PDF File X376 Technical Report

Expedition 376



Technical Reports

Passing The Torch
Good Fortune Jurie Kotze













Contents
 

LAB OFFICER'S AND ALO'S CROSS-OVER NOTES

WILLIAM MILLS, HEATHER BARNES AND ERIC MOORTGAT

IODP Expedition 376: BROTHERS ARC FLUX

The goals for this expedition are to investigate the fundamental, interrelated processes governing subseafloor hydrothermal activity at Brothers volcano, southern Kermadec Arc.
Science Prospectus: See URL http://publications.iodp.org/scientific_prospectus/376/index.html
Operational Reports: See URL https://iodp.tamu.edu/scienceops/sitesumm/376/

Operational Dates

• Departed: Auckland, New Zealand at 0821, 09 MAY 2017
• Estimated Arrival: Auckland, New Zealand a 0700, 5 July 2018

STAFFING CHANGES

• Three temporary Technicians sailed: Jurie Kotze Jr. (CoreLab/ET), Cameron Ramsey (CoreLab), Mackenzie Schoemann (Chemistry).
• Eric sailed as a Temporary ALO but was later hired to be a full-time ALO.
• Sadly, this is Jurie Kotze Sr.'s last expedition with IODP. Grandchildren and retirement beckon.

PORTCALL

Expedition 376 officially began with the first line onshore (Auckland, New Zealand) at 0652 on May 5, 2018 ending expedition 365. On the same day, the technical staff boarded and completed a routine crossover with the off-going staff. During the 5-day portcall, the technical staff welcomed the science party onboard, gave them their safety orientation classes, introduced scientist to their labs, and showed them how enter and retrieve data. All logistic activities were completed without issues.
During the portcall Bruker service call successfully addressed issues with the XRD and it was operational for the expedition.

Transit

From Auckland to our operational sites on the Brothers Volcano, was just under 24 hours and the same for our return. Because of the short transit neither bathymetric or magnetic data was collected.

Operational Areas

All operational sites were in dynamic positioning range of each other. During our time on site, we had numerous severe storms pass over us shutting down drilling operations. In between storms, the weather was cool and mild.

LOGISTICS

AMS/Inventory

• Missing D-Tube tape and Kleenex boxes – 'received' but not actually onboard.
• Looking at a possible Point-Of-Sale system for IODP Stores. Further research onshore.
• Relocated SNOOP to UTSHOP from UTS. Sealer repair kits to UTSHOP from CSPLIT.
• Relocated Gas gauges from UTS to UTSHOP opening up 3 empty drawers.
• Cleaned up, organized (again) the splitting room drawers. Moved Heat Sealer items to UTSHOP. Item #CR5022 is now in UTSHOP.
• Removed large Yellow poly rope from inventory

OFFGOING SHIPMENTS

• Air Freight to IODP (RAF)
• Surface freight to IODP (SURF) 20ft container
• Foreign Air Freight (FAF)
• 1 x 20ft Core Reefer to Kochi Japan
• Frozen and Refrigerated World Courier Agent is bringing Blue Ice to first day of port call these need to be frozen for offgoing refrigerated samples.
• Note for the Frozen (PELL and LABO going to Labonte address)
• EXP376_TAKAI Ken Takai's personal Equipment
• Hand carried:
• NZ participants samples (marked 376NZ_)
• Reyes personal Equipment including the Kuster Tool (will pick up in van)

Laboratory Summary

The usual happened when drilling into a subsea volcano….fluids of pH 2.0, venting of hydrothermal vents from the re-entry system, burning of tools, H₂S, fractured drill pipe…par for the course.
As expected, drilling on active volcanoes requires both perseverance and luck. Throughout the expedition, we had difficulties setting re-entry cones in a layer of loose ash and fresh flows that covered most of the sites. Several attempts resulted in the re-entry cones and casing returning to the surface after the under reamer arms failed to retract. On the upper cone we successfully drilled a deep hole into a highly active hydro-thermal system with reasonable recovery of highly altered volcanic material. We had some issue with H2S but no hazardous concentrations. Yet, the constant smell of H2S caused some discomfort among the staff. However, the rig floor we had several area alarms from mud on the outside of the pipe or from H2S charged water inside the pipe. Throughout the expedition, H2S protocols were followed.
During the middle part of the expedition, staff kept quite with hard rock curation but towards the end, storms and drilling conditions limited recovery.
A major objective of this expedition was to recovery fluids and temperature data from an active hydrothermal system. We were quite successful in that regard although it took a toll on both hardware and staff. However, we recovered several samples with the Kuster Water Sampler of 400F of Sulfuric and Hydrochloric acid (pH2). During the last two days on site, we conducted an intense collection of water samples and temperature data at sites U1528 and U1531.
In slower periods, the staff kept busy with numerous maintenance projects, lab cross training, and reorganization of supplies.
There were no major changes in the labs – except remodeling in Underway and repairs to the Maggie level wind.

AREA-BY AREA

General

• Updated nearly all LabVIEW application to 2017. See developer's report for details.
• In order to make room for the newly purchased 3D printer, we sorted, high graded, and moved plumbing/swage-lock supplies from UTSHOP to the new shelving in the underway lab. Plastic storage boxes have been ordered to replace the cardboard boxes.

• Other items were shifted around as summarized below:

  Description	From	To
  3/8 and larger Swagelok fitting and valves	UTSHOP	U/W Black Vidmar under porthole
  All PVC drain, water fittings and drain line (including green acid drains)	UTSHOP	U/W Storage Shelf-boxed
  Copper and brass fittings	UTSHOP	U/W Storage Shelf-boxed
  Water hose and brass tube fittings	UTSHOP	U/W Storage Shelf-boxed
  Water faucet and sing drains	UTSHOP	U/W Storage Shelf-boxed
  Epoxy sinks and sediment drains	UTSHOP	U/W Storage Shelf
  Hose clamps	UTSHOP	U/W Black Vidmar under porthole
  Snoop	UTS	UTSHOP, blue Vidmar starboard forward
  Grease gun cartridges	UTSHOP	U/W Blue Vidmar cage door
  Silicone gun cartridges, and tubes	UTSHOP Shelf	UTSHOP, blue Vidmar starboard forward
  Spare parts for heat sealers, heat guns, and pneumatic box stapler	Splitting rm.	UTSHOP, brown Vidmar across from the bolts/nuts
  Microbiology water baths	UTSHOP	U/W Blue Vidmar on top of ET cabinets
  Cold Weather Gear	UTSHOP	U/W under counter
  Sonar Dome Parts	SubSea Shop	U/W long blue vidmar cabinet

  Core Deck

  Magnetics Lab:
• Made change to the SRM as requested by Beth Novak.
• JR6 had issues with pin mechanism and may returned for repair once the back-up is returned to the ship.

Physical properties Lab:

• Add the ability to measure the velocity on whole-round pieces in the X and Y-axis directions.

Core Splitting:

• Reorganized drawers and supplies
• High-graded mini-corers and returned unusable hardware to shore.
• Fixed issue with water line and solenoid location on drill press.

Downhole:

• Attaching the APCT to the VIT camera to measure water column and hydrothermal plume temperatures was a success.

Fo'c'sle Deck

XRay Lab:

• XRD: Bruker service call determined that our issues are with Window's 10 and their configuration file and not hardware. A workaround is implemented and the unit worked without issue for the expedition.
• Handheld XRF; Started off with issue and then resolved on it's own and ran for the expedition.

Underway Geophyics Lab and Fantail

Magnetometer Winch Level Wind:

• New sheave was installed along with new bushings for the acme rod and run-out spacer.
• Entire mechanical system was removed, cleaned serviced, and painted.
• Had issues with the controller blowing fuses after the repair believe we have resolved the problem.
• System was tested on the run into Auckland. It works but the fleet arm senor needs to centered and calibrated.

General

• In preparation for the upcoming dry-dock, the magnetometer tow leader was removed from the drum and stored in the U/W lab. All other VSP hardware was removed and stored in underway, as well

High Pressure Regulator:

• Missing fittings need to complete the job. They have been ordered for the Lyttleton transit.

Underway Lab:

• Remodeled the Underway Lab based on previous discussion with the other LOs. (see photos in ET report)
  • Moved the WinFROG workstations in between the electronic racks;
  • Removed the map case from under the central table and replace with a T-slot frame;
  • Moved the above table from the center of the room and remounted it against the port bulkhead.
  • Relocated the Maggie Storage box to the inboard side of this table and secured it to the frame.
  • Built shelving over the starboard counter and relocated material from the UTSHOP.
• Excess shackles and other lifting gear was turned over the ship's crew. What was kept was eneterd on the ship's lifting gear registry.

CORE Description, SEM, Micropaleontology preparation Lab

Zenon Mateo and Alexis Armstrong

Summary

Expedition 376 is one of the few scientific ocean drilling expeditions on an active hydrothermal system, and offered the first use of the DESClogik approach in describing associated deposits. The domains/groups include a sedimentologist, a group of igneous petrologists and volcanologists, and an alteration group, which also included sulfide and oxide petrologists, and a structural geologist.

ISSUES/DEVELOPMENTS/To BE noted

DESClogik

Expedition 376 started with DESClogik version is 16.1.0.22. Known administrative pitfalls were encountered at the beginning such as duplicate column and row definitions. One way to mitigate this in the future is for the technician in-charge to perform a dry run on the initial template to be made public by entering test values into a test section-half, export to excel, upload, download and compare results with excel export file.
Another known and persistent bug (mainly for technicians) is the inability of DESClogik to accept changes to an existing template. It would initially appear to reflect the changes after the import process, but when DESClogik is re-opened, it reverts back to the previous template version, even if there are no other instances of DESClogik open in other workstations. The solution is to rename and/or delete the previous template, before re-importing, the new excel config file that contains the changes.
Towards the end of the expedition, there were reported instance in the 376_microscopic/sediment_TS when some new entries were not uploading, and sub-sequent re-uploads attempts indicated nothing new to upload.

Paleontolgy wet LAB

No micropaleontologist sailed during this expedition. So the PaleoPrep Lab was used to set up the fluid inclusion and microbiology GC systems of Agnes Reyes (GNS) and Ken Takai (JAMSTEC).

Thin Section Report Builder and Write

A Thin Section Report template was initially created and included some detailed information from the different domains. However, due to the complexity of the rocks sampled (T. Hofig, pers. comm.), the final version is a simplified format that included only the general summary from each domain, and the plane- and cross-polarized thin section images. Being a 1-page report for each thin section, the label ID and pagination footer became unnecessary. However, there is no way to deactivate the footer in the TS Report Builder. D. Fackler had to programmatically disable this in the code and release a temporary version XNF. The previous version will be rolled back in before the end of Expedition 376.

SEM

The SEM ran well, and with no complaints from the science party. The instrument was introduced to the Description Group by the Imaging Specialist and assistance was given regarding the naming and uploading of files.

Shippments

Igneous Petrology and Volcanology macroscopic and microscopic paper logging sheets (of the first few sites only; process discontinued later during the expedition) are in the databox.

Data Backup

The following files were saved in data1/10.1 Core description and \Uservol\c.Core Describers Documents:

1. DESClogik data exported to excel by site-hole and template
2. Scanned logging sheets
3. Thin section reports and the report definition .json config file
4. Updated value lists and sub-lists from this expedition

PALEOMAGNETICS LAB

Edwin Garrett

Scientists: Fabio Caratori Tontini

Summary

This expedition was a lower recovery hard rock expedition which saw limited use/need for the SRM and only one Paleomagnetics scientist was aboard. Mostly younger altered volcanic material was recovered. The JR6 spinner magnetometer was used heavily and over 4200 measurements were made.
The Kappabridge susceptibility instrument was also used regularly. Both anisotropy and bulk susceptibility measurements were made for discrete samples (over 267). The thermal demagnetizer was used on most discrete samples with temperatures from 100 to 700 celcius. Software updates to the SRM software were made but not implemented.

Issues

SRM Hardware

Most core sections were run through the SRM using multiple demag levels depending on the strength of the sample. About 200 sections were run through the SRM using 5 to 7 demag levels per section. There were no track or other hardware issues.

Kappabridge

The Kappabridge was used regularly, however there were some issues with the Kappabridge program and the new Kappabridge MUT database upload program. The Kappabridge DOS program has no comment or treatment field for anisotropy measurements. Since multiple susceptibility measurements of samples were made before and after thermal demagnetization, there was no way to distinguish between the two measurements except for the file name used for uploading. The MUT upload program worked, but often if there was a problem with the file there would be no error message, the data would just not upload after the error. This caused a lot of extra work because if an error occurred in the middle of a data file, part but not all of the data was uploaded, so the technician must find and extract the part that as not uploaded, then save it to another file to upload using the same RAN file. Not an ideal solution to the issue.

JR-6A Spinner

One JR-6A spinner magnetometer has been returned for refurbishing and so we only had one available for this expedition. We had problems with the automatic mode of the spinner. Often during an automatic measurement the spinner would stop and give an E5 error. Checking inside the spinner the manipulator would be stuck in the UP position. It would retract if manually given the command, but would again stop with the E5 error on the next measurement. We (pmag technician and ETs) did extensive testing and calibrating and adjusting of the instrument but it did not solve the problem. We came to the conclusion that the problem was the manipulator extending too far and causing the error, but we could not find a limit switch that would tell the software the manipulator was extended too far so we could not correct the issue. The spinner worked fine in semi-automatic mode, and over 4200 measurements were made. We also had an issue that holders seemed to be acquiring magnetization during use and we could not get a good holder correction value. Physical cleaning alone did not solve this, but putting them in the SRM boat while demagnetizing the boat worked. Two holders broke during the expedition and they were placed in the splitting room on top of the saws to test if cubes made there would easily fit into the spinner.

Dtech Degausser:

The Dtech degausser functioned properly as was used often.

Thermal Demagnetizer

The ASC thermal demagnetizer was used often over its entire temperature range with no problems.

IRM

The impulse magnetizer was used regularly and no problems were noted.

