Tried this yesterday. For once, the sample didn’t crystallize! It must have been because of the vacuum distillery that a friend of mine and I built. So, at least sample issues are largely taken care of.

Plus, the temperature stability was excellent, so at least I did a good job of learning how to use all this crap.

I didn’t see shear waves. For a second, I thought I did. But, it turned out to be some electrical noise at 60MHz. D’oh.

However, the longitudinal waves looked beautiful all across the glass transition, which was a definite positive step. If I can see that at high pressure, at least that will soften the blow if there are no shear waves forthcoming…

Given the experimental conditions last night, the only problem was that the sample didn’t have large shear waves. Everything else was working OK.

So, I had to give up the cryostat. But, we’re getting a couple of new ones! That means I’ll get back to it when I return from the West Coast on the 15th of August.