tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-305269222024-03-28T16:13:00.213-05:00Uncle Rod's Astro BlogA quiet little spot where Rod Mollise shares his adventures and misadventures...Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.comBlogger600125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-76851258502005085322024-02-04T12:03:00.000-06:002024-02-04T12:03:53.551-06:00Issue 601: A ZWO SeeStar Comes to Chaos Manor South<p> </p><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyjW8BDI8pZU-GD1DcGEMr9FA6rRgAWjECgO0fEMvNZJ4lq8Vl3zdDiWtwJZH2BVqYgdFH2zGBJOKENDaTepZSpwtvuWpknQ9yA1a4mmX5r0CV9t-44_8qqvv5yCb5fjrODtAT_Ev_Z5ADfSRBkiVE-QGk_3U4x44GEW2i4cTKbb8MiBigQC5NjQ/s1920/m42%20seestar%20original%20from%20scope.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1920" data-original-width="1080" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyjW8BDI8pZU-GD1DcGEMr9FA6rRgAWjECgO0fEMvNZJ4lq8Vl3zdDiWtwJZH2BVqYgdFH2zGBJOKENDaTepZSpwtvuWpknQ9yA1a4mmX5r0CV9t-44_8qqvv5yCb5fjrODtAT_Ev_Z5ADfSRBkiVE-QGk_3U4x44GEW2i4cTKbb8MiBigQC5NjQ/w360-h640/m42%20seestar%20original%20from%20scope.jpg" width="360" /></a></div>Wow, <i>just wow</i>, muchachos</b>… Now, admittedly I’ve
turned into something of an astronomical Luddite who is easily impressed by
modern technology. Hell, I’d still be using <i>NexRemote</i> if they’d update
it to a version that would take advantage of all the features of my 10-year-old
Celestron Advanced VX mount. What’s an ASAIR? What’s plate-solving? <i>What
sort of witchery is all that?</i> <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">If I didn’t write the occasional <i>Sky & Telescope</i>
Test Report, I’d be even further behind. For example, all y’all know about
plate-solving. Been around for years I reckon. But I was recently gob-smacked in
the course of doing an S&T Test Report when a plate-solving camera widget
would unerringly center the telescope on <i>anything</i>. I mean <i>dead</i>
center. Every time! Some kinda hoo-doo it seemed like. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Anyhoo, that was the way it was when a box appeared on the
doorstep of (the new, of course) Chaos Manor South. When I saw it there, I was
both excited and intimidated. If you read the previous installment of the
Little Old AstroBlog from Possum Swamp, you know I was casting about for
something that would get me observing more frequently. And you know I decided
that might be a <b>Smartscope</b>. One o’ them small, robotic image-makin’
telescopes that are the current rage. To that end, I gave the good folks at <b>Highpoint
Scientific</b>, who had ZWO Seestars in stock, my credit card number and hoped
for the best. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Why the SeeStar? If you indeed read the previous edition of this-here
AstroBlog, you also learned its price—about 500 dollars—was just right for your
stingy old Uncle. But it wasn’t just that. I had looked at quite a few online
pictures obtained by the scope. And I had viewed a passel of YouTube videos on
the SeeStar (our resident black cat, Tommy, Thomas Aquinas, got real tired of
those—he favors World War II documentaries). What I gleaned was the pictures
the little thing takes are impressive for a 50mm aperture refractor, it
appeared simple to use, and nobody had much bad to say about it including
Dennis di Cicco in his Test Report in S&T. I was still worried, though.
Mostly about getting it going. All the stuff about wi-fi and Bluetooth and <i>blah-blah-blah.<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As your Old Uncle is wont to say, though, “<b>Nuthin’ to it
but to do it!</b>”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I grabbed up the box,
moved it to the dining room table, opened it up, and pulled out a nice-looking color
box. The packaging was very professional; ZWO sure has come a long way in the
decade-plus since I took a chance on one of their initial products, a little 120MC
planetary camera. Inside the pretty box was a nice enough case containing the
scope. This case was sorta weird…being made from something like slightly denser Styrofoam…but it was nice to have some kind of case anyhow.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_wyHaXeZZ8VIzFPmsj494ng96UVnhtQ5LNuK88QnNTilwTxp9bNDLEH4rAP3FgmgYYyKOyJLXXPRKt-BQbuyEHYvBLeGXHF7UW-2l5eJ87JNbmp9AJpJYuMHSCgC8M3YTIasGVMpf8JFXTCXFcPMyD5lyBurk13JOCOl9a7THeMwbtjWewA4JUQ/s4032/SeeStar%203.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_wyHaXeZZ8VIzFPmsj494ng96UVnhtQ5LNuK88QnNTilwTxp9bNDLEH4rAP3FgmgYYyKOyJLXXPRKt-BQbuyEHYvBLeGXHF7UW-2l5eJ87JNbmp9AJpJYuMHSCgC8M3YTIasGVMpf8JFXTCXFcPMyD5lyBurk13JOCOl9a7THeMwbtjWewA4JUQ/s320/SeeStar%203.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>Inside that was the scope itself—which, as you can see,
didn’t look anything at all like a telescope—a tripod, a USB C cable for
charging and communications with a PC, a solar filter, a couple of small
instruction pamphlets, and a packet of silica gel helpfully labeled “DO NOT
EAT.”<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There was not the slightest chance of using the scope under
the stars—or even on the Sun. It had been storming for days. But I figgered I
could download the app for my iPhone (there's a version for Android, too), initially connect it to the telescope,
and see whether everything at least appeared to work. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">One thing I’ve learned about Chinese widgets from cat toys
to radios that are powered by cell-phone-style batteries: it’s best charge ‘em
up before doing anything else. From the row of indicator lights on the side of
the SeeStar that illuminated when I plugged it into a 5-volt phone charger, it
was about 75% charged out of the box. I left for a radio club meeting, and when
I returned a couple of hours later, Missy was all charged and ready to go. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Next step, I imaged the QR code on the instructions with my
phone and downloaded the impressive-looking app to my iPhone 14 Pro Max. That
done, it was rubber-meets-road time. As instructed, I did a short press of the
power button, then a long press, and the scope came to life announcing,
“POWERING UP! READY TO CONNECT!” (I also had to push a reset button on the underside
of the scope’s mount during first-time set up). Unlike some reviews I’ve read
that stated the telescope’s initial voice (yes, this telescope talks) was in
Chinese, my small wonder spoke in perfectly un-accented English. ZWO must have
tidied up some of the installation details. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Then? Well, I just touched "connect." The app responded by asking
permission to use Bluetooth, location, etc., etc., etc. I accepted it all.
When the app showed “connected,” I clicked the telescope's picture at the top of the screen to go to communications settings and put it in Station Mode. That way, the
telescope joins your home network and it and your phone communicate over that
network, not directly with each other with wi-fi. That ensures greater range
and a simultaneous Internet connection. If you are away from home, you can connect directly to the scope with your phone or tablet. There were no snags when it came to set
up. All went smoothly and without problems.</p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghLIZGmtXDj8gKIAz5SQeVfqon06e8frqWKDI4zUWk-2ouu7KFray2jAkm5atCy7cjRriy9Oa6D0Exx6wZ9YSbxb-hze4bXuYgfTgBM8VMngLfhQaiZE8sM5P1tqb0FBLG79V0aOFrkZi_hDD9VDcMZSmJDFD-f2yQxboFSM1qoGOHDweB1TuPgQ/s2796/app%20and%20atlas.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2796" data-original-width="2585" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghLIZGmtXDj8gKIAz5SQeVfqon06e8frqWKDI4zUWk-2ouu7KFray2jAkm5atCy7cjRriy9Oa6D0Exx6wZ9YSbxb-hze4bXuYgfTgBM8VMngLfhQaiZE8sM5P1tqb0FBLG79V0aOFrkZi_hDD9VDcMZSmJDFD-f2yQxboFSM1qoGOHDweB1TuPgQ/w592-h640/app%20and%20atlas.jpg" width="592" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">App and Atlas (zoomed way out)...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Well, there <i>was</i> one problem to solve before I could
get started with the SeeStar:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the small
carbon fiber tripod that comes with the telescope is nice, but fully extended
it raises the scope less than two feet off the ground. I don’t want to have to
crawl on me belly like a reptile to hit the power button, put the filter solar
filter on, or do anything else. I could round up a small camp table to place
scope and tripod on, but was afraid that would be too shaky for imaging. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Then it came to me.</i> I’d use my good, old Manfrotto tripod.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Its tilt/pan head has a ¼-inch bolt and the
SeeStar takes <span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;">⅜</span>-inch, but I recalled you can unscrew the head to reveal,
yep, a <span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;">⅜</span>-inch
bolt. I did that. What I also did was attach a tripod leveling widget (I got from
B&H photo some time ago) between scope and tripod in case precise leveling
was needed. That done, I put the scope back in her case and the tripod back the
closet and waited for clear weather. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Which came the following afternoon when I noticed ol’ Sol
peeping out. I got the scope and tripod into the backyard, set the tripod up in
the spot where the Advanced VX usually goes (there are three flagstones there for
the tripod feet to rest on), leveled the tripod with a bubble level, and mashed the “on” button. After a short interval
missy announced she was ready to connect. I opened the app, connected to the scope, tapped the “solar” button
just below the weather window. Following instructions, I moved her li’l tube up in altitude with the onscreen buttons so I could insert the solar filter over the objective.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Shortly, the SeeStar informed me she was going to the Sun.
When she stopped, I was offered an onscreen joystick thingie and told to
adjust until the Sun was centered. I didn’t have to. The Sun was <i>already</i>
centered when the scope stopped. I skipped that, mashed “AF” (autofocus), the
SeeStar focused, and with “photo” selected, I pushed the big red button to take
a picture. I did that several times, and also shot a short video.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The results? Unfortunately, I caught Sol at one of his more
peaceful moments of late. There were a couple of big sunspot groups about to
rotate off the limb, one small spot in the middle of the disk, and one new
group on the opposite limb. However, for a rather short focal length scope the
pictures (which were sent to my phone from the SeeStar) were impressive. The
lighter areas around the groups were easier to see than they are for me in my
white light-filtered C8 SCT. And so was granulation. Miss Dorothy and I thought
the video, which showed incoming clouds moving over the Sun’s face, was awful
pretty. <b>Yes, the clouds were back.<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWkhJ8guAdWiqYdYsrhmHSnsFr-23y6zLFujslb8T1OFCvL09DQuqi7NvkaslDxubOVbH0b_yVYfCd4pKlWh8m0_BB7FdaawS__7_b6UPzCYTITo2Ts0G5abmYCIo8-yD_Om4zIcTGrzGnoL8KRJ672576cQTCtXudr24oazqnKcBxGvDV0f3Gtg/s4032/SeeStar%202.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWkhJ8guAdWiqYdYsrhmHSnsFr-23y6zLFujslb8T1OFCvL09DQuqi7NvkaslDxubOVbH0b_yVYfCd4pKlWh8m0_BB7FdaawS__7_b6UPzCYTITo2Ts0G5abmYCIo8-yD_Om4zIcTGrzGnoL8KRJ672576cQTCtXudr24oazqnKcBxGvDV0f3Gtg/s320/SeeStar%202.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>And then I sat and waited <i>again</i>. The weatherman said
it would be clear Sunday evening…but there was a fly buzzing in <i>that</i>
butter. I had a <b>Mobile Amateur Radio Club</b> Board meeting to conduct,
which would no doubt go on for quite a spell Sunday evenin’. Also, we always
have our Board meetings at Heroes Sports Bar and Grill…and it was <i>somewhat</i>
likely I’d consume a “few” cold 807s over the course of said meeting—just to
wet my whistle for my orations, you unnerstan’. Would I be in any shape to take
pictures of M42 with the new scope when I returned?<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">When I got back to Chaos Manor South that evening at around
8, somewhat groggy Unk was glad he’d had the sense to set the SeeStar up in the
backyard beforehand. I removed the plastic bag I’d covered her with “just in
case,” connected to the scope, and mashed “M42” in the “tonight’s best”
section. Once the li’l gal unfolded herself, pointed to M42, and began taking her
brief preview shots, I autofocused and that was about it. I touched the big red
button and she started taking and stacking ten second frames. Oh, before that, I
<i>had</i> had the presence of mind (barely) to go into the telescope menu and
enable the SeeStar’s internal <b>dew heater</b> on this somewhat damp night.
The scope had already engaged her built-in dual-band nebula filter herself. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Yes, M42 is bright, but I was still FREAKING AMAZED that by
the time I’d got back inside and was in the den with Miss Dorothy, the
telescope had already produced an image of the Great Nebula far better lookin’
than what I see visually in a ten-inch telescope like my <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2015/06/sultry-nights-with-zelda.html">Zelda in the backyard</a>. <i>And it just kept getting
better</i>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What did I have to do next? <i>Not much.</i> I turned on the
cotton-picking television set for me and Tommy, Miss D. went off to bed, and I
and that rascally feline sat and watched TV while the SeeStar did her thing out
in the cold (man alive, it was around 40F out there!).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You don’t have to watch the scope. The phone
doesn’t need to be awake. The SeeStar does just fine on her own. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">When our program wrapped up somewhat over half an hour
later, I thought to look at the iPhone again. <b>HOLY COW!</b> The SeeStar had
accumulated just over half an hour of exposure (she will occasionally discard a
frame due to star trailing or other issues). The result was, frankly, competitive
with anything I’ve ever done with a “real” telescope and mount! I was just gobsmacked.
Yes, it seemed like <b>hoo-doo witchery</b>! The picture at the top of the page is just as it
came out of the telescope. I tweaked it a little later, but only with the minimalist
tools in my iPhone 14.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnPjEDgYkHE5ui5sxkGujFPqwRkQe518rI60ol4EbSEA2CH8NhUJ-bie5cAV6UAD8CwTeI_Tm-_xHBDi_4T48ATnuD7bNxMm1sRqs3CJICX57rOQZQoulZQ3TeYDF8AQJGNlQhOouL7tjJ8UUSQK01Z43xZswtaV8tFpw13rYwFU6P0ep4RKWJYw/s1920/M42%20for%20blog.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1920" data-original-width="1080" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnPjEDgYkHE5ui5sxkGujFPqwRkQe518rI60ol4EbSEA2CH8NhUJ-bie5cAV6UAD8CwTeI_Tm-_xHBDi_4T48ATnuD7bNxMm1sRqs3CJICX57rOQZQoulZQ3TeYDF8AQJGNlQhOouL7tjJ8UUSQK01Z43xZswtaV8tFpw13rYwFU6P0ep4RKWJYw/w360-h640/M42%20for%20blog.jpg" width="360" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">With a little processing...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Let me add that what you see at the top of the page is just the .jpg the scope
transmits to your phone automatically. If you connect to the SeeStar over the
network (like with a PC), you can download the original .fits file of your quarry.
If you cannot connect the telescope to a network with its “Station Mode,” like
out in the boonies, you can still download images to a computer using a USB
cable. If you’ve instructed the scope to save the unstacked frames as well, you
can download ‘em and stack ‘em yourself. Unk? In these latter days stuff like
that tends to confound me. For now, I’m happy just admiring the simple .jpgs
that show up on my iPhone. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That was good. But after the big meeting, those 807s, and
the excitement of first light on the night sky, Unk was feeling the need to
wind things down. I swiped “shut down” on the app, and by the time I got to the
scope in the backyard, she’d tilted her little tube down to its stowed position
and powered herself off. I picked her and the tripod up, carried them inside,
put her in her case, and was back in the den with Mr. Tommy in about 5 minutes.
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And then we waited again. What should I go after next? There
are numerous winter targets, but I thought one I should essay before it got too
high (the SeeStar does not like tracking objects much about 80 degrees) was <b>M1</b>, <b>Old
Crabby</b>. The SeeStar app is quite full featured, and tapping M1 in its
object list gave full details of the supernova remnant including a graphic
showing its elevation over the course of the evening. Oh, let me also mention
the app includes a very high-quality star atlas. You don’t have to select
objects from a list. You can go to the atlas—which appears to have a very large
complement of DSOs—and select and go-to them from there.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The next night was pretty anticlimactic. Sent the little
telescope to her target, Messier 1, and after some hemming and hawing about “enhancing-calibrating-please
wait,” she began shooting. I could see she’d do a pretty good job on the Crab
after just a couple of frames, but there was a problem:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the object wasn’t well centered. On a hunch,
I went to the star atlas. There was a frame around M1, but not <i>centered</i>
on M1. I dragged it to center the nebula, missy said she was doing a goto, we
began shooting again and all was well. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">A this point I had checked into our weekly 6-meter SSB net, signed
off, locked up the radio shack, and walked back to the main house. There, I
picked up the phone and was greeted by the very nice shot of the Crab Nebula
you see here. Oh, it’s not as impressive as M42; M1 is a smallish object not as
well suited to a small, widefield telescope. Still, the colors and detail
easily rivaled what I used to do with Big Bertha, my old C11, and Mallincam
Xtreme from the dark skies of Chiefland, Florida. And the wide-field nature of
the SeeStar did place the nebula in a dramatically star-rich field.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8vMX9ymfEYE0SdjNDF_KzobFS3f4QYvhHBd3FtmjvM7sFObx0LoKaM416yuEVqRKuEQxEXL5DTUQtuPfni7Jxg2LMZZ4qlnBa8qsCcItttJolBS53tizFf75S9FaG1wJqK8-Iq96cZmDsXuUagjEWklMWTQ0ks8HkeO2kgSt0Cl0iBIMo-awaNA/s2170/M1%20and%20M35.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1920" data-original-width="2170" height="566" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8vMX9ymfEYE0SdjNDF_KzobFS3f4QYvhHBd3FtmjvM7sFObx0LoKaM416yuEVqRKuEQxEXL5DTUQtuPfni7Jxg2LMZZ4qlnBa8qsCcItttJolBS53tizFf75S9FaG1wJqK8-Iq96cZmDsXuUagjEWklMWTQ0ks8HkeO2kgSt0Cl0iBIMo-awaNA/w640-h566/M1%20and%20M35.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>Before channel surfing for something for me and Tommy to
watch on the dadgum television, I thought I might point missy at "one more." By
this time, approaching nine pm, many of the winter marvels were beginning to
climb high in the east, putting them out of reach for a little alt-az rig. It
was also feeling humid damp out in the yard, so I double-checked I had turned on
the dew heater (nope). I took care of that, and, with the star atlas, began
searching the eastern sky for a good target. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">M35, the big galactic cluster in Gemini would be fine for a
while, it appeared. I sent the scope there via the atlas (inexplicably, the
wonderful M35 didn’t seem to be in “tonight’s best.”).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There, I adjusted framing to put the smaller,
more distant cluster NGC 2158 in the field, autofocused, and let the ZWO have
at the cluster for around 15 minutes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>All this was done while sitting on the couch in the den, you understand.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The results? The pair of clusters is maybe not as inherently
interesting an object as the supernova remnant, but is really more suited for a
widefield instrument (in fact, it coulda used <i>more</i> field). Being able to
place the smaller cluster in the frame really helped, and I was pleased with
the results. And ready for the evening to begin reaching its conclusion as 10pm
came on. When M35 finished up, I commanded “shut down” and retrieved scope and
tripod from the yard, putting the little scope back on charge after two nights.
