LHC portal

CERN has some fun names for problems apparently... It seems that the "Hump" is an unwanted oscilliation that's been observed since last year - and it sounded like some people were rather pissed off that it hadn't gone away after Christmas! It seems they're having a fun time trying to find the cause ...

LHC Config seems to be mostly collision, tune, luminosity info and so forth. There's also some general info on the accelerator at the top, and what Harbles posted above. Accelerator Mode: Not sure if this means LHC as a whole, or just RF. Beam Mode: Fairly self explanatory I'd hope Active Filling Sc...

Tuesday's Progress Report claims:

"Beam Thursday evening at the earliest."

Yes, 7 TeV will be a new record for power (LHC already holds that having surpassed the Tevatron).

And in theory, yes, it should reveal some new/more powerful physics

I would've thought they'd want to keep it a secret until they can make a big show and tell - or release it only just before to give visitors time to read it

Plus even scientists like Christmas/New Year's off

Christmas isn't completely silent in CERN - today a fire alarm was set off in the LHC.

However, not to worry - after an investigation by a pair of firemen, it turns out that someone forgot they were doing welding down there!

Not just El Reg (which brought me here) who have heard of us, either: 'Fan' helps make sense of world's biggest experiment (Nov 23, Toronto Star) ... Stephens' site (www.lhcportal.com) has now been up for seven days. It's already drawn nearly a quarter of a million page views ... http://www.thestar....

Today's schedule implies a Ramp to 1.18TeV, squeezing and then collisions ("measurements"). These could well be 16x16 as well, just to be more exciting! Last night, the LHC reached what we believe is the highest intensity it has ever reached - 1.55/1.75e11 for the respective beams. They were collidi...

Tuesday's -- Comments: TOTEM/Roman Pots tests completed by time of posting. (1600 CERN Time). Ramp + Squeeze - 16x16? We'll have to watch! -- Morning: - Prepare 4x4 - Set up TOTEM Roman Pots, then take data, ~2h - Study abort gap cleaner Afternoon/evening: - Orbit feedback - Ramp, squeeze and machin...

16x16 + Pilots now.

1.50E11 B1, 1.70E11 B2.

Best suggestion in IRC is that some fills are just worse than others - and of course, they're always fiddling with buttons and switches to try and make it work better.

To be fair, it's so rare that the links/title change it's not worth it - once a day at best, in all honesty.

Saturday's Timetable

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Comments: Collisions and analying why B2 keeps falling is that?
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- Continue stable beam collisions at 450 GeV, 2e10 p/bch,
4x4_c+shifted (no overinjection), review tomorrow morning.
- Try understanding beam life times.
- If possible, further transverse IP adjustments.

Then again, surely they'll want incredibly high purity samples of Hydrogen (which I assume they want for protons) and Lead - that I know can cost a lot. But like you say, it is miniscule quantities.