Page History

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• Bartington MS2K or MS2E (Note: MS2E is not generally recommended because of its very small read area) magnetic susceptibility contact probe
• Bartington MS2 meter, run in serial communications mode
• Ocean Optics QE Pro visible spectrum spectrophotometer
• Ocean Optics HL-2000 Halogen Light Source with Attenuator and TTL-Shutter
• Ocean Optics Multi-LED BluLoop Light Source
• Ocean Optics 30 mm integrating sphere, with a 10 mm aperture
• Acuity AccuRange AR700 Laser
• Barcode scanner
• Instrument platform
• Hardware abort switch

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Figure 1. SHMSL Hardware

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The IMS immediately initializes the system hardware (Figure 3): the track system is initialized first, finding the home position for the Y- and then the Z-axes. Following that, the laser displacement sensor, magnetic susceptibility probe, and spectrometer are initialized (Figure 4).

Figure 3. IMS Initialization

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Figure 5. Setup Instrument Sensors

Instrument offset: track position of the laser where the center of the sensor is over the benchmarks zero edge.
Sensor/Contact width: physical width of the sensor that makes contact with the core's surface.
Analysis name: LIMS analysis component (must match LIMS component exactly).
Instrument group: LIMS instrument group logger name (i.e., SHMSL).
Model: model name of the sensor (from manufacturer).
S/N: serial number of the sensor (from manufacturer).
Menu name: value that appears as the instrument's menu name.
Full name: value that appears in instrument dialog boxes.
Description: instrument purpose; used in the System Information report.

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The SHMSL software also has a utility feature (shown in Figure 7, below) that allows the user to test the MS performance. The MS utility allows the user to zero the meter and to set it to continuous measurement.

Figure 7. MS2K Utility

Setting up the QE Pro parameters

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The Ocean Optics QE Pro spectrometer can be set up using the screen shown in Figure 8.

Figure 8. QE Pro Sensor Setup

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Figure 25. QE Pro Measurement Parameters

Click OK to save settings to the instrument configuration file and return to the Measurement Editor.
Only one parameter can be set for the laser, and that is Gap Detection Offset shown in Figure 26. This is the height below the benchmark which will be tagged by the system as a gap and will therefore not be measured. For piston cores, the recommended gap offset should be set to 10 mm or less. For hard rock cores, the gap offset should be set between 20 and 30 mm.

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1. Click the Start button (Figure 28) to open the Section Information screen (Figure 29).
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   Figure 28. Start ScanFigure 
   
   
   
   Figure 29. Section Information Screen
   
   
   
   1. Place the cursor in the SCAN text field (circled in black in Figure 29, above) so that the barcode information will be parsed appropriately. Pull the trigger on the barcode scanner; at the beep, the information will automatically fill for Expedition, Site, Hole, and so on.
   2. (Optional) Enter any comment needed into the Comment field.
   3. If material is missing from the top of the section, enter the distance in the Missing Top field (circled in red in Figure 29, above).
      Note: If material is missing at the top of the section, be sure the section half is positioned all the way up to the top of the rail. The software will add the missing top interval to all of the measurements in the database. For example, if a 150 cm section half has a missing 10 cm at the top, the yellow endcap should be placed against "0 cm" at the top of the instrument's rails. The user should enter 10.0 in the Missing Top (cm) field. The logger will measure the section, and all measurements will be placed at the correct offsets in the database.
   4. Additional intervals can be specified for omission from measurement by clicking the Exclude Interval button (top left of Figure 29, above). Enter the top and bottom offsets of the areas to be excluded during the measurement pass as shown in Figure 30. The excluded intervals apply to all enabled sensors.
      
      Figure 30. Exclude interval
      
      
2. When the required minimum sample information has been entered, the Measure button becomes active. Click it to start the measurement. If the QE Pro does not require calibration (see Calibrating the Sensors, below), proceed to the next step.
3. The sensor assembly will move down the track while the laser acquires a profile of the split surface of the section. When the software has detected a gap, it will indicate regions that will not be measured by the MS and reflectance sensors on the screen in red.
   Note       Note: (Gap detection parameters are configurable; ask the PP tech for assistance in modifying them.) 
   Acquisition of this profile is why the section is not yet wrapped in plastic wrap—sometimes the laser will profile the wrap rather than the sediment beneath it and give incorrect heights to the gap detection routine. 
   
   Figure 31Figure31. Laser Profile

1. After the surface profile is completed, the measured section length as determined by the laser is displayed (Figure 32). Apply GLAD® Plastic Wrap to the surface of sediment cores as demonstrated by the PP Tech (Figure 33). Adjust the displayed length if needed in the Scan Length field and click GO to start the section measurement.
   
   Figure32. Final Sample Preparation 
   
   IMPORTANT!!! Before pressing GO, it is necessary to cover the core section with GLAD® PlasticWrap in order to avoid damage to the integration sphere. Any mud that gets inside the sphere will ruin it!
   IMPORTANT! Do not cover the standards with GLAD® Plastic Wrap; they will give erroneous results if you do.
   
   
   Figure 33. Wrapped Sample Ready to Analyze.
2. The measurement sequence begins. For efficiency, measurements begin at the bottom of the section and move upcore. Results are displayed during acquisition on instrument graphs on screen. Note that the QE Pro has several tabs that display different views of the color reflectance data. Tabs can be changed during the measurement sequence. The Normalized Spectra tab shows the corrected percent color reflectance being measured at each point.
   
   Figure 34. Data Acquisition Screen
3. After the section has been measured, the logger takes measurements using the MS2K and WHITE standards as check standards if the control sample measurement was set up in the measurement parameters.

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