Miss Dorothy was somewhat startled to see the odd-looking scope—she’d only seen
it briefly once—sitting in the living room attached to a cell charger when she
got up the next morning.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And that was that after two nights. I was frankly thrilled
by the small scope, think we will have a lot of fun together, and told her she
could officially join the Chaos Manor South family. She then whispered me her
name (y’all know I name all my telescopes), “Suzie,” as in “Suzie-Q,” she said.
That sounded about right. She is a cutie in her odd way. But this little thing
is also surprisingly powerful. If you’re an over the hill suburban astronomer
like your Old Uncle? <b>RECOMMENDED</b>. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-87366795248895424322024-01-21T09:25:00.002-06:002024-01-21T09:47:32.451-06:00Issue 600: Smartscope Revolution?<p> </p><p><b></b></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFAx3uAS758wzsAAufElcx5TMdUZt9CrBQOUlnn3tqgVIiZObcg_FMltsInMZhPPasgIDbVFKkz-8wWPXRFQlsIxp6q_bpUL9pvCHtDnZDN_IXSIvfHqaZzntZPgmZ9UFWMbOte72bYd_4kr1BvKT9w1klZUuYZ1B5T6-er1g4hiWyJX-qFLSmxA/s541/seestar.GIF" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="541" data-original-width="507" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFAx3uAS758wzsAAufElcx5TMdUZt9CrBQOUlnn3tqgVIiZObcg_FMltsInMZhPPasgIDbVFKkz-8wWPXRFQlsIxp6q_bpUL9pvCHtDnZDN_IXSIvfHqaZzntZPgmZ9UFWMbOte72bYd_4kr1BvKT9w1klZUuYZ1B5T6-er1g4hiWyJX-qFLSmxA/w600-h640/seestar.GIF" width="600" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">ZWO SeeStar S50</span></td></tr></tbody></table><b>Issue 600, muchachos?!</b> If somebody had told me 18
years ago that the Little Old AstroBlog from Chaos Manor South would still be
around and going strong in 2024, I’d have laughed. Actually, it goes back even
farther than that, to almost 25 years ago and AOL’s old blogspace. No, it’s not
<i>quite</i> what it was in the go-go days of the amateur astronomy explosion of
the 1990s and early 2000s, but, yeah, <i>here we still are more or less..</i>.<p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Not long after I retired, I found for various reasons I had to back off the weekly blog releases I’d done for years and years.
For a while thereafter, it was hard for me to buckle down and get a blog out
the door every few <i>months</i>. There was one year, 2019, when there was <i>one</i>
new entry. For the whole freaking <i>year</i> (one of my excuses is in 2019 I
delivered TWO new books to their publishers). Eventually, however, I adjusted
to retired life, the Universe, and everything, found I missed doing this, and,
yeah, <i>here we are</i>. The last year or so, I've even found I don’t have to <i>make</i>
myself do the AstroBlog. I <i>want</i> to again. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Twenty-five years</i>, yeah. Retirement. Getting older
with a capital “O.” Your old Uncle put up a brave fight and played Peter Pan up
until the fricking pandemic, which kinda took the wind out of me sails. Now, I
have to admit age <i>ain’t</i> just a number as some boomers like to say. <b>Hit
the big 7-0</b> as Unk has, and you’ll gain a real understanding of that every
freaking morning when you get out of bed. To the accompaniment of <i>more </i>aches and
pains. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">None of which means I don’t observe or at least <i>want</i>
to. It’s just getting harder. A recent <i>Sky & Telescope</i> assignment
required me to set up a scope and a mount and a computer and do some imaging,
somethin’ I hadn’t done a lot of in the last several annums. It was doable for
me mainly because of the stretch of OK weather we were having. Once I got the
telescope set up, I could leave her (the Edge 800, Mrs. Peel) outside under a
cover for multiple nights. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Not that getting her, an AVX mount, etc., etc. into the yard
was a treat. Neither was operating her when she was set up. Not so much because
of age, but because of the accident I suffered in 2019. One of my multiple
injuries was a compound fracture of my right arm. The docs did a good job of
putting me back together with the aid of screws and metal plates. But I noted
none of ‘em assured me I’d be as good as new. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Five years down the line, I have regained most lost
dexterity. I can get on my Vibroplex keyer and send Morse code at 30
words-per-minute again. BUT…<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s clear
the strength in that arm is not coming back. I can very easily drop something
if I am not careful, and the arm will quickly warn me if I try “too heavy.” Ever
since the accident I have also, strangely, found my ability to endure the cold
much reduced. To top if all off, I have developed a lingering and seemingly
unreasoning fear of falling in the dark. None of this a recipe for setting up
and operating old-fashioned astrophotography rigs. Or big, complicated
telescopes of any kind.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, what have I done when I want to observe? I’ve mostly
kept it simple. I can still get my 10-inch Dobsonian, <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2015/06/zelda-at-dark-site.html">Zelda</a>, into the backyard if I am careful, take is slowly, and use a hand truck on
bad days. Her simple operation means my fuzzy-headedness as the hours grow late
(as in 11pm) is not going to cause a major equipment disaster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not a night when I feel like wrestling
with Z? One of my smaller refractors on my SkyWatcher AZ-4 alt-azimuth mount
serves me well when I get cosmic wanderlust. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSBRNryk4DG0cyQswQTDXj0pOiKHhxuXY4eqt0uT_6f9Za-WBW67MwuX3lkdiqK25jY7Omk9IGJSUs1wDhY-4jHD3BeMcRdOLz9gTG96PYvkuxXWpFPFAtXEhjGyCHVPqk4TYZWOIxrauiaeUB5c6xBZR-p-5-kDOeRsqsm8njkFWBkXn6aq1Nag/s572/unistellar.GIF" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="572" data-original-width="567" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSBRNryk4DG0cyQswQTDXj0pOiKHhxuXY4eqt0uT_6f9Za-WBW67MwuX3lkdiqK25jY7Omk9IGJSUs1wDhY-4jHD3BeMcRdOLz9gTG96PYvkuxXWpFPFAtXEhjGyCHVPqk4TYZWOIxrauiaeUB5c6xBZR-p-5-kDOeRsqsm8njkFWBkXn6aq1Nag/s320/unistellar.GIF" width="317" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Equinox II</span></td></tr></tbody></table>I still love my big 6-inch achromat and Losmandy
mount. But. The last time I tried to get that OTA on the Losmandy I nearly dropped
her and injured myself in the process. I hope to get that big glass out this
summer for a stroll through the wonders of the season, but night-in-and-night-out,
it’s clearly best if I stay with <b>simple</b>. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Which brings us to our subject this morning, <b>smart
telescopes</b>. <i>“Wut’s they-at, Unk?”</i> If you’ve been under a rock
the last three-four years, they are a new breed of scope. Most are small-aperture short focal length reflectors or refractors on alt-azimuth mounts. While at least one allows
you to view objects with a built-in display, most depend on your smart phone for both display and control. And
the big deal with all is something most of us have experimented with:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>taking and stacking many short exposures
(like 10 seconds) into finished images. All feature goto via plate solving and include the usual frippery like GPS.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I knew about these
scopes almost from the beginning since an old friend and accomplished observer,
<b>Jack Estes</b>, was an early adopter and has shared the images he’s obtained
with his Unistellar smartscope with me on occasion. I had to admit I was
impressed. But, somehow, the whole thing seemed like <i>heresy</i>. Like <i>cheating</i>.
I wasn’t quite ready to hang up my Peter Pan duds. I’d sold my C11.
Was I now going to embrace a tiny telescope that sat in the backyard and took
pictures <i>for me</i> as I sat in the warm den?</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Well</i>, <i>why the Hell not?</i> Would it really be such a
come down? The thing is <i>seeing</i>. If that means with a big scope and an
eyepiece…or a smaller scope and a Mallincam extreme…or a tiny scope and a digital
camera, that’s still <i>seeing</i> the Universe, ain’t it? I never felt like
the Mallincam was a compromise; it was just the opposite. It expanded my
horizons from the Messier and NGC to the dim and distant marvels that lie beyond
them. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjU_z7o7-ByQuz8nKZDqk0tyOkQjvWNTVZ1Gx2WJmSnksARkQVCOfOtWMDmx4sjO2asfm0D6yK87GAgn6YtJlnhLHbakU3j1oy2tbQNnWAXjt70zxf9iIHqiUyjNxazRhxPE7woc_cqyh63aGQQOyM4O_wF1ZrDXIT0gTpyUTDrYI08zrbBKjDcFQ/s678/vespera.GIF" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="678" data-original-width="645" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjU_z7o7-ByQuz8nKZDqk0tyOkQjvWNTVZ1Gx2WJmSnksARkQVCOfOtWMDmx4sjO2asfm0D6yK87GAgn6YtJlnhLHbakU3j1oy2tbQNnWAXjt70zxf9iIHqiUyjNxazRhxPE7woc_cqyh63aGQQOyM4O_wF1ZrDXIT0gTpyUTDrYI08zrbBKjDcFQ/s320/vespera.GIF" width="304" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Vespera II</span></td></tr></tbody></table>The question that remained was whether one of these small
scopes could get the job done. From what I’d seen and heard from Jack and from other observers,
it was clear these little telescopes can produce deep sky images that please.
No, one wouldn’t go as deep as the Xtreme and C8 would in a minute or so. But
allowed to stack images for longer, they could go deep. <i>Real deep</i>. And
produce images that looked far prettier and more finished than what my analog
Mallincams can do. Keep in mind these scopes are mainly for the deep sky. They can produce nice full-disk images of the Moon and Sun, but the image scale is not suited for the planets. <p></p><p class="MsoNormal">I began to think all signs pointed to a smartscope as being
what I needed to get me observing more frequently again. Then, of course, the question
became <i>which one?<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>So, who do we have here?<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Unistellar’s</b> instruments, most of which are 4-inch reflectors,
go from around $2000 to $5000. The middle of the road is the Equinox II. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Unlike some of the more expensive Unistellars,
it doesn’t feature the unique electronic eyepiece technology that makes you
feel like you’re using a “real” telescope. Instead, like other smartscopes, it
depends on your phone for display of the images produced by its Sony IMX347
sensor, and communicates over Wi-Fi. Seemed nice. But…I dunno. $2500 made Unk
skittish despite the fairly impressive pictures I’ve seen from these scopes.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Vaonis</b> produces several different models. The one I’ve
heard the most talk about, however, is the futuristic looking Vespera II ($1590 without field tripod or case). It’s a 50mm f/5 refractor, and features the usual things: built-in camera, automatic stacking
and—necessary for an alt-azimuth telescope, natch—field de-rotation to prevent star
trailing. Various filters that fit on the front of the OTA are available as
options. The image sensor is a Sony IMX 585.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Cheap as your old Unk is…investing in a technology I wasn’t
sure I’d like to the tune of well over a thousand dollars didn’t seem smart, smart telescope or
not. <i>Then</i> I heard about a Chinese company, <b>Dwarf Labs</b>…<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG9XJxpwWXeNQfzT5kOBOlztEnttHWvL1JofiuHwhWn2RYE8nniPsZ2-j6hL6cE6VzOPl4AkuZBI6ZwzULyy9kZ8ELiKdg1EnuMCvlDovZJFyx14mOnmqMSbje2Wh6QSdp_6PkO0SJSQ70ejlVhn4uv2eqOwI8_QnD-kPHM0kRolGXpy3WF_apEQ/s688/dwarf%20II.GIF" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="508" data-original-width="688" height="236" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG9XJxpwWXeNQfzT5kOBOlztEnttHWvL1JofiuHwhWn2RYE8nniPsZ2-j6hL6cE6VzOPl4AkuZBI6ZwzULyy9kZ8ELiKdg1EnuMCvlDovZJFyx14mOnmqMSbje2Wh6QSdp_6PkO0SJSQ70ejlVhn4uv2eqOwI8_QnD-kPHM0kRolGXpy3WF_apEQ/s320/dwarf%20II.GIF" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Dwarf II</span></td></tr></tbody></table>The Dwarf II is a rather odd looking smartscope—it looks more
like a…I dunno…can opener? Clock radio? —than a telescope. But it was clear to
me from the <a href="https://dwarflab.com/products/dwarf-2-smart-telescope">images</a><span style="color: red;"> </span>produced by it that the Dwarf
and its Sony IMX415 sensor get ‘er done. And get ‘er done for less than
$500. The only “I dunno” for me being its
very small (26mm) aperture. As with the Vespera, filters are available that fit
over the objective end. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I don’t know why I was surprised when <b>Celestron</b>
announced recently that it’s getting into the smartscope game. Anyhoo, it’s a
sign these little scopes are going to be a big factor in amateur astronomy
going forward. Probably including Celestron’s not-so-little new one, the Origin.
Yes, it really kicks things up a notch. This is a larger Smartscope, based on a
6-inch aperture f/2.2 version of their Rowe Ackerman astrograph OTA. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The Origin is mounted on a pretty standard-looking Evolution
mount…but obviously that’s been upgraded with some fancier firmware. The brains
are in part from Celestron’s StarSense autoguider technology. Their Smart Dew-removal
system is also incorporated—I was impressed by that when I did the S&T
Test Report on it a while back. Finally, the mount can be placed on a wedge and
used in equatorial fashion with a guide camera, giving it the capability of much
longer than 10-second exposures. Impressive specs, indeed, I had to admit. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The images taken by the Origin and its Sony IMX178LQJ chip displayed
on the Celestron pages look good. <i>Impressive</i>, even. But…well…the chip is
similar to what’s in the other smartscopes, so the Origin pictures are not in a
whole other category. On the good side, Celestron says the onboard camera can
be replaced by possible future models (I would assume from 3<sup>rd</sup> party
manufacturers, too). <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, did I preorder an Origin? <b>No</b>. It wasn’t so much
the 4K price tag that dissuaded me (though, of course, it did), but the fact the
Origin is right back in the “<b>getting difficult for Unk to handle</b>”
category. It’s <i>substantially</i> larger than my ETX-125, Charity Hope Valentine,
and she is pretty much the limit of what I’ll use frequently. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0yuPpo-ZhOhrEX1SceXtA85WEaHtgNX4T8ApSJtVq6jb4MiQjHv2IpGY1gWzpTBuRFn_UBGfnMl6RmkLrfmlL-iBg0zoWQnceFrO4qUXsHUqI4Jyc9d5WGc7QMB64NNdsvzrwQABMOBie5l54SgAfiuDQgMQ-mvFIv5klcfs94ef3_ITaUoLrsg/s477/origin.GIF" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="415" data-original-width="477" height="278" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0yuPpo-ZhOhrEX1SceXtA85WEaHtgNX4T8ApSJtVq6jb4MiQjHv2IpGY1gWzpTBuRFn_UBGfnMl6RmkLrfmlL-iBg0zoWQnceFrO4qUXsHUqI4Jyc9d5WGc7QMB64NNdsvzrwQABMOBie5l54SgAfiuDQgMQ-mvFIv5klcfs94ef3_ITaUoLrsg/s320/origin.GIF" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Celestron Origin</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Which left a smartscope I’d heard about a lot recently. <b>ZWO’s</b>
SeeStar S50. Despite the somewhat corny name, I was impressed by what I’d heard
about it, what Dennis di Cicco had written about it in his recent S&T test
report, and by the images I’d seen. This is a 50mm f/5 refractor that uses a Sony IMX462 sensor. Unlike any of the others, though, there’s a
built-in filter wheel and an included LPR filter. A solar filter is also
provided that fits over the objective (third parties make filter holders for
your own 2-inch filters), there is an integral dew-heater, and, best of all for
your miserly Uncle, the price is about $500.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I <i>still</i> wasn’t sure…but screwing my courage to the
sticking place, I ordered one and wondered if I’d done the right thing or not.
I trust ZWO—I’ve used one of their planetary cameras for years—but a <i>smartscope</i>?
