SDSU (ARC) CCD controller documentation

29 November 2018

Following Dave Atkinson's visit to Thailand, we realised that the documentation for ULTRASPEC is in a dire state. To rectify this, Dave collated the following set of circuit diagrams and user manuals for the CCD controller boards in ULTRASPEC, as well as providing a change history document. Note that all of the drawing versions should now be correct with the exception of the power control board (ARC73). Bob Leach does not have any 6B documentation on file, but he suggests that 6C will be as good as "identical".

I've now also added the circuit diagram for the SDSU PSU (ARC80) that we use for both ULTRASPEC and ULTRACAM. I also added updated information on PSU situation and the spare CCD controller, following Dave's and my visit to the TNT from 23-29 Nov 2018.

ULTRASPEC has the following boards in its 6-slot chassis:

• Slot 1: UKATC HV CLOCK BOARD. Labelled "BRD2" (sticker) and marked "UKATC L3CCD HV Clock Rev 3.0".
• Slot 2: ARC-32 IR & CCD CLOCK DRIVE BOARD, REV. 6A 6/6/2006. On the back it says (in pen): S/N 176, Rails = 13V, Rise Time = 10ns.
• Slot 3: Empty.
• Slot 4: SDSU CCD VIDEO PROCESSOR BOARD, REV. 3B 7/3/97. On the back it says (in pen): S/N 53. The board has two ADCs. One has a PAT testing sticker on it (!) and says "From right NO2" (?). The other has a printed sticker saying "VD NoO". The ADCs are code number 9745. None of the PALs have any stickers on them - not sure if any are exchangeable. Note that the SMA connector marked "LS" goes on the connector nearer the centre of the board, and the one marked "HR" goes on the connector nearer the edge of the board.
• Slot 5: Empty.
• Slot 6: ARC, INC., ARC-22 TIMING BOARD, R5D 7/10/02. On the back it says (in pen): S/N 368. There is an EPROM with a (UKATC-provided) sticker saying "utim 3.4". There are three PALs. The smallest has a white sticker with "U3R52". The middle-sized one has a sticker saying "U16R53". The largest has a sticker saying "U37R53".
• Power control board: This is located at the end of the SDSU chassis. It says: SDSU ASTRONOMY, POWER CONTROL BOARD, R6B 4/8/98. It has a sticker saying "S/N 124". There are no exchangeable PALs or EPROMs on it. It has jumpers JP6 and JP9 removed.

The drawings and manuals for the various SDSU boards are below:

1. ARC22r5D_Layout.pdf
2. ARC22r5D_Sch.pdf
3. ARC32r6A_Layout.pdf
4. ARC32r6A_Sch.pdf
5. ARC32_UsersManual.pdf
6. ARC45r3B_Layout.pdf
7. ARC45r3B_Sch.pdf
8. ARC45_UsersManual.pdf
9. ARC73r6C_Layout.pdf
10. ARC73r6C_Sch.pdf
11. ARCControllerHistory.pdf
12. ARCControllerHistory.xls
    
    
13. ARC-22: 250 Mhz Fiber Optic Timing Board, Gen III: User Manual

During visits in Nov 2017 and Nov 2018, Dave and I configured our spare SDSU 6-slot chassis with the following spare set of boards:

• Slot 1: Spare UKATC L3CCD HV CLOCK BOARD. Labelled "BRD1" (sticker). A visual inspection comparing this board with the one in the controller reveals no differences, with all jumpers set the same.
• Slot 2: Spare ARC-32 IR & CCD CLOCK DRIVE BOARD, REV. 6A 6/6/2006. On the back it says (in pen): S/N 185, Rails = 13V, Rise Time = 20ns. A visual inspection comparing this board with the one in the controller reveals no differences, with all jumpers set the same. Testing in Thailand with Dave demonstrates that this spare works perfectly when swapped with the existing board.
• Slot 3: Empty.
• Slot 4: Spare video board (SDSU CCD VIDEO PROCESSOR BOARD, REV. 3B 7/3/97). The components on this board had to be modified slightly by Dave so that it gave the same bias voltages as the main video board. On the back it says (in pen): S/N 385. The board has two ADCs, with no stickers on them. There are two PALs, both of which have "R3.1" stickers on them. Note that the SMA connector marked "LS" goes on the connector nearer the centre of the board, and the one marked "HR" goes on the connector nearer the edge of the board.
• Slot 5: Empty.
• Slot 6: Spare timing board (ARC, INC., ARC-22 TIMING BOARD, R5D 7/10/02). The original was given to me by Derek ages ago, but Dave found it didn't work during testing at UKATC in Oct 2018. So Dave gave me an identical board he had in his lab, and I intend to return the original board to Bob Leach for repair in Dec 2018. When I get this back, I will give it to Dave to pay him back. The final (Dave's) board in the spare controller has the latest version of the UKATC code ("utim 3.4"). On the back it says (in pen): S/N 66 (the broken original was S/N 1064). There are three PALs. The smallest has a white sticker with "R5.4". The middle-sized one has a sticker saying "R5.2". The largest has a sticker saying "R5.5".
• Spare power control board (SDSU ASTRONOMY, POWER CONTROL BOARD, R6C 5/1/9). I bought this from Bob Leach in 2013. This is located at the end of the SDSU chassis. It has a sticker saying "S/N 256". There are no exchangeable PALs or EPROMs on it. It has jumpers JP6 and JP9 removed.

We use an ARC80 (large) PSU for ULTRASPEC, the same as we do for ULTRACAM. We currently have 3 of these SDSU PSUs in Thailand. These are:

• Original SDSU PSU: The circuit diagram for this is given here: ARC80_Sch.pdf. This is the original PSU that Derek gave me with the instrument back in 2006. During testing in Sheffield in 2013 prior to shipping to Thailand for first light, we discovered this PSU to be unreliable, sometimes not allowing a successful PON. It eventually failed completely (never allowing a PON) in March 2017, so it was swapped for the Old Spare SDSU PSU - see below for details, which we have used since then. I intend to return this to Bob Leach for repair in Dec 2018.
• Old Spare SDSU PSU: The circuit diagram for this is given here: ARC80_Sch.pdf. I bought this PSU from Bob Leach around February 2013, prior to shipping to Thailand for first light. We have been using this PSU in the instrument since Mar 2017, when the Original SDSU PSU failed.
• New Spare SDSU PSU: The circuit diagram for this is given here: ARC80R2A_Sch.pdf. I bought this PSU from Bob Leach in 2017 as a new spare, to replace the Original SDSU PSU which had failed. (I also bought a second such PSU at the same time to act as a new spare for ULTRACAM at the NTT). This PSU behaves differently when you probe it with a multimeter. The two older PSUs give 6.5V when you probe pins B-C and P-N. This PSU, however, gives the expected 6.5V for pins B-C, but pins P-N gives 3V which gradually ramps down the longer you probe it. After much discussion with Bob Leach, it turns out that he has recently changed the funtionality of pin N so that it is no longer the 6.5V return within the PSU. However, this doesn't affect the functionality of the PSU and it should work identically to our older two PSUs. You can check by probing pins P-a, which does give the expected 6.5V. However, Dave and I found in Nov 2018 that this PSU does not work with the 10m SDSU PSU cables - the PON only works when a shorter SDSU PSU cable is used. Fortunately, Dave swapped this PSU with one that he had in his lab that does work with 10m cables. So I restickered Dave's PSU as New Spare SDSU PSU and put it in the crates.