Sarah using the heat gun to dry off her laptop.

On the 7th day in Palestine, even more testing was conducted.  Robert and Pierre-Simon continued tracker tests and analysis.  We continued monitoring the shell pressure leak test.  There was a small drop in pressure (1 psi), but given the temperature changes over the past few days a small change was expected.  Sarah converted the barometer data for Palestine and then spilled her coffee for the fourth time in 7 days.  This was the second time she had spilled it on her laptop, which actually isn’t even her laptop, but a friends because her own laptop stopped working.  I have a theory that coffee was involved.

After John made a short trip to the hated Lowe’s, we got to work adjusting the legs on the calorimeter, which is a tool that allows us to measure the energy of the particles crossing the detector above.  It was a very delicate process that involved taking off the old legs, placing the calorimeter on blocks of hood to prevent it from touching the ground, screwing on the new legs, and then flipping the calorimeter upright and on its three new feet.  The difficult part was not applying any pressure on the 4 photo-multiplier tubes.  The first one sticks straight out of the bottom and the other three stick out of the side symmetrically every 120 degrees.  Trust me, it was very tempting to use them to lift the calorimeter, however that would probably render them useless and potentially ruin the calorimeter.  The next step was to place the the calorimeter onto the lab stand and under the instrument.  It was a tight fit, but we got it in there without causing any damage.  It was stressful work, nevertheless it was necessary.

Sarah assisting in moving the calorimeter into place

Me assisting in moving the calorimeter into place

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-Matt Collins