<i>For me? Really? </i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>And then…and then... </b> We are out of time and space for this morning, and Unk is waiting for the ZWO to arrive as he writes this. I will be back
with the big reveal in a week or three, after I’ve had some time with the new telescope. <o:p></o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-17227713457920944942023-12-24T18:14:00.003-06:002024-01-21T09:21:43.792-06:00Issue 599: A Chaos Manor South Merry Christmas 2023<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoxWX7QPbFSsUbW8nkfUda7wJPRKlFgXPP2lxWP2op-_j72d_0Yj-CMElJyZgepFlkZRaNCiZIPD9mi8XOPLfRXSqwQ6jz70j4lU6vCKnBm6t6aVmIgzCCAfws_zeitb6KCyGBcA95BVa_nNYnqM3QlAC6KxnPVxe5gKn0D8nEdyZBvWPcmC5zKQ/s640/stars%205.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="599" data-original-width="640" height="600" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoxWX7QPbFSsUbW8nkfUda7wJPRKlFgXPP2lxWP2op-_j72d_0Yj-CMElJyZgepFlkZRaNCiZIPD9mi8XOPLfRXSqwQ6jz70j4lU6vCKnBm6t6aVmIgzCCAfws_zeitb6KCyGBcA95BVa_nNYnqM3QlAC6KxnPVxe5gKn0D8nEdyZBvWPcmC5zKQ/w640-h600/stars%205.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>“What in the hail are you goin’ on about <i>now</i>, Unk?
Ever’body knows you and Miss Dorothy decamped from the Old Manse to the suburbs
almost a decade ago!” Yes and no,
Skeeter, yes and no.” I have come to realize Chaos Manor South is more a <i>state
of mind</i> than a <i>place</i>, no matter how much I sometimes miss that place
itself and those grand old Christmases of yore on Selma St.<p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Yeah, muchachos, those exciting Yule eves sporting a giant
tree crowded by presents and a house of little ones unable to sleep. And me
sitting, a season of furious preparations done, watching for a glimpse of that
most numinous of all Christmas ornaments, Messier 42.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The years have passed as years do, crowding
one upon another. Christmas is again on the doorstep—they seem to come thick
and fast in these latter days.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Here I still sit on the
couch in the den with Chaos Manor South’s resident black cat, <b>Thomas Aquinas</b>,
waiting for the sky to clear and for us to get a glimpse of the Great Nebula.
Tommy and I are older now, but that is the only difference. Our hopes for clear
skies on Christmas Eve are as firm and resolute as ever.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Admittedly, it doesn’t look as if those hopes will be borne
out this year. I was awakened at three in the morning by the weather radio
alarming its head off about <i>flood warnings</i>. By 9am, it began to
sprinkle. It would, looked to me, be a blue-eyed Christmas miracle if we got
even the tiniest sucker-hole.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But you know as well as I do the key to practicing amateur
astronomy successfully is being ready to take advantage of miracles, Christmas
or otherwise. To wit, I needed to have a scope ready. Oh, I could have just
said to myself that my old but still beloved Burgess 15x70 binocs would be fine
“just in case.” But somehow that didn’t seem in the spirit of the thing, my
traditional Christmas Eve look at “Orion,” as I simply and innocently called
the Great Nebula when I was a boy.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnBqdTeUx5D64yAXJHDEhFffX-DmiHBoVjTJOTu-D49Fe2t3MiFsw0Gw3lyqk_Cjk_viaRXxD6RDP_nHCHoUcXkkt-__Xrrm6ABQ-2XGMTBoJa0xANKop1oaj4fr7yYZSiv4k-tX2FiYZLEWM5gCyrpKq9qC3PV_ZsHEl-WxO0NVu9qYWpm1zCJw/s4032/Tanya.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnBqdTeUx5D64yAXJHDEhFffX-DmiHBoVjTJOTu-D49Fe2t3MiFsw0Gw3lyqk_Cjk_viaRXxD6RDP_nHCHoUcXkkt-__Xrrm6ABQ-2XGMTBoJa0xANKop1oaj4fr7yYZSiv4k-tX2FiYZLEWM5gCyrpKq9qC3PV_ZsHEl-WxO0NVu9qYWpm1zCJw/w300-h400/Tanya.jpg" width="300" /></a></div>Perfect for those unlooked for looks? <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2023/01/issue-588-uncle-rod-and-rescue-telescope.html">Tanya, my rescue telescope</a>. As I wrote in the article
that detailed her coming to Chaos Manor South, she is not perfect. In addition
to having lived a hard knock life, with a few dents in her steel tube bearing
witness to that, she is saddled with an f/5.2 spherical mirror. That somewhat
limits her performance—well, theoretically. “Theoretically” because I don’t use
her for high-power views of the planets. She is perfect for wide-field looks,
which is what my quick looks usually call for, but is quite capable of handling
100x or so. Cleaned and collimated, her 114mm primary does a surprisingly nice job.
<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, Tommy and I sat and waited. And waited. He watching
something or other on television. Me, naturally, ruminating on Christmases past
as I am wont to do on Yule Eves. Which one spells “Christmas” for me? There are
several, including some newer-ish ones, like the first Christmas I spent with
Miss Dorothy at the Old Manse. But if you are going to pin me down, I guess Christmas
for me is still and will forever be:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2010/08/stars-instead-of-cars.html">Stars instead of Cars.</a><span style="color: red;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Here we still sit as it pours. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The weather goobers are predicting 2-inches of
the wet stuff before morning. I’ll be surprised to hear the rain slacken, much
less see a single star wink through this mess. <i>Them’s the breaks</i>. I’ve
had a pretty good run of clear Xmas Eves of late, and, as always in amateur
astronomy, <b>you take what you get</b>. We shall sit a while longer, Tommy and
I. Till I finally drift off and a little black paw nudges me, telling me it is
time for bed. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Have a merry one. When we meet again in the new year, I
will tell you what the hell happened to my other yearly tradition, my annual
imaging run on the Great Globular, M13. Till then… “This is Chaos Manor signing
off and clear.”<o:p></o:p></i></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-13989907892998204292023-11-19T15:26:00.007-06:002023-11-19T16:00:46.479-06:00Issue 598: When is a Star Party Not a Star Party? Redux…<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2SsjLD6_y2QkEU2vOAyhtJrHoKFTrtWtIGYFZQO2z27ezFsLc0wM4cdsUI9RoaS5wX6RgXUeJTSrxYQEqAxiWgVM6CDlPGBkMOE6Vrr9r6ZcyDcJKANAcfL3t9NOg-c07zjbFBP2vTvClFDGPG5w1eIZfwBzojBf91_VWno1OHUvz78qUh_EZpg/s4032/DSSG%207.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2SsjLD6_y2QkEU2vOAyhtJrHoKFTrtWtIGYFZQO2z27ezFsLc0wM4cdsUI9RoaS5wX6RgXUeJTSrxYQEqAxiWgVM6CDlPGBkMOE6Vrr9r6ZcyDcJKANAcfL3t9NOg-c07zjbFBP2vTvClFDGPG5w1eIZfwBzojBf91_VWno1OHUvz78qUh_EZpg/w640-h480/DSSG%207.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>The answer is still the same as it was <a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2015/04/when-is-star-party-not-star-party.html">many a year ago</a>, muchachos: “<b>Never!</b>” I almost always
have a great time at an astronomy event, even when I don’t <i>see</i> much—or
anything at all. It’s nice to hang out with friends, look at other folks’ astro-gear,
yadda-yadda-yadda. But for all that, there is, as I have <i>also</i> said before,
one big reason I go to a star party that trumps all:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><b>To see the deep sky</b>. Alas, that is the
one thing that was in short supply at the just completed 41<sup>st</sup> annual
<b>Deep South Star Gaze</b> (née, Deep South Regional Star Gaze).<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The extended forecasts for the event’s location near
Sandy Hook, Mississippi hadn’t been looking good for weeks. They indicated the
time Miss Dorothy and I would be on site, Thursday – Sunday, would be resolutely
cloudy, and most likely rainy—game over, end of story zip up your fly. The “safe”
thing to have done would have been not to even register. Or, to have saved some
gas and not hit the road for the Mississippi backwoods when November 9<sup>th</sup>
came around. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Nope. No way.</i> I was finally back in the mood for a
star party, and, in particular, for <i>this</i> star party after a lay-off of
six years. After not the best star party experience in 2017, mostly thanks to
deteriorating conditions at the event’s previous location, the Feliciana Retreat
Center in Louisiana, and the change of venue in ’18 to the current White Horse
Christian Retreat Center, we took a couple of years off. Then came covid. And
we hadn’t been back since the end of the plague. Once you get out of the habit
of going to a star party, it’s sometimes hard to get with it again, but this
year, I’d decided, would be different. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In dipping-toe-into-shallow-end-of-pool fashion, Miss D. and
I began slowly, ever so slowly, planning for the 2023 Deep South Star Gaze. At
first it seemed strange to be rounding up the sleeping bags and the tent canopy
again (I sprayed plenty of waterproofing on the latter in view of the forecast).
But mostly, it just seemed <i>right</i> and <i>natural</i>. After all, Deep South was
something we’d been doing together since we were married in 1994. What <i>was</i>
feeling strange now was those six autumns <b>without</b> a Deep South.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In addition to gathering up the ancillary gear, I naturally
had to decide “Which telescope?” The weather forecasts didn’t quite look
horrible, not yet, but they did <i>not </i>look good. It was not a year for fancy
mounts and SCTs and computers. Also, something simpler would be more in line
with the “dipping-a-toe-back-in” theme for the year. So, what I decided on (at
first) was my 10-inch GSO Dobsonian, <a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2015/06/zelda-at-dark-site.html">Zelda</a>. Object
finding assistance? Her 50mm finder, her Rigel Quickfinder, and <i>Sky &
Telescope’s Pocket Sky Atlas Jumbo Edition</i> backed by my treasured deck of George
Kepple’s legendary <b>Astro Cards</b>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Wednesday evening before our departure, I loaded up the
4Runner, Miss Van Pelt. What I did <i>not</i> load up, after all, was Zelda. Why lug
a 10-inch when there was little—if any—doubt it would be clouds and rain for our
entire stay at White Horse? The forecasts had just got worse, not better. I wouldn’t
be without a scope, though. I packed a smallish one just in case we saw <b style="font-style: italic;">something</b>.
Frankly, for reasonable people (obviously that does <i>not</i> include your
strange, old Uncle) this would have been the time to say, <b>“Let’s stay home
and watch it rain in comfort.”<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Nope, nosir-buddy</b>. Not only were we interested in
giving the new star party site a look-see, we wanted to show we still support
the event, and, maybe more than anything else, we wanted to see friends we hadn’t
seen in years and whom I’d begun to wonder if we we’d ever seen again. I
finished loading the truck, just like the good, old days and called it a night
reasonably early…after indulging our resident black cat, Thomas Aquinas, by watching WWII
videos on YouTube (he favors “Midway” and “The Great Marianas Turkey Shoot”).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEil3fcY-oN61ONXs6GsGUdBFkVR2p0Jl1wvTfH7FhB4dtMWcN7IublQzI9JXpVfD-VJe6rFPOWZ3aKlTT-3-wyHT-KTN6UnB9OA-pnlX5KUqw4aPSu4zl4xsRs5GByDrht8gOq-lREYZyfx7Oyfx0hPFVWDre2g38gNPDf_SQq6O0ncJeXmY1aaAA/s4032/DSSG%203.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEil3fcY-oN61ONXs6GsGUdBFkVR2p0Jl1wvTfH7FhB4dtMWcN7IublQzI9JXpVfD-VJe6rFPOWZ3aKlTT-3-wyHT-KTN6UnB9OA-pnlX5KUqw4aPSu4zl4xsRs5GByDrht8gOq-lREYZyfx7Oyfx0hPFVWDre2g38gNPDf_SQq6O0ncJeXmY1aaAA/s320/DSSG%203.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Interior of the rustic lodge...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Thursday morning dawned to heavy clouds—which have been the
rule rather than the exception down here for weeks and weeks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was no need to get on the road early.
The drive is a reasonably short one, about two-and-a-half hours, and the event’s
only meal, supper, would not be served until 4pm daily. With that situation in
mind, I’d loaded up on snacks and Hormel’s “Compleats” stabilized microwave dinners
(like I used to keep in my desk at work long ago).<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The drive was, yeah, a short one, and there wouldn’t have
been much to say about it if not for the nostalgia factor. Like our long-ago
visits to Percy Quin State Park, original home of the star party, the journey
to White Horse is up Highway 98 to Hattiesburg (and then on to Sandy Hook). Miss
D. and I sure did a lot of reminiscin’ about our trip on this very road through
the Mississippi piney woods in 1994 when <a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2009/09/cloudy-nights.html">we were newlyweds.</a><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">A big difference this time? No AAA trip-ticks or Rand McNally
Road Atlas. It was GPS all the way, and she did get us to White Horse, albeit not without one bit of minor unpleasantness. As we neared our destination, the GPS, <b>Samantha</b>,
told us to turn onto <b>THE ROAD</b>. Yep, no name, just “the road.” A <i>dirt</i>
road that quickly devolved into a rutted two-lane track, and then into mudholes
just short of a swamp. Miss Van Pelt loved it, since she rarely gets to be a
real <i>off-road</i> 4Runner. Dorothy and I sure were bemused…to put it mildly…wondering
what would have happened if we’d turned down THE ROAD in her Camry!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am still washing the mud off Miss Van P.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Soon, we were on another nondescript (but at least paved)
road.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The excellent directions Barry provided
for the area near the site reassured us we were indeed in the right place. Soon, there was, as mentioned in said directions, a column with, yep, a white horse sculpture
atop it. And…in just a moment we were at the facility. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4x_IUY8QbyDqpLSNB6MmJSYbXKhWNCZZ6ZR8SviqjDMI9jO-naZd29VQbbw0OU5Y2GG_y0ZNcvvQH3kANmlyjTDYL8M9yVBovRhR3J0XEqbTOJ-7aoD-XeUPCbgbCDQ_DUUqqwbfpxORYIsikQ4NJeXP0kFJNYtLfCVzr7jFVlT1nidbr1Nx6uA/s4032/DSSG%206.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4x_IUY8QbyDqpLSNB6MmJSYbXKhWNCZZ6ZR8SviqjDMI9jO-naZd29VQbbw0OU5Y2GG_y0ZNcvvQH3kANmlyjTDYL8M9yVBovRhR3J0XEqbTOJ-7aoD-XeUPCbgbCDQ_DUUqqwbfpxORYIsikQ4NJeXP0kFJNYtLfCVzr7jFVlT1nidbr1Nx6uA/s320/DSSG%206.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">White Horse Observing Field...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>What was it like? See the pictures…but what it reminded me of
was the hunting camps the daddies of my pals used to belong to back in the
sixties (my own Daddy was not exactly an outdoors type), and which I’d visited
occasionally. That is, a complex of structures that involved tin sheeting and
which the owners appeared to have expanded as they’d gone along.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Driving toward the building we noticed a paddock-like area on
the right festooned with a few tent canopies and even a few telescopes. We figgered
that must be the place, parked there, grabbed our suitcases, and headed back to
the main building. Inside, we were informed by the friendly star-partiers there
that DSSG Director <b>Barry Simon</b> had left the site for lunch and would be back
shortly. We spent half an hour or so looking around and getting a feel for the
place. The interior of the lodge continued the hunting camp theme but was
really purty darned nice. Oh, and there was Wi-Fi. At poor, old Feliciana that
had often been missing. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Upon Barry’s return, he pointed us at our room—the facility
has several small motel-like rooms in addition to bunkhouses. It was even tinier
than what we had become accustomed to at Feliciana, but was clean and really
just perfect for us. The window air conditioner was noisy but cooled remarkably
well. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4eo-7ZmK7eC0-cCWkB12-UoQlWXIOjovMSxTnMLBDvTq0BxboW-0t5Kav5T8rWQIwKabY2HwYaEkmw7IyKEFioCL86PdaszkRGikmWCwREMv8wRHBSoMu1y0jVDFrBEON4aDIT-OYWYQsFaQIe_8yWz-gJMdbnDxqTtwr3fgsaS0Wbz7k43u2Sw/s4032/DSSG%202.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4eo-7ZmK7eC0-cCWkB12-UoQlWXIOjovMSxTnMLBDvTq0BxboW-0t5Kav5T8rWQIwKabY2HwYaEkmw7IyKEFioCL86PdaszkRGikmWCwREMv8wRHBSoMu1y0jVDFrBEON4aDIT-OYWYQsFaQIe_8yWz-gJMdbnDxqTtwr3fgsaS0Wbz7k43u2Sw/s320/DSSG%202.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">The storied pumpkin...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Thence to the field for a prize drawing. Despite Dorothy
drawing the tickets from the legendary orange DSRSG plastic pumpkin (the same one
from back in the vaunted Percy Quin days), I didn’t win a dadgum thing—and they
were giving away a real nice widefield eyepiece and some other cool stuff
besides. That ain’t exactly a surprise. I rarely win anything in a raffle—other
than a raffle for ham radio gear. <i>That</i>, I win again and again—strange. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Afterwards, there not being much to do before supper, it was
back to the main building, “the lodge,” for web surfing and getting reacquainted
with old friends. If I don’t list your name here, I’m not slighting you. It’s
just that I’d have to list 40 or more. <i>All of you</i>, old friends and
new ones alike, are important to us. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That hour or two in the lodge was the high point of the star
party. What else did I do other then get caught up with buddies?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I took frequent trips outside for looks at
the sky—all in vain. And I kept my eye on an app recommended to me by <i>Sky
& Telescope’s</i> Sean Walker some time back, <b><i>Astropheric</i></b>. It
took a while for me to get used to it, but, yeah, it really <i>is</i> better
than <i>Clear Sky Charts</i>. In fact, it’s like CSC on steroids. If you don’t
have it on your phone already, you should (it's free).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Then came supper. Miss Dorothy and I were signed up for the
meal plan, but were informed that had been cancelled (because the weather kept
attendance down so much, I guess). Instead, there were hamburger and hotdog plates
available for a reasonable price. Dorothy and I ordered hamburgers…and were a
little surprised at their definitely <i>different</i> taste. The ebullient lady
who owns White Horse informed us that was because they were made from not just
beef, but pork, and <i>deer meat,</i> too! Well, when in Rome do as the Romans
do, I reckon.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxN9jrL2-DkVeWspRoxnh8DCKtNJhj9sWVwx-_qbpFaPrTcXDrklD-VA-Z1HzY5NCcdH7m4GzP3x4GD0KH5w3MNf8U9EiUGpe6ShavUBW1CNtrwVgSJRrb3szqFsMJDSr37v5FP1-Pr6qGvWAS8RDqNqlPN3KjsW9i58X3h36xwTBzjlek7NrKGg/s4032/DSSG%204.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxN9jrL2-DkVeWspRoxnh8DCKtNJhj9sWVwx-_qbpFaPrTcXDrklD-VA-Z1HzY5NCcdH7m4GzP3x4GD0KH5w3MNf8U9EiUGpe6ShavUBW1CNtrwVgSJRrb3szqFsMJDSr37v5FP1-Pr6qGvWAS8RDqNqlPN3KjsW9i58X3h36xwTBzjlek7NrKGg/s320/DSSG%204.JPG" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">My usual mascot promoting "Dark Nights."</span></td></tr></tbody></table>And so, we hung out in the lodge till the Sun was long gone.
