAY IN installation in vacuum chamber (Majorana, Puppo, Pinto, and Benedetti, #69345).
07:54 - 08:40 NI PAY & tower electrical checks (Gherardini, Ricci, and Zaza in the tower, while Dattilo outside the tower, #69344, #69347, #69348). Tower electrical checks successfull.
The test of the backup generator has been performed twice in the afternoon (14:06, and 15:30), the IPS is now stable again and no other tests involving the shutting off of the IPS are needed. The setup of the Technical Building is back at the standard configuration using another generator #69351.
The activity in the CEB Clean Room is proceeding. 
 

Sub-system reports
SBE
SQB1: Recovered Vertical Position with Motor 3 rotating left, and Motor 4 rotating right.
DMS
TCS > Chillers: Shelved all DMS flags until the TCS AUX Lasers Cooling System will be installed.

Images attached to this report
AdV-PAY (Assembly Structure for Monolithic Payloads (NI,WI,NE,WE))
Eugenio Benedetti, Ettore Majorana, Paola Puppo, Marco Ricci, Manuel Pinto - 14:27 Tuesday 14 July 2026 (69343) Print this report
NI Payload in tower. Full disassembly WI Payload
NI payload in tower, actuation cage bolted to F7. Marionette NOT suspended.
WI payload full disassembled
Images attached to this report
Comments to this report:
Gherardini, Zaza - 10:53 Tuesday 14 July 2026 (69348) Print this report
This morning we checked the electrical continuity and insulation towards the metallic frame for the following cables: S1 and S2 (marionette coils); U1 (Ring Heater); U2 (Ring Heater motors); U3 (mirror coils for sensing and PT100 on marionette coil); V1 (mirror coils); V2 and V3 (marionette motors); Z2 (temperature probes on mirror coils and on ring heater).

We found one broken connection on the U2 cable: problem fixed.
majorana, pinto - 19:58 Tuesday 14 July 2026 (69353) Print this report
NI payload integrated. Left with the full load on the fibers. The Marionette is free but totally unbalanced.
Tomorrow the activity of weight checks and balancing.
Full availability of VAC and Clean Operation crews.

Safety (General safety)
lunghini - 13:07 Tuesday 14 July 2026 (69349) Print this report
Comment to PAY IN installation in vacuum chamber (69345)

Activity concluded at 11:06 UTC.

AdV-PAY (CP Support for NI and WI Monolithic Payloads)
Gherardini, Zaza - 10:53 Tuesday 14 July 2026 (69348) Print this report
Comment to Payload assembly: WI payload full assembly, NI payload CP assembly (69343)
This morning we checked the electrical continuity and insulation towards the metallic frame for the following cables: S1 and S2 (marionette coils); U1 (Ring Heater); U2 (Ring Heater motors); U3 (mirror coils for sensing and PT100 on marionette coil); V1 (mirror coils); V2 and V3 (marionette motors); Z2 (temperature probes on mirror coils and on ring heater).

We found one broken connection on the U2 cable: problem fixed.
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