Sunday, 18 March, 2012
sent samples to Alister
After studying his notes and the planet conjunction images, I made some of my own notes. I also reviewed past RASC calendars. After two sudden BSOD crashes, I was finally able to send him an e-mail with a couple of calendar conjunction samples for his review. And I fired off a bunch of questions.
Tony called about the bins
Tony and I chatted about the Celestron binoculars. Told him I'm leaving the "better" pair for him to adjust. Referred to my blog (and the embedded link).
Tony said he's going to fabricate his own adapter, out of metal. I sent him photos of the crappy plastic adapter beside a ruler. We discussed dimensions and clearances.
Tony said he's going to fabricate his own adapter, out of metal. I sent him photos of the crappy plastic adapter beside a ruler. We discussed dimensions and clearances.
collimated Tony's binos (Toronto)
When I reported to Tony that I knew how to fix the Celestron 15x70 SkyMaster binoculars, he asked me to try. Collimated the worst of them. Exact same way the Oberwerk are collimated. The exact way... I affected the maintenance with a orange peeler and turntable screwdriver!
Adjusted first the right screw. Then left screw to draw the images together. Then eased off the right a bit. Got a merged image. Yeh! Didn't have to struggle or strain to make the image. Could relax. Looking good (although I think the right ocular has a finger print). Hint of red and blue colour off the disk of the planet in these binos.
I could easily see Callisto, Io, Jupiter, and Ganymede. Estimated, correctly, Ganymede to be slightly brighter than Io. Tried to get fainter Europe between Ganymede and the planet. No luck.
Clouds are moving in.
Told Grace the good news...
Adjusted first the right screw. Then left screw to draw the images together. Then eased off the right a bit. Got a merged image. Yeh! Didn't have to struggle or strain to make the image. Could relax. Looking good (although I think the right ocular has a finger print). Hint of red and blue colour off the disk of the planet in these binos.
I could easily see Callisto, Io, Jupiter, and Ganymede. Estimated, correctly, Ganymede to be slightly brighter than Io. Tried to get fainter Europe between Ganymede and the planet. No luck.
Clouds are moving in.
Told Grace the good news...
staring at 1300 maps
Learned how to read the map (plane chart) images provided by Alister.
The dark shading is obvious: that's night time area.
The thick black line and hatched area... And the black star. Still working on that...
Oh. Found the notes! The star is the point on Earth where the event is at zenith. The white space then, up to the thick black line, is the "zone of visibility," i.e. 90° from the zenith.
The dark shading is obvious: that's night time area.
The thick black line and hatched area... And the black star. Still working on that...
Oh. Found the notes! The star is the point on Earth where the event is at zenith. The white space then, up to the thick black line, is the "zone of visibility," i.e. 90° from the zenith.
Saturday, 17 March, 2012
Friday, 16 March, 2012
tried Tony's binos x2
Tony gave me his two pair of Celestron Skymaster 15x70 binoculars to test. He said that both he and Trevor were having a hard time with them.
Put outside my monster Manfrotto tripod.
I tried the "unboxed" glasses first. Easy to use, good colour, easy to focus. But at no time could I merge bright stars. Proof was that I'd stand back from the binos, look at the sky, relax. Then I'd move to the oculars and look in. I'd see my quarry, the bright star, as two images, widely separated. Immediately, my eyes (and/or brain) would start to adjust. The dual images would draw close together. But, again, never merge to one. Also, if I scanned the field and relaxed, dual bright stars would draw a little closer; but whenever I'd centre on the bright object, they'd stay apart. I could make my eyes move (going a little cross-eyed) to make them go further apart, then relax, and they'd draw closer together. And never merge.
I then got out the "boxed" glasses. Far worse. The right tube was badly out of collimation. The image was worse. Dual stars, further apart than the other set, and not even level. Also, there was something wrong with the transmission in the right tube. The image was much darker.
The binoculars-tripod adapter was terrible, by the way. Given the mass, size, and polar moment of these binos, any movement or shock would cause the glasses to yaw violently. And then they would oscillate for several seconds. Ridiculous.
I told Tony he'd have to return them to Canadian Tire. This smokin' good deal is consuming more time and fuel...
Put outside my monster Manfrotto tripod.
I tried the "unboxed" glasses first. Easy to use, good colour, easy to focus. But at no time could I merge bright stars. Proof was that I'd stand back from the binos, look at the sky, relax. Then I'd move to the oculars and look in. I'd see my quarry, the bright star, as two images, widely separated. Immediately, my eyes (and/or brain) would start to adjust. The dual images would draw close together. But, again, never merge to one. Also, if I scanned the field and relaxed, dual bright stars would draw a little closer; but whenever I'd centre on the bright object, they'd stay apart. I could make my eyes move (going a little cross-eyed) to make them go further apart, then relax, and they'd draw closer together. And never merge.
