Wednesday, December 14, 2016

Hello everyone,
Finally a proper update on the Buccoo Reef CREWS station.
 On December 1st a team from the IMA towed in the CREWS, cleaned, and started troubleshooting.
On opening the main canister, there was some evidence of salt water intrusion and damp desiccant bags. Not a lot, but enough that small droplets were visible on the batteries. On further investigation, the voltage regulator was not outputting any power. However, it was still charging the batteries as it should. Some corroded connections were cleaned and that solved the power issue.
 Next issue was the modem. The power indicator light was on, but no sign of network activity or antenna signal. We switched the sim card with a new one, but still no change. Finally, we changed the entire modem with a spare one. That solved the communication problem and the CREWS is now transmitting normally.
 There was an unexpected problem with the EXO2 probe and it's umbilical cord. One of the six pins had corroded away. This is probably why we were not seeing the dissolved oxygen and pH readings. This will be corrected before we redeploy the CREWS.
 To prevent any more water intrusion I will do a thorough leak test before deploying, I do not think this was done during the last service.
 That's basically the jist of it and I'll update on the progress of the EXO repairs.
 Regards,
 Jonathan Gomez
Marine Technician
Institute of Marine Affairs