Under the tiles

In addition to the site perimeter, we have also check underneath the HBA tiles. Of course that required a bit of digging to get to the hatch...

Digging down to get to the antenna hatch.

And, as expected, the conditions underneath the antennas are good. There is relatively little snow blown under and the original framesets are holding up well.

Conditions under the north-western section of the HBA array.

Photos by T. Iinatti.

Snow barriers

Around the sides of the High-Band Antenna array, there are a mix of different snow barrier types. The leading edge of the array was fitted with timber barriers immediately, but did not have time last year to complete the side panels. As a result, a temporary plastic mesh was put in place. During this build season we are replacing the original meshes with the proper timber panelling.

Building snow barriers to fit to the side of the HBA. Photograph by Arttu Jutila.

The planks used for this are actually the pallets on which the HBA tiles were originally delivered. By re-using the packing and transport materials we can reduce build waste to nearly zero. We feel that this is an important lesson for other large scale projects like the Square Kilometer Array and EISCAT_3D.

The temporary plastic mesh barriers are slowing being replaced by timber ones. Photograph by Arttu Jutila.

We hope to have all the snow barriers completed soon.

Snow conditions

Arriving at the site, the first concern was what was the state of the HBA. Had it survived the winter? Was there much snow about? How deep was it and had it managed to get through the snow barriers to choke and lift any tiles? As it turned out, we were pleasantly surprised at the condition of the site. Absolutely perfect! Our design had worked brilliantly.

Snow build-up under the array... minimal!

Conditions along the trailing edges... fine!

Snow build-up on the leading north-west edge... deep, but okay!

As it turned out, there was exactly what we had expected in terms of snow depth and density. There was considerable drift banks on the leading edge, but there was no shift in the array structure at all.

Snow fence - Part 2

Below you can see the finished snow fence under the support structure. We also used plastic snow fencing material on the other edges for the antenna groups. Luckily this material was available in other colors than bright orange.

Ready for winter

Snow fence - Part 1

With winter already half through, we will go through several preparations that we did at the end of 2011 at KAIRA for the approaching winter. 

First of all, in order to prevent snow from blowing underneath the tiles, we converted the palettes used for transporting the HBA tiles into a snow fence. In the summer the snow fence will also prevent reindeer from walking under the tiles.

HBA palettes being converted into a snow fence. 

A small access door to allow