I then got out the "boxed" glasses. Far worse. The right tube was badly out of collimation. The image was worse. Dual stars, further apart than the other set, and not even level. Also, there was something wrong with the transmission in the right tube. The image was much darker.The binoculars-tripod adapter was terrible, by the way. Given the mass, size, and polar moment of these binos, any movement or shock would cause the glasses to yaw violently. And then they would oscillate for several seconds. Ridiculous.
I told Tony he'd have to return them to Canadian Tire. This smokin' good deal is consuming more time and fuel...
Grace found Mars (Toronto)
Grace was the first to spot Mars from her front porch. I used Astrolabe Clock to get us in the neighbourhood. It said it was about 24° up but we found it much higher.
Murky in the south-east.
[ed: I didn't realise at the time that the iPod had not sync'ed up to their home network so the time was off by an hour or so...]
Murky in the south-east.
[ed: I didn't realise at the time that the iPod had not sync'ed up to their home network so the time was off by an hour or so...]
liaised with Greg on shortcuts
Greg and I chatted about keyboard shortcuts in SkyTools 3 Pro. He shared another one that was undocumented! Heh. I sent him my updated list for his review. He gave some pointers. And clarified the magnitude limit vs. light pollution controls.
can't go
Jason sent a note to Phil and I. Said he and Stu were thinking about going to Kirkfield tonight. Both Phil and I had to decline.
I asked Jason to take photos of the site and Stu to get an SQM reading.
§
Seems they've already been, some time in the past. Jason said it's "fairly close [sic], easy to get to, very dark... with a SQM of 21.5... with snow cover... and you don't see the light dome from TO."
I asked Jason to take photos of the site and Stu to get an SQM reading.
§
Seems they've already been, some time in the past. Jason said it's "fairly close [sic], easy to get to, very dark... with a SQM of 21.5... with snow cover... and you don't see the light dome from TO."
Thursday, 15 March, 2012
made obstructed horizon
For SkyTools 3 Pro, for the porch, I made an obstructed horizon profile. So to have a bit more information regarding the visibility of objects and observing from home. I used custom landscape image I had made in Stellarium! Is that allowed?
researched two stars
I wanted to know the identity of the two stars (or the double star system) I had spotted, Wednesday night, in the middle of Messier 41 but that did not show up in SkyTools 3. Jumped into SIMBAD and entered the coordinates.
Not a double star; two separate stars:
BD-20 1553 6.84
*iC 06 45 53.24 -20 41 21.1 A0:V: 7 0
CPD-20 1596 24.20
*iC 06 45 52.57 -20 41 35.9 ~ 1 0
So, no great mystery. Just an aberration in the ST3 database.
Not a double star; two separate stars:BD-20 1553 6.84
*iC 06 45 53.24 -20 41 21.1 A0:V: 7 0
CPD-20 1596 24.20
*iC 06 45 52.57 -20 41 35.9 ~ 1 0
So, no great mystery. Just an aberration in the ST3 database.
new date selected
Gord sent out a note saying they had selected a new date for the SNO LAB tour. And hoped it worked for most everyone.
Wednesday, 14 March, 2012
to the Moon
Malcolm sent me a quick e-mail with the current mileage of his car. I'll add it to my records so to update his car maintenance log. He thought the 389092 a curious number. I think he was thinking it was high and getting close to 400000.The number caught my eye. I told him to look up how far away the Moon is and sent him a wikipedia link...
a little Meade
Charles showed me his little Meade ETX. Holy cow! I didn't know he had this. Sounds like he didn't either. Or more correctly, he had forgotten about it. He's agreed to let me try it.
It is clearly a knock-off clone of the Questar 3.5. Down to the little legs and knobs.
It is clearly a knock-off clone of the Questar 3.5. Down to the little legs and knobs.
evaluated 11" donation (Eringate)
Met up with Charles at his shop. We shook down, in two phases, the recently donated Celestron 11" telescope.
Just after my arrival, we pulled it out of the warehouse. We considered setting it up on the "front" sidewalk. But the sky was still terribly bright. Despite using the Celestron SkyScout, we still couldn't spot Venus. Even with the large binocs propped against the wall.
So we kept it inside and did a dress rehearsal. It gave us a chance to review the inventory, document features (e.g. CF tubing, Starbright XLT coatings) and other particulars (Fastar ready). Looked for scuffs, dents, dings; it was dusty. We powered it up and walked through the 2-star alignment process. Both the alt and az motors were working fine. The hand controller seemed fine. But the on-board GPS was clearly struggling under the metal roof. So, we turned it off and headed to the new Shebeen pub to ruminate.
When we egressed from truck, after dinner, given the angle of Venus and Jupiter, I suggested for round two that we try from the backlot. Charles agreed. He opened the big door. We hefted the 29 kilo beast outside. And in short order, we had the 'mount roughly aligned.