Outside, <b>Len Philpot</b> pointed out the only light dome visible around the horizon
was miniscule. Far smaller than what we’d had at Feliciana and certainly minor
compared to what Percy Quin’s sky must be like today (it’s near what is now verging
on a small city, McComb, Mississippi). I suspected the sky would have been
great if it had been clear. <i>Which it wasn’t</i>. Since it was obvious there
wouldn’t even be sucker holes, I said my goodnights and headed back to the room
where Dorothy was already relaxing.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The good thing? While the Wi-Fi was not exactly strong
outside the lodge, it was strong enough in our room for my Macintosh Airbook M2
to pull in YouTube with ease. I spent the evening looking at whatever whack-a-doodle
videos my heart desired until it was nigh-on ten o’clock.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In the morning, another cloudy morning, Dorothy and I
showered, dressed, and said our farewells. There were to be talks Friday, but we’d decided it would be best to get back down Highway 98
before the weather worsened. Barry was already planning on finishing up with
all the talks and the prize drawings as well that afternoon. Which was wise—the field was
already practically empty, and it was clear few folks would hang on till Saturday, much less the
official end of DSSG Sunday morning.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As we pulled away from White Horse, was I sad to be leaving?
Well, <i>sort of</i>. I was happy to have seen my old buddies again. But…leaving
a clouded-out star party just doesn’t have the same feel—that wistful regret—you
get when departing one that’s had nights and nights of deep space voyaging. Well,
maybe next fall. Maybe even this coming spring (Deep South still does its smaller Spring
Scrimmage edition).<o:p></o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-89863458364548141662023-10-19T18:03:00.013-05:002024-01-20T16:43:40.361-06:00Issue 597: The Big Eclipse<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_wC0tRhX3iiFVkBuGc-0ZGfGaQKzZp_kQAL235ErUKWm2EQhNJ3VkovwJUDBhlXLVEnHQDE1TrYKv-A1V3Xvyvs8OmRdGizoUWffSt2YoLHPQzgFjc7kmcW-Fr5wjULC_rr8xVE6z12rjtgLchpFcjkQ5mL0pUayuPLa1oPSTodV30sv7c6hUtA/s2048/387824244_7141973985836657_4708169031919912628_n.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1536" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_wC0tRhX3iiFVkBuGc-0ZGfGaQKzZp_kQAL235ErUKWm2EQhNJ3VkovwJUDBhlXLVEnHQDE1TrYKv-A1V3Xvyvs8OmRdGizoUWffSt2YoLHPQzgFjc7kmcW-Fr5wjULC_rr8xVE6z12rjtgLchpFcjkQ5mL0pUayuPLa1oPSTodV30sv7c6hUtA/w480-h640/387824244_7141973985836657_4708169031919912628_n.jpg" width="480" /></a></div>Well, in a <i>small </i>way, muchachos. Not that it wasn’t a fairly
big deal, but it hadn’t assumed much prominence in my reckonings in the days
before the event. Saturday morning’s annular eclipse had been <i>somewhat</i>
on your ol’ Uncle’s mind, of course. How could it not be? Every weatherman, local and
national, had been talking about little else for the last week. And yet, and yet…<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I felt <i>unmoved</i>. Yes, it would be a fairly
deep eclipse, around 75% of Sol’s face would be covered by Miss Hecate in the
environs of Possum Swamp…but…yeah, <i>just another partial eclipse.</i><o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Anyhoo, Eclipse morning, I wasn’t thinking much about the Sun;
I was thinking more about my current addiction: <i>breakfast biscuits, fried
chicken breakfast biscuits slathered in honey sauce</i>. “Guess I’ll head up to
Whataburger for breakfast with the hams like I do every Saturday.” In addition to
my guilty pleasure, those dadgum biscuits, I am the president of the <a href="http://w4iax.net/">Mobile Amateur Radio Club</a> and feel like it’s part of my job to attend every edition of
the Saturday morning assemblage of OMs and YLs—the fried chicken is just a perk (uh-huh).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It was a jolly gathering at Whataburger that morning.
Everybody was awful excited about the <b>Swains Island DXpedition</b>, which had been
causing quite the stimulation of the HF ether. But, also, the solar eclipse, which would begin about 90 minutes
from the time the nice li’l girl brought Unk his breakfast tray. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Hams and astronomy? There are lots of amateur radio operators
who are also amateur astronomers. Radio propagation depends on the Sun, so most hams have a natural interest in it. More than that, amateur radio is a scientific
hobby, and hams tend to be curious about things like, yeah, The Great Out
There. Question a ham and you’ll often find she/he has a telescope. A dealer at
our last tailgater, Bud’s Tailgator, had a couple of scopes for sale, smallish
Meades, and they generated a heck of a lot of interest. “Rod! What do you think
of <i>this</i> one?”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Our efforts and success or lack thereof in working Swains
Island in the South Pacific (I got him without much trouble on CW) talked over
at fair length, the ragchewing turned to ECLIPSE, ECLIPSE, ECLIPSE. I grumbled
it was <i>just</i> an annular eclipse, and a partial one at that from the Gulf
Coast. <i>Nothing to get excited about</i>. My friends looked at me as if I
were crazy, <b>“But W4NNF, <i>it’s a solar eclipse!” <o:p></o:p></i></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Unfortunately, I reckon I got off on a bad foot when it comes to solar
eclipses just over 50 years ago. I am talking about the great total eclipse of
March 1970.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not only would it be a deep partial
one for Possum Swamp, over 90%, the path of totality wouldn’t be far away. It would
pass relatively near here in fact, the path going right through <b>this little town on the
Florida – Georgia Parkway, Chiefland, Florida (!). <o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibImBPX_yGqiDOWEUst6foOvaZCLjG_oTguKJ18sqpW-aBMK5GVu08VOuWxVoQyVH6mEHogLwNMI8UTj0LYRzDOLzWEwHUnF_6Q5aObw8o_A7RvQIrGJ84Oi0oKQ8254Je_FzuwG2Bx2g7zjklCumQoy1tmOT0OYI56HcrM9H1ToLEtiBuILjIhA/s4032/eclipse%203.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibImBPX_yGqiDOWEUst6foOvaZCLjG_oTguKJ18sqpW-aBMK5GVu08VOuWxVoQyVH6mEHogLwNMI8UTj0LYRzDOLzWEwHUnF_6Q5aObw8o_A7RvQIrGJ84Oi0oKQ8254Je_FzuwG2Bx2g7zjklCumQoy1tmOT0OYI56HcrM9H1ToLEtiBuILjIhA/s320/eclipse%203.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">The "pinhole effect."</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Now, I didn’t know a <i>thing</i> about Chiefland; it was
just a spot on the map. I certainly had no inkling one day there’d be such a
thing as the Chiefland Astronomy Village there or that I’d spend many a night
under the stars on a Chiefland observing field. All I knew was it was on
Highway 19/98, Highway 98 could be picked up right across the Bay, and the map
I got at the Gulf Station indicated there were motels there. <i>What if…what if…<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What if I got in my 1962 Ford Galaxie and
headed for Chiefland to observe the eclipse?</i> Hell, maybe even to take
pictures of it. <b>It would be a real eclipse expedition just like the pros did!</b><o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">While I had enough money saved up from my various endeavors—mostly
lawn mowing—to pay for gas and maybe even enough for a cheap motel room, one
impediment remained—the old man. OK, no use holding back; <i>nothing to it but
to do it</i>. I apprised <b>W4SLJ </b>of my plans for the eclipse expedition.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">His reaction? I feared it would be the same as the previous month, when I’d
asked if I could borrow $24.95 for a Gotham Vertical antenna for WN4NNF: “Daddy," I'd said, waving a copy of <i>73 Magazine</i> under his nose, "It says right here in the ad it will let me work plenty of DX!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal">I was correct. When I paused for breath THIS TIME after pouring out my eclipse plans, he gave a me a look that indicated he was momentarily
speechless and/or concerned his peculiar young son had finally taken complete leave
of his senses. He grabbed me by the shoulder and led me outside to the driveway
where my prized Galaxie was parked.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“For crying out loud, you are going to drive six or eight
hours on Highway 98 <i>with this?</i> Look at those tires!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m surprised when you go into the gas
station and ask for a dollar’s worth that the attendant doesn’t ask ‘Gas or
oil?’ <i>No</i>. I’m guessing you wouldn’t get halfway there. And I’d have to take
a day off work to come and retrieve you and figure out what to do with this—<i>junker</i>.”
Said he, looking over at my poor Ford and shaking his head. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">To soften the blow, he patted me on the shoulder. “Sorry
coach. That’s the way it is. Say, you want to put up an HF vertical? Let’s <i>build</i>
you one. I’ve got some aluminum tubing here somewhere, and we’ll put together a
loading coil.” <i>And that was that</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I was frankly embarrassed I’d troubled the OM, who usually maintained a calm if serious demeanor indicative of his European heritage. I imagined daddy was a
lot like Enrico Fermi must have been. Yes, I was embarrassed and had no intention
of bringing the subject up again. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The coda on the big spring eclipse of 1970? The OM was
mostly right. Oh, I still wonder if the Galaxie might not have made it there and back
in one piece…but it wouldn’t have made any difference. It was cloudy in Chiefland.
And it was cloudy up here on the Northern Gulf Coast. The way I remember it, I
didn’t get a glimpse of the eclipsed Sun that day.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The above somewhat bitter memory did pass through my mind at breakfast, but,
on the other hand, no eclipse I’ve ever actually been able to see has, yes, failed to move
me. Anyway, I was brought back to the present by the excited chirping of my
fellow ops about the cardboard box solar viewers they had ready to go—I’d
printed instructions on safe solar viewing and plans for a pinhole viewer in
the radio club’s weekly newsletter. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I looked at my watch. 9:30 had come and gone and the eclipse
would begin at 10:37. I announced we’d all better get a move on, and we headed for the doors nearly <i>en masse</i>—no doubt to the astonishment of the Whataburger crew.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Back home, I couldn’t deny it; a bit of the ol’ eclipse
fever was setting in. If you want heresy, lunar eclipses have always meant more
to me than solar ones. <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2014/12/a-tale-of-two-eclipses-and-merry.html">Maybe because of the events surrounding a memorable one early in my astronomy career.</a> But, like the ops had said, <b>“’NNF, it’s an eclipse!”</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Having not prepared in advance for this one,
there wouldn’t be any fancy telescopes or cameras. I grabbed my humble 80mm
SkyWatcher refractor, <a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2010/11/">Eloise</a>, and headed for the backyard. I plunked her down
on the driveway in a spot with a good view to the east, slapped the Thousand
Oaks solar filter over her objective end, and was ready. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilt0eatf1b04-yTJ4sdGZUBmXJHbL3DUX6yvpis_h6yCBKgaa35TLVlK4Ch1uxn1alud1MM8Bs7sHsslW1TzuPDjfbdnWOiv8y1R-ZD8EZXXorSrpU4xrs07u07kCnucmdC-Isxepd007tK69NTrpg9PfhWZy1bjJwfiE-NK4JT5rgFd6LPiQ8mQ/s3024/eclipse%20for%20fb.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1692" data-original-width="3024" height="224" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilt0eatf1b04-yTJ4sdGZUBmXJHbL3DUX6yvpis_h6yCBKgaa35TLVlK4Ch1uxn1alud1MM8Bs7sHsslW1TzuPDjfbdnWOiv8y1R-ZD8EZXXorSrpU4xrs07u07kCnucmdC-Isxepd007tK69NTrpg9PfhWZy1bjJwfiE-NK4JT5rgFd6LPiQ8mQ/w400-h224/eclipse%20for%20fb.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">iPhone 14 Sun.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>And soon it began, Luna creeping across the solar disk. As partial
eclipses go, this would be a good-looking one. We are at a time of high solar
activity here in Cycle 25. It’s been wild for months, and we are not at max yet—some
fellers are saying this solar cycle might rival the legendary Cycle 19 for activity.
That meant the solar disk was peppered by sunspots including one impressively large
group. I reckoned it would be especially purty in a hydrogen alpha scope. Alas,
your stingy Unk doesn’t have one of those. The Thousand Oaks filter did produce
a beautiful yellow-orange Sun, however. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What was it like? <i>Yes, any solar eclipse is an experience</i>,
one that isn’t duplicated by looking at photos of one. For one thing, looking
at the Moon blotting out the Sun always gives me a real feeling for the depth
of the sky. The Moon, our nearby pal, passing in front of far more distant Sol…I
almost get a feeling of vertigo and the view in the eyepiece seems to assume almost
the look of 3D.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Feeling that semi-vertigo, I pulled away from the eyepiece
for a moment and thought, “Hell, this is a GOOD ONE. Oughta take a picture.”
How? Just with my cell phone. I recalled I’d purchased a smartphone mount, a
plastic widget that clamps your phone onto an eyepiece, to use when I was writing
a <i>Sky &Telescope</i> Test Report on a SkyWatcher reflector and ran inside
to fetch it. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">With a little fiddling, I got the iPhone 14 set up and
starting taking little snapshots. I didn’t expect much, just a souvenir of the
day, but the iPhone 14 Pro Max does have a surprisingly good and versatile
camera as phone cameras go, and I was able to get a couple of OK snapshots
despite my excited fumbling. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">With eclipse maximum upon us, I ran inside to get Miss Dorothy
so she could have a look (and also document Unk’s <i>uber</i>-simple setup). Soon that eerie semi-twilight that comes with a deep partial eclipse set in, and the world was silent and still for a while. And we looked and we looked and we looked until the Moon passed on in her timeless
path. It was a good one y’all and I was happy to have seen it. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Next time:</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Shortly, I should have finished my yearly M13 image quest (I would have done
that this evening but for dratted clouds moving in in advance of a mild front).
So that will—knock on wood—be my subject next edition. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-59207887891022702122023-09-30T15:15:00.039-05:002024-01-26T14:36:02.315-06:00Issue 596: My Favorite Star Parties<p> </p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYZW9nC4A1xSSNMAMrpJwsIvaw2HrH8tT7SBqpoorV9TGstPqsw4kFsi7EdtoHoO2OFxhTD7T-1pavlUFwDp3vOIoiw1GGAXbKuvKNOIvEfQbyQy8mnYQnYw3HZpN0OvuVV68eknp6nA9ZNy3oyHGqvJjzfV2PyeML6HZM3WVgJM8UwlIa9Qh2NA/s600/dorothy%20and%20friend.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="403" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYZW9nC4A1xSSNMAMrpJwsIvaw2HrH8tT7SBqpoorV9TGstPqsw4kFsi7EdtoHoO2OFxhTD7T-1pavlUFwDp3vOIoiw1GGAXbKuvKNOIvEfQbyQy8mnYQnYw3HZpN0OvuVV68eknp6nA9ZNy3oyHGqvJjzfV2PyeML6HZM3WVgJM8UwlIa9Qh2NA/w430-h640/dorothy%20and%20friend.jpg" width="430" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Miss Dorothy and Friend, 1994...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>This one was <i>intended</i> to recount my efforts taking my
traditional yearly astrophoto of the Great Globular, M13 in Hercules, y’all. That
didn’t happen. It wasn’t weather that prevented it, but equipment snafus.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’ll learn more about that in the near future,
muchachos. But as you know, sometime back I swore <b>I would not let a month pass without a fresh article for the Little Old Blog from Possum Swamp</b>.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What did I start thinking about as I was pondering what to
write about here? <i>Star parties</i>. Why? Well it is definitely and obviously
the fall star party season in the Northern Hemisphere. There was more to it
than that, however. <b>Mostly, how much I miss the star party experience</b>. I
haven’t been to one in, oh, about four years.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>“Whyzat, Unk, whyzat, huh?”</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A couple of reasons, Scooter. The biggest one
being <i>covid</i>. 2020 wasn’t any year to gather with a bunch of people even
if you tried to keep your distance. 2021 wasn’t either. 2022, the supposed last year of the plague? I had a <i>relatively </i>mild case late that year and I am not anxious to get it again. But… </p><p class="MsoNormal">I sure got sick of the fracking lockdown and am glad to be back teaching undergraduates in
person. Dorothy and I made it through this year’s big Huntsville Hamfest no problem…so, what's to worry? Yes, I can still get skittish about crowds. But I think that is <i>psychological </i>more than anything
else, and I can shake it off as I did at Huntsville.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That ain’t all that’s kept me off the star party trail, though.
