(updated: 2016/11/09) 2016 HOK RADAR OPERATION HISTORY (this part in preparation) 03/27 - 03/29 Visit to the radar site (Nishitani, Ruohoniemi and Iida). The radar stopped a few times. 08/03 04 UT - 08/10 02 UT THe network to the radar site was cut off. The cause was the wireless LAN relaying device at the pump hut damaged by a thunderstrike. It was replaced with a spare device on 08/10. 08/04 0726 UT to 08/08 0536 UT The radar was stopped because of the sudden electric power outage due to a thunderstrike. 09/06 1200 UT to 10/12 05 UT The network to the radar site was cut off. The cause of the problem was not yet identified, but it is most likely due to the water leakage into the connection portion of the cable when there was a heavy rain (durint a thunderstorm). We shielded the portion using self-fusing tape. 09/07-09/10 Visit to the radar site by NIPR / JARE people (radar stopped intermittently). 10/03 0420 UT to 10/07 0556 UT The radar was stopped owing to regular antenna maintenance. As a result of testing, it was found that the VSWR of F3 and F4 antennas showed errorneous values. It is likely that the cable between the mast and the feed is faulty. We are investigating the cause of the problem. present status: working normally ---- 2015 RADAR OPERATION HISTORY 3/12 to 3/14 Visit to Rikubetsu made, but visit to the radar site was not possible due to too much snow. 3/24 to 4/24 The radar was stopped owing to the malfunctioning of the main computer. We do not know the reason for this, but one possibility was that the room temp was too high (around 30 C for 1 week). It was replaced with another one by Univ. of Leicester. Simultanously the hard disk drive capacity increased (80 GB -> 160 GB). 6/6 0516 - 2339 UT The data were not stored because it was not noticed that the main computer hard disk was full. 06/13 1221 UT - 06/14 0558 UT The data were not stored because it was not noticed that the main computer hard disk was full. 07/11 - 08/24 After the replacement of BASBOX, there were several problems with the radar such as the running of 2 different modes although the Hokkaido East is a mono radar. It was partly due to the old button lithium battery inside BASBOX. They were replaced with the other BASBOX. Since Channal A was malfunctioning, we operated the radar with channel B. It seems to work without a serious problem. The other BASBOX was sent to Univ. of Leicester for repair, but it still has a problem of 12/20 MHz LPF switching in channel A (channel B seems to be OK). 8/11 to 8/24 The network to the radar site was cut off because of the thunderstrikes damaging the wireless LAN relaying devices. 8/12 to 8/* Two phasing matrix phasing cards (connected to the interferometer array) got faulty because of the lightning strikes. They were replaced with the hkw channel B phasing cards (control box did not work anyway), and after the repair was made at Univ. of Leicester, they were replaced again with the original cards. 09/05 1223 UT - 09/06 0146 UT The data were not stored because it was not noticed that the main computer hard disk was full. 9/22-9/24 Visit to the radar site by NIPR / JARE people as well as Nishitani, hori, Iida and Yokote (radar stopped intermittently). 10/08 0252 UT - 10/09 0058 UT The radar was stopped owing to the sudden power outage following the passage of a typhoon. 10/08 - 10/09 14 of 16 (main array) log-periodic antennas were forced to change orientations randomly due to typhoon in October. They were fixed in about two weeks. 11/05 0011 UT - 11/05 0639 UT The radar was stopped owing to the maintenance of antennas (orientation displaced due to typhoon). ---- 2014 RADAR OPERATION HISTORY 3/9 1523:00-3/11 0111:43 UT: The data were not stored because it was not noticed that the main computer hard disk was full. 3/20 During the visit to the radar site, it was found that one of the phase matrix phasing cards, 8i/9i, had not been operating properly for beams 0,1,2,3,12,13,14 and 15 (it had worked for beams 4 to 11). The card was taken out, and sent to Univ. Leicester for repair. It was fixed and sent back to the radar site and installed at 0857 UT on 5/19. Between 0232 UT on 3/20 and 0856 UT on 5/19, the phasing card 8i/9i did not exist, so that the interferometer data was not fairly useful (although phasing card 7i/10i still worked). 