For eight HARPS series, every choice of 30 added 2027 La Silla grid nights leaves an annual orbit at eccentricity 0.8 below 10% ideal amplitude information under independent noise

We tested whether new observing nights can remove annual information gaps in eight public HARPS radial velocity series. We used 1186 old nightly bins and one fixed time per 2027 night at La Silla. Each target has 252 to 291 nights that pass the stated visibility rule. We tested exactly 10 or 30 new nights at a period of 365.25 days and eccentricity 0.8. The information model fits instrument offsets and a linear trend. Errors are independent. Each variance includes a 1 m/s noise floor. For every allowed schedule, at least one orbital phase and orientation has an amplitude information ratio below 0.1. The upper bounds range from 0.01554 to 0.04749 for ten nights and from 0.01937 to 0.05120 for thirty nights. The reference has the same total weight, uniform mean anomaly, and known nuisance terms. An optimistic control permits dates outside the visibility rule. Found schedules have conservative continuous-phase lower bounds above 0.1 for 8 of eight targets with ten dates and 8 with thirty dates. At eccentricity 0.4, we found ten-night visible schedules with lower bounds above 0.1 for all eight targets. We give affine bounds that apply to every schedule on each fixed grid. We check their saved coefficients with a separate orbit solver. We also give source rows, schedules, code, figures, and repeat instructions. The 0.1 level is a design diagnostic. These results do not measure planet detection probability. They apply to the fixed time grid and stated noise and calibration assumptions.

radial velocity · HARPS · observing schedules · eccentric orbits · annual sampling · optimal design · information bounds · reproducible research