Sunday, January 20, 2013
The Herschel Project (Slight Return) and O.A. Nights 1 and 2
Dorothy and
I originally talked about making a CAV run in December, but a couple of things intervened: the holidays—the new Moon would come just
before Christmas—and the fact that the Herschels I wanted wouldn’t rise till
pretty cotton-picking late in December. How about January, then?
I’ve been
down to the CAV in January 'most every year, with a couple of memorable after-New Year’s expeditions coming to mind. Besides “which month?” there was
also the question of “which days?” Wednesday - Sunday or Thursday - Sunday?
Don’t know why I told D. “Thursday” instead of “Wednesday,” trimming off my
usual fourth day, but I did. Hoped I wouldn’t live to regret that if a Thursday
– Saturday skunk-out struck.
I loaded up
our 4Runner, Miss Lucille Van Pelt, the night before, Wednesday night. That
makes departure morning oh-so-much more pleasant. What did Unk load? The
NexStar C11, Big Bertha, natch. I’ve used her more than any of my other
telescopes down Chiefland way. Yeah, she’s on the heavy side for me these days,
but the observing field payoff is well worth a mite of huffing and puffing. What
else? Mallincam Xtreme, Orion digital video recorder, laptop, assorted
equipment cases, EZ-Up canopy, observing and camp chairs, suitcases, eyepiece
box (just in case)—you get the picture.
 |
| Hope I didn't forget nuthin'... |
Wednesday
morning, we were up early and raring to go, bettering our standard departure
time of 8 a.m. by a few minutes. First stop, as always, was the neighborhood
Mickey D’s for a healthy breakfast—as such things go at Macdonald’s—for D. and
a fried chicken biscuit and hashbrowns (well, that’s what they call ‘em, anyway)
for moi. Getting breakfast means we
can drive straight through without lunch, which is vital this time of year when
darkness comes early--usually before Unk is ready for it.
Miss Dorothy
and I cruised down I-10 to the accompaniment of Sirius XM’s Real Jazz Channel.
If you do much driving and don’t have satellite radio in your vehicle, think
about getting it; it makes both road trips and daily commutes mucho more
enjoyable. How did the sky look as we traversed the Sunshine State? When we
left The Swamp it was not only cloudy but slightly foggy, and it felt as if
really bad weather might be on the way. The closer we got to our turnoff just
past Tallahassee, however, the more the clouds scudded off.
 |
| Good old Sunoco. And lots of clouds... |
No matter
how the weather looks, we always stick to the hallowed Plan: check into the Day’s Inn, head to the site for
equipment set up if it ain’t raining, back to town for a supply run on
Wal-Mart, early supper, quick stop by the room, and out to the field for, if’n
we are lucky, a long night of deep sky voyaging.
That is just
what we did after a bit of delay at the motel. The room we were given did not
pass muster. Say what you will about the dadgum Chiefland Day’s Inn, the rooms there
are usually clean. The one we got this time, though, well…STANK. Literally. It had a strong musty odor that slapped us in our
faces when I opened the door. Back to the office for a change of room, one on
the north side rather than pool side this time, which was fine. We unpacked and
skedaddled for the CAV.
It being
Thursday, I was not surprised to see quite a few of my fellow Chiefland
Observers already onsite. After saying “hey” to John and Bobbie, Carl, Paul,
and other folks I see too infrequently, we got to work. Up went the
C11and the EZ-Up and out came the multitudinous gear boxes. After we were
done, it was very pleasant hanging out with our friends in the warm (mid 80s, y’all) afternoon air and
shooting the breeze, but it was already 4 o’clock and we had that Wal-Mart trip
and supper to do.
 |
| Room number two at the Days Inn... |
I hate being
rushed setting up, but there was simply nothing for it. Back on the field, I
scurried to hook up the scope’s and computer’s and monitor’s myriad cables including
the NexRemote line, the video cable
for the Xtreme, the serial cable for the Xtreme, the wire for the telescope’s
Motofocus, and power for computer, telescope, and video monitor (my portable
DVD player). Figgered I’d better get the DewBuster cranking, even though a
steady breeze seemed to be keeping the after-sundown dew at bay. Finally,
plugged my Orion StarShoot digital video recorder into the switch I use to
route video to either it or the monitor. By the time I was done it was well and
truly dark.