5/19 As a result of measuring the cable width of each antenna using the TDR cable tester, it was found that the F2 antenna cable connection had a serious problem. After checking SWR value on 6/27 and 7/3, it was suggested that the feeder point was cut off. On 9/3 the antenna manufacturer climbed the antenna and did some test to find out that the balun was not working. The balun was replaced on 10/3. We do not know how long the F2 antennas was faulty (at least after the last antenna maintenance on 2011/10/11-15). 9/2 0529 - 0647 UT The radar was stopped owing to BASBOX replacement (although it was not successful). 9/3-9/5 Visit to the radar site by NIPR / JARE people (radar stopped intermittently). This time the team was not accompanied by the Hokkaido radar PI. 10/1 2122 UT - 10/03 0613 UT: The radar was stopped owing to regular antenna maintenance. 10/20 - 10/28 Visit to the radar site by HKW installation team (Mick, Pasha, Alexey, Yoshiyuki, Nobuyuki and Nozomu). 10/21 0200 UT - 11/30 0141 UT, intermittently The default radar frequency was set to 14 MHz instead of 11 MHz because of the initial operation of the Hokkaido West radar. 10/22 00-09 UT The radar was stopped intermittently because of the initial operation of the Hokkaido West radar. 10/25 0501 - 0728 UT The radar was stopped because of the maintainance / phasing matrix checking by Mick Parsons and HKW installation team. 10/25 During the phasing matrix checking it was found that the internal pre-receiver unit was not working at transmitter #15. We do not how long it was not working, but during the malfunctioning of the unit the antenna #15 was not working at all for receiving (it worked for transmitting). The transmitter was immediately replacced with a spare unit. 11/08 0502 UT - 11/09 1624 UT The data were not stored because it was not noticed that the main computer hard disk was full. 12/28 0252 - 0504 UT The data were not stored because it was not noticed that the main computer hard disk was full. ---- 2013 RADAR OPERATION HISTORY 2/21 12-18 UT: The radar was running with wrong frequency setting, so that the radio wave was not emitted. 3/29 0052:48-0103:46 UT: 2013 RADAR OPERATION HISTORY 2/21 12-18 UT: The radar was running with wrong frequency setting, so that the radio wave was not emitted. 3/29 0052:48-0103:46 UT: The spare basbox was tested, but it produced very high noise level with LOWPWR flag turned on for all the transmitters. Therefore it was replaced with the original basbox and sent back to Univ. Leicester. 4/17: The transmitter power was measured (although not connected to the dummy load but to the antenna, making the measured power rather inaccurate), and the transmitter #27 (connected to F3 antenna) was found to produce no power for 14 and 16 MHz. It was replaced with a spare transmitter. One of the spare transmitter #37 was also found to have a problem, probably related to faulty 350V power supply. It was sent to Nagoya for repair (replacement of power supply card). 5/19 002:04 UT - 5/20 0819 UT: The iq data was not recorded, probably owing to the bad timing of triggered rbspscan mode just 1 min after the starting of scheduled normalscan mode. 6/14 0646-0748 UT: The radar was stopped in order to replace the BASBOX with a spare one. The spare BASBOX started working normally again after 2 years of several problems. 7/4-9/5: The weather station anemometer unit was occasionally malfunctional until it was replaced by a new unit. 8/5 1035-1202 UT: The data were not stored because it was not noticed that the main computer hard disk was full. 08/20 0638-0659 UT: The radar was stopped owning to the sudden power failure associated with lightening. Even after the power recovery, 4 transmitters (F2,F3,F4,F9) showed errors (V/F lamp turned on). Two of them were replaced by the spares, but two (F2, F14) showed errors until the system was rebooted on 9/5. It turned out later that the replaced units had no problem either. 9/3 0526-0634 UT: The radar was stopped for the replacement of transmitters. 