IMS 10.1

The new version of the cryomag software was used this expedition, and additional software modifications were made and testing was done, but the changes were not implemented. Some of the changes were fixes to know issues and other changes were more cosmetic and/or informational or to improve the user friendliness of the program. The changes have not been fully tested.

MUT upload

The MUT upload program worked, but it was usually only a semiautomatic procedure for JR6 and Kappabridge data. For the spinner, the pmag scientist had a defined folder hierarchy for the various sites and holes that worked with the software he used, however this required copying the files to the JR6 IN folder regularly to be uploaded, and depending on the file naming scheme he used, it could allow duplicates to be uploaded that the developers had to remove. There was also the same problem with the Kappabridge files as the same file name for each site/hole was used and new data continually added. The Kappabridge MUT did not recognize the duplicate data when uploading, so the technician had to extract the new data and upload it in a different file name.

PHYSICAL PROPERTY LAB

Sherry Frazier , Cameron Ramsey

Summary

During Expedition 376 the WRMSL was used regularly, the STMSL was not used. NGR and TCON were used regularly without issue. MAD adjustments were made and MAD station was used regularly without further issues. Section Half Multi-Sensor Logger performed well for the duration of the expedition, with no major issues. There were minor issues corrected with routine maintenance.

Individual Measurement Systems

Whole Round MultiSensor Logger (WRMSl)

WRMSL was used regularly during this expedition, primarily without the P-Wave due to sediment conditions.
Technical Service

• Routine maintenance was preformed, transducers buffed and cleaned, fresh couplant applied as needed.
• QSG updated.
• GRA Standard was disassembled and cleaned, tested without water and liner. Measurements were accurate, standard was reassembled, and new distances were updated in software. See image below for standard measurement AL-GRA Velocity without water and liner.

Special Track Multisensor Logger (STMSL)

The STMSL was not used by expedition but so extensive use testing various methods for determining the first-arrival time for velocity measurements.

Natural Gamma Radiation (NGR)

The NGR was used throughout the expedition.
Technical Service

• Energy Calibration and background checks were conducted as needed. Calibration was checked periodically to detect any possible drift, there was none significant, checks are noted with calibrations in folder.
• Thermal Conductivity (TCON)
• TCON was used regularly during this expedition.
• Attached is a "Quick Start Guide" offered by Kannikha Kolandaivelu for review.

VELOCITY GANTRY

The Velocity Gantry system was used to measure the X and Y axis velocities of section halves, as well as whole round (allowing for two orthogonal measurements at any location that they found competent core), and cubes. Regular calibrations and maintenance performed. Some updates have been made on the Gantry to accommodate for "whole round samples" and for "manual pick" data.
Notes and Problems

• User Guide and QSG updated.
• Scanned shlf IDs are elevated to their parent section ID regardless if it is the working or archive shlf scanned.
• 2 context buttons were added to screen, X and Y axis for whole round samples.
• When user switches from "Auto-pick" to "Manual-pick", data acquisition halts and auto pick data is frozen. When user acquires and saves "Manual-pick" data, both the manual-pick and auto-pick data are saved.

• Changes as requested in the last Geophysics LWG meeting notes, updates to the Sample Information window and other changes.  These changes have not been deployed for this expedition but they have been tested and committed to SVN (Bill Mills). Changes include:

1. The presentation of the Manual/Auto pick button has been corrected to be more meaningful.
2. Active acquisition stops when in manual mode or when the user click the Save Data button freezing the values on the screen.  The manual velocity values will still update as the user moves the cursor.
3. In the Sample information window displays the measurement context picture so that they user is aware of how the data will be saved.
4. The LWG requested that the user be able to change the measurement context in the Sample Information window.  This would require a fundamental restructuring of the program so it was not implemented.  The user can simply click the Cancel button which takes them back to the Main screen where they can select the correct context and then click the Save Data button.
5. In the Sample Information window, the Manual file naming and the LIMS drop down list functions are now working.  As with the SRM, the LIMS window will list all discrete samples in LIMS appropriate for the measurement context.

Moisture and Density (MAD)

The MAD station ran successfully and no issues were reported.
Technical Service

• Cleaning and calibration were performed throughout the expedition. The standard Sphere_10 was measured as a sample throughout the expedition. 05/16, 06/03
• New labels for Standards were generated, can now scan label to fill ID fields. New label generates a new ID than before, so images in guides have been updated.
• QSG and UG updated.

Problems

• Cell # 2 displayed some deviation drift, O-ring was changed on cell #2 on June 18, 2018, checked by measuring standard and deviation is minimal.
• David Fackler's notes on the USB-6225 & PCI-6224;

Goal: Verify whether the National Instruments USB-6225 multifunction I/O board is a direct replacement for the existing PCI-6224 device.
Summary: No. It is not.
Activity summary

• Shutdown the instrument host.¿
• Remove the existing PCI-6224 multifunction I/O board from the operational instrument host.
• Reboot.
• Plug in the USB-6225 hardware.
• Open NI-MAX (tool to configure measurement and automation hardware) as admin.
• Remove the entry for the PCI-6224. Rename the USB-6225 to "Dev1".
• Save.
• Reboot.
• Launch MadMax.
• Exercise components of the pycnometer interface
• Inlet, expansion, and outlet valves trip for cells 1 & 2, but no others.
• Launch of a measurement on the spheres in cell 1 results in errors.
• Shutdown MadMax.
• ¿Restore the original hardware configuration.
• Verify (restored) operational function of mass and pycnometer measurements. 
• Review the PCI-6224, USB-6225, and Pycnometer Electronics hardware.
• A single USB-6225 only provides 24 digital I/O lines. Operation of the pycnometer electronics requires 36 (6 per cell).
• Search for a more precise fit.

Recommendation: Purchase National Instruments product USB-6363. It is pin-for-pin compatible with the PCI-6224.

Shear Strength Station

Shear strength measurements were not conducted with the Torvane during this expedition.

Section Half Multisensor Logger (SHMSL)

The SHMSL ran successfully throughout the expedition, with MS point and color spectrometry measurements taken on archive section halves. Halogen light source bulb changed 06/01/2018.

Section Half image logger (SHIL)

The SHIL was used to image section halves. No serious issues reported.

Whole Round image logger (WRIL)

• The WRIL was used during this expedition.
• On occasion an error warning shows up and the light array is partially functioning. Error warning gave option to "retry". Select "retry" and light array works properly.
• New rubber lining was put on the 4 detachable aluminum braces

SPECIAL PROJECTS, cAMERON RAMSEY

p-wAVE lOGGER tESTING

The goal of this project was to determine the best method for automatic time picking of first arrival wavelets on the P-Wave Logger. In the first round of testing, Zenon Mateo and Cameron Ramsey ran both water cores and play cores as well as an aluminum block through the P-Wave Logger using the Gaussian Fit method of determining the first arrival time. For this method, a Gaussian curve is fitted in the first significant negative phase of the waveform, starting from the zero crossing and working backwards to the inflection point that includes first arrival point. The first arrival is defined as the intersection of this Gaussian fit with the 2% amplitude threshold. We ran multiple tests on the P-Wave Logger using the Gaussian Fit to determine the first arrival time and calibrated the logger to the water core and the sediment play core. We found that the Gaussian Fit did not make accurate picks for the first arrival time without significantly adjusting the gain setting, especially when changing between our three test materials that also included an aluminum block.
In the second round of testing, the Energy Ratio Method (ER) and an adjusted Gaussian Fit method were added to the P-Wave Logger. The Energy Ratio Method uses the equation ERi=j=ii+Wgrm(j)2/j+i-Wi-1grm(j)2 and is able to determine that the first arrival pick occurs where ERi is at maximum (Han et al., 2009; Wong et al., 2009) (Figure 1). The adjusted Gaussian Fit creates its curve starting from the Energy Ratio's first arrival pick and generates the downward Gaussian curve forward until the first zero crossing. Heather Barnes, Zenon Mateo, and Cameron Ramsey tested the two methods by running the full length of the water core and sediment play core through the track. Both approaches worked well on the water core when calibrated with the corresponding method, but varied in the first arrivals and velocity when it came to the play core (Figure 2). We also noticed a discrepancy in the system delay and liner velocities when calibrating to the different methods. When calibrated to the Gaussian Fit the system delay was about 14.30μs and the liner velocity was 2205.12 m/s whereas for the Energy Ratio the system delay was 14.68μs and the liner velocity was 2628.53 m/s. We determined that the Energy Ratio method was the better of the two and even considered using an improved version of the Energy Ratio from Lee et al. (2017). The Modified Energy Ratio (MER) would most likely not work well because this method becomes more dependent on amplitude rather than on the Energy Ratio in a noisy environment like the core lab.
In the third and final round of testing, we took measurements using the Energy Ratio, Gaussian Fit, and Zero Crossing methods on the play core, water core, and aluminum core and adjusted the gain to determine what settings worked best on each core type. This Zero Crossing method determines the first arrival time by subtracting 1.5 microsecond. The best time picks when adjusting the gain occurred at -0.5 gain for the water core, -0.0 for the play core, and +2.0 for the aluminum core. Comparing all the methods, the Gaussian Fit consistently picked lower arrival times than the Energy Ratio and the Zero Crossing (Figure 3, 4, and 5). Both the Zero Crossing and Energy Ratio provide a valid and accurate first arrival pick for the P-Wave Logger system, especially when using the proper gain setting.
Figure 1: Example of Energy Ratio Method making a first arrival time pick


Figure 2: Testing play core velocity on the Gaussian Fit and Energy Ratio
Figure 3: Testing gain settings on the water core with the Gaussian, Energy Ratio, and Zero Crossing methods
Figure 4: Testing gain settings on the play core with the Gaussian, Energy Ratio, and Zero Crossing methods

Figure 5: Testing gain settings on the aluminum core with the Gaussian, Energy Ratio, and Zero Crossing method

IMAGING & MICROSCOPES

WILLIAM CRAWFORD

summary

The site for the expedition were a 1 day transit to Brothers volcano. It is said to be a "live volcano" with many "Black Smokers" and plumes. The drilling was difficult with most sites having a rubbly characteristic in the material make-up which offered difficulty in drilling and core recovery. This was and expected and low recovery was understood to be normal for this kind of structure.
Despite the challenges of drilling, the recovery yielded seem to be satisfying to the Co-cheifs and scientist.
The weather also provided its own style of challenges with many periods of weather delays.
The temperature and corrosive fluids found down hole at Site U1528 caused damage to the downhole instruments and caused embrittlement of the drill pipe. This was sited as the major reason for a drill bit departing. The end of the recovered pipe showed the embrittlement damage and was well photographically documented.
The Co-chiefs and scientist were delightful to work with and the atmosphere was light.
There was little use for the stereo microscope and all were moved to temporary storage except for one. This allowed space in the Paleo lab for personal equipment for personal instruments brought by scientist Agnes Reyes.
The Imaging Specialist worked closely with Expedition Project Manager/Staff Scientist Tobias Hoefig on the creation of the weekly images and captions.
The expedition's duties for the Imaging Specialist was more or less normal for a hard rock style mission. Higher than normal request for close-up photography, Thin Section imaging and whole round imaging and assembly are typical hard rock expedition requirements of the Imaging Specialist.

Still Cameras

All of the still cameras worked very well inclusive of the Hasseblad. The Canon IDS which failed a few missions ago was replaced by a newer version which was a delight to use. The failed camera was repair and sent to the ship as a back-up system.

Video Camera

As per urged by the Co-chiefs and because the proposed video team could not be a part of the Expedition, The Imaging Specialist captured B-roll footage of the majority of the processes to be used by the New Zealand imaging team.

Epson printer

The Epson printer continues to perform superiorly to that of its predecessor and older model. In my opinion, it's not often a newer model actually provides such a significant improvement in performance but this is certainly the case for the 4900.

Close-up Imaging

The close-up imaging station worked well with heavy use. The imaging up-loader was free of "bugs" as these were taken care of during my last expedition. The system is a delight to use with the results of the exposure being viewed immediately on the monitor where any imperfection can be corrected or perhaps another angle of light is needed. Many times extreme close-ups were requested of in-filling of veins and or crystals forming in vugs.

Petrographic Image Capture and Archiving Tool (PICAT)

As mentioned earlier, we did have frequent times we were waiting on weather due to high seas. During such periods of time the ship must have higher outputs from the thrusters to stay on location accurately. During this time of high thruster use, the vibration of the entire ship increases. This vibration can cause degraded imaging. In order to combat this, the diffuser was removed allowing for a more intense lighting source. This gave the freedom of higher shutter speeds which was necessary to still the extra vibration. The installation of a higher intensity light source would be welcome!
The work station saw high use with over 100 thin sections produced on board by our thin section tech Seth Franks.

SECTION HALF IMAGE LOGGER

Green flashes were more prevalent for an unknown reason with the imaging of the whole round components. At least this is my feeling while running the imager.
Other than the pesky green flashes which are thought to a result of the camera sensor not to be discharged before the image producing process has begun, the Section Half Imaging Logger worked without flaw.
The logger was wonderfully stable during the whole cruise and only needed monitoring which was done on a daily basis.
Many whole round images were produced. These are compiled from four images being taken of 0, 90, 180, and 270 degrees of rotation of the whole-round sections before splitting. These are the assembled in the imaging lab office. The resulting image shows then the outside surface of the whole round section. This shows the features better with hopes of matching the images to the downhole records to find meters below sea floor.
This process is time consuming as I am struggling to catch up to what is been imaged as I write this report.

Other duties

Normal duties including the images sent to shore and identifying those in the image and suggestions for cut-lines were done weekly.
Helping the Education and Outreach Officers were requested time to time with still, video and live demonstrations for live broadcast.
Normal duties of photographing groups and printing of those groups were completed without issue.