A combination of health issues and me getting older is maybe
more the reason I haven’t been back to an observing field than fear of the covid
cooties. Miss Dorothy and I made a short trip the other day, to Biloxi,
Mississippi, and I realized <b>I was just…I dunno…<i>hesitant </i>about driving I-10. I
felt shaky behind the wheel. </b>Of course, that is probably just that I haven’t
driven long distances much thanks to the combination of retirement and the virus. I’m thinking I
could get more comfortable with it again—though never like in the days
of my two-hour daily Interstate commutes.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Anyhow, thinking about these things just naturally led me
to thinking about the wonderful star parties I’ve attended</b>. I became a
regular at the game about 30 years ago. Oh, I’d been to a couple before that,
but wasn’t a regular star-partier. By the 2000s, though, I was <i>star party crazy</i> and
you could find me on observing fields from sea to shining sea, both observing the sky and speaking before the assembled multitudes. In fact, I did
so many star parties as a speaker in 2016 that a dear friend said in retrospect that that long spring and summer
was <i>Uncle Rod’s Farewell Tour.<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Maybe, maybe not. I am thinking about the Deep South Star
Gaze in November</b> as a way of dipping my toe back in—we shall see. And who
knows what the new year will bring? I know I’m interested in going again. <b>But
I will only go if I want to. If I know it will be fun. <o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Be that as it may, over the years I have naturally accumulated
some favorites when it comes to star parties, and I thought I would share them
with you this morning. As in the old series of articles, <i>My Favorite Star
Parties</i> I ran for a long time, “favorite” doesn’t necessarily mean “<i>best</i>.”
Sometimes it does…but mostly these are the ones where your ol’ Unk just had him a
Real Good Time.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2009/09/cloudy-nights.html">Deep South Regional Star Gaze</a><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This event is still ongoing, now being called the “Deep
South Star Gaze.” So why do I refer to it by its older name? I’ve had good
times at this Mississippi/Louisiana event for three solid decades, but I
believe I loved it best when it was in its original home at beautiful Percy
Quin State Park near McComb, Mississippi. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Why is this one of my great ones?</b> I’ll fess up that
is mostly because it was the first star party I went to with my beautiful new
bride, Miss Dorothy, way back in 1994. But that’s not the only reason. Another
is it is <i>focused</i> <i>on observing</i>. Oh,
there’ve been talks and occasional contests over the years, but what everybody
is out for at this star party is <b>observing</b>. It’s also that I’ve been so
many times over the years my fellow attendees have become genuine friends. I
will also admit it’s also been wonderful to have a good star
party just around the corner, less than three hours from home. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">How is it now? <i>I’ll just have to go to find out, won’t
I?</i> While the star party is in its fourth home, and while I still miss Percy
Quin, I admit I have had terrific times at all of the DSRSG’s locations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Stay tuned…<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2015/11/nights-of-living-star-party.html?m=0">Chiefland Star Party</a><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgM60auiuAnlr0PMMOczbW2nad_gpIZYbeFFD3qR3ADdaZ2l9R_fmhjqAG76IZJ1uf7MMp0KFMJiBIxD1N27BLCg8_3PoA_BpOIvy_WMwP_0zl3UkmT5i6JYJCz2_5PciYIBDoGmNKOIWN7uVe_IpVckr2eglugNaKCDBboz9RsOnsDZmlDT-YrHQ/s640/chiefland%20redux.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="427" data-original-width="640" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgM60auiuAnlr0PMMOczbW2nad_gpIZYbeFFD3qR3ADdaZ2l9R_fmhjqAG76IZJ1uf7MMp0KFMJiBIxD1N27BLCg8_3PoA_BpOIvy_WMwP_0zl3UkmT5i6JYJCz2_5PciYIBDoGmNKOIWN7uVe_IpVckr2eglugNaKCDBboz9RsOnsDZmlDT-YrHQ/w400-h268/chiefland%20redux.jpg" width="400" /></a></b></div><b>This one is long gone.</b> Oh, various people have tried
to revive it a time or two. And a semi-Chiefland was held fairly recently when
a hurricane caused the Winter’s Star Party’s usual home to be unavailable one
year. I will make no bones about it:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i>I loved the
Chiefland Star Party</i>. Expansive observing field. Motels and (good)
restaurants close at hand. Often outstanding skies. Hell, they had wireless
internet on the field <i>years</i> ago.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The straight poop on Chiefland? It was held year after year
in the first decade of this new century at the Chiefland Astronomy Village
near, natch, Chiefland, Florida. Other folks loved it, too, for the above
reasons, and also for the incredible friendliness and welcoming attitude of the
CAV residents. Maybe we loved it <i>too</i> much. The attendance became so
large it overwhelmed the facilities (like porta-potties) and caused various headaches
for the residents. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In addition to the WSP year, there’ve been several revivals
of the CSP. In fact, I was at one of the last organized ones. But…while it was
a good enough star party…it just wasn’t the same. How could it be? The original movers and shakers
at Chiefland have like all of us grown older. <b>Billy and Alice Dodd</b> are
gone, have passed away. My old friend <b>Carl Wright</b> has left us as well.
Others, like <b>the heart and soul of Chiefland, Tom and Jeannie Clark</b>, moved away
years ago. I’m thinking I’ll have to be content with my memories. I won’t lie,
though:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If somebody decided to put on
a CSP in the old mode, your Uncle would be SOUTHBOUND. <b><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2012/07/my-favorite-star-parties-texas-star.html">Texas Star Party</a><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzNoJ0DXvWtzvTuN8XyEnaf7DgkuKG_sLLF4ElsAh4lSpTfF7oiqVOPMh6o9mt3Z76LcaHpf6Uyumvop0eHp0mxfQI9JAyqX2qSLACPGiQfPHGQa1FCzmxFGJU8Pv8pTrXPaSMI5aAxGZH_ktHKnSxcwskMAipJBa5W9URLz17GKbK4rTJhxWUNw/s640/tsp01%2018.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="464" data-original-width="640" height="290" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzNoJ0DXvWtzvTuN8XyEnaf7DgkuKG_sLLF4ElsAh4lSpTfF7oiqVOPMh6o9mt3Z76LcaHpf6Uyumvop0eHp0mxfQI9JAyqX2qSLACPGiQfPHGQa1FCzmxFGJU8Pv8pTrXPaSMI5aAxGZH_ktHKnSxcwskMAipJBa5W9URLz17GKbK4rTJhxWUNw/w400-h290/tsp01%2018.jpg" width="400" /></a></i></div><i>There’s got to be a number one in everything, ain’t
there?</i> There are other events that might lay claim to the title of “The
Greatest” when it comes to star parties, like Stellafane or the (now gone)
Riverside. Most active observers will admit, however, that when it comes to
deep sky pedal-to-the-metal, The Texas Star Party is it. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">How could it not be? Where is it? Near <b>Fort Davis Texas</b>.
Where is that? Go west till you almost run out of Texas. There’s little there
other than the picturesque town of Fort Davis, McDonald Observatory, and, yeah,
the Prude Ranch. Sometimes it doesn’t rain for months and months. The dude ranch
where the event is held is dark, oh, it’s <b><i>real dark</i></b>, folks. It’s
so dark the sky is that dark gray color it assumes when there is no light
pollution. The Prude Ranch is also very nice, the food great, and if you want
to meet the big names in amateur astronomy, you will meet them there. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I am proud to say I was at Prude Ranch twice (as an
unassuming attendee, not a speaker or anything). It was wonderful. I’ll never
forget it. I haven’t been back, though<i>. It’s such a long way.</i> When
Dorothy and I were at the height of our careers, there wasn’t time. Now that I’m
retired? As above, the idea of that long of a trip on crazy I-10 is a
non-starter with <i>moi</i>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2016/09/on-road-iii-almost-heaven-star-party.html">Almost Heaven Star Party</a><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMEvZdmcnggBu9Ysy-2Nqm8esgUJMaFAaGP3ko-zc3Y5BMgUqMn429VAimRl0xKR4l1VbfZAJRBeSCDKBC9ZoFLmvzh-tkKdMqiDALpKUjzQduIhvMXt7emi9Urts6kPheyxHVw-33Bj27xlUft8IEvADrkOHPtZgMKDe8tNJdE_-jgoD4QjP3nw/s640/ah%201.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="640" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMEvZdmcnggBu9Ysy-2Nqm8esgUJMaFAaGP3ko-zc3Y5BMgUqMn429VAimRl0xKR4l1VbfZAJRBeSCDKBC9ZoFLmvzh-tkKdMqiDALpKUjzQduIhvMXt7emi9Urts6kPheyxHVw-33Bj27xlUft8IEvADrkOHPtZgMKDe8tNJdE_-jgoD4QjP3nw/w400-h300/ah%201.jpg" width="400" /></a></b></div><b>If you haven’t heard of this one, you should have. </b>It’s
another Real Dark One with outstanding facilities. It is held on Spruce Knob
Mountain in West Virginia, at the Mountain Institute facility there. Do you
long for dark, <b>DARK</b> skies (only compromised, of course, by our weather
east of the Mississip)? Do you want to sleep in a wooden yurt? Hear great
speakers? <i>Go. Just go. You’ll thank me later. <o:p></o:p></i><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I have been at Spruce Knob many times thanks to the kindness
of a couple of sets of organizers (associated with Washington DC’s outstanding
NOVAC) who had me up as a speaker. God knows why they’d want to hear your silly
Uncle more than once, but I’m glad they did. I would dearly love to go back. As
with TSP, what has prevented me post-pandemic is my physical ailments brought
on by the accident I had in 2019. An airplane ride from the ‘Swamp to DC (and a
car ride from there to West Virginny) just doesn’t seem doable. Well, it <i>hasn’t</i>
seemed so. Maybe next year will be different. Sure hope so…<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Five Star Final<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Those are my big four, y’all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But there are other greats, some of which I
only got to experience once. <b>The Idaho Star Party</b> is sure one. Dark, I
mean CRAZY dark—topped off by folks who instantly became friends. One of the
nicest times I’ve ever had and another of the friendliest groups I’ve encountered
is the <b>Miami Valley Astronomical Society (in Ohio, not Florida), who put on
the Apollo Rendezvous</b>. You want to get out of the heat, meet some great observers,
and experience truly dark skies? Try the North Woods Starfest (Chippewa Valley
Astronomy Society) in Wisconsin. Their star party at Hobbs Observatory is just….well,
<b><i>it’s fab, y’all, fab, I tell you. <o:p></o:p></i></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Next time?</b> Keep your fingers crossed for Unk to get
some hours with M13…<o:p></o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-44712162864517678982023-08-29T16:15:00.004-05:002023-08-29T16:15:54.933-05:00Issue 595: A New Way to Autostar Part II<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtI9aFa3-ztVB_an2qu6XWHfOVpp2hIDFgNbnay4d72Mn7hwq_3NwQE0US5SvA43HUWAhgtNm_PDepnn5YMyQlTC9YxB_mJu8CA3GgnQ8hWlLGrnB4LmiDsKtAjzyMmIBXiD4CUcIK7XTIwJYj0PkmKKv9A9YBJqbw85uVW-eVppUD3Y7px23lDg/s4032/010.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtI9aFa3-ztVB_an2qu6XWHfOVpp2hIDFgNbnay4d72Mn7hwq_3NwQE0US5SvA43HUWAhgtNm_PDepnn5YMyQlTC9YxB_mJu8CA3GgnQ8hWlLGrnB4LmiDsKtAjzyMmIBXiD4CUcIK7XTIwJYj0PkmKKv9A9YBJqbw85uVW-eVppUD3Y7px23lDg/w480-h640/010.JPG" width="480" /></a></div>Well, muchachos, <i>don’t
ever say your old Uncle doesn’t love you</i>. It was hot—90F well after
sunset—it was humid. There was a bad something brewing out in the Gulf.
Nevertheless, I did not shy from the accomplishment of my goals. I wanted to
get out and finish testing <b>Digital
Optica’s</b> new <a href="https://digital-optica.square.site/product/autostar-bluetooth-adapter/7?cs=true&cst=custom">Bluetooth module for the Meade Autostar</a>.
Secondly, I have resolved not to let a single month go by without an update to
this here old blog, so I had to <i>do</i>
something so I could <i>write about</i> something.<p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So it was on one recent passable, though far from good,
evening I got my ETX125PE, Miss Charity Hope Valentine, out into the backyard.
No, the sky wasn’t good <i>at all</i>. A
gibbous Moon was shining bravely in the east, but one look at her and I knew
there was a layer of haze encompassing at least that part of the sky. And despite Sweet Charity not being much of a handful to set up, I was sweatin’ by
the time I was done getting her on her tripod. I quickly retired to the den to
cool off and await darkness. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As those of y’all who’ve observed with me know, however,
when there is observing on the menu your old Unk tends to get <b>Go Fever</b>. I fidgeted on the couch for a
while, tried to watch the boob tube (<i>Ahsoka</i>),
then went back outside to Charity to see how things was a-goin’.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">They were going just a mite <b><i>slow</i></b>. Yes, here at the tail-end
of August it is getting dark a little—a little—earlier, but we won’t see much
improvement on that score till dadgum Daylight Savings Time ends. So, I fiddled
around, repositioning the eyepiece case, opening it up and looking inside to
make sure my fave 1.25-inch ocular was still in there (<a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2013/03/my-favorite-star-parties-deep-south.html">a Konig I’ve had for almost 30 years</a>), and taking an occasional gander at
the sky. I didn’t like the way it
looked, but reckoned it was better than nuthin’. I did precious little
observing last month, and August has been even worse in that regard. One good
thing: It has been strangely dry the
last few weeks and there were no skeeters buzzing.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Maybe it was thinking about that Konig that somehow led me
to ruminating on my long-ago Chaos Manor South nights. Those who haven’t been
with this here blog for long might not know what “Chaos Manor South” is (or
was). Well, it was the old Victorian Manse where Unk lived with Miss Dorothy
from the time of our marriage till about a decade ago, when Unk retired and he
and D. decided they no longer needed the space the stately manor offered, nor wanted
to do the upkeep it required.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6gPLSl-kSBTrlLy-eLNgTRhr2RBux42CzWEW3QVM3xC4nAAYqthvJ7TJ8celsWXqZEq6oqtrMO0sIJyr7LVZXxV1wlZ9ZrHZMO5dOUkLk-qAtpA798HdEQjtpKozFQJNykROCFpjzFYFmYtFkIpCG51KFe8lcxaRSNnlSYFZdLuJIS_XozAmvJQ/s4032/004.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6gPLSl-kSBTrlLy-eLNgTRhr2RBux42CzWEW3QVM3xC4nAAYqthvJ7TJ8celsWXqZEq6oqtrMO0sIJyr7LVZXxV1wlZ9ZrHZMO5dOUkLk-qAtpA798HdEQjtpKozFQJNykROCFpjzFYFmYtFkIpCG51KFe8lcxaRSNnlSYFZdLuJIS_XozAmvJQ/s320/004.JPG" width="240" /></a></i></div><i>Oh, those long-ago nights under the stars in an urban
backyard! </i>Yes, the light pollution was heavy. The Milky Way was utterly
invisible—well you might catch the merest glimpse of it on a cold and clear
December’s eve. I <i>could</i> make out M31
naked eye on any reasonable night, but that was as good as it got. <i>I didn’t care</i>. I was in astro-heaven. As
recounted <span style="color: red;"><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2011/06/big-one.html">here</a></span>, not only had the lovely Miss
Dorothy recently come into my life, so had <b>Old
Betsy</b>, a 12-inch Meade StarFinder Dobsonian. She was the largest telescope
I’d ever owned, and I was amazed at what and how much I could see with her from
downtown Possum Swamp. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>An evening of
observing would begin with me dodging cats. </i>Chaos Manor South’s resident
Siamese cat (and queen, she thought), <b>Miss
Sue Lynn</b> would watch as I began to gather the things I needed for an
observing run and would resolutely insist I needed her help. I had a horror of
her wandering off in the dark. And being downtown, there was enough traffic to
make that a real hazard for her. So, I’d bribe her with a can of Fancy Feast
and somehow try to get that enormous old OTA outside before she wised up (in
those days, Betsy was still in her original Sonotube body, and it was like
wrestling with a water heater).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">With Old Betsy in our small urban backyard, what else did I
need? The observing table (a TV tray) held the very same old black plastic Orion
eyepiece box full of 1.25-inchers I had outside with Charity on this evening.
Inside it? Some treasured Plössls from Orion and Vixen, the utterly horrible
“Modified Achromats” that shipped from Meade with Bets (why I didn’t just toss
them in the trash I don’t know—<i>that</i>
bad), and of course, that lovely 17mm Konig I bought at the 1993 Deep South
Regional Star Gaze.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This was long before I began using a laptop computer in the
field with a telescope. At the time, a laptop was still an expensive thing. It
gave me the heebie-jeebies to think about subjecting one to Possum Swamp’s
dew-laden night air. I <i>was</i> using a
computer (a genu-wine IBM 486) for amateur astronomy though. I’d print out charts from
two of the greatest astro-programs there ever were: <b>David Chandler’s <i>Deep Space 3D</i>,
and Emil Bonanno’s <i>Megastar</i>.</b> Both
are more or less forgotten relics of the amateur astronomy past (DS3D never
even made the transition from DOS to Windows), but both could produce very beautiful, very
detailed, very deep printed charts. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">You might think it funny I’d need detailed charts for a
light-polluted urban sky. But in those days, they were actually more valuable
to me there than they were under dark skies. As you know, higher magnification
tends to spread out light pollution, revealing objects that might be invisible
at lower powers. Often, I’d star-hop in an area like the Virgo Cluster with the
main scope. I would, as I called it, <i><b>eyepiece
hop</b></i> with my treasured 12mm Nagler Type II and those DS3D or <i>Megastar</i> printouts.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjX5DXTam_ay-Vib228tzcGCwi-nR20CmbUpiMUGFrEYKCE1pUQAtbNkmhff6_XZBTQvM4H4DVB4UfX34Z9kwJnPVdA3MB6CoOPbvvmgau55zU-266ZY8q-6QmaWNzB6rDquTjQNETrT4BPtN9qbr7lRkIDBuAm5wBUM0rS4ZTqQSFXSnmN1G91oA/s4032/005.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjX5DXTam_ay-Vib228tzcGCwi-nR20CmbUpiMUGFrEYKCE1pUQAtbNkmhff6_XZBTQvM4H4DVB4UfX34Z9kwJnPVdA3MB6CoOPbvvmgau55zU-266ZY8q-6QmaWNzB6rDquTjQNETrT4BPtN9qbr7lRkIDBuAm5wBUM0rS4ZTqQSFXSnmN1G91oA/s320/005.JPG" width="240" /></a></div>Of course, I needed wider field guidance—charts—as well.