9/5-9/7: Visit to the radar site together with NIPR / JARE people (radar stopped intermittently). During the visit all the transmitters were checked for 16 MHz frequency power output. None of them had problems. 10/16 0607 UT - 2203 UT: The radar was stopped owning to the sudden power failure associated with heavy snow. 12/29 1510 UT - 12/30 1807 UT: The data were not stored because it was not noticed that the main computer hard disk was full. ---- 2012 RADAR OPERATION HISTORY 1/5 0302 UT: Fixed integration time setting bug pointed out by Dieter Andre. 1/23 0730 UT - 1/24 2040 UT, 1/24 0030 UT - 1/24 0610 UT and a few other times: The high-speed network connection was cut off probably because of the loose connection at the 7.5 m tower. 1/23-4/5: The network speed was slow, probably because of the loose connection at the 7.5 m tower, until electrial shop people climbed up the tower and changed the connection state unconsciously. 3/20 0822 UT - 3/21 0140 UT: The transmitter #3 stopped operation until it was replaced by a spare unit. 4/25 1939 UT - 4/26 0022 UT The data were not stored because it was not noticed that the main computer hard disk was full. 5/10 2100 UT - 5/14 0400 UT The high speed network was stopped owing to the electric power failure of two wireless LAN network relay points (possibly due to a lightening strike). 5/19 0530 UT - 5/20 0356 UT The radar was stopped owing to the sudden power failure in whole Rikubetsu town on 5/19 (lasting from 0530 to 0900 UT). 7/30 2354 UT - 7/31 0243 UT The data were not stored because it was not noticed that the main computer hard disk was full. 10/2 0045 UT - 11/19 0550 UT: The digital camera stopped operation because it was sent to Nikon for repair of shutter parts. 10/24 - 10/25: Visit to the radar site together with NIPR / JARE people (radar stopped intermittently). 10/10-10/24: The digital camera / weather monitor conrtoller Windows PC was stopped until it was replaced with a new PC. 11/22 0612-0643 UT The radar was stopped in order to install rbspscan triggering mode (but it was not triggered until 2013/01/26 owing to programming error). 12/3 1046-1200 UT, 1222-1928 UT The data were not stored because it was not noticed that the main computer hard disk was full. 12/04 22:18 UT - 12/05 05:09 UT The radar was stopped owing to the sudden power failure in whole Rikubetsu town. --- 2011 RADAR OPERATION HISTORY 3/20 0600 UT - 3/22 0240 UT: Radar stopped owing to BASBOX failure, caused by CPU board overheating (room temp was ~30 C) until it was replaced by a spare unit. 5/18: Network link to the radar site was upgraded to 100 Mbps (best effort value). 7/19 about 0100 UT: Adjusted R2 antenna attitude (Oda-denki). 8/5 0106 UT: IQ data sampling started. 8/8 0529 UT - 8/24 05:40 UT: The high-speed network was down due to the lightening attack to the network bridges (SB-5100 and SB-510) until it was replaced by spare units. 8/10 1600 UT - 08/11 0223 UT: Repaird BASBOX was replaced with the spare unit on 8/8. However, the box went down after 2-day operation. So it was replaced by a spare unit again on 8/11. 9/2 2309 UT - 9/3 0730 UT: The radar was down owing to the power outage of the whole Rikubetsu town during Typhoon No. 12 passage. 10/11 0429 UT - 10/15 0032 UT: The radar was stopped owing to regular antenna maintenance (every 2 years). 10/29 after 06 UT - 10/30 0725:35 UT Transmitter #5 was down (due to the loose connection in the power sensor module) until it was replaced by a spare unit. 10/30 - 11/01: Visit to the radar site together with NIPR / JARE people (radar stopped intermittently). 11/09 after 06 UT - 11/10 0302:00 UT: Transmitter #11 was down (reason probably due to failure in 500 V power supply unit) until it was replaced by a spare unit. 11/11 - 11/29: The digital camera had problems, occasionally the internal mirror did not go down. 11/21: Updated normalscan etc. programs so that ucont error messages are logged properly (they were not logged since the upgrade to digital receiver in September 2008). 11/29 0735 UT - 12/27 0808 UT: The digital camera stopped operation because it was sent to Nikon for repair. 