Shipped to Shore

Each of us were encouraged by the Laboratory Officer to ship home items which were surplus or had not been used in a good while.
The imaging lab is shipping quite a few items off including, many of the older style oculars. These were found to have too long of a tube which if used on the newer style microscopes could cause damage to the prisms. New ones were ordered and received and the old style were shipped to be used on shore. Continuing with items shipped to shore from the microscope lab were two Zeiss SV-5 and 8 stereo microscopes, misalliances power supplies for cameras not in use and lamp housings and power sources also not in use. Three faulty Spot imaging cameras, one of the smaller type and two of the larger type. All of them have communication problems with the computer. David Fackler and I worked hours to find the problem and repair it. Every combination of computer, cords, power supplies, you name it was tried with no good results. We borrowed cameras from microscopes not in use or little used to give the scientist what they needed. The other smaller spot camera being returned was investigated by Steve Thomas and he too found a similar problem and determined the camera to be faulty. We had one back up camera in the Imaging Office which was brought into use during this very unusual microscope camera crises.
Two old Metz handle style camera flashes, battery holders and powered supplies were also sent to shore.
Canon tape style video camera and one lens plus 2 tape style video recorders.
Other items included empty camera cases and one very large Pelican box.

Image Summary

Counted at the time the report was written

• LSIMG 1337 section scans
• WRLSC 137 not complete at the time of this report. Est +1/3 more.
• Close-up 244 images
• Micrographs 1936 images
• Thin Section 314 images
• Still Images 177 gb including whole round production
• Video 60gb Raw 1920x1080
• SEM 26

Microscopes

The microscopes were cleaned, configured and adjusted during the transit. We had numerous, costly failures on the camera systems. Three Spot cameras quit functioning and had to be removed from service. The issues were communication problems between the camera and the computer. As stated earlier, many hours were spent with multiple people involved to try to find a solution to the problem.
The microscopes were configured for petrographic use and required little as for adjustment. We do have a reoccurring problem in rough seas by the chairs swinging around and hitting the condenser on the newer microscopes. This bumps the condenser out of alignment. I have urged the scientist to scoot the chairs closer to the desk to stop the swing.

SEM

The SEM was moderately used and other than the first instruction for use and subsequent instruction to the scientist for the uploader given by Zenon, little input from the Imaging Specialist was called for.

Other issues

No large issues which had me deviate from my normal duties

CHEMISTRY LAB TECHNICIANS REPORT

VINCENT PERCUOCO AND MACKENZIE SCHOEMANN

Summary

INSTRUMENT Status

Ampulator

The ampoule sealer was not used.

Balances

The new Cahn Balance software has been implemented and is working great.
There were no issues with the Mettler balances.

Carver Presses

The Carver Presses were seldom used this expedition. There are no major issues to report.

Cary Spectrophotometer

The SPEC was not used this expedition. The Spectrophotometer Workbook.xlsm has been updated to help streamline additional aspects of the spec analysis. Techs can create a sample sequence which can be automatically exported as a .txt file and imported by Cary Advanced Reads. Once the run has finished, the user may run a macro to import the raw data, parse it, and display it in tabular format.
Also added the capability to export charts of the calibration as .pdfs, and added placeholders for directory names of the imported raw data file, calibration pdf, and the Spectrophotometer Workbook file.xlsm so that they can be uploaded by Spreadsheet Uploader if need be. The Spectrophotometer Workbook has been added to subversion for version control and to archive it.

CHNS

Total nitrogen, carbon and sulfur were measured on the EA. Buffalo River Sediment was used as the calibration standard for carbon and nitrogen. To constrain the high levels of sulfur encountered the geochemists concocted several sets of in-house standards consisting of a sample matrix having undergone LOI, with either magnesium sulfate, barium sulfate, or silver sulfide mixed in at different concentrations. They performed the data processing offline. An important outcome from their tests was that barium sulfate (BaSO4) was poorly oxidized even with high levels of vanadium pentoxide added to the tin crucibles. The poor combustion resulted in significant peak tailing. Silver sulfide and magnesium sulfate both fully combusted, and in the future, should be chosen first when calibrating sulfur. Along the same lines, if an expedition is looking at sediments and/or rocks with sulfate containing minerals, and they find that there is peak tailing in the EA, they should run a few silver sulfide standards. If the sulfur dioxide peak comes out fine, then it is the sample matrix and not the instrument that is the problem.
Instrument Issues:

• The EA software throws an error when importing a sample table from LIMS if a field is missing (for example if the user forgot to enter in a "vial #" when weighing a sample). Add the required field manually in Worklist Generator, export the sequence, then import into the EA software.
• An "Error under voltage" error occurred on several occasions while running a sample sequence. The error put the EA in a hang state and automatically shut down the oven. The vendor documentation only mentions that "a circuit" had a spurious voltage reading and the "system will eventually restore itself" after several moments. This was not the case. We hard-started the EA, turned the oven back on, and continued the sequence. The chromatogram immediately following was off but the rest of the sequence was fine. If this occurs again, the tech should export the preliminary results before troubleshooting as the EA software may delete the results summary file automatically when it restarts.
• Mechler mentioned at the last crossover than he was encountering broken glass near the base of the reactor oven when changing the column. I noticed this late in the cruise as well. A glass covering within the oven annulus appears to have fractured and occasionally drops bits of broken glass. We will need to do a PM on this during tie-up.

Coulometer

We had some issues with the coulometer this leg giving poor % recovery of 100% calcium carbonate standards (~95%). Typically, values for the CaCO3 standards will range 97-101%—the vendor manual lists an analytical precision of ±1.25%. We tested both coulometers with different glassware, scrubbers, electrodes, cells, various CaCO3 standards (void of H2O), and users. We replaced the bulb for the coulometers, and the bulb intensities have been fine (~3200 ± 10). We have gone through the flow path with Snoop to verify there have been no leaks.
Electronic calibration checks performed in triplicate for both shipboard coulometers were within the accuracy of 0.15%, as specified in the vendor manual (procedure listed on page 33). The Cahn balance was within 0.5% of the 20 mg reference masses (Cahn1 and Cahn2 weight sets).
I have gone through the database records for standards and there seems to be a slight trending loss in accuracy over the last 6 months or so. The only problem I can see is that the cell solutions themselves have degraded. All bottles of each type are all of the same LOT and, according to their labels, have passed their expiration dates (Cathode: Jan 18, 2018, Anode: Feb 27, 2018). We have tested solutions from different bottles—all yield the same result.
I wanted to put this on the radar for testing during the tie-up period. I think it is premature to ship anything back home without first verifying if the solutions indeed are the problem.

Freeze-drier

The O-ring for the oil mist filter was missing which caused the vacuum pump to leak oil. An O-ring has been added. It is leak free.

Fume hoods

There was dust covering the resistors that extend across the inlet ports of the fume hood airflow monitors. The dust buildup increased the monitor sensitivity and would cause the alarms to frequently sound. The monitors were detached from the fume hood by loosening two screws and disconnecting a single wire clip. The dust was blown out with compressed air.

Gas Lines/manifold

There were no issues with the gas system aside from 5735 crashes of the Gas Data Collector. Jurie Jr. and Etienne plumbed an extra argon gas line to the NGA for the detection of hydrogen gas. Stainless steel tubing extends from the main argon inlet in the ceiling above the Cahn Balance station. It connects to a regulator on the wall above the coulometer workstation. A plastic line extends from the regulator back into the ceiling, then over to the NGA workstation.

GC3/NGA1

The GC3 was used to measure headspace gases. There were no issues to report with the GC3.
The NGA is currently plumbed with helium. However, the setup was altered during the expedition for the determination of hydrogen gases collected via the Kuster Sampler. The physical setup of the instrument is the same as the typical setup for hydrocarbons except that argon is used as a carrier instead of helium. When switching gases, the new carrier gas should be specified within the ChemStation method. "Argon" alone is not an option, but "Ar/Me 5%" is. I haven't verified this but believe the software accounts for density differences in gases when adjusting flowrates/pressures for gases controlled by the EPC (Electronic Pressure Control).
The hydrogen method is called x376_Hydrogen_Method.m. The main thing the techs will need to do in the future for setting up the method is to identify the correct peaks for the calibration. Hydrogen elutes first followed by oxygen then by nitrogen. The amount of oxygen gives an indication of atmospheric contamination in the samples/standards. Expect there to be small atmospheric contribution in the calibration standards even when the gas syringes have been adequately flushed. Argon in the calibration standards will not appear in the chromatograms because it is used as the carrier gas.
We may like to consider altering the NGA setup to allow for quick swapping of sample loops. It would make the analysis more flexible in that the calibration range and/or the sample range could be adjusted to overlap by changing the sample loop volumes. The loops are located within the valve box and are essentially untouchable, currently.
A portion of the NGA FID glow plug filament burnt off and fell within the FID. The hydrogen gas feeding the FID was enough to sustain it burning within the base of the castle, next to the column entrance into the FID base. The FID was switched off, allowed to cool to room temp. Then the castle was removed and cleaned. Air-In-a-Can was used to spray out debris from the column jet housing. Agilent's user guide (pdf on instrument host) gives good instruction on performing this cleaning. There was no significant deviation in FID baseline signal before and after cleaning.

Hydrogen generators

No issues with the hydrogen generators aside from the occasion low water alarm. During tieup we should purchase additional consumables for the generators and review the maintenance schedule. I am not sure how closely it is followed. There are deionizer bags, water filters, air filters, and desiccators that should replaced every several months, and several of these parts are not listed in AMS.

IC

After an initial successful IC analysis, the anions determinations started coming out 3x lower than what was expected for IAPSO standards. We isolated the issue to the anions suppressor and cleaned it with a mixture of 0.1 M oxalic acid, 0.1 M sulfuric acid, and 5% (vol/vol) of acetone, made up with DI. The anions response afterwards was much higher than it was pre-failure, so it seems there was a gradual degradation in the efficiency of the MSM. We should plan on cleaning this once at the beginning/end of every expedition. If the peak areas for the DF100 (STD1) calibration standard decrease over weeks of running, it is an indication, among other things, that the MSM may need to be cleaned.
We analyzed water samples recovered by the Kuster tool, several interstitial waters, and numerous anhydrite digestions of ICP powders using water (to understand sulfur speciation). Most of the Kuster tools were high in iron, and were visibly precipitating iron oxides over the subsequent days. We recommend waiting until these solutions have reached an equilibrium before filtering and analyzing by IC to lessen the amount of precipitates introduced to the instrument. However, even when the waters were filtered beforehand, the pH of the bicarbonate/carbonate eluent was high enough to facilitate noticeable precipitation. At the conclusion of a few runs there was doubling of the sulfate peak, which is the typical sign that the guard column is clogging. Simply replacing the anions guard column was enough to correct this (the filter was caked with iron oxides).
We had a similar problem with the anions detector as on x369, and x374. An air bubble or particle lodged in the conductivity cell and the cell showed extreme fluctuations in baseline. We tried flushing the cell with DI using a syringe attached to the inlet line. When this didn't remove the bubble, we removed the detector out-line from the waste container on the rear of the instrument, and backflushed the cell with DI (the column wasn't connected)—which cleared the flow path and restored the conductivity detector.
Other issues:

• We started writing a draft IC User Guide.
• Put instructions in the user guide for purging out the sample flowpath using the Dosino in MANUAL mode. This should be done whenever the ultrafiltration membrane, a filter, tubing, etc has been changed along the sample route, to lessen the chance of air getting to the detector.
• Samples may be reprocessed if a mistake has been made when entering in a "Dilution" factor into the sample sequence. However, MagIC Net only updates the "Concentrations" results with the new dilution factor, not the "Final Concentrations" field—which is the one we typically look at.
• Jill McDermott ran a set of lithium and ammonium standards to constrain those species. This could be something we implement in the future.

ICP

The ICP was used extensively this expedition for hardrock samples, with a few runs for interstitial waters, Kuster water samples, and several runs of mineral dissolution experiments. The geochemists decided to analyze non-combusted powders.
In addition, to the regular hardrock prep the geochemists measured proportions of certain trace metals residing in the sulfur-bearing minerals. Samples were digested with concentrated nitric acid, diluted with DI, and measured using a method derived from the standard hardrock ICP template. These results were not uploaded to the database.
There was some confusion over ICPExperts correction using internal standards. The geochemists ultimately concluded that internal standard must be spiked in every vial in the same amount (which is what Agilent stipulates in their documentation). The correction cannot be intuitively processed offline if the standards have different levels of internal standard than the samples (i.e. it is not as simple as applying your own dilution factor). I tried looking for documentation from Agilent covering the topic of internal standard calculations, but there is nothing listed in the manuals that came with the instrument, the ICPExpert Help Menu, or online. We should consult Agilent to get an equation because this is not the first time this has happened.
Other Issues:

• Added components to the database to capture the internal standard used for each elemental wavelength uploaded.
• The data reduction program (I finally bucked down and gave this one a name: AIDR-Agilent ICP Data Reduction) has been updated with several new features, which are listed as follows:
• Ability to import a sample results file.
• Ability to input criteria for each line to automatically flag values below detection, above the calibrated range, and/or with too high % RSD. These values are all appropriately labeled when converting to the format for upload.
• Ability to quick filter the lines by specifying the desired ones in the conditions sets table. Makes it easier to filter using the lines from a previous analysis, instead of manually filtering them one-by-one.
• Uploaded the AIDR template to Subversion for version control and to keep a permanent location of the most up-to-date file. I will occasionally be working on it back in College Station.

Microbiology

We did extensive testing with the GC2 method this expedition.
Conclusions from testing:

• PFMD contamination from lab air is negligible.
• PFMD contamination originates from the syringe used for injection. There was no residual PFMD in the sample inlet, column, and detector between runs.
• PFMD carryover from the Autosampler causes high values in the blank, potentially higher than in the samples (if a standard had just been analyzed). It is preferable to do manual injections if there are high levels of tracer present ("high" meaning orders of magnitude differences).
• PFMD saturation of the detector occurs for a 10 ppm PFMD sample in hexane, heated and headspace measured the regular way. At this point, the signal has reached a maximum current and flat-lines until the PFMD concentration in the detection diminished.