It had been
a long time since I’d been able to use the Mallincam—months—but the original
software that shipped with the Xtreme is simple to use, and I had no trouble lighting
off the cam and getting a set of crosshairs overlaid on the monitor. Telescope?
You-all will not believe it, but I did the same thing I always do; I started NexRemote
and tried to connect to Bertha before I turned her on. I didn’t fiddle around,
just rebooted the computer, turned the NS11’s o-n/o-f-f to o-n, and that was
that.
 |
| Xtreme in diagonal so it clears the drivebase. |
My rear cell
setup would be a little different this time. Usually, I’ve either had the
Stellacam 2 in a visual back screwed directly onto a Meade f/3.3 reducer on the
SCT’s rear port, or I have had a
Celestron f/6.3 on the port, a diagonal after that, and the Mallincam with an
f/5 reducer on its nose inserted in the diagonal. In alt-az mode, the Xtreme,
which is longer than the Stellacam, will hit the base of the scope when it is pointed
anywhere near the zenith, so a star diagonal is necessary.
Tonight
would, I hoped, be mostly small galaxies, so I dispensed with the combined
f/6.3 and f/5 reducers. Instead, I screwed my SCT style William Optics diagonal
directly onto the scope’s rear port, inserted the f/3.3 reducer into the
diagonal, screwed a visual back onto that, and slid the Xtreme, sans f/5
reducer, into that visual back. “Now hold on, Unk. How in hail did you insert a
Meade f/3.3 reducer into the eyepiece end of a cotton-picking star diagonal?”
Easy,
Skeezix. Easy with the addition of an accessory from Jim Henson’s
Scopestuff.com, his 2" Eyepiece Barrel to Schmidt Thread Adapter. What
that is is a 2-inch tube with SCT threads on one end. Screw the 3.3 (or any
other SCT accessory) onto that end and slide the whole works into the diagonal.
Simple, elegant, allows me to use the Meade f/3.3 with a diagonal (the camera
will not reach focus if you put the reducer ahead of the diagonal).
Only
down-check? I do not get as much reduction in this mode as I normally do. With
the reducer set back from the rear port a fur piece, I’d guess the focal ratio is
around f/5. Which was OK for small galaxies, though it didn’t produce images of
diffuse nebulae as smooth and pretty as I am normally used to with the Xtreme. There
are always tradeoffs in amateur astronomy.
Thursday Night: Catch as Catch Can...
Alignment
done, I sent Miss Bertha to M35’s tiny companion cluster, NGC 2158, for a test
of her go-to accuracy at this longer than accustomed focal length. NGC 2158,
which is composed of tiny, tiny stars, is also a wonderful focusing aid. Entered
“2158” in the virtual hand control on the Toshiba laptop’s screen and away we
went. When Bertha announced “target acquired” and the Xtreme’s exposures caught
up with her, there was the cluster, dang near centered. Cool. Now to focus with
my JMI Motofocus remote.
I tried to focus, anyway. Clouds, dadgum
clouds, had begun rolling back in in substantial numbers shortly after sunset.
I did the best I could, mashing the JMI paddle to get the stars as small as possible
in 7-second exposures. When I was done, I figured “good enough for gubmint
work.” Unless something changed in a right quick hurry, it didn’t look like we’d
get much on this night anyway.
We didn’t.
Orion’s area of the sky was in the semi-clear every once in a while, so I hung
out there. M43 was a real wonder. At f/5 or so, it filled a substantial part of
the screen, showing off countless dark lanes. Had to do the Horsehead, natch.
It was OK, but was subdued in the building haze, even when I bumped the
exposure up to 56 consarned seconds.
The clouds
would come and the clouds would go. I took frequent breaks, schmoozed with my
mates, and headed to the clubhouse for the occasional Monster Energy Drink, trying
to hang in until the sky stopped teasing and decided whether it wanted to open
up or close down. Nothing changed. I revisited the Horse a time or two, but it
was never very good.