Immediately, through the eyepiece, I could see the collimation was quite good. First target: Venus. I showed Charles the "first quarter" phase of Venus. The view was pretty good in the e-Lux 40mm Plössl, without any significant colouring. We slewed to Jupiter. The moons were in a neat pattern, one close on the left, the other three equally spaced on the right. The surface banding was well-portrayed. Initially, the seeing was shakey; a moment later it went rock solid. A very nice view.
For a deep sky target we chose Messier 42. The view at 50x [er, 70x] was fair, with the nebula clearly visible. I found it difficult to focus well on the θ 1 and 2 (theta) stars. Probably a combination of telescope cooling, sketchey seeing, and heat from the roof tops. Charles said he could see green colour; looked grey to me. How many pints did he have?! We bumped the power to 400x [ah no, 560x] with the 5mm Tele Vue Radian. Whoa. Too much. But it clearly portrayed the clumpy nature of the diffuse nebula. Some lumpy darkness. Yes! I centred on θ2 Orionis and defocused slightly. The seeing was definitely badly. But I confirmed the diffraction rings were not circular.
Charles wanted to try some of his gear. While he fetched a 2" visual back, 2" mirror, and 2" wide-field 26mm, I went to Castor. It was easily split in the 40mm. Charles 2" accessories improved the view.
While we never nailed an object in the eyepiece, we agreed that the alignment was fair and the tracking was working well (once we turned it on). This might be a great 'scope for public outreach events. With a proper alignment, it would easy-peasy to use.
Satisfied the telescope was performing well, we packed up. We both agreed the rubber covers on the feet of the tripod were probably not stock. Certainly they were not a good idea.
I wonder where council will send it...
§
It was later that I confirmed the telescope particulars... We checked a NexStar 11 GPS Computerized Telescope. Given that it's focal length is 2800mm, not 2000, my magnification numbers were off.
Just after my arrival, we pulled it out of the warehouse. We considered setting it up on the "front" sidewalk. But the sky was still terribly bright. Despite using the Celestron SkyScout, we still couldn't spot Venus. Even with the large binocs propped against the wall.
So we kept it inside and did a dress rehearsal. It gave us a chance to review the inventory, document features (e.g. CF tubing, Starbright XLT coatings) and other particulars (Fastar ready). Looked for scuffs, dents, dings; it was dusty. We powered it up and walked through the 2-star alignment process. Both the alt and az motors were working fine. The hand controller seemed fine. But the on-board GPS was clearly struggling under the metal roof. So, we turned it off and headed to the new Shebeen pub to ruminate.When we egressed from truck, after dinner, given the angle of Venus and Jupiter, I suggested for round two that we try from the backlot. Charles agreed. He opened the big door. We hefted the 29 kilo beast outside. And in short order, we had the 'mount roughly aligned.
Immediately, through the eyepiece, I could see the collimation was quite good. First target: Venus. I showed Charles the "first quarter" phase of Venus. The view was pretty good in the e-Lux 40mm Plössl, without any significant colouring. We slewed to Jupiter. The moons were in a neat pattern, one close on the left, the other three equally spaced on the right. The surface banding was well-portrayed. Initially, the seeing was shakey; a moment later it went rock solid. A very nice view.
For a deep sky target we chose Messier 42. The view at 50x [er, 70x] was fair, with the nebula clearly visible. I found it difficult to focus well on the θ 1 and 2 (theta) stars. Probably a combination of telescope cooling, sketchey seeing, and heat from the roof tops. Charles said he could see green colour; looked grey to me. How many pints did he have?! We bumped the power to 400x [ah no, 560x] with the 5mm Tele Vue Radian. Whoa. Too much. But it clearly portrayed the clumpy nature of the diffuse nebula. Some lumpy darkness. Yes! I centred on θ2 Orionis and defocused slightly. The seeing was definitely badly. But I confirmed the diffraction rings were not circular.
Charles wanted to try some of his gear. While he fetched a 2" visual back, 2" mirror, and 2" wide-field 26mm, I went to Castor. It was easily split in the 40mm. Charles 2" accessories improved the view.
While we never nailed an object in the eyepiece, we agreed that the alignment was fair and the tracking was working well (once we turned it on). This might be a great 'scope for public outreach events. With a proper alignment, it would easy-peasy to use.
Satisfied the telescope was performing well, we packed up. We both agreed the rubber covers on the feet of the tripod were probably not stock. Certainly they were not a good idea.
I wonder where council will send it...
§
It was later that I confirmed the telescope particulars... We checked a NexStar 11 GPS Computerized Telescope. Given that it's focal length is 2800mm, not 2000, my magnification numbers were off.
received Skyhound package
The special package from Greg arrived in my mailbox. Woo hoo.
A tad too late for First Light (this time). But in time for NOVA!