Issues with the Method:

• The gas concentrations reported in the method (written in the previous user guide) are confusing. Tracer in fluid (drill water or hexane solvent) is reported in ppm (by mass), yet the same unit (ppm) is used to identify the concentrations of tracer in the headspaces of calibration standards (which are in an air/hexane vapor mixture). My recommendation is to continue reporting tracer in drilling fluid by ppm, but the calibration should consist of the total mass (ng tracer) injected. It is easier then to tabulate the amount of tracer present per unit of liquid, solid or gas—whichever is in the vial.
• There is non-linearity in the curve of the calibration standards that contain hexane in liquid form after heating. The standards are made from serial dilutions of a single PFMD/hexane mixture, so vials of high-end standards have higher content of both PFMD and hexane. Upon heating low standards, all the hexane volatilizes (likely the PFMD as well), whereas a portion of hexane remains as liquid for the high-end standards (with a dissolved PFMD component). The method originally stated that PFMD would be "consistently volatilized", yet the non-linearity of the calibration proved otherwise.
• We found that it was better to perform serial dilutions of hexane saturated with PFMD to reduce the amount of hexane present in the vials. The amount of standard volume pipetted into a single vial then was on the level of µL, and all hexane volatilized after heating. The concentration range also more closely bracketed the range of PFMD recovered in the drilling fluid and rock samples. The recipe for these serial dilutions has been added to the GC2 User Guide.
• There was variability in the amount of the tracer measured in drilling fluid, likely because the fluorocarbon tracer and water are not soluble. It would be better to mix the tracer with a surfactant first, so that is it well mixed with seawater. This would have to be something the LWG discusses with the geochemists as well because the presence of a surfactant may affect organic analyses. There are also fluorosurfactants out there, but they have varying levels of toxicity.

Issues with the Autosampler:
The syringe heater block will occasionally have faulty contacts and send spurious temperature readings by the software (-999.99°C). We removed the heater block, cleaned off the contacts, then replaced.
The autosampler would bend needles during injection. Erik ended up changing the autosampler tension cords. The cords ensure the magnetic tip of the AS stays in position as it injects. Otherwise, it collides with the sample inlet and raises slightly. Then needle would then miss the septum and bend on the surrounding metal.

• Once ChemStation is started, it takes control of the AS. To get manual control of the AS (from the AS control panel) for changing needles or the heater block, within Chemstation navigate to Instrument>Change PAL Configuration and select "Release Terminal". When giving control back to Chemstation press "Lock Terminal."
• The type of plunger used in the AS syringe is a determining factor in the amount of carryover between samples. A Teflon tipped plunger should be used as instead of a porous polymer.

Issues with the PFT Pumps and RIGWATCH

• There was an issue with the NI Ethernet box within the PFT cabinet not communicating with RIGWATCH. Normal behavior is for the drillers or sci ops to send a command via RIGWATCH to enable the pump (Tracer ON/OFF status, Channel 1), and then receive a verification message back from the NI box indicating that the command was received (Tracer ON/OFF status, Channel 2). This communication is indicated on the RIGWATCH Main Screen. The MCS discovered the Baud Rate for one of the pumps was set to something other than the default value. No one is quite sure how this occurred. The MCS reset the BAUD rate and communication was restored.

salinity

There were no issues with the optical refractometer.

SRA

The SRA was not used.

Pipettors

There were no issues with any of the pipettors.

alkalinity

The alkalinity titrator was used for a few interstitial waters and for the vent fluids recovered via the Kuster tool.
Issues:

• The alkalinity software should allow for more than three standards when calibrating the pH probe. The normal standards are pH of 1, 4, 7, and 10, which means that one endpoint is left out.
• The alkalinity software aborts a sample analysis without uploading the pH to LIMS if the pH is lower than 4.8-4.9 (the titration endpoint for the alkalinity). We should tweak the Labview code so that it still captures the pH, especially since we do not have another station dedicated only to pH.
• I've noticed the pH probe response time slowly lengthening over the past several expeditions. There is a precipitate buildup (most likely silver sulfide) causing a discoloration of the frit in the probe sidewall. The vendor documentation mentions that it may be cleaned with a combination of 7% thiourea and 0.1 M HCl. Will send a request to order thiourea.

Chloride

The chloride titration system was calibrated but was not used.

TOC

Was not used.

Water system

The spigot on the RO reservoir, the Diamond RO Prefilter and Diamond RO carbon cartridge were replaced.

Geochemists

Anna Kutovaya Organic Geochemist Institute of Geology and Geochemistry of Petroleum and CoalRWTH Aachen UniversityGermany
Jill M. McDermott Fluid Geochemist Department of Earth and Environmental SciencesLehigh UniversityUSA
Olivier RouxelInorganic GeochemistDepartment of Oceanography/SOESTUniversity of Hawaii at ManoaUSA

Microbiologists

Lanlan Cai Microbiologist State Key Laboratory of Marine Environmental ScienceXiamen UniversityChina
Jessica Labonté MicrobiologistDepartment of Marine BiologyTexas A&M University at GalvestonUSA Vivian H. Pellizari MicrobiologistInstituto OceanográficoUniversidade de São PauloBrazil Ken Takai MicrobiologistDepartment of Subsurface Geobiological Analysis and Research (D-SUGAR)Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC)Japan

XRD & ICP SAMPLE PREP LABS

ALEXIS ARMSTRONG

Summary

Expedition 376 was a low recovery hard rock expedition. Extensive XRD, XRF and ICP measurements were taken. A Bruker service happened at the start of the expedition to fix the broken D4. After service, the D4 ran without issue. XRF continued to get Check Board Temperatures and Data Grab Failure errors. The instrument has been functioning for a month without error, we have a workaround curtsey of Olympus, and are in contact with vendor technicians. Extensive testing on the XRF should be done in tie-up. All other instruments functioned without issue.

Total samples

• XRD: 319
• ICP: 206
• XRF: 918 (206 powdered mounts, 100 section measurements); all measurements run three times.

XRD D4

On Exp. 375, the D4 failed while running the Corundum Standard. When the machine got to the 'sample ready switch' an 'object lost' error popped up. After a re-alignment and re-start of the D4, the system activity light would not come on and the error code 400/7: Device returned error code after command RP6,1: No argument(s) permissible, would appear. After speaking to the vendor, it was deemed that the TDC board in the controller had failed.
However, during the Bruker service at port, it was found that the error was not hardware related at all, but was a software bug related to Windows 10. The old TDC board was fully functional, however when running the Corundum Standard and changing the calibration file, the calibration file when created on the new Windows 10 system, corrupted the board and led to all of the error messages. This was discovered by the Bruker technician as after the installation and calibration of the new TDC board, we received the same errors—i.e. that the new board had also failed.
We were able to re-calibrate the D4 and get the system working again by creating a workaround. In order to do an initial calibration, we have to switch to the old system and run the D4 on Windows 7. However, we were able to finally switch back onto the new system (Windows 10) by recalibrating the D4, but sending the calibration file solely to the D4 not to the controller. This is done by de-selecting the controller option on the apply calibration window, when completing a save and download. That way the entire system was calibrated appropriately: the controller calibrated on Windows 7, and the D4 on the new system. Once this setup was in place, the D4 functioned with no issue.
The Corundum standard was run, and a Zi correction factor was applied. For future calibrations, the old system should stay available. During port call a new TDC board as well as a new detector were installed.
All samples were processed using the Shatterbox, per the scientist's request. The Mixer Mill was not used.

ICP

Extensive ICP measurements were taken. Shatterbox, Grinding wheel, X-ray Oven, Furnace, Beadmaker, Mettler Toledo balances all functioned without issue. The X-press was not used this expedition, as samples were heavily altered and fairly soft, and could be ground to the correct softness using solely the Shatterbox.
Platinum crucibles were heavily used, and a couple have been bent; however, we observed no problems with sticking beads or crucibles being extensively dirty, thus crucibles do not need to be recast.
The ICP manual has been updated and our procedure concerning LOI should be modified. Extensive testing of ICP data by chemistry technicians and scientists (X374; X376) suggests that there is no discernable difference in running ignited powders versus raw. Because of this, all ICP measurements and beads used a combination of raw sample and flux instead of ignited sample and flux. LOI measurements should be done as a secondary test on ICP samples, completed after the bead making process. The procedure of measuring LOI has not changed, however, the order in which it is to be completed, as well as the use of the ignited powder has.

XRF

The handheld XRF was used extensively on this expedition, primarily measuring discrete powdered mounts, however, some section half measurements were taken as well.
At the beginning of the expedition, we routinely received the errors: Data grab failed (Figure 1, 2) and Comm error in MonitorThread_CheckBoardTemperatures (Do PeltierFeedback; Figure 3, 4). Errors would frequently appear after a two-hour use of the machine, and would appear back to back. First, the data grab failure and then the check board temperature log.
After speaking with Olympus they suggested two possible reasons why we are having these issues: 1) All comm errors are a result of broken communication between your PC and the instrument (i.e., the handshake got dropped).  This would mean that there is nothing wrong with the instrument's hardware. 2) These errors are a hardware problem, possibly temperature related. As the instrument heats up through testing, some connection or other electronic connection issue becomes bad and starts to act flakey.
Following Murphy's Law, after speaking with Olympus, we stopped receiving both sets of errors. Since the XRF was being actively used, and was functioning completely, we left it alone. Moreover, since the errors did not appear after significant testing for the rest of the expedition, my guess is that the problem is a PC connection issue. If it were a true hardware error, we would have seen it regularly without abruptly stopping.
Extensive testing of the XRF should be done in tie up. See if you can throw the error again and if so start working through the tests suggested by Olympus.
Last minute addition………………..

HASKRIS PUMP FAILURE July 4^th 2018:

• Woke up (6pm) to an X-ray alarm; X-ray turned off error. Machine was fully functional and no error was reported when going to bed the night before (6am on the 4^th)
• Alarm was that the X-rays had turned off. Shut down machine, tried to re-start it; same problem persisted.
• Notice that the Haskris temperature display was water temperatures of 93 degrees. Immediately tuned off machine and Haskris.
• Called Engineering to ask about chill water--- chill water was still functional; meaning that he pump had failed.
• Opened up Haskris—water level still full; no problems in it being too low or had run dry
• Grinding noise when turning on pump
• ABBARemoved pump and inspected parts; Pump had seized, and the shear-able coupling had been completed ripped off (Fig. 1; Fig. 2; the coupling is designed to shear if the motor seizes).

Figure 1 and 2. Comparison between old (A) and new coupling (B). Old coupling has been completely ground down and ripped off once the pump had seized.

• Repaired the pump; replaced the coupling; refitted water lines; reinstalled connection to motor shaft. Pump is now fully functioning; no grinding noises when operational.
• Refilled Haskris water; reinstalled filter.
• Haskris fully functional
• Performed a tube conditioning and ran standards

NOTE: When examining the drive shaft of the motor—the connection point between motor and coupling is already gaped (Fig. 3). Meaning that the motor (i.e the pump) will seize again in a couple of months. That physical gaping will cause the coupling to corrode and shear. Best practice to order another motor (requisition already sent—July 4^th).
Figure 3. Connection point between drive shaft of motor and the coupling of the pump. The drive shaft is already uneven or 'gaped'. This will cause the pump to seize again. A requisition for a new motor has already been placed.
NOTE: Went to replace pump with spare located in the X-ray lab. However, two types of spare pumps were available. One type of spare is a fraction of the size, too small, and does not fit into the Haskris (Fig. 4). These spares should not be used. Two spares (of the correct model and size) are still available.
Figure 4. Comparison between the two types of pumps available. 'A' is a fraction of the size and does not fit into the Haskris. BA








Figure 2 Figure 3



Figure 4 Figure 5

user guides

The ICP_HR_Prep_UG has been edited and sent in to David Houpt for approval.

THIN SECTION LAB

SETH FRANK

Summary

124 Thin section requests with a large variety of volcanoclastic material: brecciated material, fresh basalt, vesicular basalts, altered clay, clay with clasts, various alteration minerals, and some unidentifiable volcanics.

LP-50

Not used.

Petrothin

Ran well. I had a few slides that cracked but I think that was just bad luck. I noticed that I was getting significant slide gouge and 'lifted' corners on some of my samples, so I devised an experiment that filtered out factors on by one until I arrived at the culprit. The slides used weren't a factor, I used both frosted and unfrosted slides with randomized personal billets. I had some samples that were impregnated and some that weren't. I used a sandstone and a granite personal sample. I used the NOA and I used the Epotek epoxy. After about 20 different samples, I concluded that the NOA was the culprit of the lifted corners and general degradation of the end result thin sections. I started exclusively using Epotek epoxy to avoid this problem, and had no further problems with any production thin sections.

PM5 Polisher

The pitch and whine of the motor on the polishing head would sometimes change, causing the rotation to slow down for half a cycle, before returning to the normal speed. No cause could be found.
No other issues with the polisher.

Samples and methods

All samples impregnated with Epotek epoxy in order to ensure they would stay together, given the material origin. The glass plate and 600 grit/water slurry method to lap the samples worked perfectly for almost every single sample. A few had to be redone simply because the material was so soft that it disappeared when too much pressure was applied on the glass plate. In those cases, the polisher was used exclusively to retain the sample integrity.
A great deal of samples had to be polished for a minimum of 4 hours in order to achieve the correct thickness as well as clearing up 'darker' sectors of the sample. Some of these samples did not achieve this even with more than 6 hours of polishing.

Miscellaneous

No miscellaneous. Everything ran as intended and no problems occurred.

ET Report

ETIENNE CLAASSEN, JJ.KOTZE SR and JJ.KOTZE JR
Father and son ET'S . One legacy ends and another starts!

Chem lab

1. Installed a new argon manifold above and left to the coulombmeter to provide gas to the new GC Analyzer.
2. The Chem tech encountered calibration trouble on the coulombmeter. We opened and checked voltage points on power and measuring boards, there were some out of range voltages present on the measurement board that we struggle to adjusted to the correct range. We exchanged instruments to compare but problem remained. A fresh batch solution was prepared and both instruments came back in range.

