D1
Troubleshooting
Detlef Smilgies,
CHESS
Remark
The following procedures are written for SAXS and GISAXS/GIWAXS users
as well as for the CHESS operators. It is recommended that the users
work with the CHESS Operator to start-up the station computers or
troubleshoot the detector. Read the whole subsection dealing with your
problem carefully, identify which symptom fits your problem best, and
then go through the steps in order. If nobody has any idea what I'm talking about, you should give me a yell.
Rock'n'Roll Trouble Shooting
Rock'n' Roll refers to the semiautomatic line-up macros for lining-up
samples for grazing incidence scattering and for calibrating the
incident angle.
Rock'n Roll works in over 95% of all line-ups, but occasionally there
can be a problem, either due to a non-ideal sample or an operator error.
Here is a trouble shooting list
- Check whether the shutter was open during the line-up scan; if not, redo line up with shutter open
- you can redo "rock" as many times as needed, but do not repeat "roll"
- if "roll does not work (only noise in the scans, no reflected beam), your sample may have poor x-ray reflectivity
- for poor reflectivity samples run rock a couple of times, and then set "samth" and "samz" to ZERO
- Check in the hutch whether something is blocking the beam
- Type "wsam" and compare user values and dial values for motors samz and samth.
- I carefully align the sample stage relative to the beam; these motor positions are saved as "dial" values
- if
values differ by more than 10%, use the "set" command to set the motors
to the dial values: set samz <dial value>;set samth <dial
value>
- use the "mv" command to move motors to zero: mv samz 0; mv samth 0
- Make sure that you use a proper sample name containing only (A-Z, a-z, 0-9, -, _); otherwise an error results
- redo "new" with a proper sample name
- Make sure that you supply the correct sample thickness when using the "new" command
- Check that the shutter is open.
- Run the "rock" and "roll" macros again.
If this does not help
- Remove the sample, move samz and samth to ZERO, and carefully line up the sample holder with "rock"; then set "samz" and "samth" to ZERO as you new starting values
- you may want to note the dial values shown by "wsam" in your logbook
- if the sample stage does not look horizontal, you can level it with a water level, before doing "rock"
- if the Imon signal is low or high throught the samz scan in "rock", the sample stage is either too high or too low, respectively
- type "gclose" to protect the detector, then "shopen"
- move the "samz" manually with the "mv" command
- note a position when the beam intensity is starting to decrease
- redo "rock"
- Put the sample back on, do "new" with a new sample name, and
chose the correct sample thickness (wafer: between 0.5mm and 0.7mm,
glass slide: 1-1.5mm, ITO/FTO coated glass: 2mm)
- Try "Rock" and "Roll" again
- Does the sample look flat? rough samples are always hard to
align - "rock" is you best bet, "roll" won't work most likely (see
above)
The monitor intensity Imon has steadily dropped - what's wrong with the mono?
- Call the CHESS operator to help.
- Run the macro "monolup"
- The report from "monolup" is printed out on the laser printer in the F2 control area
- Operator, please file the printout
- If this doesn't help, call me or other CHESS staff familiar with mono line-up
Background: Eversince we have been running in the special orbit for the undulators, the D1 beam has been less stable.
The Pilatus detector doesn't take images and/or SPEC gets stuck during taking an image
- Call the CHESS operator for help.
- If SPEC gets stuck, exit the waitinng loop with "Ctrl-C"
- Pull out the screen and keboard of the detector computer, and wait until the detector GUI appears.
- Take some (3+) images manually by hitting the "Start" button
- if image acquisition does not stop automatically, hit the "Stop" button
- check the exposure time, correct it to a smaller number (1s) if need be, and try again to take an image with "Start"
- when the detector responds normally, run "movie_setup" with new
parameters (filename, exposure time) and check that the GUI values on
the detector computer are properly updated
- if the detector computer remains unresponsive, close the GUI
and click the "Stop" icon and wait until all detector windows are
closed. Then click the "Start" icon.
- try again with "movie_setup" and "shoot"
- if the detector is still unresponsive, have the CHESS operator
call in help (Scott Smith - detector group, Phil Sorensen - LINUX
software group)
The laser printer does not print - how do I get the printer to cooperate again ?