A tad too late for First Light (this time). But in time for NOVA!
was on list
Asked Denis is there was any way to figure out if I had been on the RASC-generated SkyNews mailing list for the Jan/Feb issue. After a false start, he did say there was a way. And he did in fact confirm it. Thanks.
a couple of Messiers (Toronto)
I had a good visual observing session on the porch.
13 Mar 2012, 7:24 PM. Did not set up light shield. Couldn't be bothered. Did not turn on dew heaters (at first). Found Venus and Jupiter in the bins. Higher than I expected. Just put the 'scope on Venus. In the 36mm eyepiece, the "first quarter phase" was obvious. Nice.
7:30 PM. Red mode started up. I put the red film on Dell monitors. Started SkyTools 3 Pro up and turned night vision mode on. Dropped the brightness on external monitor. I still don't have a properly-size piece of film for this flatscreen.
7:33. Put the 9mm on Venus. Wow, huge! The seeing is coming and going. Or was it clouds? The higher power showed it was just over ¼ phase.
7:59. Shot the planets with the FujiFilm FinePix J20. Did piggyback, make shift, to the Celestron OTA. Shot 1 to 4 sec exposures with fireworks mode. Used the 10 second timer. It was a little windy.
I had been in short sleeves up to this point. And I hadn't had dinner yet...
8:05. Turned to Mars. Seeing is very bad. Heat waves. Noticed a bright star nearby: HD 93993 at magnitude 6.8.
8:16. Spotted Auriga up high. Surveyed the sky wide field, Mark II eyeballs. Gemini, Sirius, Procyon, Orion, the Pleaides, Aldebaran.
Check the Environment Canada web site for Toronto conditions (as reported from Pearson International Airport).
temperature 11.9°C
dew point 0.7°
wind 21 km/h from west, becoming light
101.5 kPa and rising
low 2°C
The humidity? I must have missed it! Forgot to jot it down.
8:32. Viewed Messier 41. Ha! I had never seen it before. One for the life list! With the 36mm. There was an orange star in centre. And a double to the west: HD 49024.
8:38. I normally don't get too excited with open clusters. this one is colourful! 12 CMa was in the 2 o'clock orientation, HD 49024 around 6 o'clock, and there was a tight double to the north-east: SAO 172308.
9:00. I saw a faint double at a 45° angle to HD 49024, to the east. But it was not in SkyTools. Weird.
[ed: I looked it up. Checked deep sky imagery - the double is there. So ST3 is wrong. The J2000 location was approx.: 06 45 53.6 -20 41 16.49. Used Aladin and Simbad...]
I also observed that the bright star of the equally spaced line of 3 was not visible, while ST3P was showing it. Star GSC 05961-3174 is simply NOT there! I wondered if I should report this. ST3P said it was a mag 11.5 star with no known variabililty.
[ed: I checked for this too in a deep sky image - also not there. So ST3P was wrong here too.]
9:10. Viewed the double, BD -20 01558, at about half the seperation of SAO 172308. I tried the ole Celestron 26mm ocular for a little more power. The 9mm views were not good.
9:19. I had to change observating site location in ST3P to the Texas Star Party to get a better representation of the sky I was seeing. I was seeing faint stars, e.g. J064603.9-204503 is mag 12.9, near the L shape, the fainter of 2 stars, before HD 49126.
There was still no sign of double east of 49024. I tried to split HD 49317; no joy.
9:53. Viewed M48 for some time. Bit of a difficult hop, from Procyon, with tree limbs in the way, and few bright stars in the 'hood. Once there, spotted the double star HJ 2435A, in the centre, in the string of central stars. Cool. Another life list item done!
I copied the unfinished Turn Left At Orion winter items to the main ST3P list.
10:13. Spotted the faint 11.5 star, TYC 04859-0622 1, forming a triangle. Spotted a faint double: HDO 116A.
10:38. Took a quick peek at Castor, hopped from Pollox. Had to wait for it to clear the tree. Enjoyed the whole of Orion for a moment... Thinking about the multi-star systems σ (sigma) and ι (iota). While waiting, a plane went right by Mintaka.
Arrived at 63 Gem. Oooh, just tried ST3P companions feature, the "c" key, in the atlas. Nice, it highlights the other stars in multi-systems. But is that cheating?!
(The wrong symbols started appearing in my quick notes on John Smallberries. What's wrong with the keyboard?! I wondered. It was almost like I had a language option flip. But I knew this could not be the case; I did not have this setting enabled.)
10:48. Spotted B star to the north, the C star to south-west. Now D... that will be a challenge... I could see GSC 01359-0150 between.
[ed: Had attempted 63 Gem almost exactly 1 year ago. No luck then with AD stars then, like tonight. Decided to mark it as observed in ST3P so to show completion in the TLAO winter list, having seen the "two faint companions." And double stars for small telescopes for that matter, which only comments on two stars.]