Core laB

Mad staTion

MAD 105 C (Thermo Scientific) drying oven alarm sound intermittently as it usually does. Regardless of resetting the program or servicing the equipment, the alarm continued to repeat. Although the error code indicated aklixon temperature error (temperature protection circuit), the temperature was never a problem. We knew something was upsetting the control monitoring circuit.
We found a spare 2Kva Minuteman UPS and installed it between the oven and the mains supply which immediately cleared the problem. However, the UPS will periodically cycle the battery as setup in the software by the ET. The cycling period that can vary for up to an hr. or so, depending on the battery health. During the cycle, the UPS will hand power to the line voltage while the batteries remain below 15%. The cycling test can be disabled via a laptop or on a PC once, the UPS's communications are back on the network. Although the cycling will trigger the oven alarm because of the noisy line voltage, it is best to live with it. It only happens once a month and is good for battery life. For these cyclic intervals, that the line voltage takes the oven load it does happen that the line noise causes alarms.

Splitter room

We did some maintenance on the core drill press and replaced the core cutter blade on the small core saw closest to the Super saw. It had a flaked off cutting edge of about ½ inch.
!worddav262e76ab548561086ab76b431a016b05.png|height=287,width=156!The water valve that was fitted on the front side of the drill press post was refitted on the backside of the drilling machine away from wet area. We had to come up with an idea to give the water line some rigidity as the friction of the water seal around the shaft tends to pull hard on the water line. What eventually worked very well was to slide a thicker 20mm silicone pipe like a sleeve, (not tied anywhere) over the thinner waterline and pushed it about ¾ " over the coupled waterline on the feeding end, just a slide over that can be pulled back with the hand and remove the smaller waterline when necessary.
On the water valve side at the back we used a very heavy gauge cable tie cut to length and pushed between the waterline and silicone sleeve pipe to give it a rigid backbone. The cable tie sticking out was tied on the side of the valve to keep a horizontal stiffness. It works very well with no pulling in the axial plain on the water line but allow a full travel in the vertical plane.

P_MAG-JR6

We had an intermittent error with the Agico spinner and after a thorough inspections we found the shaft is not moving up and down freely. We suspected that the shaft was the issue and replaced it with a new shaft but the problem persisted. Then inspecting the tube that the shaft travels in, we noticed that it was bent.
We try to remove the tubing but found that it was corroded and would not extract. Concerned that applying more force would further damage the tube, we were able to repair it by using a steel rod to straightening the tube. We were unable to realign the pusher but using in manual mode the JR6 was useable.
The question came up this instrument went for a service with the supplier and still it came back not working, this was the first expedition in used, but did not work properly.

Shil

The vertical Power supply rack carrying the power supply cards had a fan that started to squeak. We removed the rack and cleaned and lubricated the bearings on both fan. They run at a very high speed and need more service than low speed rack fans.
We ordered 4 new ones.

Down hole lab

APC-T tool runs

1. The APCT3's were not used as we were drilling volcanic rock. However, we used a logger twice on the VIT frame to measure the water column temperature. It was secured to the frame while surveying the seafloor drilling area. This was just a curiosity exercise.
2. We need to get the right APCT3 shoes that fit our loggers properly to the ship ASAP, the new ones that we have are all pinching the loggers. The APCT3 logger used: no 18580322.
3. Assisted the scientists to prepare and assemble the Kuster water sampling tools that they brought with them to collect borehole water. It needed to be cleaned after every run according to a prescribed procedure.

Fan tail

Maggie Winch

1. After the repairs, we had problems with the level wind travel. Manually using the fleet arm sensor to simulate the cable movement (not the hand controller), we would lead the level wind to the starboard side end-of-travel. As soon as it was stopped (after triggering the end-of-travel sensor), we moved the fleet arm in the other direction. The level wind would begin to follow but then immediately return to the starboard end-of-travel and repeat the pattern. In addition, we blew the 12v fuses when using the manual controller and switching directions before it came to a complete stop. We believe this is because after rebuilding the system resulting in a tight bearing fit. The additional power to move the level wind combined with the sudden direction change would overload the system. Until the bearings are worn in, we need to be careful with sudden direction changes.

1. We removed the relay control panel and found two faulty relays. They situated next to D11 and D12. The one at D12 was stuck/burnt in one position and the one next to D11 switched about once every third time, we replaced both.

IMPORTANT: Cards fitted with relays other than W172DIP-3
If the 12V fuse blows on the control card check all 5 read relay coils (about 500 ohms) by measuring over the coil pins or in some cards with plug in IC sockets on the board it's a bit easier, unplug the relays and replace the lot and test them at a convenient time. In case any of the 5 relays are activated with a shorted internal diode it will blow the 12v fuse. So try to stay with the prescribed P/N above.
A second complete relay board was assembled and fitted with new components, it only misses a power relay to the motor controller, it's the bigger relay about 1'X1.5" with a red LED to show the switch status, that plugs into the corner of the board, 2 new relays were ordered. One to use and one for a spare.

1. Two sister relay boards were fitted with a complete set of relays and Op Amps as well. It must be mentioned that we make sure to order and use the correct Read relays, we found a couple of newer type read relays .This different newer equivalents are made with an internal clamping/ringing diode over the coil, they are meant to clamp the relays "back-emf" effect while in operation. In itself, it is good but the small internal clamping diode is better not used in our environment. We have a noisy power line with lots of spikes that easily jumps the 12v power supply and peaks that will kill the small diodes PIV's (peak inverse voltage) This can cause lots of frustration looking for the reason of failure.

The correct ones to use are either: W172DIP-3. The W172DIP-7 works as well but has the built in "ring diode" that we want to avoid. We made space in the spares rack for them so they can be kept separate in the shop. The preferred read relay is the W172DIP-3.
The Pinout diagrams below shows the different styles for the W17DIP-3 (Figure A) without the ring diode and the W172DIP-7 (Figure-7) with the internal diode.

1. Hydraulic motor door panel screw lock handles were cleaned and greased with aqua lube. They should not freeze up again. !worddav56c68fd8f79e8f6e7cd5e0cf9896210c.png|height=183,width=152!We wire connected the emergency stop on the new manual directional control handle.

1. We decided that we would relocate the relay control card to a different place where it is more readily accessible to work on and less environmental vibration. We decided that we will replace the On/off control box on the side of the Hydraulic pump housing with a new stainless steel enclosure, size 16X14X10" instead of the old 14X12X6". This will just fit the extra space available and give comfortable work area. A new panel mount 3 phase On/off switch was ordered to replace the "long arm" rear mechanism switch currently in there. The next image shows the box to be replaced and in the same position.

SPECIAL PROJECTS

Shop clean up: The ET shop got a cleanup of old stock cluttering up the drawers that became obsolete over a long period of time. S ome drawers were completely cleaned out to free up space and shifting around left over usable parts together in different locations.
Science Support:

1. Etienne machined square hollow brass blocks about 1X1.5" to carry folded-gold foil packets with crystals that has analytical properties at certain temperatures. Once the bit gets back on the rig floor, we removed the blocks and the scientists analyzed the crystals afterwards. These blocks were tightly fitted after a nitrogen super cooling treatment to reduce their dimensions to the maximum and tapped into a slot on the drill bit side.

1. We machined parts for the ETBS and the Kuster tools; we had to manufacture an adapter to run both tools through the drill bit and flapper valve. We machined the adaptor to connect with the Kuster sucker rod threads and the ETBS threads.
2. We also made the adaptor to fit into a RCB core barrel, so it could move up and down to prevent us from getting stuck while pushing the tool into the formation.

Adaptor for Kuster, or ETBS and Sliding RCB connection

The rumors are true! Jurie, cleaning up his precious treasures gathered over years of dedication and service to IODP.

WIRELINE LOGGING AND DOWNHOLE TOOLS

Zenon Mateo

Summary

Expedition 376 drilled five sites within the Brothers Caldera, along the southern Kermadec Arc. Being an active submarine hydrothermal system with acidic fluids and extremely high temperature, several challenges were presented to the drilling, coring and downhole logging operations. A variety of additional downhole temperature and fluid sampling tools were utilized during this expedition:
1. Temperature-indicator strips (housed and deployed with the core barrel)
2. Enhanced Temperature Borehole Sensor (ETBS)
3. Kuster Flow-Through Fluid Sampler
4. Petrospec thermocouple (rated to 600^oC),
Details about these tools can be found in other chapters of the compiled Technical Report for this expedition.
Downhole geophysical logging was conducted on 08 June 2018, for the upper part of Hole U1528D. Just before the logging operation, borehole conditions were determined to have maximum temperature of about 212^oC (ETBS) and fluid pH of around 5.3 with minimal H₂S. Due to the elevated temperature, only the tools with flask were assembled to make up a 14.91 m long string. However, repeat measurements after wireling logging indicated higher borehole temperature and more acidic fluid. In contrast, at U1530A, an ETBS run prior to logging returned a maximum borehole temperature of only 40^oC, despite being about 25 m away from active hydrothermal chimneys.

The viability of the APCT-3 being deployed with the VIT frame to profile the water column temperature was also explored during this expedition. The results were compared with previous CTD data and sonic velocity was also derived to determine the seafloor TWT. Additionally, an uncontrolled bucket experiment was also conducted to determine the time constant (¿) or response time of the APCT-3. Results from this exercise and those from Expedition 311 indicate that at best, the APCT-3 needs to travel at Schlumberger logging speed of 1,800 ft/hr (0.15 m/s), which would be too slow for a survey or re-entry camera deployment. Therefore, in order not to impede with normal VIT operations, a thermometer with faster response time is needed.
Given the seismic acquisition parameters and boreholes situated in a high-relief volcanic complex under moderate water depths, all the sites for this expedition very well demonstrate the need to independently measure the seafloor TWT.

NOTES

Match-maker: VIT with APCT-3

For the first time, the APCT-3 was temporarily strapped to the VIT frame to test its viability in profiling the water column temperature at sites U1527 and U1528. This exercise is in line with the ongoing effort to further instrument the VIT. The result appeared promising, and is illustrated in the graph below. For comparison, result from a CTD profiling done in May 2005 is also plotted (Lavelle et al., 2008). The shape or general trend of the temperature profiles are very similar, possibly because both measurements were collected at the same month (May). However, the APCT-3 temperature readings are about 1.5°C lower, attributed to instrument difference, and possibly to temporal variability given that the two datasets were collected 13 years apart. The ideal approach would be to deploy an actual CTD or other temperature logging device together with the APCT-3 in order to determine the accuracy of the values. Potentially, this can be conducted during the September-October 2018 transit from Subic, Philippines to Lyttelton, New Zealand, using a SeaBird CTD on loan from the Department of Oceanography (J. Van Hyfte, pers. comm.)
The APCT-3 temperature values were adjusted to the 2005 CTD results and used to calculate the sonic velocity profile of the water column using the simple equation of Mackenzie (1981). Though the effect of salinity on sonic velocity is very small, the values were estimated from the CTD profile reported by Lavelle et al., 2008.
Photo of the APCT-3 assembly (cutting shoe and catcher sub) tightly strapped horizontally onto the VIT frame using two sets of metal cable clamps. The loosely installed plastic cable ties going through the tool acts as a secondary attachment.






Another use case of having a temperature sensor on the VIT was demonstrated during a subsequent re-entry to Hole U1528D on 08 June 2018. Previous deployment of the APCT-3-VIT on 21 May 2018 for U1528A showed a stable bottom water temperature of around 2.2^oC. However, in Hole D, several re-entry VIT camera surveys showed significant "cloud" (nepheloid layer) buildup around the re-entry cone, induced by hot fluid flowing out from the borehole. Initial hypothesis is that these plumes have thermally equilibrated with surrounding water. However, APCT-3 data indicate that these plumes still have elevated temperature that is about 3^oC warmer than ambient bottom water. In the graph below, these are recorded as temperature spikes that occur when the VIT passes through the plume during the re-entry attempts.

The Need for Speed: Water column property and seafloor pick

With the sonic velocity profile of the water column at sites U1527, a TWT value was independently calculated for the seafloor. This agrees well with the first high amplitude positive reflector, which is what would be normally picked by geophysicists and seismic stratigraphers (see figure below).

Site U1527: Usual seafloor pick on MCS profile corroborated by independent travel time calculated from water column temperature and salinity profile.

Site U1528 is more complicated because it is located inside a summit crater 1229 mbsl or at most 50 m below the peak of the volcanic cone. The seafloor spectral data of the nearest trace (#732) of line Bro-3a has a trapezoidal frequency distribution starting from 30 Hz, which gives a maximum radius for the Fresnel Zone of about 175 m. This defines the horizontal resolution of the MCS profile, but also implies that it integrates a 350 m-wide swath, which covers the volcanic peak down to about 1260 mbsl on either side, equivalent to a relief of about 70 m! Picking the seafloor is therefore not straightforward despite the site being only 50 m away from the centerline of the seismic profile. This requires an independent way to determine the travel time to the seafloor. Without considering these parameters, the first significant positive or negative reflector is often selected as the seafloor. However, with the semi-calibrated temperature readings from the APCT-3, and the derived sonic velocity profile of the water column, the seafloor for site U1528 is estimated to have a TWT of 1637.6 ms, or about 20 ms lower than where it would normally be pegged in the seismic profile.







Location map of Site U1528 (UC-1A). Yellow lines delineate the 350 m-wide Fresnel Zone based on a nominal source frequency of 30 Hz. The dominant source frequency of 50 Hz would yield a narrower 272 m-wide zone.


Site U1528: Local relief around volcano summit, which are mostly within the Fresnel Zone, create a complex reflection pattern, requiring an independent method to determine seafloor TWT at the drill site.
A more exaggerated case is exhibited by site U1530, which is (1) 600 m away from the seismic centerline; (2) midway down the caldera slope, and (3) the actual seafloor is nowhere near the apparent seafloor shown in the seismic line because of the slope-oblique orientation. All of these discourage even attempting a core-log-seismic integration from the very beginning. However, despite the low core recovery, the sampling regularity provided a very good coverage of the borehole which allowed a synthetic seismogram to be generated using the PWC and MAD bulk density data. Most importantly, this synthetic seismogram show a very good phase match with the seismic profile even without applying any time shift, considering that the seafloor TWT is calculated using the APCT3-VIT water column temperature data.