By 11 p.m.,
Urania’s final verdict was in: “That’s
all for you-all tonight, Unk, get on off to bed.” With yet another wave of thick clouds in the offing,
I threw that accursed Big Switch, hopped in Miss Van Pelt, who I’d parked well off
the field so as not to disturb anybody, and headed down the eerie old lane of mossy oaks and back to Highway
19 and Chiefland. At the motel, it was Kolorado Kool-Aid, Ghost Hunters, and Cloudy Nights. What? No Rebel Yell?
Nope. Not a drop. The pea-picking Alabama state store did not have a single
bottle of Unk’s fave beverage. I had greater faith in Florida’s package stores,
and hoped I could rectify this disgusting want on the morrow.
Friday
dawned to clear, if foggy, skies and we were up and about early for a day’s activities
that began with a motel breakfast. Unk, you will not be surprised to hear,
cooked himself a giant waffle, which he drowned in syrup. At least he only made
one waffle and bypassed the sausage
biscuits. I keep threatening to take Miss Dorothy across the street for a big
old Huddle House breakfast some day, but in truth the Day’s Inn breakfast is
sufficient.
Well before
noon, we were out of the motel. Unk was fired up—not all my observing goals
were celestial in nature, you see. Despite visiting their hangouts every time
we’d been down in C-land over the last several years, Rod and Miss Dorothy had
never yet seen a manatee. I swore I was going to spot one of the big, friendly
aquatic mammals this time.
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| A little spooky in the wee hours, yeah. |
‘Twas not to
be. This is the correct time of year; it’s in the winter that the manatees seek
sheltered inlets, but apparently the weather was not right. Too warm to
encourage ‘em to head up into the springs, I suppose. The temperature was headed
for the upper 80s and would fall only slowly as the day wound down. Needless to
say, the butane and thermal socks were never unpacked. Anyhoo, we didn’t see a single
manatee despite spending quite some time at Manatee Springs State Park. We did
see plenty of fish, turtles, squirrels, and assorted birds as we wandered the
grounds surrounding the crystal clear springs. Next time for sure!
And then,
and then…it was lunchtime. If you are a faithful reader of The Little Old Blog
from Possum Swamp, I don’t have to tell you where we went. If not? I’ll spell
it out: Bar B-Q Bill’s. Funny thing?
While Bill’s pork and beef are tops with me, I believe it is their salad bar I crave
most. No purple lettuce or weird-colored pasta, just the same ingredients Mama
put on her table in the 1960s. In profusion. Unk heaped it high, poured on the old-fashioned
blue cheese dressing, and topped it off with the crunchy artificial bacon bits
he loves. When the Pork Special Plate came, it was almost an anticlimax.
Friday Night and Operation Arp...
When Unk
left the Day’s Inn at 4 p.m.—a wee bit early because I had got my time-zones mixed
up—the signs all appeared favorable. The few clouds that had been touring the
afternoon sky had mostly scampered off, and the liquor store, an adjunct to
Chiefland’s other barbeque joint,
Bubbaque’s, had Rebel Yell aplenty. And, indeed, the night started off strong,
even if it didn’t quite stay that way. Computer and cameras were fired up and
scope aligned without a glitch and we were “go” for Operation Arp.
“The whosits?
The Whatsits?” Operation Arp is Unk’s new observing project, his quest to see all
the Arp galaxies—and maybe even do a little more than just that. What’s an
“Arp”? If you’ve been in astronomy long, the name Halton “Chip” Arp is probably
familiar to you. He is an American astronomer who did most of his work in the
1960s and 1970s, but who is still active today. His most famous accomplishment
is probably his Atlas of Peculiar Galaxies, which focuses on 338 galaxies that looked
disturbed or strange or otherwise stood out for Arp.
