[3dem] two Talos Arctica questions

Tue Nov 14 13:25:08 PST 2023

Hi David,

Yup. Seen both of those, diff aperture, diff scope, same issue. My solution is one of two things: a) open the aperture status mechanism and see if the aperture position is somewhere in the range it should be (for us it happens with the SA, but same behavior), if it is, you can try to enable/disable the aperture, then try to Home it. That is the least invasive method. The b) method, includes touching one of the gears (not sanctioned by any scope manufacturer, and it's not moved a lot, but you do have to know what you're doing and the direction you're moving) a little, enough to run the Home routine. We exchanged cables, apertures, motors, etc etc. I just think the SA area is possessed. I try to tell users to test when they're collecting data, and if they know they'll need diffraction imaging, so I can pop in, troubleshoot (only takes a couple of minutes), then let them be.

For the second issue: we had a leak when the scope was very new (I joined once the install was on its way, but this happened when the scope was being put together). You can get a sensor that calls your phone if the temp goes up above a certain level. What you do is that, for the type of sensor we got, about 8yrs ago, you have 2-4 probes or leads that you glue/affix to the lines you want (in our case, lines going into the scope), and you add whatever value is bad. If it goes above a certain level (I think in our case it's somewhere between 3-5 degrees because the temp shouldn't vary more than 2-3 degs IIRC, it triggers a call, and you should up on campus ... usually giving you enough time before the chillers shut off to intervene.

I'm happy to share the name of the vendor for the sensor. Or maybe something simpler, like getting a camera with live feed you can check if something appears to go wonky.

Best of luck,

Mariena
________________________________
From: 3dem <3dem-bounces at ncmir.ucsd.edu> on behalf of Morgan, David Gene <dagmorga at indiana.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, November 14, 2023 4:07 PM
To: 3dem at ncmir.ucsd.edu <3dem at ncmir.ucsd.edu>
Subject: [3dem] two Talos Arctica questions

Hi,

We continue to have two annoying problems with our Arctica, and I'd like to know whether this is just our microscope or if other have the same problems...

  1.  The minor issue is that the instrument seems to often forget the position of the objective aperture.  The UI reports that the aperture status is "unknown" and multiple things will not happen when this occurs.  We can sometimes (but not always) reset this by telling the instrument to insert the aperture and then to remove it.  Our service engineer tells us that the solution is to do this insert/retract step, but I am wondering whether this really means that something in our aperture hardware/software is not working properly.  Any experiences that others have would be appreciated.
  2.  The much more major issue involves what happens when there is an interruption to the chilled water flow.  On our instrument, the optics board immediately overheats and the camera chillers follow that shortly.  Those are minor issues that can be easily fixed regardless of how long the chilled water is off.  However, if the chilled water is off for "long enough," the turbo pump in the autoloader shuts off and cannot/will not restart.  This in turn means that the dewars cannot refill, and that the autoloader warms up.  It also means that the cassette and any grids in the instrument will warm up because the cassette cannot be removed - without the TMP, the vacuum system can't work properly, and a grid can neither be taken off the stage, nor can the entire cassette be unloaded.  This problem with the TMP seems like it is either a serious design flaw in the instrument (if this is what others experience) or that something is fundamentally wrong with our instrument/turbo.  And in case anyone is wondering, by the time we know that the chilled water will be out for long enough to worry about samples in the microscope, the turbo has quit and it's impossible to salvage the grids.

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

--
    politics is more difficult than physics.
                                             A. Einstein

            David Gene Morgan
        Electron Microscopy Center
             047E Simon Hall
             IU Bloomington
          812 856 1457 (office)
          812 856 3221 (3200)
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