10:55. Spotted mag 13.0 star GSC 01372-0667, north-east of 63!
But I still couldn't see the D component!
Viewed HD 294271. I had viewed this, of course, when looking at σ Ori in the past. ST3P shows the faint D star. I couldn't see it tonight. A, B, C were easy. But it was getting low. I decided to cross this off the TLAO winter list.
11:17. Felt a little chilled. Added a layer, a long sleeve shirt. Reviewed ST3 list. And felt pretty good. Only two to go in winter TLAO list!
Considered them but they are in Puppis. And that was not viable here, now.
I thought, let's go see what's up with Mars...
11:32. View seemed mushy, no detail. Noticed some faint stars in the field.
11:38. I was feeling a little tired. I realised that I had been at it pretty hard core for 4 hours now. Without dinner.
The view of Mars was disappointing. I was a little surprised with Mars so high up.
Checked Env Can - PIA again:
pressure 101.8 and rising
temp 5.5°C
dewpoint 2.1
low 2
humidity 79%
wind 11
Ah ha. It looked like the humidity was up. And it seemed possible that we'd hit the dew point...
14 Mar 2012, 12:07 AM. I cleanly split Alula Australis in Ursa Major. The stars looked the same colour to me. Same brightness.
The prospect of hooking up the SKYnyx right now, to do a video drift recording, is a little daunting... Then I checked the view in ST3. That is, the simulated view with the Lumenera camera. It showed that they would not be split far apart! Oh. Huh. Maybe this is the wrong 'scope... Need more magnification. The C14?
12:21 AM. Found the comet Garradd. Vear near star HR4659. Three stars actually. The software showed the galaxy NGC 4236. Simply could not see it.
12:35. I was yawning a lot. I considered that I should probably call it quits.
12:42. Finished a super fast shut down. That was a good night. I had not expected to cross off any new Messiers!
13 Mar 2012, 7:24 PM. Did not set up light shield. Couldn't be bothered. Did not turn on dew heaters (at first). Found Venus and Jupiter in the bins. Higher than I expected. Just put the 'scope on Venus. In the 36mm eyepiece, the "first quarter phase" was obvious. Nice.
7:30 PM. Red mode started up. I put the red film on Dell monitors. Started SkyTools 3 Pro up and turned night vision mode on. Dropped the brightness on external monitor. I still don't have a properly-size piece of film for this flatscreen.
7:33. Put the 9mm on Venus. Wow, huge! The seeing is coming and going. Or was it clouds? The higher power showed it was just over ¼ phase.
7:59. Shot the planets with the FujiFilm FinePix J20. Did piggyback, make shift, to the Celestron OTA. Shot 1 to 4 sec exposures with fireworks mode. Used the 10 second timer. It was a little windy.
I had been in short sleeves up to this point. And I hadn't had dinner yet...
8:05. Turned to Mars. Seeing is very bad. Heat waves. Noticed a bright star nearby: HD 93993 at magnitude 6.8.
8:16. Spotted Auriga up high. Surveyed the sky wide field, Mark II eyeballs. Gemini, Sirius, Procyon, Orion, the Pleaides, Aldebaran.
Check the Environment Canada web site for Toronto conditions (as reported from Pearson International Airport).
temperature 11.9°C
dew point 0.7°
wind 21 km/h from west, becoming light
101.5 kPa and rising
low 2°C
The humidity? I must have missed it! Forgot to jot it down.
8:32. Viewed Messier 41. Ha! I had never seen it before. One for the life list! With the 36mm. There was an orange star in centre. And a double to the west: HD 49024.
8:38. I normally don't get too excited with open clusters. this one is colourful! 12 CMa was in the 2 o'clock orientation, HD 49024 around 6 o'clock, and there was a tight double to the north-east: SAO 172308.
9:00. I saw a faint double at a 45° angle to HD 49024, to the east. But it was not in SkyTools. Weird.
[ed: I looked it up. Checked deep sky imagery - the double is there. So ST3 is wrong. The J2000 location was approx.: 06 45 53.6 -20 41 16.49. Used Aladin and Simbad...]
I also observed that the bright star of the equally spaced line of 3 was not visible, while ST3P was showing it. Star GSC 05961-3174 is simply NOT there! I wondered if I should report this. ST3P said it was a mag 11.5 star with no known variabililty.
[ed: I checked for this too in a deep sky image - also not there. So ST3P was wrong here too.]
9:10. Viewed the double, BD -20 01558, at about half the seperation of SAO 172308. I tried the ole Celestron 26mm ocular for a little more power. The 9mm views were not good.
9:19. I had to change observating site location in ST3P to the Texas Star Party to get a better representation of the sky I was seeing. I was seeing faint stars, e.g. J064603.9-204503 is mag 12.9, near the L shape, the fainter of 2 stars, before HD 49126.