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| No, the weather did not look promising Friday morning. |
Most of
these odd-duck galaxies are in the Atlas because they do not fit in with normal
morphological types, with most no doubt being disturbed galaxies, galaxies that
have suffered close encounters with their neighbors. That’s just the tip of the
iceberg, though; Arp divides his three-hundred plus galaxies into five major
groups and nearly forty subgroups, which you can find listed either in his
atlas or in the article here. Most
interestingly, some of these galaxies appeared to Arp to have spit out quasars.
Back when
the Atlas was published in 1966, the nature of quasars, which are now thought
to be (extremely) active galactic nuclei in the early Universe, was very much unsettled.
Even then, though, the redshifts displayed by these bizarre objects seemed to
indicate they were far, far away, much farther away than the galaxies they were
paired with in Arp’s atlas. Nevertheless, Dr. Arp was convinced “his” quasars,
which sometimes even appeared to have streams of matter connecting them to
their “host” galaxies, were indeed something ejected by these larger galaxies.
How did/does
Arp explain the discordant redshifts between the galaxies and their supposedly ejected
quasars? Largely with the theory that the redshift value of a galaxy is
composed of two parts, a velocity component and an intrinsic redshift value inherent
in the matter of the galaxy. If you are interested in learning more about Dr.
Arp’s theories, have a look at his book, Quasars, Redshifts and Controversies.
Controversial? Darn tootin’, since Arp not only dismisses redshift as a reliable indicator of distance, but the Big Bang theory itself. While he does have his
fans, it’s fair to say most astronomers do not put much credence in his theories today.
The Hubble Space Telescope has, after all, revealed some quasars are the centers
of very distant galaxies—you can see their galactic disks in Hubble images. Most
astronomers are firmly convinced Arp’s galaxy – quasar alignments are nothing
more than coincidence, chance alignments.
Whatever you
think of Halton Arp’s theories about quasars and the Big Bang, one thing is
sure, he has given us a splendid list of interesting and sometimes outré
galaxies. It is also a list that can be pretty hard going. Some of his galaxies
are easy showpieces like M51, but many of them are way too small and distant to
have been included in even the NGC catalog. If you start the Arp list, you will
soon be hunting Markarians, LEDAs, and PGCs.
Which put
the complete Arp list beyond the reach of amateur astronomers till fairly
recently. Then things changed. Huge Dobsonians came to the observing field,
insanely sensitive deep space video cameras got into amateur hands, and the
combination of the two made “too dim for amateur scopes” a thing of the past.
Not that you
need a gigant-a-normous Dob to see all the Arps. A C8 will do it with a
sensitive enough camera and long enough exposures. Yes, there are some terribly
dim ones, but, as usual, the dimmest also tend to be the smallest, so that even a
magnitude 16 Arp won’t be much challenge for a Mallincam. At not much bigger
than fuzzy stars, these teeny-weenies show up easily. Dimmest object in the catalog?
Arp 211 at magnitude 18. Will that be beyond Unk’s C11 and Mallincam Xtreme?
That is one of the things I want to find out as Operation Arp goes on.
If you decide to follow me onto those distant Arp fields, you, like me, will need some help. In addition to the Atlas
itself, there is an excellent book by Jeff
Kanipe and Dennis Webb, and plenty of good pages on the Internet to help you
attack these sometimes frighteningly dim objects. My fave website is this one here.
Why am I
doing this? One reason is I need a
project. I don’t do much fruitful observing unless I have a list, preferably
a big list, to work. Since The Herschel Project has (more or less) ended, I’ve
been bereft of one. The other reason is that the galaxies in Arp’s legendary
atlas are weird and interesting—and sometimes beautiful.
Gotta have
ground rules. What are the ground rules? Unlike the Herschel II part of The
Herschel Project, there will not be a time limit. The goal here will not be to dash through the list, picking
off as many as possible in one night, but instead will be comparatively
leisurely contemplation. I don’t just want to say I’ve seen an Arp; if possible
I want to be able to see for myself why an object was included in The Atlas of Peculiar Galaxies. If I
have to come back to a galaxy again and again to try to find that out, I will
do so. I will share my successes and failures with y’all right here. And that
is that.