What I used then was the old Desk Edition (black stars on a white sky) of the
esteemed Wil Tirion’s <i>Sky Atlas 2000</i>.
I’ve tried ‘em all, campers, e’en the vaunted <i>Millennium Star Atlas</i>, but I still do not think there is a better
tool for getting you in the general vicinity of your target than SA2000 Desk
(though the much more recent <i><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2016/02/do-you-like-jumbo-shrimp.html">Sky & Telescope Pocket Sky Atlas Jumbo Edition</a></i><span style="color: red;"> </span>is a close second).<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What else was out there with me as a slight chill descended on a
mid-autumn urban evening? If I was being serious, I had some blank observing
forms and a sketchpad, pencils, and pens to record what I saw of the urban sky.
Not so serious? Just my Orion astronomer’s flashlight (the yellow one
with—gasp—an incandescent flashlight bulb powered by two D-cells). Those were
the simple days, weren’t they? Of late, at least when it comes to backyard
astronomy, I seem to be pining for them. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And then… I’d just
pick a constellation in the clear from the huge old oaks that blocked much of it
and see how deep I could drill down. A typical project (I’ve always liked
observing projects)? Observe every single open cluster Betsy and me could see in
Cassiopeia (there are a <i>few</i>).
Whatever I looked at, it was <i>wonderful</i>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Said ruminations came
to a halt when I realized it was finally getting good and dark, and no matter
how much I missed The Old Way, it was time to concentrate on new-fangled stuff
like <b>Bluetooth</b>…<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Well, alrighty then. As I mentioned in Part I, the Digital
Optica Bluetooth Module is impressive. It snaps onto the bottom of the Autostar
hand paddle and honestly looks like it came out of the same factory that
produced Charity. Module plugged into the Autostar, and hand control cable
plugged into it and into Charity, it was time to get <b>aligned</b>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The ETX PE provides a semi-automatic goto alignment routine
that makes it a joy to use. Put the tube in home position (level and rotated
counterclockwise to the hard azimuth stop), turn the girl on, and she does a
little dance, finding north and level. That done, she heads for two alignment
stars, bright stars. You center them with the red-dot finder and in the main
eyepiece (I use an ancient Kellner equipped with crosshairs) and you are done.
Charity’s gotos were good all night, as I expected them to be, since she’d
stopped close to both alignment stars.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Next up, I went inside to fetch the laptop I’ve used for
astronomy the last several years. A nice Lenovo with a solid-state hard drive.
On said drive being more astro-ware than humans should be allowed to have. What
I intended to use on this summer night would be my favorite in my current
“simpler” days, <i>Stellarium</i>. It is
really a capable program now, containing many thousands of deep sky objects. It
certainly does everything this old boy can even dream of needing to do. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE9Jm3JRls2Rd5tGWbBVnqtVU2XvIeoz_5Z5ABonEABGvr4XERD7bs4MSbhNs1-9ZWpIlzdtGgOGMiWO1H3EK9Yh26CytC7Bj7h0zWcy23cf-1_p7krCOWdb5JK5GlfyqxCAXcIB_RvPAOlf69mO5GHF7f_ktN-A7aqHHo4PnJ8y8YrTtE1_raOA/s4032/009.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE9Jm3JRls2Rd5tGWbBVnqtVU2XvIeoz_5Z5ABonEABGvr4XERD7bs4MSbhNs1-9ZWpIlzdtGgOGMiWO1H3EK9Yh26CytC7Bj7h0zWcy23cf-1_p7krCOWdb5JK5GlfyqxCAXcIB_RvPAOlf69mO5GHF7f_ktN-A7aqHHo4PnJ8y8YrTtE1_raOA/w300-h400/009.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>As I said last time, use the instructions that came with the
Digital Optica module only as a rough guide when it comes to <i>Stellarium</i>. You don’t have to select the
module or Bluetooth from within the program. All you need do is pair the widget
to your computer just like you would a Bluetooth speaker or any other Bluetooth
device (you will find the Autostar module is called “ScopeAccess”).<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">With it successfully paired, the rest is duck
soup if you’ve ever used <i>Stellarium</i>
with a telescope. In <i>Stellarium’s</i>
scope-set up menu, establish an Autostar connection; you will see there is a
com port (like “com 3”) now associated with ScopeAccess. Choose that, click “connect,” and you should be, well, <i>connected</i>.
The <i>Stellarium</i> software is savvy
enough to establish a serial connection over Bluetooth for you; you don’t have
to know anything about any of that—thankfully. Once you are connected, the
scope is controlled exactly the same as if you had a serial cable between scope
and computer—no difference.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What is the bottom line on Digital Optica Bluetooth device? <b>It works. <i>It just works</i></b>. It never dropped out on me or did anything
funny. There were no delays when I’d choose an object in <i>Stellarium</i> and issue a goto command. If you didn’t know the scope
and computer were connected by radio, you’d think you had a serial cable
plugged in. I think that is the most praise I can give any observing tool—it
worked well, and it worked simply and transparently. Note that the module does
not require you to use <i>Stellarium</i>.
Any program you can connect to a telescope over a serial port should work just
fine. I just like <i>Stellarium</i>. It’s
pretty and it is cheap. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>“But what did you
look at, Unk? What did you <i>look</i> at,
huh?”</b> I looked at quite a few
things. Beginning with M3 and M13 and M53. <i>Which
almost ended my evening</i>. One gaze at the Great Globular in Hercules and I
near about threw the Big Switch, <b>“Hell, it don’t look worth a <i>flip</i> tonight.” </b>But then I thought back
to those ancient nights at Chaos Manor South. <i>What would I have done then?<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I knew the answer very well. I’d tell myself, <b>“Wait. Concentrate. Look some more. Spend
plenty of time with the object. Increase the magnification. Try a different
eyepiece. <i>You will only see if you look</i>.”</b>
Indeed, following those old strictures <i>I
began to see</i>. "Dang! There are some stars in M3! Wonder if I can pick up some
in M13 with a 5-inch on a punk night? Yep, takes 200x, but I’m seeing ‘em. M92? Stars, yay!” And so it went till
the night grew old (it did not grow cold, alas), and I had finally had enough
of the deep sky. Well, enough for one late August’s eve.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="line-height: 107%;"><i><span style="font-family: inherit;">As for the Digital Optica Bluetooth widget
(well, “module,” or “transceiver” if you prefer). It works. End of story. Game
over. Zip up your fly. If you think you’d prefer connecting wirelessly to the
scope rather than having a cord you will inevitably trip over for your Autostar
equipped Meade, just to get you one. The price sure is right.</span></i></span></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-6929409045540014172023-07-30T13:36:00.010-05:002024-01-20T17:15:33.009-06:00Issue #594: Telescopes I Have Known<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXwfq6yAtr_mONmrQnbO7aMbFvDsMRVhoDMiSH-LhmgcweTTDqQc2R3ulFLyRpgfczoEKIyIxM-zx8bW8_bSENKR86X1lX3-tg8ZsOkrDyiuUP7DMuJWdd6QUFOtv66n6uubuDXy00fmoSrr_B4f3AhEgfrqLSmYSx_P_kR8cPmj7pajsagVyt8Q/s800/betsy%20first%20light.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="529" data-original-width="800" height="424" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXwfq6yAtr_mONmrQnbO7aMbFvDsMRVhoDMiSH-LhmgcweTTDqQc2R3ulFLyRpgfczoEKIyIxM-zx8bW8_bSENKR86X1lX3-tg8ZsOkrDyiuUP7DMuJWdd6QUFOtv66n6uubuDXy00fmoSrr_B4f3AhEgfrqLSmYSx_P_kR8cPmj7pajsagVyt8Q/w640-h424/betsy%20first%20light.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>Well, Doggonit, Muchachos. I very much wanted to finish up
my review of the <b>Digital Optica Bluetooth Adapter for Autostar</b>. I
<i>intended </i>to, as a matter of fact. I even set Charity Hope Valentine’s (for newcomers, Charity is a <b>Meade ETX125PE</b>) tripod up in the backyard. Not only
was I gonna check-out the Bluetooth widget with <i>Stellarium </i>and other
programs, I was gonna do a mini tour of the late spring sky.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Yeah, I know it’s not spring anymore</i>. Admittedly, of late, Unk
sometimes don’t know what day it is, but he still (usually) knows what <i>season</i>
it is. Although spring 2023 is but a memory, and even summer is slowly
fading, the marvels of spring are still on display. Hell, Coma Berenices and Canes
Venatici are <i>very </i>well placed for early evening viewing (<b><i>early</i></b>
evening being a must for your aged Uncle).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Alas, ‘twas not to be.</b> Yeah, I’d set that tripod up
about 5pm every day, just as it was slowly, ever so slowly, beginning to cool
off this hellish summer. And, sure enough, in would come the clouds. Usually
great big dark ones festooned with lightning. And the Moon, a fat post-First
Quarter one, was back. And it was humid. And it was hazy. Sigh.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I will get to the Digital Optica adapter as soon as possible.
Given what little use I’ve been able to give it, it has impressed me. It will <i>not</i>
be used to revisit “The Tresses of Berenice” objects from Unk’s <i>The Urban
Astronomer’s Guide</i>, of course. More likely, we’ll be doing late summer DSOs
instead (if I’m lucky). Oh, well. So it goes here on the border of the Great
Possum Swamp. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I have resolved not to let a month go by without an
AstroBlog for y’all. <i>What would I write about, though?</i> I wasn’t sure.
Then it came to me: “Telescopes I Have Known,” a rundown of the instruments I’ve
used the past 30 (or so) years…something I thought y’all might find to be of at
least passing interest. <b>Nota Bene</b>:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These
aren’t <i>every</i> telescope I had in my hot little hands over the last three
decades—for a while there, I was quite the gear addict—these are the ones that
meant the most to me. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Coulter f/7 8-inch Odyssey<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOrF74ceuR5TUWC6ZuTJZWxZJVkHAHXY-7m4Ue9CbMtdYcPc5bd3aA23pQtdYuotxtBZEll5bZYAM3o69D7g0Je7t3SrJZ6uTnvALwJI3S3U8KIH4eb03tU9o5PSvR76GjgqUipwNU19ydUKB-ctzTwRr9e84Ve1khU3y0FY-AKe8tPtPhj9JwzA/s638/93%207.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="438" data-original-width="638" height="275" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOrF74ceuR5TUWC6ZuTJZWxZJVkHAHXY-7m4Ue9CbMtdYcPc5bd3aA23pQtdYuotxtBZEll5bZYAM3o69D7g0Je7t3SrJZ6uTnvALwJI3S3U8KIH4eb03tU9o5PSvR76GjgqUipwNU19ydUKB-ctzTwRr9e84Ve1khU3y0FY-AKe8tPtPhj9JwzA/w400-h275/93%207.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>At the time I bought the Odyssey, Unk was recovering from a
divorce and trying to save his pennies for a new C8. So how/why did I wind up
with a telescope from the old Coulter Optical? I was paging through an issue of <i>Sky
& Telescope</i> one evening after work when I came upon a new Coulter ad
(surprising, since they had been running the exact same one for years). For a new scope,
an 8-inch f/7 Dobsonian. <i>I simply couldn’t believe it</i>; <i>they said would
sell you a working telescope (with an eyepiece) for just over $200!</i> Impossible!
I was skeptical but couldn’t restrain myself from writing a check.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">They could and did sell me a complete 8-inch Dob, and it
didn’t even take that long to arrive (back in the glorious day, now-gone
Coulter was notorious for horrendously long delivery times). The telescope wasn’t
exactly pretty. She was awfully plain, in fact. Sonotube tube painted fire
engine red, a focuser made from plumbing parts, and a rocker box made of particle board
that appeared to have been cut with a chainsaw. That was about what I expected.
Coulter kept costs down by cheapening their scopes year by year.
Plain, she was. Would she be serviceable?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Indeed, she was, giving nice views of the Moon and planets.
Maybe not <i>quite</i> as exquisite as I hoped for from an f/7 reflector, but
certainly better than those of the other Coulter 8-inch, an f/4.5, I’d had the opportunity
to try one night. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A star test revealed
some turned-down edge, but not too bad, and wattaya want for 200 bucks?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> The Odyssey</span> did well on the deep sky from my club’s
old dark site on the Mississippi line. 30 years down the road, I still recall
how beautiful the Swan Nebula looked in the Odyssey one summer’s eve.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What became of Mabel (given that name in recognition of her plain
yet solid nature)? My brother-in-law in Colorado was without a telescope, and
all Mabel had done for years was gather dust in old Chaos Manor South’s <b>Massive
Equipment Vault</b>. So, way out west she went, where, I understand, she prospers
and thrives to this very day. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Meade StarFinder 12.5-inch Dobsonian<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Just when I had accumulated a few more dineros toward a C8, yet
<i>another</i> Dobsonian turned my head. Meade’s new 12.5-inch StarFinder Dob
was making a big splash in ads in the holiday issues of <i>Sky & Telescope</i>
and <i>Astronomy</i> that yule of ’93. She certainly wasn’t 200 bucks, but she
was still cheaper than any telescope in this aperture range I knew of other than
Coulter’s 13.1-inch Odyssey. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">One thing was sure, in the pictures at least, the Meade was
a lot purtier than the Coulter 13.1. Lovely gleaming white tube and rocker box.
A real rack and pinion focuser. A finder (the Coulter did not come with a
finder). A real secondary mount and spider (don’t ask what the Coulter had).
Once again, out the door went money meant for a new SCT.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">After ordering the StarFinder from Astronomics (an upgrade
package that included a couple of eyepieces and a 50mm finder), a long, <i>long
</i>wait ensued. <i>How long?</i> When I ordered the scope, I was single and expected
to stay that way. I wasn't e'en dating anybody. By the time the 12.5-inch arrived as August was running out in ’94, Miss
Dorothy and I were planning our wedding at Chaos Manor South!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In fact, the StarFinder arrived shortly before we were wed, and I
wasn’t able to get it under the stars until we returned from our honeymoon.
When I did, I was absolutely gobsmacked. I’d expected optical quality in the neighborhood
of what Coulter offered. One look at the Moon and Jupiter (followed by a star
test) showed she instead had an excellent, outstanding primary mirror.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“Old Betsy,” as the scope became known far and wide, was
with me many a long year and went to many a star party. She progressed from her
original Meade body to a lovely truss tube configuration (thanks to ATM, Pat Rochford),
and to a couple of upgrades—weight saving, better secondary, Sky Commander
digital setting circles, super-duper primary coatings. She was always wonderful
and <b>I used her till I couldn’t</b>, till she was too much for me and I passed
her on. <i>I shall say no more about Betsy lest I get choked up…</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Celestron Ultima 8<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgM0qeFcAExyO1rawqVH5U9X1hnMuXNxAX0tnGF3Qc0WxwgS0Gede_aa8zTuMBDhvGDqFNppP0E7J_x3Yfkoi-w3BLjnbHs-PvjekD3IwFoi6Aiv7USNTRWOPSLCs77JhpZCUKrJuAZk8z321j_QdhpZOSbQYWmih8sgrgMK6Ti15MSJ8ZELwK46w/s800/hp%2015%205.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="800" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgM0qeFcAExyO1rawqVH5U9X1hnMuXNxAX0tnGF3Qc0WxwgS0Gede_aa8zTuMBDhvGDqFNppP0E7J_x3Yfkoi-w3BLjnbHs-PvjekD3IwFoi6Aiv7USNTRWOPSLCs77JhpZCUKrJuAZk8z321j_QdhpZOSbQYWmih8sgrgMK6Ti15MSJ8ZELwK46w/s320/hp%2015%205.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>I loved Betsy…but…she would not fit in my car when I finally
upgraded to a grownup’s auto, a Toyota Camry. Oh, she would eventually, as
above, be converted to a truss configuration, but that was for the future. I
needed a scope to take to the <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2012/03/my-favorite-star-parties-mid-south-star.html">1995 Mid-South Star Gaze.</a>
One better than Mabel. <i>It was time for another SCT.<o:p></o:p></i><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The price for Celestron's top-of-the-line C8, the Ultima 8, seemed way high (hell, over
two-THOUSAND dollars), but Miss Dorothy counseled me to buy quality. I did, and
that paid off over the long run. She did need her drive repaired by Celestron
shortly after she was delivered, but that was the only problem I had with her
over more than 20 years of use. Quality was the word. Massive forks, Starbright
coatings, super heavy-duty rubber-coated tripod, same wedge Celestron used for
the 11 inch Ultima, PEC (whatever that was). <i>Celeste had it all.<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Perhaps the most notable thing about Celeste? She was the
telescope that brought me home to astrophotography after a multi-year layoff. <i>And
man was she good at it</i>, beginning with closeups and piggyback shots of
Comet Hale Bopp. She went with me to the Texas Star Party in ’97 to take pictures, and she was
the SCT who taught me electronic imaging with the Meade DSI and the <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2013/07/a-tale-of-two-cameras.html">SAC 7b</a><span style="color: red;">.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>What friends we were! </i>I did eventually dispense with
that huge fork and drivebase. As above, the Ultima had everything…<b>EXCEPT
GOTO</b>. I wanted that, and I was sick of wedges. So, I deforked Celeste and
we kept on trucking for many years with A Celestron ASGT CG5. Why did she leave?