There was still no sign of double east of 49024. I tried to split HD 49317; no joy.
9:53. Viewed M48 for some time. Bit of a difficult hop, from Procyon, with tree limbs in the way, and few bright stars in the 'hood. Once there, spotted the double star HJ 2435A, in the centre, in the string of central stars. Cool. Another life list item done!
I copied the unfinished Turn Left At Orion winter items to the main ST3P list.
10:13. Spotted the faint 11.5 star, TYC 04859-0622 1, forming a triangle. Spotted a faint double: HDO 116A.
10:38. Took a quick peek at Castor, hopped from Pollox. Had to wait for it to clear the tree. Enjoyed the whole of Orion for a moment... Thinking about the multi-star systems σ (sigma) and ι (iota). While waiting, a plane went right by Mintaka.
Arrived at 63 Gem. Oooh, just tried ST3P companions feature, the "c" key, in the atlas. Nice, it highlights the other stars in multi-systems. But is that cheating?!
(The wrong symbols started appearing in my quick notes on John Smallberries. What's wrong with the keyboard?! I wondered. It was almost like I had a language option flip. But I knew this could not be the case; I did not have this setting enabled.)
10:48. Spotted B star to the north, the C star to south-west. Now D... that will be a challenge... I could see GSC 01359-0150 between.
[ed: Had attempted 63 Gem almost exactly 1 year ago. No luck then with AD stars then, like tonight. Decided to mark it as observed in ST3P so to show completion in the TLAO winter list, having seen the "two faint companions." And double stars for small telescopes for that matter, which only comments on two stars.]
10:55. Spotted mag 13.0 star GSC 01372-0667, north-east of 63!
But I still couldn't see the D component!
Viewed HD 294271. I had viewed this, of course, when looking at σ Ori in the past. ST3P shows the faint D star. I couldn't see it tonight. A, B, C were easy. But it was getting low. I decided to cross this off the TLAO winter list.
11:17. Felt a little chilled. Added a layer, a long sleeve shirt. Reviewed ST3 list. And felt pretty good. Only two to go in winter TLAO list!
Considered them but they are in Puppis. And that was not viable here, now.
I thought, let's go see what's up with Mars...
11:32. View seemed mushy, no detail. Noticed some faint stars in the field.
11:38. I was feeling a little tired. I realised that I had been at it pretty hard core for 4 hours now. Without dinner.
The view of Mars was disappointing. I was a little surprised with Mars so high up.
Checked Env Can - PIA again:
pressure 101.8 and rising
temp 5.5°C
dewpoint 2.1
low 2
humidity 79%
wind 11
Ah ha. It looked like the humidity was up. And it seemed possible that we'd hit the dew point...
14 Mar 2012, 12:07 AM. I cleanly split Alula Australis in Ursa Major. The stars looked the same colour to me. Same brightness.
The prospect of hooking up the SKYnyx right now, to do a video drift recording, is a little daunting... Then I checked the view in ST3. That is, the simulated view with the Lumenera camera. It showed that they would not be split far apart! Oh. Huh. Maybe this is the wrong 'scope... Need more magnification. The C14?
12:21 AM. Found the comet Garradd. Vear near star HR4659. Three stars actually. The software showed the galaxy NGC 4236. Simply could not see it.
12:35. I was yawning a lot. I considered that I should probably call it quits.
12:42. Finished a super fast shut down. That was a good night. I had not expected to cross off any new Messiers!
Tuesday, 13 March, 2012
signboard photo'ed
Charles sent over a photo he shot of the new OSC signboard.
I uploaded it to the Council area. And explained why it was on the floor.
§
It was only at this point that I noticed the word "meeting" was missing (suggested by me). And that I recalled that there was not "default" arrow printed (suggested by Tony). And that the QR is frickin' tiny (dunno why). Little errors. But, it works.
I uploaded it to the Council area. And explained why it was on the floor.
§
It was only at this point that I noticed the word "meeting" was missing (suggested by me). And that I recalled that there was not "default" arrow printed (suggested by Tony). And that the QR is frickin' tiny (dunno why). Little errors. But, it works.
Monday, 12 March, 2012
where's Mar/Apr?
I popped into the SkyNews web site for a moment, just sort of breezing through. And I caught out of the corner of my eye the little banner about the latest issue... When it occurred to me that I didn't remember that one. Did I receive it? I'll have to check. It must have been sent out early- or mid-February...
Sunday, 11 March, 2012
frustrating session (Etobicoke)
Manuel and I had high hopes for observing and imaging. I was hoping to image Mars again. I also thought, by playing with exposure, we might be able to coax out the Martian moons. I considered trying to split some of the tight stars, naked eye, in Pleiades. And with his binoculars and my tripod adapter, I wanted to see if I could spot Garrard to the north. He wanted to trying the 9¼" on the DX, image Mars and maybe a DSO, and make sure the big SCT was collimated well. But, in the end, we were clouded out.