- check whether there is paper in the printer - the CHESS operator can get more paper from the stock room
- powercycle the printer and wait 5 min
- sometimes the cause for printer failure is a bad job
- if printed from LINUX (station computer)
- open a new window
- check the D1 print queue > lpq
- remove the top job > lprm
- wait 5 min
- if failed job printed from Windows (analysis computer)
- check the print manager and remove stalled jobs
- see the CHESS operator for help
SPEC refuses to let me open a new data file
SPEC
only permits the user to have a finite number of files open. Usually
thsi does not cause problems, but under certain conditions that I have
not yet clearly identified SPEC "forgets" to close old data files
and hence new ones cannot be opened. Here's the fix:
- list all open files by typing > on()
- note: the parentheses "()" need to be typed!
- close all old data files that are not in use any more > close("<data file name>")
- note: close only the files that you recognize as old data files!
- you should be able to use "newfile" or "new" now
I accidently closed the SPEC window - how do I restart SPEC ?
Call the CHESS operator for help. Often the SPEC process is still active
in the computer, and does not allow you to start SPEC again. In this case,
first the old process needs to be killed, before SPEC can be restarted.
- open a new window (window icon on the bottom left)
- type "ps -ef | grep -i saxs" and find the process id of the
process called "saxs"
- of the two numbers listed, this is usually the second one
- type "kill -9 [process id]"
- note: read the process table carefully: if you kill the wrong
process, the computer may crash
- open a new window , type "saxs"
How do I recover from a crash of the D1 station computer ?
Only the CHESS operator or other qualified CHESS staff should reboot the
station computer. This following shows how to reconfigure the SPEC
interface:
- log in and open a window (window icon on the bottom left in the command bar)
- type "saxs"
- all relevant macros should be loaded automatically when SPEC
starts, even from a fresh start
How do I recover from a crash of the D1 analysis computer ?
- reboot the Windows PC
- start "captureGIXS36" using the icon on the desk top
- images are on the S: drive on the Terabyte server
- find your user directory on the S: drive, image data should be in the "pilatus" subdirectory
Film thickness monitor hung up
- try to quit and restart the soft ware
- if this does not help: try to reboot the computer (hutch, on top of the FilMetrics controller)
- note: the USB cable has to be connected to start the acquisition program
Microscope computer
- check that the USB cable between camera and the hutch computer is properly connected
- close and restart "Debut" program
Microbeam stage: motor does not respond
- identidy controller (1-3) and channel (1-8) of problem motor
- switch to manual by pushing knob on the corresponding manual controller 1, 2 or 3
- dial up motor channel using the V or P push buttons
- hold knob of manual control down for 2 seconds - motor will be reinitialized and moved to home position
- if this does not help: power-cycle the controller
NOTE: After 15 years of faithful heavy duty at D1, the MedOptics detector has been retired in favor of the Pilatus 200k.
What do I do when the CCD camera seems to be hung up?
sympton 1:
go through checklist:
- is the personal safety shutter open?
- is the garage door open?
- is the ion chamber removed?
- is the sample at a reasonable position (wsam)?
- is the beamstop at a reasonable position (wbs)?
- is there signal on Idet in line-up mode (GISAXS users) or on the
photodiode (SAXS users) ?
- is there an obstacle in the beam, like a fallen down cable,
shielding etc. ?
in many cases steps 1-7 fixed the problem, and the CCD turned out to be
just fine.
if none of the 7 steps bring an improvement, move on to symptom 2
symptom 2:
- always the same image, regardless whether there are x-rays on the
sample or not
explanation: the IDL interface does not notice, when it loses
connection to the CCD controller - this time the CCD is definitely hung
up
troubleshooting steps:
- check that the water interlock on the CCD rack is okay (yellow
control light on)
- check that the CCD controller is on (green LED on front)
- if the controller had been off for a while, wait 10 min for the
CCD to cool down before proceeding
- stop the acquisition program by hitting q on the Windows PC keyboard in
the CCD camera rack
- restart the program by typing allez
- take a test image
if the CCD is still unresponsive:
- exit the IDL program
- restart by
double-clicking the IDL icon on the desk top
- type "allez" on the command line
- take a test image
whenever you feel completely lost at one of these steps
symptom 3:
- the CCD macros return without any delay without producing an image
when an image gets terminated with Ctrl-C before the end of the
exposure time (NOT recommended !!!), the CCD can end up in an undefined
state
- type "ccd_off", then
type "ccd_on" to reset the
CCD interface