After I got the Edge 800 (below), Celeste was not being used. Heck, if I still
had her, she <i>still</i> wouldn’t be used. I sold her and believe she want to
a good home. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Celestron Short Tube 80<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhF-QgyWJhqKL54jXXtCqY_XAopt9w56ethwuQ7-uOVqdfmdYNy4WSa4RHA3y0ttBFTgN1Bz55fseDmhBl4To56NFrcI_4byyByb5DGxVmzuiLcy4brwJ4wh9mQ9V6DyLI7rdpXQw84JuWMzkyOHG-qBhAg8tiCAnJ3_ur6rFSLnblcPH-dMwvPdA/s791/woodstock%20rd.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="791" data-original-width="500" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhF-QgyWJhqKL54jXXtCqY_XAopt9w56ethwuQ7-uOVqdfmdYNy4WSa4RHA3y0ttBFTgN1Bz55fseDmhBl4To56NFrcI_4byyByb5DGxVmzuiLcy4brwJ4wh9mQ9V6DyLI7rdpXQw84JuWMzkyOHG-qBhAg8tiCAnJ3_ur6rFSLnblcPH-dMwvPdA/s320/woodstock%20rd.JPG" width="202" /></a></div>How the heck did Unk wind up with a short focal length Chinese
achromat? Well, those telescopes, which were introduced to American observers
by Orion Telescope and Binocular Center as the <b>Short Tube 80</b>, were all
the rage in the late 90s. Pretty cheap as decent refractors went back then. Good optics for the price. Enormously wide
fields. The reason I wanted one, though, was
mostly <i>I needed a grab ‘n go. </i><o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">"Grab ‘n go" is a cliché in these latter days, I reckon. But a
scope I could easily get into the backyard and easily move around when I got
there was a must for me at Chaos Manor South.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I had to have a telescope I could move around to peer up through clear spaces between
the limbs of the Garden District's many ancient oaks. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I didn’t get the Orion, though. By this time, the Chinese
maker, a little outfit called “Synta,” was selling 80 f/5s to all comers, and
it turned out Celestron had one with a pretty black tube emblazoned with the Celestron
logo. I figgered it would look right fine piggybacked on Celeste. But…it also came
with a little GEM, an EQ-1 perfect for waltzing around Chaos Manor South’s
backyard. Oh, and a couple of decent eyepieces. All the better? A Celestron dealer,
Eagle Optics, was offering a special edition (their logo added to the tube) for
an amazing—at the time—price of just under 300 bucks. You got scope, mount,
eyepieces, and some other accessories for what Orion charged for just the tube
alone. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I had a tremendous amount of fun with Woodstock everywhere
from the backyard of Chaos Manor South to the Great Smoky Mountains, as you can
<a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2009/05/mother-of-all-chinese-scopes.html">read here</a>. I eventually passed the scope on (I
acquired a 66mm ED refractor that was frankly mucho better). But I have no
complaints about the little scope some have looked down upon then and now. I
still remember watching a double satellite transit on Jupiter, and then me and
Woodstock being back in the house and enjoying a glass o’ the Rebel Yell in
five freaking minutes. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>William Optics 80mm Fluorite Zenithstar</b></p>Gosh, by the time I finally got my paws on a genu-wine APO
refractor, they had been the rage for a long time. Unk was not any sort of a refractor
guy back in the first years of this new millennium, having been Schmidt
Cassegrain CRAZY for a long time. Suddenly everything changed; a beautiful little refractor made a believer outa me. Oh, I didn’t give up SCTs for visual use and planetary
imaging…but as the years rolled on, I got to where I didn’t want to use
anything <i>but</i> APO refractors for deep sky picture taking.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It wasn’t just the William Optics scope’s exquisite optics. I
named the scope <b>Veronica Lodge</b> in recognition of her high-toned build quality. This
80mm f/7 was the heaviest 3-inch scope I’d ever lifted. Tube, cell, dew shield,
focuser (especially), <i>just everything,</i> reeked of high quality and
convinced me it does make a difference. Great optics, not so great everything
else…<i>and you cannot have a great scope. <o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But, yeah, while the little 80 has amazed me with what she can
do visually from my suburban backyard, it’s imaging where she excels. At f/7,
the image scale is good, but the focal length is still short enough that
guiding is easy. Assuming you even <i>need</i> to guide. Ronnie is the only
telescope I have ever known where imaging isn’t just “easy”…she almost seems to
take pictures by herself. I still have and love this telescope.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Celestron NexStar 11 GPS<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO3M1ixLjOBZMJ4jwMN873_-hcNcsAjfwSltcNynGxYEZ5nhDLuf0G9Tuoieex_js0uMYpFv8yZk6k56oMK4mo6FuFaAwDMjFWRn34nOZfhppl1DVOVS_Cdr5gqQ4SSBLGBRFg1TdbTEfvSiiQem5UL8bFmHSXuwLe7WJn8BFKFR9kOFma30mLTg/s800/csp02%2012.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="603" data-original-width="800" height="241" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO3M1ixLjOBZMJ4jwMN873_-hcNcsAjfwSltcNynGxYEZ5nhDLuf0G9Tuoieex_js0uMYpFv8yZk6k56oMK4mo6FuFaAwDMjFWRn34nOZfhppl1DVOVS_Cdr5gqQ4SSBLGBRFg1TdbTEfvSiiQem5UL8bFmHSXuwLe7WJn8BFKFR9kOFma30mLTg/s320/csp02%2012.jpg" width="320" /></a></b></div><b>By 2003, I was more than convinced goto was the way to go</b>.
The way <i>I</i> wanted to go, anyway. I had been following the revival of
Celestron heralded by its release of the new goto NexStars, and, finally, the
NexStar 11 GPS. I came into some unlooked-for money from an inheritance, Dorothy
said “do it!” <i>and I did</i>. Soon enough, an enormous box was on the front porch.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">At first, I was afraid of Big Bertha. She was so
humongous I despaired of getting her safely on her tripod, even in alt-AZ fashion.
It took a little practice for me to become confident mounting the scope, but I did get confident, and could finally admire her:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>huge fork, beautiful CARBON FIBER tube,
futuristic NexStar hand controller, and a giant 2-inch diagonal on her rear port. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>I loved Bertha from the beginning</b>. She was perfection itself. The first few days after she came to live with us
at Chaos Manor South, I went around mumbling <i>“I have a C11…I have a C11…I
have a C11.”</i> Miss Dorothy sure did look at me funny. Bertha's GPS-fueled goto
was amazing—she would put any target I requested from horizon to horizon on the
tiny chip of my Mallincam Xtreme. Visually, she was just terrific. I can still see in
my mind’s eye all the wonders she presented to me at her first dark sky outing
at the Chiefland Astronomy Village one long-ago spring.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It was the beginning of a beautiful friendship. Maybe the
most notable thing about her? She was the telescope that allowed me to conquer 2500+
Herschel objects, to view all the wonders discovered by William and Caroline Herschel.
And to do that in just a few years. Stationed under a dark Chiefland sky, Xtreme
on her rear port, she’d <i>easily</i> bring home a hundred (or more) faint
fuzzies in an evening. She wasn’t the only telescope I used for the Herschel
Project, but she was the one I enjoyed using the most for it (including visually).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As my 60s wound down, alas, Bertha became a problem. She was
just too much. Getting her to the club dark site became not just <i>laborious</i>
but <i>dangerous</i>. She nearly messed up one of my knees when I was lugging her down the front steps of Chaos Manor South in her humongous case one afternoon.
I deforked her and put her on a nice Celestron CGEM…but eventually that
was too much, too. Her beautiful OTA now lives with my friend Charles, a
talented observer over in New Orleans. I sometimes miss her, but realize, she
would just be gathering dust here. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Celestron Edge 800<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTb68WW9cIj56T20lWfr5jINRnIZKaaQWmtcRcsUH8Im_iAk5ekdn48_d5QbFX_F0At2Kl3PHEk1yap_k956viKmRzuJ60Ov6cs4LInnXkkJmdR0ONwXuEBhRuW_9C_e5miuREbF-t_uH3Qpaj0jIY_ewGqyOlGYIYV2TkLY1kgE2KLhS6djaR2A/s640/ss11.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTb68WW9cIj56T20lWfr5jINRnIZKaaQWmtcRcsUH8Im_iAk5ekdn48_d5QbFX_F0At2Kl3PHEk1yap_k956viKmRzuJ60Ov6cs4LInnXkkJmdR0ONwXuEBhRuW_9C_e5miuREbF-t_uH3Qpaj0jIY_ewGqyOlGYIYV2TkLY1kgE2KLhS6djaR2A/s320/ss11.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>I was having a ball with Celeste on her CG5. If Bertha delivered
the lion’s share of Herschel Objects, that doesn’t mean Celeste didn’t make her
contribution to the Project, <span style="color: red;"><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2010/11/herschel-project-nights-15-and-16-380.html">including visually</a></span>.
However, in 2013 I retired, and thought I deserved a retirement gift from
myself, a <i>treat</i>. What could be more of a treat than updating the CG5
with Celestron’s new Advanced VX, and the Ultima 8 OTA with Celestron’s new Edge
800 (reduced coma/flat field) C8? <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What a lovely scope she has been (mostly). And what fun we
had on her first deep sky outing to the <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2013/05/the-herschel-project-nights-41-and-42.html">Deep South Spring Scrimmage 2013</a> (sans her defective AVX which had to be replaced
by Celestron). I had come to laugh at the idea an SCT’s images could be
described as “refractor like,” but Mrs. Emma Peel, my new Edge, changed my
mind. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Ten years down the road, the replacement AVX mount Celestron
quickly got to me has been great, guiding amazingly well and delivering
many astrophotos that have pleased me. Mrs. Peel? <b><i>Mostly good</i></b>,
but one big problem. Several years ago, I found the paint on the interior of
her tube was failing. I had to repaint her myself (I had no intention of shipping
her to Celestron at the height of the covid pandemic). A pain in the butt, but
I believe we are good to go with her excellent optics for many years to come. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>SkyWatcher 120 APO</b></p>When I let Bertha go, I was really quite sad. My sadness was
assuaged by this big SkyWatcher 120. This is the sought-after one these days. I
believe it is still available but is certainly not the bargain it was when I
got mine pre-covid. <b>This is the one with the beautiful and color-free FPL-53
doublet</b>. <i>I named here “Hermione” because she is magic. <o:p></o:p></i><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">She was and is beautiful. Her build quality is not up there
with what you’d get from William Optics but her price at the time was much more
doable than what a 5-inch class WO would have cost. No, her focuser isn’t a
monster, but it doesn't slip with my DSLR on it, even when I am pointed at zenith.
From her first big astrophotography outing at the Deep South Regional Star Gaze,
she has delivered the goods easily. <b>Nota Bene</b>:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While she was initially on my CGEM, I quickly
replaced that with a far more manageable (for me) Losmandy GM811!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Zhumell 10-inch Dobsonian<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHyiwJsZH10LVhwaoFqjC6njIKuVQyN0x-e1eIiVy-7RW1w0jYcDzt8dVxFh2YSuY1HzRIPS_b3HGhgd5FH_QpNNuCaJr1gHkDsOEWpJMiXJWMlICD0XT18YHlbCMQ13e593ibErjYaRgBI7VagFzDgkRhBusUj9MNgyHTyQm5QdKOQ9j1F7fpgQ/s640/021.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="640" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHyiwJsZH10LVhwaoFqjC6njIKuVQyN0x-e1eIiVy-7RW1w0jYcDzt8dVxFh2YSuY1HzRIPS_b3HGhgd5FH_QpNNuCaJr1gHkDsOEWpJMiXJWMlICD0XT18YHlbCMQ13e593ibErjYaRgBI7VagFzDgkRhBusUj9MNgyHTyQm5QdKOQ9j1F7fpgQ/s320/021.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>And so, we come ‘round to "simple" again. Zelda is not really much
different from the StarFinder and Odyssey of yore. Why did she come here? I missed
the aperture of Bertha and Betsy and thought I might be able to handle <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2015/05/the-zhumell-z10.html">this 10-inch GSO-made Zhumell Dobsonian</a>. Certainly, when I bought her in 2015 her low price—about 500 bucks delivered
with 50mm finder, two speed focuser, two eyepieces, laser collimator, and
cooling fan—was attractive. I soon had a new telescope in the house.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Zelda is a cut above the old StarFinder in several
ways. While her mirror is comparable in quality to that of the Meade, she has a
beautifully finished steel tube, an excellent 2-inch Crayford focuser, butter-smooth lazy Susan azimuth bearings, adjustable altitude balance, and a REAL
mirror cell (don’t even ask about the old Meade’s primary cell or what passed
for one). <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I can still handle Zelda without much trouble, and 10-inches
of aperture really helps in suburban light pollution. She has been to the club
dark site a few times, but I am thinking she deserves some real dark-sky time.
I have been ruminating about doing the Deep South Regional Star Gaze this autumn,
and if I do, I think I want to do it <b>simply</b>…no computers, no motors,
just a manual Dob and a star atlas…and that is just how Zelda rolls. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And we are out of space and time this Sunday. I really should have mentioned the <b>StarBlast</b>. Certainly, Miss Valentine should be in there. How about my beloved <b>80mm f/11 SkyWatcher</b>? Well, nothing says there cannot be a "Part II." Anyhow, thanks for indulging me in this trip down memory lane, and I
swear I will get out and do some actual observing soon. I hope….<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-26249194662948117572023-06-29T16:06:00.010-05:002024-01-26T15:00:43.505-06:00Issue 593: The Astronomer Looks at 70<p> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-margin-bottom-alt: 8.0pt; mso-margin-top-alt: 0in;"><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMozDwth_WZ-hZMCCl_6syabufB1O9s80d7MwveZS27KoBCjttH6N6AyDU0Ph0QF7aSNwTmRswOk56CH_zg-tf1_0Scoab6bTGj1BwW88yUIbghr_id622pTejQhhSds2DRIst7bViAVXmf59sEeVITwX7LKKZ6FJeH6r6X0Ah6L1xtJzqE83cbA/s640/adventures%203.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="418" data-original-width="640" height="261" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMozDwth_WZ-hZMCCl_6syabufB1O9s80d7MwveZS27KoBCjttH6N6AyDU0Ph0QF7aSNwTmRswOk56CH_zg-tf1_0Scoab6bTGj1BwW88yUIbghr_id622pTejQhhSds2DRIst7bViAVXmf59sEeVITwX7LKKZ6FJeH6r6X0Ah6L1xtJzqE83cbA/w400-h261/adventures%203.jpg" width="400" /></a></i></div><i>Mother, mother ocean, I have heard you call,</i><div><i>Wanted to sail upon your waters</i><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-margin-bottom-alt: 8.0pt; mso-margin-top-alt: 0in;"><i>since I was three feet tall.</i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-margin-bottom-alt: 8.0pt; mso-margin-top-alt: 0in;"><i>You've seen it all, you've seen it all.</i></p><div><i><o:p> </o:p></i></div>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-margin-bottom-alt: 8.0pt; mso-margin-top-alt: 0in;"><i>I
have been drunk now for over two weeks,<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-margin-bottom-alt: 8.0pt; mso-margin-top-alt: 0in;"><i>I
passed out and I rallied and I sprung a few leaks,<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-margin-bottom-alt: 8.0pt; mso-margin-top-alt: 0in;"><i>But
I've got to stop wishin',<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-margin-bottom-alt: 8.0pt; mso-margin-top-alt: 0in;"><i>Got
to go fishin', I'm down to rock bottom again.<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-margin-bottom-alt: 8.0pt; mso-margin-top-alt: 0in;"><i>Just
a few friends, just a few friends.<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">—Jimmy Buffet<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I did this ten years ago on my birthday, muchachos, took stock of me and that avocation, amateur astronomy, I’ve loved so well over the years. Why am I doing
it again? 60 just didn’t feel that momentous, not in
the way 50 had. And not much had really changed with me between 50 and 60. 70?
<b>That’s different. Way different.</b><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That summer I was 60, summer 2013, Unk carried on merrily as I
normally do. I was still chasin’ the countless faint fuzzies of the Herschel
Project, jaunting down to the Chiefland Astronomy Village at the drop of a hat.
And, having retired just three months before my birthday, I was really livin’ the
life. Well, or <i>so your old Uncle thought…</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">You are not reading this exactly on my birthday. I may
provide an update on the activities of my Big Day—such as it may be—three weeks
hence, but I am writing on this dadgummed subject today for two reasons. First, I kinda want <i>to get it out of the way</i>. </p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVPjrzsUYM1OTShunJGMqcc33M4h061kh2vZtsnyQdXJlPlrGCj7UVksKUHY_sOvv9zGkVuLG7NdLoFQZjrzWkZEcrdXVNLHlXsUsmU_YSA1B9wEoZM6Il9C1esErKIfbaMbrSdQhLoXoRZbU2aott7KvjT-o55u6EAMLaapRxECsmiftWZG-qLw/s320/60%2010.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="320" data-original-width="240" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVPjrzsUYM1OTShunJGMqcc33M4h061kh2vZtsnyQdXJlPlrGCj7UVksKUHY_sOvv9zGkVuLG7NdLoFQZjrzWkZEcrdXVNLHlXsUsmU_YSA1B9wEoZM6Il9C1esErKIfbaMbrSdQhLoXoRZbU2aott7KvjT-o55u6EAMLaapRxECsmiftWZG-qLw/w300-h400/60%2010.jpg" width="300" /></a></div>These days, we tend to laugh at 60<i>: “Man, it’s the new 50,
donchaknow!”</i> <b>But 70?</b> Comes
that, and you have to finally admit you are, yes, <b>OLD</b>. The toughest thing in the world for a baby-boomer? The acknowledgement that no matter how you slice it, your time onstage is
running out. Best, face-front on that and get it off Unk’s mind (such as it
is).<p></p><o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Secondly, I hope—<b>hopes I tells you!</b>—July will be a month of <i>observing</i>.