The rise and Fall of Tau: APCT-3 time constant/response time

Overall borehole temperature during the coring operations were estimated using thermal strips housed in a customized metal segment of the core barrel assembly. During test runs, it was thought that the deployment period maybe too quick given the thick metal housing that delays the strips in equilibrating to ambient borehole temperature. This idea brought out the concept of a thermometer metric called time constant or response time (¿; tau) defined as the time it takes for a thermometer to reach either 50, 63 or 90 percent of a given temperature step range.
With the initial deployment of the APCT-3 using the VIT frame, an (uncontrolled) laboratory exercise was conducted together with Cameron Ramsey (MLS). The APCT-3 cutting shoe-sub assembly was successively immersed for 10 minutes in three buckets of 20 cm-deep ice-cooled, regular and warm tap water. A more sensitive Fisher-Thermo digital thermometer was also taped to the side of the APCT-3 to provide a reference value. Six step-wise stages (0 to 5) were conducted and the result is illustrated in the annotated graph below.


Note that at the end of stages 1-5, the APCT-3 temperature is significantly offset from the digital thermometer reading, often not reaching the target temperature especially during the heating up stages. Several factors can account for this, but the most obvious is the fact that 63% of the shoe-sub assembly is outside of the water bath, and could have acted as a heat sink in the experiment set up. The standard (official) calibration procedure requires a water or heated oil bath that is insulated, thermally stable and big enough to contain the entire assembly (D. Ferrell, pers. comm.).
For each 10-minute stage, Cameron Ramsey (MLS) defined the best fitting regression line for the end/stabilization phase of each stage (see graph above). The segment from the start of each stage to the start of this regression line is interpreted as the "time to equilibrate" (see table below). The same start and end points define the temperature range used in the subsequent calculation for the rate of change. Result using this method show that on the average, the APCT-3 needs about 45 s to adjust for every degree Celsius, or can record a temperature change of 0.06 °C/s.
At site U1527, the overall water column temperature gradient is about 0.01 °C/m; and the average VIT cable speed during the deployment is about 1 m/s (0.75 – 1.04 m/s). These give a temporal rate of temperature change of about 0.01 °C/s during the survey.
Therefore, accurate recording of the water temperature profile at site U1527 requires either:
(1) a thermometer with a better response time commensurate with the VIT cable speed; or,
(2) if the APCT-3 is to be used, the VIT cable speed needs to be 6 times slower than normal, which would be 0.17 m/s. This is equivalent to 1970 ft/hr, just above the cable speed of 1,800 ft/hr (0.15 m/s) used during downhole geophysical logging. However, this logging speed is not operationally practical when deploying the VIT intended for hole re-entry or sea floor survey.

To compare the APCT-3 assembly with standard thermometers, the temperature range of six stages of the experiment were normalized in order to determine the ¿ value. Results show that for this exercise, the APCT-3 ¿_0.63 is about 15 to 50 s. During Expedition 311, Heesemann et al. (2006), who are the experts and developers of the APCT-3 tool, performed a similar water bath test aboard the JOIDES Resolution and reported a ¿_0.63 of 10 s. Despite this low value, the robust casing of the APCT-3 results to a response time that is three orders of magnitude longer than the standard CTD thermometer used by oceanographers to profile the water column (e.g. Seabird SBE 3F CTD temperature sensor has a ¿_0.63 of 0.07 s!).

A similar exercise was requested by the logging scientist for the ETBS, in order to constrain the borehole temperature profiles collected during the expedition. Results from the two-stage but extended exercise give a ¿_0.63 of about 31 seconds. Dean Ferrell plans to conduct a more thorough and official measurement back in College Station.

E.T.: Thermal effects on bulk density measurements

This topic is included in this report as a future reference for interpreting the HLDS bulk density data (RHOM), especially in sites of elevated borehole temperature.
For U1528D, C. Massiot (Petrophysics; GNS New Zealand) noted an anomalous decrease in the lower segment of the HLDS-derived bulk density profile. This decrease is not reflected in the core data (MAD) and coincides with the zone of very high borehole mud temperature (MTEM).
Kerry Swain (Logging Engineer, Schlumberger) re-played the data and noted that "the short spacing high voltage loop (HVMS) was not nominal and was causing the short spacing density to be too low towards the lower end of the hole". In this case, he suggested that instead of using RHOM for this lower segment, the long-spaced bulk density (RHL) be used as it does not appear to have been affected by expansion due to hotter flask and the cooler electronics cartridge.
A plot of the HLDS hardware voltages within this zone in question indeed show an erratic HVMS compared to the HVML.

DATA BACKUPS

Raw and LDEO-BRG-processed logging data files and Petrel Project files for Expedition 376 were copied to: \\JR1\DATA\data1\27.1 Logging and also at S:\Uservol\r. Logging.
A copy of a Petrel project file (~6.7 GB total) is in the ship-based logging external drive.

PUBLICATIONS REPORT

DOUGLAS CUMMINGS

Summary

My duties included collection of publication materials from the scientists and generating the visual core descriptions (VCDs). I generated VCDs for 5 sites and 12 holes, core recovery figures for each hole/site, hole summary figures, and draft figures for the Methods chapter.
I distributed/collected passports, visas, and crew declaration forms from the scientists and technicians for port call activities and worked closely with the Radio Operator to provide the necessary paperwork to ensure the science party and technicians would clear immigration. I also kept track of seagoing personnel using the check in/check out spreadsheet for port call.
Other expedition related administrative/publication duties.

Equipment & Software Performance Summary

Software used: Strater 5, DESClogik, Lims2Excel, Acrobat, Illustrator CS6 and CC, Excel, and Word. No notable software issues were experienced.

Database, entries, and data upload or downloaD

• L2E was used to export depth, section, core scale, title, core images, samples, track data, and core composites photos. No issues were encountered with the use of this program.
• DESC export was used for all core descriptive data. I encountered no issues or problems.
• LIVE – no problems with the use of this program.
• Virtual Photo Table – no problems with the use of this program.

Volume Materials

Chapters were collected as they were finished and I kept track of all material using the tracking logs for text, tables, and figures. Getting some scientists to report when their materials were complete was a recurring issue.
I updated the VCDs daily while description was ongoing and on demand other times when requested, and implemented changes as requested by the science party.

General Duties Performed

• Exported data using L2E, DESClogik, and Lims Reports; reviewed data for accuracy; plotted data using Strater 5; produced PDFs of the VCDs, recovery plots, and hole summaries; and distributed PDFs to the scientists for review.
• Wrote excel macros as needed to facilitate data plotting.
• Worked with the scientists to ensure accurate data display in the VCDs. Corrected/modified VCDs, Strater schemes, templates, and Methods legend figure as needed.
• Collected, organized, and tracked all publication volume materials including text, figures, and tables in hard copy and electronic files.
• Assisted scientists with figure creation and in the use of the Adobe Illustrator software.
• Attended science meetings as needed.
• Provided administrative support to scientists and technical staff as needed, including providing supplies and assisting with travel arrangements.
• Distributed and collected necessary expedition paperwork - IODP communication policy, photo image release, manuscript and copyright forms, cabin repairs, personal safety equipment, shipboard network access, and science party addresses.
• Worked with the Radio Operator to ensure the science party and technical staff had appropriate documents for departure from and arrival in Auckland.
• Kept track of seagoing personnel using the check in/check out spreadsheet for port call.
• Planned and executed the T-shirt logo contest .
• Arranged birthday celebrations for 10 scientists and technicians.
• Communicated with shore staff regularly to provide updates.
• Restocked Publication supply cabinet as needed, and provide science party with supplies per request.
• Created draft web form and php script to replace cabin info form, to be deployed in future expeditions.
• Assisted in other areas where necessary.

CURATORIAL REPORT

INVA BRAHA

EXPEDITION SUMMARY

• 3,940 samples (2,377personal and 1,563 shipboard). There will not be a post-cruise sampling party at the Kochi Core Repository (KCC).
• 222.37 m of core recovered from a cored interval of 1736.0m interval (17.875% recovery rate)

SHIPMENTS

• 60 boxes of core were recovered from X376. These cores will be shipped in KCC at the end of Expedition 376.
• The pallet inventory for this expedition has been emailed to KCC (GCR curators also copied) along with this report. The Core Box inventory sheets have attached to this email as well.
• There will be 4 pallets: 2 pallets of 17 core boxes; 2 pallets of 13 Core Boxes.
• 1 Residue Pallet- ship to KCC
• 2 boxes of PMAG_MAD (Thin Sections and Smear Slides included)
• 1 Box of XRD_XRF
• 2 Small Boxes of TSB
• 1 Box of HS
• 1 Box of PFT viles
• 1 box of Squeeze cakes
• 1 box of Special Samples Residue- Junk Basket(JB, BHA, Under Reamer)
• All hard rock /dacite sand sections were shrink wrapped.
• Frozen and refrigerated shipments will be sent via World Courier from during the port call. See the following table for specifics.
  • 7 Frozen shipment
  • 5 Refrigerated

Site Conversion

The conversion between pre-site to site identifiers are listed below:

Figure 1. X376 Catwalk Sample Strategy for Shipboard & Personal Analysis Sampling !worddav0b7006ef173a3e7933e97d0e3fea27ef.png|height=516,width=670!Sampling

• Head Space (HS) – 4-5cc syringe as needed (usually every other core). Used: syringes for sediment and broken pieces for hard rock.
• Interstitial Water (IW) –1-2 IW(10-20cm) per core ( Sediment/sand recover cores only)
• Microbiology (MBIO) – 1-(5-10cm) WRND were collected based on recovery/lithology.
• Chemistry (CHEM) – Perfluoro (methyldecalin)- PFMD- Contamination test. Samples were taken as needed by microbiologists.

New/Special Curated Samples

• Crystal Housing; Agnes Reyes designed a device made of copper.
• 2-3 crystals were placed inside, wrapped with a gold foil and placed inside this device.
• This device was attached to RCB bit and CDEX bit.
• The samples were curated, and the results were used for shipboard data. Since this was designed by Agnes with her personal materials, these crystal housing devices go back with her (SAC decision).
• Fluid Inclusion- Sampled for shipboard tests.
• A needle was used to scrape crystal powders (less than 1cc) from the rock veins.
• Results for these data are recorded in a template saved in Uservol. Data will be included in the preliminary reports in IODP database.
• Samples from Site U1530A are going with Agnes to GNS for further studies of fluid inclusions. Rest will be shipped as residues to KCC.
• Broken/Melted Pipe – Fractured/melted/corroded pipe.
• Small parts were cut from the main pipe and curated for contamination tests by chemists.
• Kuster Flow-Through Sampler (KFTS) - Borehole Fluid Samples were collected using this tool.
• Samples were used for shipboard data, and the residues were split between chemists for personal/post cruise research. (See Residues)
• Junk Basket (JB)- There were a total of two junk baskets recovered and curated:
• JB_1 and JB_2 were recovered from U1528D at ~359.30m depth.
• CAUTION!!- STRONG H2S smell was observed in both of them.
• The material was placed in canvas bags and labeled appropriately.
• BHA- It was recovered from Site U1527C. Mixed rubble and pieces of metal from casing.
• Under Reamer Core- ~100cc chunks of fresh basalt were recovered from Site U1530.
• Some was sampled for post cruise research. The rest is in the box with JB and BHA residues.

Residues

The residue distribution is as follows:

• All residues requested were approved by the Sample Allocation Committee (SAC) and reassigned to each scientist's request code and number. The rest of residues will be shipped to KCC along with the special samples residues (JB, BHA, Under Reamer, Fluid Inclusions)

Smear Slides

• 5 smear slides were prepared and described by the shipboard scientists. All smear slides will be shipped to KCC after X376.

Thin Sections

• 124 thin section billets (TSB) were prepared during X376. 57 of these billets were approved for post cruise research by SAC (See final residue list). Requestors are listed under Residues. The rest of TSB will be shipped to KCC after X376 along with other residues.

Personal Sampling

• Below is a list of the samples requests that were approved by the Expedition 376 SAC and their respective Sample Request Codes. These are samples taken from sample table.

PROBLEMS ENCOUNTERED

Sample Master and RCM: There were problems encountered with the request code manager (RCM). I had to log out and log back in each time I needed to enter a new code. The green button on the top right corner would not function (see figure below). The problem still exists. (See developer notes)

IMPORTANT Notes

Expedition 376

• H2S Smell was detected and noted in the database. H2S stickers were placed on D-Tubes as well.
• Karen Strehlow (59470IODP) has requested HRND samples (See list attached to email). Karen will scan these HRNDs. After scanning she is sampling QRND and sending back to KCC the other QRND.

