Starting out the morning with a relaxing flashlamp change for the laser. Flashlamps are skinny little lightbulbs (see one on the right in the photo) and they get worn out the longer they run. Worn out flashlamps = sucky laser power. Lidar folks are usually interested in More Power!
I was also a plumber. Refilled the laser's cooling system with distilled water, and checked for leaks. Then fixed the hugest leaks. Then tested again. Then filled the smaller leaks that I couldn't see for the huge ones before. Then tested again. Then thought it was okay. Then tested for longer. Then found a teensy tiny leak that would have proved bad later in the campaign. Had to replace a part to fix that one. Luckily, we had several proper spares, and several not-made-for-that-purpose-exactly-but-would-have-worked spares.
This is Zen's instrument. The back panel is kind of huge and heavy, so he gets to have company over to his lab anytime he needs to open his instrument.
Installing the pump chamber back in the laser. Also, you can see my new hat. I like it. It is green and keeps me warm.
Also, I'm learning some new things, including how to take video of stuff. We practiced today, and all the photos in this post are stills grabbed from video (hence the fuzziness).
These are the same photos that I passed to Dan today to put on the Official Campaign Website, which will be up in a few days. You can check out previous years campaign websites here: http://acebox.uwaterloo.ca/eureka/
Because the campaign is starting a little later in the year than it does usually, there's already a good bit of daylight each day, and the sun is up for 22 additional minutes every day. Doesn't make *much* difference when I'm working on the inside of the shipping-container-turned-laboratory, but it will make things way nicer tomorrow when I do some maintenance work on the hatch switches on the roof!
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