Controls Meeting 21-Mar-2013

Agenda

• Announcements
• Minutes from previous meeting 7-Mar-2013
• Requirements for BCAL/FCAL LED pulser calibration system - Elton
• Update on FCAL dark room - Dan, John, Manuel
• Update on PLC test stand - Dave
• Counting House status - Hovanes, Elliott
  • furniture, computers, networks, etc.
• EPICS update - Hovanes
• Solenoid update - Mark, Scot, Elliott
• Progress on other controls applications - Dave
  • storing/retrieving PLC parameters
• What is the role of the JInventory system - All
  • relation to DAQ, HV/LV control, cabling?
  • need to finalize conventions and get all equipment entered
  • need to purchase/print and install barcode labels
  • some software improvements and bug fixes remain
  • other halls interested, may provide programming manpower
• Mantis task tracker
  • start using this again?
• Midas elog

• Experiment Control Supervisor - Elliott

Time/Location

9:30AM Thurs 21-Mar-2013 CC A110

Next Meeting

9:30am Thurs 4-Apr-2013

Minutes

Present: Elliott W, Elton S, Dan B, Fernando B, John L, Yi Q, Scot S, Mark S, Dave B, Tara B, Alex S, Hovanes E.

BCAL/FCAL Pulser

Elton gave a thorough overview of the LED pulser calibration system:

• System needs to send trigger to TS and TTL pulses to LED flashers.
• External power includes 5V and bias to set LED intensity, will use SiPM power supplies.
• LED flashed via capacitor discharge.
• Will have LED boards, distribution boards and external TTL pulsing system.
• LED boards done, distribution boards and pulsing system to be designed.
• For trigger timing all cables will be equal length, will get ~5ns jitter.
• Need 50' LEMO cables from VME crates to distribution cards.
• Cables from distribution boards about 12'.
• 4 lines go to each LED board.
• Will use three CAEN V1495 modules to generate TTL pulses, about $5k each incl. mezzanine boards.
• Max 16 TTL channels per V1495.
• Will likely use two VME crates, one for BCAL with two V1495's, one for FCAL with one V1495.
• Not clear if crates need to be purchased, hope to find free slots in other crates.
• Hope to not have to put V1495's in DAQ crates (discriminator crates are ok).
• V1495 has many LVDS outputs suitable for input to TS.
• FCAL has 10 LED boards per quadrant, 4 LED's per board, three colors.
• FCAL does not use distribution board, TTL signals go directly to LED boards.
• Ben will program V1495, 2 man-weeks allocated.
• Need to program pulse width, trig-to-pulse delay, start, stop, #pulses, etc.
• Once written and tested the FPGA code is not expected to need to change.
• V1495 has programmable switches that could be used to implement local operational modes.
• Will use EPICS to control V1495 operation.
• EPICS driver needs to be written (Nerses or Hovanes).
• Considering running pulsers all the time at low rate during data taking.
• Max conceivable pulse rate 1 MHz, less ok.

FCAL Controls

John and Dan reported:

• Dark room parts list to be sent out, want feedback from JLab techs on choices.
• If no comments received will choose parts themselves.
• Dark room might be done in 2-3 months.
• One working power supply here, remainder in production or repair.
• Will soon have enough equipment to test FCAL in manual mode.

Counting House

• Rack room is ready and working, some computer and network equipment will be ordered in May.
• Furniture ordered, should arrive in a few weeks.
• Some conference equipment not ordered yet.
• Chairs finally ordered.

PLC Test Stand

• Parts coming.
• Need to test EPICS connection to CompactLogix processor (SNS swears it works).
• Dave will create tags, Hovanes will try to access them via EPICS IOC.

EPICS

• Beni and Hovanes working on auto-configuring power supply drivers.
• Nerses may finally be coming in May!

Solenoid