Summary notes of the LCU meeting on 19/02/2013

Present: FB, RB, HB, RdM, LD, OD, MHF, MG, BH, LL, SR, MS, RT, RV, GR

Report from meetings

• SLM and general information -> MG
  Welcome to Ghislain Roy who (re)joins our group on the first of March after years of work in other groups on operation, safety and risk management! He plans to work on MAD-X and the online-model. He is also the office space manager for the department.
  IPAC student grants are being decided and the results will soon be communicated to the people concerned.
  There will be 10+2 summer students for BE which means that only a fraction of the requests for summer students in BE (with 4 from LCU alone) can be granted. Few more students can be expected from the non-member state programme.
  Massimo said that he passed-on to the SLM the comments received in our last meeting concerning the group re-structuring. The mandate for the new "LCU" section is not yet finalized.
  Exchange of information between the sections has been discussed. It was noted that fora did not attract many people from other sections. The proposal made during the retreat where the new group structure has been discussed, consists of regular presentations of the main activities (projects and studies) within the group. Given the large number of activities to report on, two groups should be defined. Such a presentation should be on a monthly basis and each topic would then be presented every two months. Once more, Massimo stresses to provide him with feedback on restructuring and communication exchange within the group.
  There has been further follow up on the subject of IR8 aperture measurements. A list of poor pickups was received from BI. The subject will be re-discussed at the next meeting in view of reporting back to the LMC. It should also be clarified to which extent reduced emittances and reduced separation on the first parasitic beam-beam encounter can be accepted. Ramping the IR8 spectrometer would help but appears to be excluded by LHCb due to the concern about the mechanical stability of the spectrometer magnet.
  It is also planned to do similar studies for IR2.
  It has been proposed to install a new profile measurement device based on beam-gas scattering and particle detection in IR4. It should ideally be located in a place where horizontal and vertical beta functions are equal.
  There is also follow up on the specification of orbit correctors for the HL-LHC in view of minimising the strength requirements.
• Collimation status -> SR
  Stefano said the collimation teams has been closely involved in the program of quench tests at the end of the LHC operation with beams. Some quench limits appeared to be higher than expected. A full analysis will follow. Ions had to be switched off before these tests, so that the quench levels for ions could not be verified with beams.
  The collimator production delays caused by problems in one firm can be expected to be largely absorbed by increased production rate by another firm.
  The collimator review will be scheduled in May and aims at a rather detailed analysis of the recent quench tests.
  The collimation team has been moved temporarily to the barracks for office renovation work. This was announced to them rather late. Several of us said they were also unhappy about delays and poor communication in the context of the office renovation work. Massimo took note and sent a mail informing Oliver of the situation. Also Ghislain took note in his role of space manager.
• MAD-X status -> LD
  Laurent said the pro release would be released today in 32 and 64 bit versions for several platforms. Much effort went into improved testing. He is in contact with IT and PH-SFT on standardised, automatic testing procedures of software. This would allow sharing the testing procedures and platforms with most of the codes in ABP, with a nice synergy and improved efficiency with respect to the current situation.

• SixTrack status -> RdM
  Riccardo said there is in fact work on automatic testing joining the MAD-X efforts as reported by Laurent. There is also work on documentation describing the physical models implemented in SixTrack is doing.

AOB

None

Last update: 25-February-2013

MG & HB

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