§
In the afternoon, I packed the netbook, my hand-made focusing mask, and some warm clothes. Headed to his place in the early evening.
First order of business: get some food. While we waited for the delivery, we chatted and watched a bit of NASA TV. One segment talked about the recent successful trials with Dextre on the satellite repair test platform, on orbit of course, at the International Space Station.
Showed him my Bahtinov focusing mask. I asked Manuel if he had all the required software for focusing. I recalled some discussion before about something missing. He said he did have everything now. He had all the software and hardware in place. I'm not sure if he's used it much. This will be helpful in the future during his imaging runs and should allow for results better than focusing by hand (like we did for Mars).
I asked if the DFK camera had cooling. He said it did. [ed: I'm still unclear. One report I read says it does not have active cooling.] Regardless, I had an eye to getting everything outside to begin cooling down. Manuel already had the Celestron optical tube assembly outside (stowed safely) to get to ambient temp. All the camera gear was still inside though.
I also wanted to know if he was using the DX's All-Star Polar Alignment process given that he could not see Polaris. He said he was. Good stuff. Austin Grant's DX review in (the Jan/Feb 2012) Astronomy Technology Today suggested this built-in procedure could allow one to forego a drift alignment. Still, I wanted to see Manuel go through the process. I wanted to observe the degree of accuracy he used. For example, I wanted to see if he'd use 2 alignment stars and 4 calibration stars.
After dinner, we continued the setup of the mount and telescope.
I also wanted to verify he was using accurate date, time, location information in the DX mount. The date and time was fine but the location had been set to Toronto. Not good enough. I programmed in his exact latitude and longitude. Advocating high accuracy at every stage.
We did not install the dew heating equipment. Didn't think it necessary.
When Manuel started to balance the telescope, I asked why he was doing this wihout the camera mounted. He said that it didn't weight that much. I said I thought it odd that he took such great care to balance the 'scope so early. I recommended he do it quickly at this stage but do it again after mounting all the accessories.
I also asked if he balanced the mount so to preload the drive. I'm not sure he knew what I was talking about. I'll have to explain this another time, that many imagers take care to predict where the mount will be pointing and then bias the balance slightly so that the gears are always loaded.
We discussed his cameras. For some reason, I thought he only had one now. Nope. He still has the QHY5: it is for guiding; still has the QHY9; for deep sky. And of course he has the Imaging Source DFK: for planetary.
We ran through the normal startup process for the mount. When it prompted for alignment stars, named of course, we didn't see obvious ones listed. Manuel forced the hand controller to offer more stars. After the two-star alignment, we slewed about. It was way off. We even checked the mount with his compass. It was fairly close. We rebooted and tried again. And then went through the All Star alignment. It only seemed to prompt for one calibration star. I wanted to do more but couldn't see a way to do that. Still, going through the process quickly was insightful. It really is a lot like drift aligning... Nevertheless, the mount was still off.
We did the process again. Manuel asked if I wanted the calibrated eyepiece. Yep. It will improve our accuracy.
I wanted to try again from scratch but I was having a hard time seeing stars. It was then we realised there was some thin cloud up high dimming things out...
Manuel copied the DX user manual to my netbook. I'll give it a thorough read at some point.
By 10:30 PM, we resigned. It was obvious that we were clouded out.
Never had a chance to check the collimation of the 9¼"... Never did split Pleiades. Never try for Garradd. Pity.
§
In the afternoon, I packed the netbook, my hand-made focusing mask, and some warm clothes. Headed to his place in the early evening.
First order of business: get some food. While we waited for the delivery, we chatted and watched a bit of NASA TV. One segment talked about the recent successful trials with Dextre on the satellite repair test platform, on orbit of course, at the International Space Station.
Showed him my Bahtinov focusing mask. I asked Manuel if he had all the required software for focusing. I recalled some discussion before about something missing. He said he did have everything now. He had all the software and hardware in place. I'm not sure if he's used it much. This will be helpful in the future during his imaging runs and should allow for results better than focusing by hand (like we did for Mars).
I asked if the DFK camera had cooling. He said it did. [ed: I'm still unclear. One report I read says it does not have active cooling.] Regardless, I had an eye to getting everything outside to begin cooling down. Manuel already had the Celestron optical tube assembly outside (stowed safely) to get to ambient temp. All the camera gear was still inside though.
I also wanted to know if he was using the DX's All-Star Polar Alignment process given that he could not see Polaris. He said he was. Good stuff. Austin Grant's DX review in (the Jan/Feb 2012) Astronomy Technology Today suggested this built-in procedure could allow one to forego a drift alignment. Still, I wanted to see Manuel go through the process. I wanted to observe the degree of accuracy he used. For example, I wanted to see if he'd use 2 alignment stars and 4 calibration stars.