12/08 1217 UT - 12/09 0149 UT: The main computer was down due to the malfunctioning of cooling fans. 12/09 1217 UT - 12/21 0602 UT: The main computer was down due to the malfunctioning of cooling fans. After the replacement of all 4 cooling fans including 1 CPU fan, the radar restarted operation. 12/27 1457 UT: Changed longscan, fregogscan, esqpogscan etc. programs to the previous one because it was found that with 15 km resolution mode the ucont log did not work properly. Since this change no ucont logging is made during the 15 km mode. --- 2010 RADAR OPERATION HISTORY around 2/19 - 2/22 0751 UT: Transmitter #12 was down (due to failure in 500v power supply). 6/10: Installed digital camera at the radar site to monitor the northern sky every 5 minutes. 6/10: Installed large HDD capacity (1.5 TB) Linux system to store digital camera images and SuperDARN Hokkaido radar data. 9/16-17: Visit to the radar site together with NIPR / JARE people (radar stopped intermittently). --- 2009 RADAR OPERATION HISTORY 5/14 (after 3 UT) to 5/18 0457:43 UT transmitter #11 was down (due to failure in 500v power supply). 7/3 1527 UT - present applied narrow band (7 kHz) filter 9/2-4 Visit to the radar site with NIPR / JARE people (radar stopped intermittently). 10/20 0410 UT - 10/23 0304 UT: The radar was stopped owing to regular antenna maintenance (every 2 years). 12/15 06 UT: Recovered high-speed network link to the radar site. 12/25 0917 UT: adjusted range offset: See information on range offset --- 2008 RADAR OPERATION HISTORY 1/10 0552 UT: synth unit was sent back to the radar site, although Leicester people did not identify the problem. Anyway the radar restarted operation. March, April and May Synth unit occasionally stopped working, stopping radar operation. The problem continued until the receiver together with the synth unit was replaced with digital receiver system in September. July and August: The high-speed network was intermittently down. 8/3 18:57UT - 8/5 0746 UT: Synth unit was down, stopping radar operation. sometime - 9/1: The BASBOX was down due to the overheating of the CPU board. It did not seem to affect the radar operation for this case. 9/2 - 9/5: Visit to the radar site together with NIPR / JARE people (radar stopped intermittently). 9/3: Installed digital receiver. September and later: The high-speed network was down continuously until the establishment of new link using wired network in part of of the path in December 2009. 10/4 1536 UT - 10/20 0840 UT: 10/22 2233 UT - 10/26 0801 UT: timing computer was down due to the malfunctioning of the ATX power supply until the unit was replaced. --- 2007 RADAR OPERATION HISTORY 02/25 0141 UT to 2/27 0224 UT: The transmitter #7 and #8 with interferometer #17 and #18 stopped working owing to blown fuse of 50v power supply. 6/6: Radar site visit during a SuperDARN Workshop 2007. 6/30 to 10/12: The noise level was occasionally very high, owing to faulty connector in the receiver IF module. The receiver was sent to Leicester on 10/13 for repair, leading to the halt of the radar. Also it was found that the there was a leakage of the signal from the main array into the interferometer array inside the receiver. It means that the interferometer data cannot be used till 2007/10/12. 8/7 0537 UT - 8/16 01:50 UT: The high-speed network was down owing to the lightening until the network bridge was replaced by a spare unit. 9/3 15:04 UT - 9/19 05:30 UT: The high-speed network was down owing to the lightening until the network bridge was replaced by a spare unit. 11/20 0704 UT: Repaired receiver arrived and started operation, with correct interferometer data. 12/3: synth unit stopped operation owing to overheated CPU module. 12/13 0806 UT: synth unit was sent to Leicester for repair. Accordingly the data was stopped till the next month. --- 2006 RADAR OPERATION HISTORY 11/10: First light: started test operation. Phasing matrix cards #5 and #6 were malfunctional in the beginning (card #8 also got malfunctional later, around 11/20). 11/25 1340 UT: Radar stopped working due to PTS-310 blown mains fuse. 12/02 0451 UT: Started full operation using Agilent signal generator with all the phasing cards operational (#5, #6 repaired and and #8 loaned from Leicester). 12/27 0505 UT: Replaced phasing cards #8 and synthesizer to original ones.