This first
night out, I thought I’d focus on the “easier” Arp galaxies, those with NGC
numbers. In addition to the fact that these would be the best targets for what
might be a borderline night, there was another reason for confining myself to
the NGCs in the list. I wouldn't have to worry about my virtual port problem. It had been a long time since I’d had NexRemote’s virtual port working. The
virtual port feature allows you to send the scope on go-tos using a computer
program like SkyTools 3 (or Stellarium, or whatever) while you are
using NexRemote. You specify a
“virtual” port, which mimics the serial port on the “real” Celestron hand
control.
I had not
been able to get the virtual port to work since I switched to Windows 7. But I
knew I had to get it going to do the
Arps or give up NexRemote. You can’t
punch “PGC 12053” into the NexRemote
virtual hand control any more than you can punch it into the non-virtual HC.
Neither has the PGC (or other obscure or “professional” catalogs) onboard. I'd have to connect SkyTools directly to the hardware hand controller and access those pro catalogs with ST3. I
planned to reserve Saturday night for tinkering with NexRemote, and figured it would take a lot of tinkering.
Anyhoo, as
soon as it was good and dark, I brought up the Arp list on SkyTools 3 and got to work. Please note that an “Arp” may be a
single galaxy, or a pair of galaxies, or a whole group of ‘em.
 |
| Good ol' Crabby. |
NGC 1253 (Arp 279). At 28 seconds the image was detailed and the companion
object easy. The larger galaxy is 1253,
while the odd shaped little feller is 1253A (aka "PGC 12053”). This is an Arp because of the interaction between
the two, I reckon.
NGC 1741 (Arp 259). This galaxy is dim, but looks pretty good at 28-seconds.
It is a highly distorted irregular with a small companion close at hand.
Streams of matter have obviously been pulled off the main galaxy by close
encounters in this crowded field.
NGC 1241 (Arp 304) is a very pretty magnitude 13 spiral that shows a lot of
detail. Why is it here? It's been messed with by the small nearby galaxy, NGC
1242. The arms are obviously misshapen from its encounter.
IC 1892 (Arp 332). IC 1892 is an attractive galaxy with an odd looking
hooked arm, but that is not why it is part of an Arp. It's a member of Arp 332,
which is the chain of galaxies that leads off to the northwest. Galaxy chains
were another oddity that caught Dr. Arp's eye.
NGC 1097 (Arp 22) is one of my all time favorites, which I knew well from The
Herschel Project. Even under less than optimum conditions, it's easy to see the
effects in its arms and center caused by interaction with the companion.
NGC 1888 (Arp 123). This Arp is of Mr. Chip's "E-like galaxies
perturbing spirals." 1888 is the spiral, while the little companion E is
NGC 1889.
NGC 1875 (Arp 327). This is another galaxy chain consisting of a prominent
(magnitude 14.6) elliptical and three little sprites. The whole shebang is also
known as Hickson 34.
NGC 1232 (Arp 41) is a beautiful near-face-on magnitude 13.9 galaxy in
Eridanus. The small companion, LEDA 816443, which is a barred spiral, may be
interacting with the main galaxy.
NGC 1347 (Arp 39). This is in Arp's class, "spirals with low surface
brightness companions on arms." Not much detail in the main galaxy, but
this magnitude 13.9/16.2 duo makes a pretty sight.
NGC 2276 (Arp 25) is a nice spiral, if one with a weird shape, paired with a
bright elliptical. It is in Arp's "one heavy arm" class, and on the
original video I can see one arm is indeed pulled off in the direction of the
elliptical (NGC 2300).
NGC 2300 (Arp 114) is a repeater. It is the elliptical in the field with Arp
25. It gets its own entry because it fits Arp’s class "ellipticals
perturbing spirals."
NGC 2655 (Arp 225) lands in the class "amorphous spiral arms." Can
I see signs of them? Maybe.
 |
| NGC 1097 |
NGC 2633 (Arp 80) is a pretty little thing. Arp places this in the group
"spirals with high surface brightness companions on arms," but it's
not clear to me, even looking at the atlas' POSS plate, what he was talking about.