World Courier Shipments

Jessica Labonte (2 Frozen, 1 Refrigerated Cooler, 1 Regular Box)
Texas A&M University at GalvestonATTN:  Jessica Labonte1001 Texas Clipper RoadMarine BiologyGalveston, TX 77554 USA labontej@tamug.eduTel: (1) 409-740-4921
LanLan Cai (1 Frozen, 1 Refrigerated)
State Key Laboratory of Marine Environmental ScienceXiamen University (Xiang'an campus)A1-313 Zhoulongquan BuildingXiang'an, XiamenFujian 361102P.R. China lanlancai@xmu.edu.cnTel: (86) 592-218-5752Tel: (86) 592-288-0152
Ken Takai ( 1 Frozen, 1 refrigerated, 2 Regular)
D-SUGAR, JAMSTEC2-15 Natsushima-cho,YokosukaKanagawaJapan237-0061email: kent@jamstec.go.jpTel: 81468679677
Jill McDermott (1 Frozen, 1 Refrigerated, 1Regular)
Department of Earth and Environmental SciencesLehigh University1 West Packer AvenueBethlehem PA 18015USA jim416@lehigh.eduTel: (1) 610-758-3683

Kannikha Kolandaivelu (1 Refrigerated)
Department of Geosciences
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
4044 Derring Hall (MC0420)
926 West Campus Drive
Blacksburg VA 24061
USA
kannikha@vt.edu
Tel: (1) 540-231-6521
Anna Kutovaya (2 Frozen)
Institute of Geology and Geochemistry of Petroleum and CoalRWTH Aachen UniversityLochnerstrasse 4-20, haus Broom 107Aachen 52056Nordrhein-WestfalenGermany ann.kutovaya@gmail.comTel: (49) 241-809-8296

DEVELOPER'S REPORT

DAVID FACKLER, JON HOWELL, VINY PERCUOCO and WILLIAM MILLS

Overview

This document highlights changes to the JOIDES Resolution laboratory data management environment during Expedition 376. Selected issues are highlighted, but not reviewed in exhaustive detail. See the ship activity log and product pages on the developer site for additional detail. http://banff.iodp.tamu.edu/display/DEV/Ship+Activity+Log

WORK IN PROGRESS

During 376 the developers participated in:

• Routine expedition support.
• Selected projects
  • Data Publishing development.
  • LabVIEW 2017 instrument host upgrades
  • Database and Tomcat server password changes

CHange Summary

Applications, services, instrument software.

Outstanding Issues

Outstanding items are tracked by development in a system called Trello. www.trello.com

JR6A

Numerous demagnetization treatments—AF, IRM, thermal, etc.—were applied to discrete cubes, then condensed to summaries using PuffinPlot. When treatment categorizations were noted to be incorrect for a few of these series--they were recoded appropriately in the raw files. The raw files were then re-uploaded.
This cycle of repair and re-upload led to more than the usual amount of data management in PMAG. Scripts were developed to ease the identification (and cancelling) of tests duplicated by the re-upload process.

KAPPA BRIDGE

The AMSSpinner KappaBridge software is upgraded to LabVIEW 2017. The software runs the KappaBridge, but has not been fully vetted through end-to-end uploads of content to LIMS. The LabVIEW 2014 version is retained on backup if required.

Software Change

Additional notes on software systems changed. Items that have not changed are not listed.

LabVIEW 2017 updates

These systems are fully migrated to LabVIEW 2017 and have been operational that way for the bulk of Exp 376

• Source distributions from Subversion. WRMSL, STMSL, SHIL, SHMSL, SRM, VELOCITY, WINFROG 1 & 2 (SiteFix, JRNav)
• Executable distributions. CahnBalance (375), Coulometer (375), NGR.
• Nota bene.
  • WRMSL, STMSL are 32-bit LabVIEW applications running under Win 10 Enterprise 64-bit.
  • Laser Engraver is 32-bit LabVIEW running on a 32-bit Win 10 Enterprise box—LaserMarking software communicates with the PLC via a 32-bit driver component.

These systems are built to LabVIEW 2017, and distributed, but not as fully exercised as the other systems at this time: ALKALINITY, AMSS pinner
These additional systems are modified to support LabVIEW 2017.

• Build box Hikurangi.
• SHIL spares/development-test box: SHILb, SHIL-2
• Dev desktop VMs incorporate on LabVIEW 2017 (32-bit & 64-bit)
• JRData Server
• JR_GE
• Site Fix
• U/W Summary

These systems remain to be completed.

• MAD. See work to-date in Subversion ~branches/df/madmax-lv2017
• DOWComm (core-line depth feed and other support)—on Krakatoa. LabVIEW 2017 64-bit runtime staged—but not installed.
• VIT frame control system
• Instrument host image still carries LabVIEW 2014.

Additional activity notes available in Trello https://trello.com/c/qKlFVag2 AND Confluence http://banff.iodp.tamu.edu/x/iAD1AQ

COULOMETER

1.3 distributed. Updated core LDAQ libraries enabling Coulometer and CAHNbalance to operate independently on the same CPU.

CAHNBALANCE

1.0.0.54 distributed. New code using LDAQ Architecture. See Coulometer.

• Visibility of mass measurement improved by use of a larger font.
• Accepted for general use in chemistry.
• Clear to retire JavaBalance64.

samplemaster

12.4.0.3 distributed. Includes core type N as a member of the rotary drilling list.

DESCLogik

See items in Trello. Functioned, a few issues outstanding specifically for hardrock usage.

DESCReport

Application rewritten in Angular programming tool to remove last GWT (Google Web Tools) application from system. Also happens to be the first Angular application moved to Angular 5 with attendant tool-chain ricochets. Noted in Confluence under the Angular document tree.

Laser Engraver

MCS updated this instrument host to an HP Z240 running 32-bit Win 10 Enterprise.

LIVE

Numerous panels added and modified to support participant dashboards and quick looks at data. Some of the customizations are specific to hard-rock, e.g.

• READY TO SPLIT. Added WRLS image panel suite.

Some of the customizations were for clarity, e.g.

• PHYS PROPS Summary. PWL/PWC panel were reworked to separate the plots for readability/clarity.
• Demo'd use of LIVE as a tool to review coverage of selected descriptions. In general more quickly handled by review as text in DescLogik.

LORE

These revisions are retained.

• MICROIMG report changed to pull comments from result
• Expanded WRLS (ex-wrls2) is once again correctly reported and active on ship.
• Expanded ICPAES-SOLIDS, Expanded ICPAES-LIQ. Revised to include internal_standard column.

These revisions were applied during the expedition, then rolled back at the end—to last versions in Subversion.

• Revised pwc, pwcdiscrete, pwb to show result comments in addition to the existing sample and test comment columns.
• Revised pwc.
  • Remove embedded (i.e. hidden from end-user) filter for SHLF--allow user to filter as desired.
  • Depth on these reports are intended to reflect (top) depth of observation range. No change, but clarification in About would be helpful. There is math in the report to accommodate variations discrete vs. section, section half computation of depth. Verified to work correctly—so why have multiple reports?
  • Section half filtering is not desired this Exp as some observations are taken on pieces pulled from the section and cataloged with appropriate observation offset (relative to section top).
• XRD report revised to include sample and test comments; result comments removed—no uploader support for it.
• TCON report. Revised comment support. Removed (mostly) display of TCON_CALC related columns.

VELEOCITY

At the request of the science party, we added two new measurement context buttons so that measurements along the X and Y-axis on whole-round pieces would be properly acquired, processed, and written to file. In addition, the program no longer continues live acquisition in manual mode or when the "Save Data" button has been clicked persevering the values on the screen so what is seen is what is saved to the file. These changes were compiled into an executable and deployed.
Additional, but un-deployed changes were made to the Sample Information window. It will now look like the Sample Information on the other IMS systems and allow the user to access a list of discrete samples similar to the SRM interface. These changes will complied and deployed after the expedition.

Development Tooling and Infrastructure changes

Database

All LIMS related schema passwords have changed and are cataloged in the development password safes. Corresponding changes were made to all Tomcat instances. The password changes for LIMSJR are independent of the same for SHIPTEST.
The SHIPTEST instance has these significant modifications (for evaluation) that are not yet in production

• All triggers related to sequenced key generation are removed. Sequences are now invoked using the Oracle 12c capability to specify a column default. This is more efficient (less PL/SQL to SQL engine context switching) and reduces the code we manage. SHIPTEST was operated this way for most of the expedition and will be retained that way.
• All result comments in analyses outside of DESC are removed. Evaluation related to this Trello item: https://trello.com/c/kdIW5O1L .

The LIMSJR instance contains modification that allow the Thin Section Report Definition Builder application to more reliably cleanup retired/defunct reports and versions.

Servers, Virtual machines, Desktops

Tomcat instances all received the following configuration changes over and above the credential resets

• Tomcat manager is removed. Use WinSCP to deploy content.
• Because Tomcat manager is removed the access filter for that product (/opt/tomcat/conf/Catalina/localhost/manager.xml) is also removed.
• The tomcat-users database is removed from the file system and from server.xml.

BuildJR and BuildHQ changes.

• Reset the version of VisualSVN 3.8.1 to the community support version. License expired for testing commercial version features.
• Re-configured scheduled tasks and FireDaemon to use rsync (3.1.3) distributed with msys64: c:\msys64\usr\bin\rsync.exe
• Created rsync user to be the executor for mirroring tasks. Grant it appropriate permissions on directories srv\svn, srv\rsync.
• Nexus repository manager updated to 2.14.8-01. Configured support for NPM proxies for Angular work. See bottom of http://banff.iodp.tamu.edu/x/a4A0AQ .
• Miscellaneous tool updates
  • Installed Password Safe 3.46.0. Update credentials for ship and shore safes.
  • TortoiseSVN updated to 1.10.
  • Apply sqlcl 18.1 (preferred over sqlplus)
  • Apply sqldeveloper 18.1.1
  • Fiddler update 5.0
  • WinSCP 5.13.3
  • JDK 1.8.0_171
• Remove LabVIEW 2014 components.

Virtual Machines on development desktop

• VMs brought from shore based on Win 10 Enterprise 1607.
• All are installed on the Dev desktop box.
  • W – Complete LabVIEW, Angular, Java, C# dev tool chains. 60+ GiBAlso backed up to the former travel drive (TXRX) e:\vm\vmx\w.
  • SADR – All the tools to edit, build, deploy the aging SaDR tool chain. 19 GiB
  • LTSB – Base container for building up a specific set of services. 13 GiB
  • LVNXG – Container for exploring LabVIEW Next Generation releases—presently at 3.1. 36 GiB
  • NODE – Container for exploring Docker containerization. 24 GiB
  • SADRNEW – Container for explorations to pull SaDR to moder Grails/Gradle toolchain and dependencies.
• VMware updated to 12.5.9.
• The WAPPS VM dittos the LabVIEW 2017 and miscellaneous tool updates above.
• The VM collection includes two drives
  • src.vmdk – Carries working copies of source code from Subversion lv, wapps. The drive may be mounted in any VM—but only one can have access to it at a time. Is also small enough to backup to an SD card.
  • devtools.vmdk – Essentially a custom version of DML. Instead of copying over, e.g. LabVIEW, simply mount the drive instead, then conduct in-place installs. Reduces disk allocated for any given VM.
• Intentionally omitting install of development tools on the host OS.

SYSTEM MANAGER'S REPORT

Michael Cannon and Steven Thomas

Servers (Microsoft):

• StHelens upgraded to Windows Server 2016
• EMC (Extreme Management Center) upgraded on Sthelens
• Hikurangi has been stood up as new Build box for Developers on ship, Pinatubo has been removed from service and deleted.
• Rainier stood up as Netcrunch Server

Servers (Linux):

• Near the start of the expedition, Cleveland and Novarupta became unresponsive and Cleveland had locked files on Scratch that could not be deleted. Both servers were restarted and that cleared the problem.

Servers (ODA):

• ODA servers performed as expected without any issues.

Servers (VMware):

• VMware servers performed as expected without any issues.

3PAR SAN:

• HP 3PAR SAN performed as expected without any issues.

Network:

• NAC Appliance upgraded to 8.1.2

PC Workstations:

• Acronis updated to 12.5 on all servers and instrument hosts.

MAC Workstations:

• No major issues with any Mac workstations.

Printers:

• Sharp Copier is out of service for printing. One of the transport belts on the right hand side has a tear in it, resulting in very frequent paper jams. Sometimes a few pages will make it through, and then it jams. Printing and copying has been disabled to this device in iPrint so that the device can still be used for scanning until it is is replaced in Subic with the new HP MFP's

Satellite/Internet/Phones:

• Lost satellite service briefly on 05/07 between approximately 13:15 and 14:45. Siem was working on the the Gyro and that disrupted service to the DACs which then could not track properly
• On 05./15 the Bow system got stuck while trying to track for some reason, it was looking in the wrong spot and stuck in a search pattern. Repowered the entire Bow system and it cleared up.

Other Equipment/Projects:

• Aux AC belt was replaced on 05/15
• Siem Electricians installed a soft start system for our Aux AC system in the hope it takes some torque off the Aux AC belt when it engages and extends its life. There was a period of adjustment for about a couple weeks tweaking the system but it seems to be stable now and working. You probably will not hear the Aux AC engage anymore on start up.
• Installed new fans in spare vbrick encoder and put the unit away. More spare fans are in the box with the encoder
• While troubleshooting our ongoing aft Trimble issues, we swapped aft and bow Trimble's to help isolate the problem. So far after swapping, we haven't had any further problems.

UNDERWAY GEOPHYSICS LAB

MILLS, ETIENNE and JURIE Jr,

Summary

Only site bathymetry and navigation data was collected for the expedition. Taking advantage of this period several major maintenance and remodeling jobs were completed.

FANTAIL

MAGGIE LEVEL WIND Mechanical rework

A new nylon cable pulley was fabricated on shore to replace the old pulley, which had a wider cable-running groove for the larger seismic streamer and tow cable. The drawings provide by forum to fabricate the existing sheave did not quite match the existing system. Additional machining was need to insert the bronze bearing. The modification was performed by the SEIM mechanics under who did an excellent job with Etienne's assistance and instruction.
All the mechanical moving parts were disassembled, cleaned, painted as necessary, and reinstalled. In addition to the nylon cable sheave, the bronze acme rod bushing were replaced and the missing run-out spacers restored.
After reassembly, the travel became very tight because the upper and lower shafts may had rotated relative to the bushings (different wear pattern). Unfortunately, we forgot to mark them but after some trial and error repositioning, we were able to loosen the system up. It is still tighter than it was but should break in after some use. We believe this has contributed to some of the electrical issues with the controller. (see ET report) Will talk to Brad about getting new shafts.
The loose drive chain was fixed and now runs smoothly with the proper tension. The limit switches on both ends were replace with new ones, as well.
On the transit end in to Auckland we deployed the magnetometer. The system failed to respond to the hand controller and would only respond to the fleet arm senor when deflected in the starboard direction. The board was replaced with the new board and became operational. The fleet arm sensor still needs to be tuned.

