Clear and sunny all day today across the region. Cooler along the coast with a high in low 70s while warmer inland with highs near 80F.
All ISS systems have been running without issues again today. Some issues with the webplots still persist, as some ceilometer and profiler consensus plots not up to date on the ISS2 webplots page as of this writing.
Jacquie, Laura, and I all went to Sedgwick this afternoon. While Jacquie and Laura went to the ISFS tower at Sedgwick, I did some work on the UPSs in the ISS3 trailer after the failures that occured when the power went out on Wednesday night during the last EOP. The systems in the trailer were powered as noted below:
CyberPower OR2200LCDRT2U UPS #1, black, located on the floor beneath the sounding system: Sounding computer and monitor, MW41 receiver, and cell phone booster. Output load current ~118W, as indicated by the UPS.
CyberPower OR2200LCDRT2U UPS #2, black, located on the counter between radar system and electrical panel wall: Data Manager computer and monitor, Ethernet switch, Ubiquiti POE supply, ceilometer computer and monitor, and all-sky camera power. Output load current ~174W, as indicated by the UPS.
Best Power 610 UPS, cream color, located on the floor beneath the Data Manager computer: Radar computer, monitor, radar Power Supply Unit, tower power, ceilometer power cable, network temp sensor, and USB camera(s) power. It appeared that the 610 batteries were not charging looking at the LED status lights on the front of unit, as indicated below:
LED status panel of the Best Power 610 UPS
I then turned the main breaker off in the trailer at ~2142 UTC to simulate a power failure. The wind profiler electronics and computer went off immediately, which indicated that the Best Power 610 UPS is not working. The CyberPower UPS #1 also instantly turned off, which took down the sounding computer and MW41 receiver. However, CyberPower UPS #2 worked as expected and the Data Manager and Ceilometer systems remained running while the UPS indicated that the UPS could support the load for ~140 minutes.
When the power was turned back on (at ~2144 UTC) both the CyberPower UPS #1 and the Best Power 610 UPS came back on. The CyberPower USP shows a fully charged battery, but the system repeatedly beeps 3 times while flashing the battery icon. I checked the available documentation on CyberPower's website but did not find a meaning for this combination of indicators.
With power restored, the sounding system restarted on its own and booted to the login screen while the MW41 receiver came up to standby power, meaning one must manually turn receiver on, login to the computer, wait for the MW41's green light to stop blinking and turn solid, then start the sounding software to get the whole system back up.
The radar electronics came back on and the profiler computer did restart on its own and booted to the login screen. I logged into the radar system under the LAPXM login and, to my surprise, the radar started running before I opened the LAPXM Console program. I opened the Task Manager and found no applications running under the LAPXM user, but upon viewing tasks for all users, I saw tasks named LAPXM_Main.exe, LAPXM_Rass.exe, and LAPXM_ManageDiskSpace.exe running under the SYSTEM user. When I started the LAPXM Console program a LAPXM_Console.exe process appeared under the LAPXM user in the Task Manager. Using the Console, I could stop and unload the radar program, but the three LAPXM_xxx processes under the SYSTEM user remained running, and also remained running after I closed the LAPXM Console program (which did end the LAPXM_Console.exe process). I then rebooted Windows on the profiler computer and logged in again with the LAPXM login. The three LAPXM_xxx processes under the SYSTEM login were again running after the restart, but the radar remained idle. It appears that the three SYSTEM processes remember the last state of the radar even after the system loses power and reboots when power returns. Good info to know. Normal radar operation was restarted at 1958 UTC.
I then turned to the CyberPower UPS #1. I tried to run the unit's self test, but the system turned off, perhaps because of the load attached. I disconnected the load and ran the self test again. This time the UPS did not turn off, but did beep once with no other indicators illuminating. Upon reattaching the load, the UPS again started to intermittently beep three times with the battery icon illuminating during the beeps. I plugged in the alarm clock as an easy load, and disconnected the line power to UPS. The UPS did not turn off but was only able to support the clock load for a minute or two before turning off. All signs point to a bad battery or some other fault in the UPS.
I then moved the loads plugged into the bad CyberPower UPS (#1) to the good CyberPower UPS (#2). The draw on the (good) UPS was now ~320W and the UPS indicated that it could support this load for ~60 minutes. I then moved all other loads except for the radar (i.e. the tower power, ceilometer power, USB camera power, etc.) from the Best Power 610 UPS to the good CyberPower UPS (#2), which initially increased its load to ~520W & ~40 minutes of support, however, this level came down to ~340W with ~60 mins of support available at this level. *** This load was further decreased to ~250W & ~100 minutes of support when the monitors of the sounding, data manager, and ceilometer computers were turned off. So it is highly recommended that the monitors not being actively used be powered off with there respective power buttons to maximize the amount of time the UPS can support the systems in event of loss of line power.
UPDATE: This evening I looked at the manual for the Best Power 610 UPS and determined that the above status lights on the front display indicate that the UPS is in its battery charging mode. In this mode power is available at the outlets on the back of the UPS but the battery backup feature of the UPS is NOT enabled. The indicator LEDs on the front panel, pointed to by the red arrow, shows the load level on the system in this mode.
Per the manual, "After completing the installation and battery recharge, switch on the UPS by pressing and holding the front panel switch I for one second. The unit will now commence a system check sequence before establishing its own inverter power. At first, all the Load Level LEDs will illuminate together, and then one by one. Within a few seconds the Inverter indicator will illuminate, indicating the inverter has now started and the bypass indicator will extinguish, indicating that the UPS is now in normal mode. You may now start the equipment connected to the UPS." Once switched into 'normal' mode, the indicator LEDs will show the amount of battery capacity remaining as a percentage of the full battery capacity. I plan to make a trip out to site 3 tomorrow before the start of the half-IOP to make sure the system is in the correct configuration and may see if the unit is indeed operational.