NGC 2523 (Arp 9) is in Arp's "split arms" group. In the original
video, I can make out that at least one of the arms is divided in two
lengthwise.
IC 356 (Arp 213) is nice, but the reason for its inclusion in the catalog
is that "faint straight
absorption lanes lead toward nucleus, become triple". It's impossible to
see such features in my picture, and derned near it in Arp's POSS image in the
atlas.
NGC 1961 (Arp 184) is of the "narrow filaments" class, and it's
pretty easy to see a couple of relatively thin arms (?) in the video.
NGC 1569 (Arp 210) is in the group that features "irregularities,
absorption, and resolution." By "resolution," I assume Dr. Arp
was talking about the knots/star forming regions along the disk of this
interesting M82 like galaxy.
NGC 2608 (Arp 12) is a member of the "split spiral arm" class, with
it being fairly easy to see that at least one of arms is divided lengthwise in
the video.
NGC 2623 (Arp 243) Arp puts this one in the class "appearance of
fission," and it is indeed possible to see the central region appears
almost divided.
 |
| NGC 1232 |
IC 2339 (Arp 247). This pair of small galaxies, which also includes IC 2338,
is an Arp because of its "appearance of fission," to include a dim
lane of material that seems to connect the two, but which is invisible in my
image.
NGC 2672 (Arp 167). Supposedly this pair shows "diffuse counter-tails." But they are not only invisible in my image;
I don't see them in the atlas’ image either. The smaller galaxy is NGC 2673.
NGC 2648 (Arp 89) is another member of the "high surface brightness companions
on arms” group. The pretty and bright companion is MCG 2-22-6.
And so it
went till about 10 p.m. Just as I was getting ready to head to the clubhouse to
retrieve the second Monster of the evening, I noticed the sky background on my
monitor had turned a sickly green. That means the camera is looking through
considerable clouds/haze. Poked my head out from under the canopy and saw that,
yeah, them suckers had come back. Gave it about an hour and a half, till a line
of clouds appeared in the east and began to look positively threatening.
That was alright.
Operation Arp was off the ground, 23 objects were in the bag, and I was feeling
good. That good feeling was soon bolstered
further by a shot of the blessed Yell and a Finding
Bigfoot marathon on the cable TV. I also did a bit of strategizing about
the NexRemote virtual port problem. I
thought and I thought, but until I got out and tried it again and saw exactly what
happened, it was hard to know how to proceed. I did know that if I couldn’t get
it to work, I would not be able to use NexRemote
for Operation Arp; I’d have to, as above, use the hardware hand control and connect it to SkyTools 3 with a non-virtual serial
cable.
Saturday
came with clouds, but mostly fluffy, drifting ones, not dark, threatening,
stationary things. This would be the last full day of our Chiefland adventure,
but there was still a lot to look forward to. In addition to a long night (I
hoped) of deep sky work, this would be the day for our traditional visit to
Duma Key (OK, OK, it’s really Cedar Key
and does not involve haints and spooks).
Before
lighting out for The Key, we had to make a last run on WallyWorld for AAs and
AAAs for my red LED flashlights, which had got a fair amount of use Friday
night. I noticed that while Wal-Mart’s benighted magazine rack did not have
that greatest of all magazines, Sky &
Telescope, it at least had Astronomy.
Looked to be a fairly good issue (with a spiffed up format), but I figured
my subscription copy would be waiting for me back at the Old Manse.
Cedar Key
was great. The poor old Rusty Rim Bar and Grill, one of our former favorites,
is still out of business and vacant, but we have plenty of other faves, like Steamers Clam Bar and Grill, which is where we
wound up. Your Uncle chose the crab bisque, which is just crazy-good. I also
ordered one of their to-die-for burgers, but that rich bisque darned near spoiled
the massive assemblage of bacon and cheddar and beef for me. Oh, and of course I had a couple of cold
brewskies to go with it. After lunch we hit one of the shops for Cedar Key
t-shirts for the grandsons.
Saturday Night: Deep Sky Heaven (for a while)...