HIGH PRESSURE REGULATOR

We were unable to finish the job because of missing pipe connections. These have been ordered and the job will be completed on the Lyttleton transit. In disabling the old manifold, we found another split connector where we reduce from 1" to ½" Agh!.

Underway lab

WINFROG

• The new version numbers the data files and there is no way to turn it off. Moggy and I are of the same opinion that WInFROG needs to be replaced with a real navigation program.
• Midway thru the expedition, WinFROG changed the output format of the DAT file by excluding the version column. No clue how we did this or how to undo this!?
• For just one day WinFROG recorded 20+ nm SOG while we were in DP mode. This lasted for just a few minutes but occurred about every 2 hours. Again, no clue what went wrong and it hasn't repeated.

TRIMBLE GPS

Mike Cannon and I worked on trying to resolve why we kept dropping the AFT Trimble receiver in WinFROG. After numerous test that revealed nothing, Mike swapped out the forward and aft receivers to see if the problem would follow the receiver. It went completely away for no reason that we can tell. We left the receivers swapped and then change the configuration in WinFROG to reflect the change. Been working well ever since the swap.

Remodeling

The underway lab got quite a facelift. The motivation for the changes was to create storage space to move material from UTSHOP to make room for the new 3D printer (and possible mill). In addition, we completed the change to the layout agreed to by the LOs.
To create storage space, a unistrut framed shelving was installed over the starboard bench. Mostly pluming materials from the UT Shop were brought back aft. Before storing in the new location, material was "high" graded; tossing used or damaged material in the scrap bin and shipping excess material back to CS.
The map cabinet under the "map" table replaced with a T-slot frame and relocated from the center of the room to the port wall opening up the space. The box for the Maggie was fixed to the end so that the lid can be opened without interference. To comply with export security requirement, the box is blind bolted the t-slot support frame and a lockable hasp installed on the box. We now are in compliance without having to keep the space locked up while at sea (still lock up in port).
The tabled is anchored to the bulkhead and the outboard legs are bolted to the floor allowing us to attach the GI guns to the frame (under the magnetometer storage box) and store and secure heavy objects underneath.
The WinFRROG workstations were relocated between the outer Seismic Power amp rack and the network rack against the port side.

ENGINEERING REPORT

DEAN FERRELL

ETBS

Time Constant data

Most of our downhole temperature deployments are targeting a single depth data point. We lower the tool to a particular depth or insert the probe into sediment at a particular depth then leave the tool in this position for several minutes while it comes close to temperature equilibrium. During at least one deployment of the ETBS, it was desirable to get a temperature continuum along the entire depth of the hole. Time restraints prevented us from stopping along the deployment at depth intervals, so the tool was deployed at a slower than normal core line speed. To analyses the data, we needed a better understanding of the ETBS time constant. Therefore, we tested the ETBS in ice water and hot water baths for temperature reaction time. Although this test needs to be repeated in a more stable test environment, we determined that one time constant, (1t the time required to reach 63% of the temperature change) to be about 30 seconds and the 100% practical equivalent 5t=150 seconds. Future tool development should consider probes with faster temperature time constants if these types of measurements are desired.

Deployments

• U1528D-Run1 &2 with Claassen Adapter ver1
• U1528D-Run3
• U1530A - Run 1

Petrospec Temperature Logger

The EXP376 version of the Petrospec temperature logger seems to be poorly designed. In my understanding this tool, was created in the last 6 weeks before expedition start and the design reflects that lack of planning.
First, the electronics temperature rating of only 40ºC is extremely limiting and decision to use this data logger is somewhat perplexing, when there are consumer level devices easily available that are rated to 85ºC.
Secondly, the datalogger housing is a pipe thread seal rather than an o-ring seal. This makes it very difficult to make up and later break apart while retaining a seal. In addition, the carrier for the electronics is a crude milled block of steel that does not provide a protected path for the probe wiring.
Thirdly, the probe design, consists of thermocouple inside a stainless tube, inside a larger stainless tube, inside a protective perforated pipe. This tube in tube design, has created a sort of dewar flask in the sensor portion of the tool insulating it from outside temperature and increasing the temperature equilibration time. Ironically, the electronics housing could have benefitted from this type of design.
Lastly, the interface between the petropec tool and IODP running tools was an issue. The upper union of the petrospec tool would not match up to any of our running tools. The upper union of the Petrospec tool is our inner barrel thread, but it is in a pin-up configuration. We don't have anything that can connect to that in the proper orientation. The solution was to modify the upper union by drilling and tapping a 1-14" 8UNC hole in the upper end. We baker locked a 3-1/8" length of all-thread into this taped hole, then baker locked that same thread to the GS cup.

Deployments

Petrospec tool was deployed 4 times. The first 2 times it was deployed with the electronics housing inside the pipe and circulating to cool the data loggers which are only rated to 40º. The 3^rd time Teflon tape was not used due to a communications error and the tool was flooded. The forth deployment was outside the protection of the cooled drill pipe. Incredibly, the 40ºC rated loggers survived and measured 200ºC plus temperatures.

SET2 with temperature strips

The possibility of deploying the SET2 probe tip was discussed. We tested the ability to insert temperature strips around the SET2 electronics or alternatively around a split copper cylinder which could be inserted into the cavity which normally houses the electronics. If temperatures were expected to be below 100ºC, I felt that the tool with electronics could be deployed without damage, though the maximum measureable temperature of the SET2 is between 50ºC and 55ºC. We inserted the temperature strips into the tool, closed up the housing, started logging, and then placed the SET2 into a container of ice water. After about 15 minutes we transferred the tool to a container of hot water for about 30 minutes. Upon retrieval the temperature strip was crushed, but the indicating area seemed intact and showed a reasonable temperature. This configuration was never deployed.

Claassen Adapter, Sleeves, Bit Sample Boxes

The original deployment strategy for the Kuster tool, was to deploy it beneath the sinker bars on a GS cup. Pre-expedition, an adapter was designed and built that was a GS cup on one side with a female sucker rod thread to mate with Kuster tool. The operations superintendent devised a way to deploy the Kuster tool thru the RCB bit allowing it to be run multiple times before dropping the bit. The ET machined one of the existing GS cup to sucker rod adapters and had it welded to a section of pipe. On the opposite end of this pipe were welded some larger diameter retaining rings which could be locked into the RCB catcher sub. This allowed the Kuster to be deployed on the end of the core barrel latching in the RCB. Subsequently, the Classen adapter was modified to allow deployment of the ETBS as well. Version 2 of the adapter consists of two interchangeable tool end adapter that thread into the extension pipe. Also, the extension pipe is not welded to the retaining rings, but allowed to slide up inside the core barrel if the probe hits something hard. A stop at the end of the extension pipe prevents it from sliding out of the retaining rings. Due to his hard work and dedication to getting these tools to be deployable, the tool naturally took the name from marine electronics tech, Etienne Claasen.

In addition Claasen created sleeves that he machined from nylon stock to cover the flats of the Kuster tool. These flats caught on the flapper valve when the tool was pulled back up during bench testing. The sleeves are tapered to allow the flapper to ride over the flats. Each sleeve has a recessed hex screw to hold it in place over the flat.
One of the downhole scientists requested a method to deploy liquid sampling crystals in a location that would see formation liquid for 12 hours or more. The operation superintendent designed a small brass box which could be cooled with liquid nitrogen and then press fit into the make-up recesses on the drill bit. The ET machined and installed these boxes, for several successful runs.

Kuster Water Sampler

I attended assembly train three days prior to EXP376 at MB Century in Taupo, New Zealand along with two GSM scientists. We assembled and disassembled the tool with the exception of the trigger mechanism and the valve latch, as we were told that we would not need to do maintenance on these pieces. In the first week of EXP376 we assembled and disassembled several times for training.
In pre-deployment meetings, the chemists instructed us not to use lubricant on the threaded connection to prevent sample contamination. There was a request for Teflon grease, none has been found on board at this time. Upon further discussion they decided we could use limited silicon grease on o-rings and lithium based grease on threads. The lithium grease we used containing 50% molybdenum disulphide powder. In addition, the operations superintendent requested that we use thread locker to prevent losing parts in the hole.
Our routine deployment procedures consisted of the following:

1. Remove used o-rings
2. Disassemble the tool and clean using brass brushes
3. Assemble the tool and install o-rings while wearing rubber gloves to prevent contamination
4. Scientist clean the tool thoroughly with acetone

For the initial Kuster tool run we removed the Viton O-rings, in all locations except the trigger assembly as suggested by MB Century and replaced these with high temperature Kalrez O-rings. We only had one set of Kalrez due to limited lead time when ordered, therefore those O-rings were lost with the first tool. The Viton O-rings did the job, but were deformed and damaged after each high temp run and need to be changed and O-ring grooves cleaned after each deployment.

Claassen Nylon Sleeves

Etienne machines sleeves from nylon stock to fit over the Kuster tool flats

Deployments

Loss of Kuster

On the first Kuster tool deployment the tool was lost in hole, when the threaded upper most connection pulled out of the threads. The extension adapter was also slightly bent. The connection between the Kuster and the Claassen adapter was intact. Lock tight was used on all connections. It is possible that the tool impacted a ledge in the hole or in some other way was compacted. It is possible that the threads were compromised earlier, when putting the tool into the drill string. At the time of insertion of the probe end into drill string, there was quite a bit of ship roll and some movement at the upper end supported by a tugger. There was no indication at that time that anything was bent or any part was damaged, however, the movement was somewhat concerning.

Damaged Kuster

The only remaining Kuster tool was damaged due to thread galling. The galled thread was on the pressure chamber that holds the mechanical clock. It was so badly galled that the chamber could not be removed or completely closed. A torch was used to heat the joint to be able to remove the chamber. More than 50% of the threads were badly damaged or sheared off. The ships machinist put the pieces in a lathe and removed the bad thread and cleaned up what remained. After re-assembling the tool, we found that the latching mechanism would not latch. After some investigation it was determined that the pressure housing was very slightly bent, which was causing the trigger for the latch to hit the side wall. The machinist was able to increase inside diameter slightly on the latch end of the chamber. There is a smaller diameter stop on that end to prevent the clock from sliding into the latch, some of this material was removed.

DHML

Tools in return shipment for re-calibration: APCT3-007, APCT3-034, SET2-#2 (logger40)

Tracer Pump

There were some concerns that the tracer pumps were not operating properly. As a reminder, the tracer flow command in RigWatch is a command sent to the tracer pump to set flow rate and this rate calculated real-time as a proportion to pump stroke rate. The command is set and echoed back from the tracer pump, even if the pump off command is in place. This means that when the command is sent to turn the pump off, you will still see the current pump rate command even when the pump is off.
Technicians believed the tracer pumps were not operating properly because, the chemist was not able to find an indication of tracers in test sample. In an attempt to fix the problem, they changed over to the backup pump. At that point RigWatch communication with the tracer pump failed. Eventually, troubleshooting led to a baud rate setting that was in error on the NI serial to Ethernet converter. However, these setting had not been changed and are password protected. I theorize that RigWatch overrides the NI setting when it initialize the tracer .dll and since neither RigWatch nor the tracer dll were restarted, the system defaulted to the NI startup configuration. Settings have now been changed to reflect the same communications parameters as the RigWatch dll.
It remain to be seen whether tracer pump if operating properly, but it is thought that it is, and that the lack of tracer in the sample is due to poor mixing of the new tracer solution and drill water. Operations superintendent suggest re-pumping the tracer insert to the input of the centrifugal charger pump, which could act as a mixer.

VIT

Ran the VIT extensively, and at least twice above hole with active fluid flow. The APCT3 was attached the frame both these times and thermal spikes of a few degrees could be seen during the time over the cone. There is normal corrosion to the VIT frame, but no visual indication that it was subjected to the high acid environment.

DVR Issues

VIT was deployed many times during exp376. At the start of the last week of operations, the DVR failed. There were indication of 100% CPU usage. Task manager showed no processes using unreasonable amount of CPU cycles, however the CPU usage graph would show 100%. Closing the DVR software, would drop the usage to near zero. After talking to SubC support, I closed the DVR software and deleted all files in the SubC setting folder. Restarting the software, the problem seemed to be solved, but all record and overlay setting were gone. As I slowly re-entered each settings and started recording, the CPU usages rose. When all setting were restored, CPU again was at 100% and the program would not operate. I have determined that I can run overlays on 1 video channel and record that channel only. Any more overlays or attempting to record the second channel, causes the system to max out and fail again.
I changed out the operating DVR with the backup machine, copying the Overlay setup files from the operating machine. I had to setup the input/output channels and record setting manually, but I could load the overlay settings from file. CPU usage with both channels recording with full overlays was below 50%, however, overlay data was not updating properly. A sit turns out the backup machine com ports are labeled differently COM3 is now COM5 (Data from DOWCOmm via Blackbox Ethernet) and COM4 is COM6 (Data from VIT PC).
Still there were issues. COM5 did not appear to be updating. Any attempt to change COM5 settings in SubC caused the overlay to disappear. I deleted the COM5 serial overlay and re-created from scratch, which made the overlay stable, but still no data update and a notice that the COM port was already open. I unplugged the serial cable leading to the BlackBox, restarted the SubC DVR and things seem to be fixed.
So to summarize, I believe the issue is with the Blackbox, which might have needed rebooting or with DOWComm which might also should have been rebooted. If this should happen in the future I suggest trying these measure first.

RIS to LabVIEW Project

There is interest in extracting RigWatch data near real-time, for display and other uses outside the program and without the need for additional licenses. I have experiments with different methods to extract the data and distribute it around the ship.
DOWComm.exe communicate with RigWatch via an ethernet to serial converter connected to COM1 of the master. It sends VIT and Coreline cable depth into the RIS using a WITS formatted text string. I modified a version of DOWComm to receive WITS data from RigWatch as well. This WITS data is put into a LabVIEW shared variable with is posted to the network, allowing other LabVIEW machines to access this WITS string. This version is titled DOComm_2018_B1_32bit. There are still some bugs with the data capture portion of the program, but initial results are promising.