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Long-slit spectroscopy

A program to observe standard stars for all grisms will be started whenever the observing schedule allows. The start of the program was postponed to after the aluminising session last summmer. Since then, we had no photometric nights during ALFOSC technical time in order to get the data. Once obtained, the standard star information will be incorporated in the WWW-based ALFOSC SN estimator. This will allow potential users of ALFOSC in spectroscopic mode to estimate the required observing time when applying for time.

A full set of slits will be purchased which are rotated by 90 degrees with respect to the current set. As the grisms can also be mounted rotated by 90 degrees, it will be possible to select the option to have the dispersion direction along the rows of the CCD instead of the columns. For an equal number of rows or columns, a window limited in rows can be read-out much faster, and for star-like objects where a window can be used the overheads will decrease. The disadvantage of this set-up is that bad columns can not be avoided, but if this is a problem depends on the wavelength of interest to the observer.


next up previous contents
Next: NOTCam Up: ALFOSC Previous: ALFOSC   Contents
Thomas Augusteijn 2003-02-21