I tried to
take a nap back at the motel, but was unsuccessful. I was feeling a mite
jittery because of the obviously unsettled weather and because of my need to
troubleshoot NexRemote’s virtual
port. I managed to stick to the room till five, but at the stroke of, I jumped
back in the truck and made tracks for the field.
Despite my
nervousness about Saturday evening, all went surprisingly smoothly. When it got
dark, Bertha aligned without complaint and I resolved to bite the proverbial bullet and find out what was what with
the virtual port. When I started NexRemote, I selected virtual com port Com 5 and immediately got a
“not available” warning. Rut-roh. Me being me, I just dialed up Com 6. Not only
did I not get a warning, the laptop emitted a “bing-bong” sound just like you
get when you plug a USB - serial cable in.
That didn't mean the virtual port was working again though. The problem, which reared its ugly little
head not long after I started The Herschel Project, was not that I couldn't connect the computer to the port; it was that gotos were lousy, and tracking soon went to Hades, too. Well, rubber meets road time, I thought.
I brought up SkyTools 3, connected it to Com 6,
clicked on M43 in the Messier list, and mashed “slew to.” Off we went to it.
Centered. Thence to M1. Same. Tracking? Excellent; everything remained rock solid in the
field. And that’s the way it was for the rest of the night. Any Arp or anything
else I clicked on in SkyTools
appeared on my monitor and stayed there.
Why had I
had trouble before? I was using a netbook when the virtual port hassles began.
And I was using a no-name USB serial cable. I think I may also have been running
an earlier version of NexRemote.
Could have been any one of those things. I am, however, placing the blame on the little Asus netbook. It was a kinda sweet little PC, but I just don't think it had the horsepower I needed. Anyhow, the important thing is that the virtual port is now working and will
make Operation Arp much easier.
And Arps, mostly
non-NGC Arps, were just what I went after for a little while:
Arp 52 (PGC 17109). There’s not much to this little magnitude 15.5
fuzzie-wuzzie other than that it does have a "high surface brightness
companion on arms," which I take to be the bright area near its center.
Arp 219 (MCG 0-10-9) is a cutie. It's an Arp because it fits in Mr.
A's "adjacent loops" class. I was surprised to the see the loop on
the south side fairly easily.
Arp 180 (MCG 1-13-34) is another member of Arp's "narrow
filaments class." Can I see evidence of that? At first I don't think so,
but one distorted arm is eventually visible in the video.
Arp 187 (MCG 2-13-40A) is also a member of the "narrow
filaments" group. Can I see the feature? No way. This is a tiny 15th
magnitude sprite.
NGC 2418 (Arp 165) is a "diffuse filaments” galaxy, and one of these is visible—barely.
When I’d
finished recording (I do 30-second recordings of all objects) Arp 165, fetched
a Monster, and spent a little time with various friends on the field, I noticed
the sky was going south in a big way. Well, not really a big way, but there was increasing haze. I judged it not to be bad
enough to shut down, but not good enough for more Arps. It looked clear enough
to revisit some brighter Herschels, though.
Why am I
redoing some of the Herschel objects I imaged with the Stellacam 2? It’s not
that the pictures done with that black and white camera are bad, though they
are noisier than those the Mallincam turns it. Mostly, it’s because many of the
spring objects were imaged under poor conditions, especially the Leo – Coma –
Virgo galaxies. Not only were some of ‘em shot under poor transparency, many of
‘em were too close to the horizon. With the pressure of the Herschel Project
bearing on me, I would shoot a galaxy anytime it was in the clear, no matter
how low.
It was just
so nice to get back into that blessed Herschel groove. Find a likely candidate
on SkyTools’ Herschel 2500 Project list,
highlight it, click “slew to” on ST3, grab 30-seconds of video with the DVR,
and on to the next. Just heaven, y’all, just heaven.
Until, like
it had the previous night, the monitor’s background turned green. There’d already
been a couple of cloudy interludes, so I decided to wait this one out. I
waited. And I waited. Till I was sure that, while there was no threatening
weather on the way, it wasn’t going to improve enough for more Herschels, much
less Arps. But I’d done good, I thought. In addition to the Arps earlier in the
evening, I had corralled fifty fracking Hershels. Not bad for an iffy night.
