PIER-14 Starting from scratch

Dear fellow pier 14 subscribers,

It's likely that in 2 to 3 weeks time our pier will be up and running using the new camera and filters. In the meantime as much of the outstanding jobs will continue to be collected, subject to the weather and the moon's position. We've recently received a lot of jobs back from our pier and these ought to be checked asap and any replacement data requested and added to the job queue.

What will happen to the existing list of our submissions I don't think has yet been mentioned. I'd like to see it cleared down just as soon as the existing setup is disabled. Assuming that this does happen then we will then be able to start to submit the new jobs based upon the revised fov.

I believe that now is a good time for us to start suggesting targets. We are effectively starting from scratch with a smaller fov but being able to use almost all of it without mis-shapen stars. For several individual targets a mosaic will now be necessary, so perhaps we can discuss what percentage overlap of the panels we should use.

The new joblist needs to keep the pier busy imaging from the start. Initially there may well be a short period during the night around the full moon when there will not be any narrowband jobs. I think we've all been made aware that future jobs will need to be continually added to the list, but maybe we should first concentrate on what is current and you would like to have. 

One point that has been discussed on occasions but never given any backing is the number of hours submitted for a single job. With the change to how soon we have our data sent to us, that is the team no longer does a quick scan of the data beforehand, there will be many more instances of us having to submit a new job to replace bad subs.

For example, if you put in a job for 15 hours where there is a relatively short imaging window, then unless you get it back sooner, they'll not only be a shorter imaging window time remaining to collect the replacements, but there could be many more subs required. 

With that recent change I personally think we should stick with a maximum recommended time for a single submission. It might be 8 to 10 hours as a range or 10 to 12 hours, plus a small tolerance.

This does not mean you can't go beyond that for your target, only that you'd need to split it into 2 or more jobs. If it involves broadband and narrowband filters then this might be a good way to split the job up. Personally I think that going beyond 20 to 24 hours needs to be discussed on the forum to let people know beforehand. Chances are you'll always get backing from other members of the Syndicate. It's not that you cannot submit whatever you like, it's simply being considerate to others. 

I've rambled on for far too long as usual. Any thoughts, and all constructive criticism welcomed. 

Cheers, 

Ray