After dinner, we continued the setup of the mount and telescope.
I also wanted to verify he was using accurate date, time, location information in the DX mount. The date and time was fine but the location had been set to Toronto. Not good enough. I programmed in his exact latitude and longitude. Advocating high accuracy at every stage.
We did not install the dew heating equipment. Didn't think it necessary.
When Manuel started to balance the telescope, I asked why he was doing this wihout the camera mounted. He said that it didn't weight that much. I said I thought it odd that he took such great care to balance the 'scope so early. I recommended he do it quickly at this stage but do it again after mounting all the accessories.
I also asked if he balanced the mount so to preload the drive. I'm not sure he knew what I was talking about. I'll have to explain this another time, that many imagers take care to predict where the mount will be pointing and then bias the balance slightly so that the gears are always loaded.
We discussed his cameras. For some reason, I thought he only had one now. Nope. He still has the QHY5: it is for guiding; still has the QHY9; for deep sky. And of course he has the Imaging Source DFK: for planetary.
We ran through the normal startup process for the mount. When it prompted for alignment stars, named of course, we didn't see obvious ones listed. Manuel forced the hand controller to offer more stars. After the two-star alignment, we slewed about. It was way off. We even checked the mount with his compass. It was fairly close. We rebooted and tried again. And then went through the All Star alignment. It only seemed to prompt for one calibration star. I wanted to do more but couldn't see a way to do that. Still, going through the process quickly was insightful. It really is a lot like drift aligning... Nevertheless, the mount was still off.
We did the process again. Manuel asked if I wanted the calibrated eyepiece. Yep. It will improve our accuracy.
I wanted to try again from scratch but I was having a hard time seeing stars. It was then we realised there was some thin cloud up high dimming things out...
Manuel copied the DX user manual to my netbook. I'll give it a thorough read at some point.
By 10:30 PM, we resigned. It was obvious that we were clouded out.
Never had a chance to check the collimation of the 9¼"... Never did split Pleiades. Never try for Garradd. Pity.
Saturday, 10 March, 2012
Meade tries
I found this remark in the Meade telescope FAQ:
Q: How much maintenance do telescopes require?
A: With the reasonable care due any fine instrument, a Meade telescope will offer a lifetime of service with almost no maintenance whatever. If the telescope is dropped or damaged in some way, the Meade Customer Service Department can offer repair advice, usually sending the required repair part or component by mail, avoiding return of the telescope to the factory.
Interesting.
Q: How much maintenance do telescopes require?
A: With the reasonable care due any fine instrument, a Meade telescope will offer a lifetime of service with almost no maintenance whatever. If the telescope is dropped or damaged in some way, the Meade Customer Service Department can offer repair advice, usually sending the required repair part or component by mail, avoiding return of the telescope to the factory.
Interesting.
0.11.2 out
A new version of Stellarium is available. Version 0.11.2 fixed a number of bugs. There have been a number of behind-the-scenes changes. Other little things are in the ocular and satellite plug-ins. Ooh. There's a quasars plug-in!
Friday, 9 March, 2012
closer again (Toronto)
Noted that Venus and Jupiter were closer together again, when the clouds cleared, out my office window.Considered setting up the telescope. But when I checked the weather, while the Clear Sky Charts looked OK for tonight and tomorrow night, Environment Canada said it was going to snow during the day. Ah. No.
Bloody weather.
discussed budget
Discussed the IT budget with Allard. Sent him a copy of my request for the RASC council meeting. It shows some funds available for CMS work. Relayed that it was approved. He caught that it does not show hosting. We'll have to see where that's been allocated. I thought it was under another department.
Dietmar is holding
Dietmar asked the web team when he could update the CAO bookings calendar. He's become confused by the content freeze message from Allard and Jason.
halve the jump
There were some questions being raised on the SkyTools Yahoo!Group about moving or panning the field of view in the charts. Peter wanted something less course than the arrow keys. Paul suggested using the Home key to re-centre around the mouse pointer: a great idea. Then Greg jumped in and pointed out that one may use the Ctrl with the pan and zoom keys. Ah! An undocumented shortcut!Funny timing. I have been considering writing a keyboard shortcut guide...
Manuel is burning DVDs
Manuel sent a message to the RASC Toronto Centre Yahoo!Group...
Considering that there is not enough space to upload the moon file in the yahoo groups, I have decided to burn the large moon avi file I intended to use as sample for my Rgistax6 presentation last Saturday, March 03 at the DDO, I will bring to the next meeting at OSC several DVD's containing the large moon avi file.Finally, the matter is closed. And I'm off the hook.
Those interested, please attend next Wednesday rasc OSC meeting.
DVD quantities are limited.
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