Back at the
Day’s Inn, I wound down with something or other on the History Channel. No MeTV
on the cable there, so I was deprived of my usual Saturday night fare, Svengoolie,
who was showing Island of Lost Souls, dangit. Still, I was in
a good mood even though I hadn’t got many Arps on this inaugural expedition, I
thought. But a look at my logbook showed I had actually done plenty, 28. Which
is probably about the right pace for Operation Arp, or maybe even on the high
side. So, the final tally was 28 down 310 to go, y’all.
Next morning,
we were sad, as we always are, to say aloha to Chiefland, but it would only be for
a few months. The CAV and The Chiefland
Observers are going strong; there were plenty of people on the field for a
semi-cloudy January new Moon and everybody seemed to be having a great time. By
the end, we had close to a dozen scopes onsite. What with me and Dorothy now
resolved to stay in The Swamp after my retirement, I think we can look forward
to many more CAV trips to come, which suits me just fine, muchachos, just fine.
And that’s
the way it is, you-all, from good old Chaos Manor South out on the edge of The
Great Possum Swamp. Oh, if you'd like to see more pictures from our trip, see
Unk's Facebook page. Not a friend? Just ask.
Postscript...
What happened to Operation Arp? Not much. I was able to observe quite a few of its objects over the next year or two, but change was in the offing. As things evolved, Unk began to do most of his observing in his backyard and trips to dark sites including Chiefland became fewer and fewer. There were to be more Chiefland expeditions, but not the "many more" I prophesied, alas. Doing a good job on the Arps--actually seeing the details that intrigued Halton Arp--requires dark skies, Mallincam Xtreme or no. If Unk stages a return to dark site observing, Operation Arp could be revived, but unless and until he does, it's on ice, muchachos.
Comments:
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Good going with the Arps, it sounds a fun project.
I'm looking forward to reading future instalments.
Clear skies!
James
I'm looking forward to reading future instalments.
Clear skies!
James
# posted by 
: 3:43 PM
: 3:43 PM
Hey Rod...Sorry I missed you at Chiefland this month.
I became fascinated with the Arp Catalog just about the time I got my 28" scope mated with a Mallicam!
Margie Wright and I were set up at Kissimmee State Park (and had just met Paul Lavoie for the first time).
The very first target was M-60 (Arp 116).
It was OBVIOUS (to us, at least) that there was a definite interaction between M-60 and NGC-4647, despite claims from 'Arp-denyers' in the astro-establishment that the two galaxies just happened to lie along the same line of sight and there was no connection. I guess they 'missed' the bend in 4647's spiral arm and the slight protrusion from M-60 towards 4647! On the other hand...a 28" scope with a Mallincam delivered images that were MUCH BETTER than the photos Arp and his contemporaries were using!
NOW, recent Hubble studies seem to indicate that there IS, indeed, an interaction. Duh!
Let's get together at CAV next time and GO REALLY DEEP on those Arps!
Mike Harvey
mharveyww1@aol.com
That was about 5 years ago
Post a Comment
I became fascinated with the Arp Catalog just about the time I got my 28" scope mated with a Mallicam!
Margie Wright and I were set up at Kissimmee State Park (and had just met Paul Lavoie for the first time).
The very first target was M-60 (Arp 116).
It was OBVIOUS (to us, at least) that there was a definite interaction between M-60 and NGC-4647, despite claims from 'Arp-denyers' in the astro-establishment that the two galaxies just happened to lie along the same line of sight and there was no connection. I guess they 'missed' the bend in 4647's spiral arm and the slight protrusion from M-60 towards 4647! On the other hand...a 28" scope with a Mallincam delivered images that were MUCH BETTER than the photos Arp and his contemporaries were using!
NOW, recent Hubble studies seem to indicate that there IS, indeed, an interaction. Duh!
Let's get together at CAV next time and GO REALLY DEEP on those Arps!
Mike Harvey
mharveyww1@aol.com
That was about 5 years ago
# posted by : 7:18 PM
: 7:18 PM << Home