June was anything but. When it has not been cloudy or stormy (most often the
latter), it’s been <i>boiling</i> hot. Looking over at the weather station
readout here in the Batcave, I see the “real-feel” temperature is <b>114F</b>
right now. And, worse, it hasn’t been cooling off much at night. Oh, and while
it hasn’t been overwhelming, we here in Possum Swamp are getting some of the
smoke that has plagued our Yankee brothers and sisters. Not the sorta weather
that makes you anxious to haul a scope into the back 40, that’s for sure.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’m hoping this weather will pass, and I’ll be able to give
you Part II of the article on the <b>Digital Optica Bluetooth interface for
Autostar</b>. And maybe even do some deep sky touring with the ETX125, Miss
Charity Hope Valentine. After that? Gotta be Unk’s yearly M13. Need I say more?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Unk<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Hokay…nuthin' to it but to do it... What has the last
decade wrought concerning that rascal, your old Uncle Rod?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As above, following a great 60th birthday, which consisted
of mucho Rebel Yell, Mexican food, and gifts aplenty, Unk settled in to face another
decade of trips around our friendly G2V star. And that is just what he did at
first. Yep, <i>nothing changed</i>, just Unk continuing on his merry way. <i>Until he wasn’t.</i>
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Funny thing…the changes Unk experienced over the next years
came in with a comet and finally went out with one. What I experienced was
rather sudden. One night in early 2015 I was out in the backyard imaging Comet
Lovejoy, who was no Great Comet, but looked very good in the eyepiece and especially
in images. I was mindin’ me own bidness as the light frames rolled in when,
suddenly, it came to me: <i>“Hey, wait a minute! Where am I? Is this where I’m <b>supposed</b>
to be? How the hell did I get <b>here</b>?!” <o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In retrospect, I don’t believe my epiphany, if that is what
it was, had anything to do with the comet. I believe it was more a rather unlooked-for early retirement and a move out to the suburbs
where Unk was plunked down amidst a lot of other retirees. A change of scene
and a sudden feeling of “What comes now? <i>Nothing?</i>” threw me for a loop.
I had a rather rough year thereafter, but I had help, and to everybody who helped
me out of my midlife crisis (you know who you are), <b>THANK you!<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">During this time, it wasn’t like Unk gave up observing or
anything. In fact, a dear friend began calling 2016, “Uncle Rod’s farewell tour.” I was <i>everywhere</i> speaking at
star parties…<b>Maine in the northeast, West Viriginia in the east, Wisconsin in the far north, Oregon in the
west, and all points in-between</b>. And I didn’t just do star parties as an
astronomy writer and educator; I went as a “civilian.”</p><p class="MsoNormal">Or did until two whammies hit. The first was silly old Unk <i>falling
off the roof of (the new) Chaos Manor South</i>. I was up there adjusting an HF antenna and got to feeling a
little shaky. It was 2019 and I was “only” 65 going on 66, but I suddenly felt
like I was not up to scampering around on top of a house (much less a tower). I
climbed down, saying to myself, "Get one of your ham buddies to come help." If I’d
just left it there, all would have been well. Alas, Unk got to thinking
(disaster is always in the offing when he does <i>that</i>) “All the younger OMs have
to work. What if I can’t get anybody out here till the weekend? I left some
tools up there. Best get them down!”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Stupidly, instead of placing the ladder on the ground, it
was on the deck. I’d got away with that a bunch of times. Why should today be
any different? I got the tools and headed down. I put one foot on the ladder
and then the other. <i>Down went the ladder and on top of it went Unk to the tune
of about 15 feet.</i> To cut to the chase, I spent a week in the hospital and was convalescing for months. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And that was, to this point, the end of Unk’s star partying.
Turned out my “Farewell Tour” really <i>was</i> that. Or…you know what? <i>Maybe
not</i>. My old-time favorite local star party, <b>the Deep South Regional Star
Gaze</b> is coming up this fall, and <i>suddenly I want to go again</i>. Maybe.
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There are a couple of impediments to that, or even—sometimes—to
me observing in the ol’ backyard. I seem to have developed a rather strong and
unreasoning fear of falling in the dark. Maybe this isn’t logical, but it’s the
way I feel. Sometimes. I also notice I am very much less willing to bear the
cold. At 60F I feel uncomfortable indeed. And yet…and yet…the idea of observing
under the dark skies of Mississippi’s piney woods again has grabbed me in a big
way. We shall see. Till then I shall make do with the backyard.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>“But what was the SECOND WHAMMIE, UNK? WHAT WAS THAT?”</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The pandemic, of course, and <i>that</i> was <i>hell</i>.
As 2019 ended, I was feeling more like myself than I had in a long while. I told
more than one person, “You know, I FEEL YOUNG AGAIN!” I was at Heroes Sports
Bar and Grill Regularly, hoo-hawing till all hours.
Then <BOOM> we were all trapped at home for over a year. That didn't do a hell of a lot for my once formerly sunny <ahem> disposition. Indeed, I was afraid all those hours with little to do would bring on that more intense version of the blues, the MEAN REDS, but it didn’t.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1Pg1nNfWgb2FYV0cznawgsPX3gY50prBs4BxyIN0YGBfE1yFJB0XC7466E6iuyTE5zk1dsVuCbVrasnKMNNp-5kvgDn6K_yPHn42chKlAaCkk94Sl6Q1H2Ql5kMpZJxW8mJuAqhYb0S-8g8afhXT7cmkpYSZT9z3JQuXFJnkxwM49n1wExXB1zQ/s400/lil%20rod.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="291" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1Pg1nNfWgb2FYV0cznawgsPX3gY50prBs4BxyIN0YGBfE1yFJB0XC7466E6iuyTE5zk1dsVuCbVrasnKMNNp-5kvgDn6K_yPHn42chKlAaCkk94Sl6Q1H2Ql5kMpZJxW8mJuAqhYb0S-8g8afhXT7cmkpYSZT9z3JQuXFJnkxwM49n1wExXB1zQ/s320/lil%20rod.JPG" width="233" /></a></i></div><i>I was indeed over all that mess</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I didn’t fully realize it till the lockdown
was well and truly in the rearview mirror. Earlier this year, a night almost
exactly 8 years down the line from that strange evening with Lovejoy. I was out
having a look at the briefly loved “Green Comet,” C/2022 E3 ZTF, when it came to me, “Hey! <b><i>What the</i></b>—?! This feels like old times!
I feel just like MESELF AGAIN! <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The People<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">When I say there were plenty of people who helped me through
the doldrums those years ago, I include astronomy people in their number. Some of those I’ve
known in our wonderful avocation were instrumental in me righting my keel. But “people”
as in "astronomy club," my old astronomy club? <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Even before my minor existential crisis, I’d
pretty much given up on the Possum Swamp Astronomical Society. Oh, as the decade
of my 60s began, Miss Dorothy and I were still attending the monthly meetings.
Howsomeever, we eventually found we had to include a stop at the nearby
Applebees for drinks before the meeting to induce ourselves to attend.
Eventually, Miss D. was like, “The astronomy club meeting is tonight; are we
going to <b><i>that</i></b>?” Unk is very much a creature of habit, and I’d
been at PSAS meetings every month since 1993, but I finally had to say, “Nope.”
I put in a lot of years with the club. And by the past decade, the fact was I
wasn’t getting anything out of it. I shall just leave it at that. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I don’t know I am alone in that experience. I hear the
same from folks who were very much into the club scene for most of
their astronomy careers. The fact is, even more than amateur radio, our hobby
is aging. I don’t even want to think about the way the demographic skews now.
Clubs are mostly smaller and less active and less enthusiastic. Might a new
generation come in and revitalize astronomy clubs? Perhaps. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That oft-feared ground truth? The babyboom generation came
along at a special time, during the age of Apollo. A time when everybody was
space crazy, many wanted a telescope to see those wonders with their own eyes,
and wanted to hang out with those who shared their passion. I don’t see another
generation of people like that coming. Not in the numbers we had. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Gear<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Uncle Rod is the wrong person to ask about this. I have
pretty much eschewed new-fangled scopes and accessories. Hell, I wouldn’t know
an <b>ASAIR</b> (that everybody and their cat is mad for lately) from the window
air-conditioner in the Batcave. Oh, I exaggerate a bit. I do keep up mainly
through reviewing products for my <i>Sky & Telescope</i> Test Reports. If
it weren’t that, I’d be a real Luddite. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">If you are a regular reader, you know I thinned the scope
herd some years ago. Some of it I could no longer handle post-2019. And some of
it just wasn’t used anymore. What I am left with is two GEMs, an Advanced VX
and a Losmandy GM811; a small altazimuth mount; an Edge 800 C8, 5-inch, 80mm
and 66mm APOs; some nice achromats; Zelda, my 10-inch Chinese dob; and Charity
Hope Valentine; my ETX. Now that might sound like a lotta telescopes to you,
but trust me, it is <i>NOTHING</i> like the long-lost days of (the original) Chaos Manor
South. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The only new telescope that has come here in a very long
time is a very modest one indeed, Tanya, a<span style="color: red;"> </span><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2023/01/issue-588-uncle-rod-and-rescue-telescope.html">Celestron 4.5-inch Newtonian</a><span style="color: red;"> </span>I stumbled upon in a Goodwill store. <i>But I am content</i>. Even
after the cull, I have more telescopes than I use. What gets used most? Often,
it’s not a scope at all, but my time-honored <b>Burgess Optical 15x70 binoculars. </b><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Should I talk about telescope companies?</b> Things have not
changed much. Except that post-pandemic the crazy-low prices for scopes are,
like anything else, a thing of the past. I still can’t believe I got Zelda (a
10-inch GSO dob), two eyepieces (one a decent 2-incher), a laser collimator, a
cooling fan, a two-speed focuser, and a RACI 50mm finder <i>delivered</i> for 500
bucks. I don’t expect those days will come again, but telescopes are still quite
inexpensive. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">To be specific about telescope companies? Celestron is what
it is. They are a Chinese company with the strengths and weaknesses inherent in
that. Meade? They are in some sense an American company again, now being owned by
Telescope and Binocular Center (Orion) after a legal victory against Meade’s Chinese
masters (or really “master,” which was really, as I long thought, Celestron
owner Synta). They only make telescopes in Mexico, still, and most of their
gear is imported from China. But, yeah, a heartening sign. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5EOFk9idegqkRZt2560vO-PYJUwPcaplteCql6cGDY_TZeD8Nr-u8XdKgOTm3EJiSC9B03D8FYGqV4nQIO8TRpJqgj_2mXjkBnZyhPeLCfa-o-s9On9L1J8bnVEswIqwFTMMnMSgT0ko7I7Yh34OA0W9FEPv8C2yFSODLTAQxX7SCHtGGT7zxBA/s320/60%206.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="213" data-original-width="320" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5EOFk9idegqkRZt2560vO-PYJUwPcaplteCql6cGDY_TZeD8Nr-u8XdKgOTm3EJiSC9B03D8FYGqV4nQIO8TRpJqgj_2mXjkBnZyhPeLCfa-o-s9On9L1J8bnVEswIqwFTMMnMSgT0ko7I7Yh34OA0W9FEPv8C2yFSODLTAQxX7SCHtGGT7zxBA/s1600/60%206.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Certainly, other American telescope companies survived the
pandemic. Maybe the lockdown even gave a boost to ‘em. But Losmandy, TeleVue,
and Astro-Physics along with the other small caviar scope companies are still
chugging along. As I suspect they will as along as the demographic is large
enough to keep ‘em in bidness.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>And back to your Unk’s journey down the timestream</b>… <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>I’m 70, or soon will be, Lord willin’. </b>When I get up in the
morning, I feel every <i>bit</i> of that. The whistling past the graveyard of the
couple of years before the pandemic, the "I FEEL YOUNG!" stuff, is history. <i>But
you know what?</i> Yes, the pandemic changed <b>everything </b>and much not for the good.
But I feel OK. I am pressing on. I’ve got two more books under my belt. I continue
with <i>Sky & Telescope</i>, and next semester I am going to increase my
teaching load.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Hell, I may be over the hill, muchachos, but I am not quite
ready to give up, collapse, and roll down the opposite slope and into oblivion.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Excelsior!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p></div>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-33344687198905525112023-05-28T11:39:00.006-05:002024-01-26T15:02:07.257-06:00Issue 592: “A New Way to Autostar” or “Sweet Charity Combs the Tresses of Berenice” Part I<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFKUh6ILiDt_iJtoaLITYbGmcsrxYbhh0DbhRLqaencunhmbxLBoD3lL8mHnqgdZYYVMep5Sfhr-zW65Icb4RxLShH06bbIourfY7XblC4r7JRXNRsrD_ZWblUAQ9lUjGEZ0SG4euzLJ7hj5T849fzXMpr75Bb0I6yhQHkfkLZP7jIXq1ayh8/s4032/Autostar.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFKUh6ILiDt_iJtoaLITYbGmcsrxYbhh0DbhRLqaencunhmbxLBoD3lL8mHnqgdZYYVMep5Sfhr-zW65Icb4RxLShH06bbIourfY7XblC4r7JRXNRsrD_ZWblUAQ9lUjGEZ0SG4euzLJ7hj5T849fzXMpr75Bb0I6yhQHkfkLZP7jIXq1ayh8/w480-h640/Autostar.jpg" width="480" /></a></div>Well, muchachos, as is frequently the case of late, this is
not what I intended this installment of the Li’l Ol’ AstroBlog from Possum
Swamp to be about. What I had in mind was—<i>never mind;</i> I’ll surprise
y’all another time. Anyhoo, what changed things was a delivery from the USPS.<p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It ain’t like the good old days at Chaos Manor South, where whatever
was small enough dropped through the mail slot in the front door with a
ker-plop. At the <i>new </i>Chaos Manor South, I have to walk out to a standard suburban mailbox on the freaking
curb now. One afternoon, I moseyed out there and found a fat envelope among the
junk mail and bills. “From <b><a href="https://www.digitaloptica.com/">Digital Optica</a></b>? Who the hell is that?”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">By the time I’d wandered back to the kitchen, it was
beginning to come back to your forgetful old Uncle. Sometime back, a nice
feller had emailed me about a new product from the above concern and wondered
if I might like to try it, a Bluetooth module for Meade Autostar scopes. I said
“yes” and promptly forgot all about it. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Anyhoo, I set the rather intriguing package aside temporarily,
as I had remembered something else:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
had an <b><a href="http://www.arrl.org/field-day">ARRL Field Day 2023</a></b><span style="color: red;"> </span>planning meeting this evening at our usual radio club
committee meeting spot, <b>Heroes Bar and Grill</b> (natch).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Upon my return (not <i>too</i> late), I recalled the package
and got it open. What came forth was a professional-looking black plastic
module and a USB cable terminated on one end with an Autostar HC connector.
Perusing the instructions (before I had yet <i>another</i> cold 807, much less
a dollop o’ the ‘Yell), it sounded pretty simple: “Plug module into base of
Autostar and Autostar cable from scope into Bluetooth Module.” </p><p class="MsoNormal">The USB cable was, according to the instructions, to allow you to update the Autostar without having it connected to a computer. Could be handy, I guess, but I don't believe the standard Autostar has had a firmware update in a long while.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That was as far as I got on that particular evening. I was most
assuredly not up to fooling with computerized scopes and phones and computers
and pairing stuff and yadda-yadda-yadda. Before I turned on the TV at the
request of that rascally black cat, Thomas Aquinas, it came to me if I were to
test the Digital Optica Bluetooth widget, <b>I’d better do something about
Charity Hope Valentine. <o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">If you’re a faithful reader, you know <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2011/03/curing-charity.html">Sweet Charity</a> is my near 20-year-old Meade ETX-125EC.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What would I need to do about her? Well, as I
have said before, at this juncture the girl is in better physical condition
than Unk and still works as well as her somewhat mercurial personality has ever
allowed. But I figgered before I started connecting girly to computers and
phones, I’d want to change out the fricking-fracking button cell battery in her
<b>LNT finder</b>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“Her whatsit in her whosit?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The PE ETXes were like GPS scopes without a GPS receiver.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Enter time and date and location, and unless
you moved to an observing site a considerable distance away, you didn’t need to
enter anything next time. “LNT?” That stands for “Level North Technology,”
Meade’s Autoalign system. The little LNT finder assembly (that also serves as a
red-dot finder) includes level and north sensors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Charity aligns just like big sis LX-200 GPSes,
finding north, tilt, level, etc. and heading to two alignment stars.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMS7SHY7-4OBkkgY4_-GEWrh82CiZJT6xOmOezuj5Q0GdiHCnqQhVYpyiNd6bwKoE4bVUKewUwvN6JLOXj08-iKg6IXVacKj4BwaDbsDe8Y0T6GDHYja5hl1z8DAjSrAyRy-H3eNNavwlFnX_vSy23eQUMXGdFWxFGFYlS2mG5p-XmOnIX06c/s4032/Bluetooth.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMS7SHY7-4OBkkgY4_-GEWrh82CiZJT6xOmOezuj5Q0GdiHCnqQhVYpyiNd6bwKoE4bVUKewUwvN6JLOXj08-iKg6IXVacKj4BwaDbsDe8Y0T6GDHYja5hl1z8DAjSrAyRy-H3eNNavwlFnX_vSy23eQUMXGdFWxFGFYlS2mG5p-XmOnIX06c/w400-h300/Bluetooth.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Nicely done indeed!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>“But what does a button cell have to do with that, Unk?” I
said you don’t have to do anything unless you move to a site a long ways away
(60 miles in distance or a different time zone). For that to be the case, the
scope has to keep time and date current with the aid of a Real Time Clock
powered by a <b>battery</b>. That’s what the cell, a 2032, is for. Now, that
sounds pedestrian in a day and age when most mounts have RTCs, but 20 years ago
it was <i>purty</i> high tech.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Since this was a new idea at the time for Meade—<b>the REAL
Meade, the John Diebel Meade, not no Ningbo-Sunny nor fracking Orion</b>—they must
not have given much thought to batteries nor done much testing. They said it would
last four or five years. The reality? “About two if you’re lucky.” They later
redesigned the LNT finder and made the battery more accessible, but if you’ve
an older ETX PE like Unk, you are in for some work to get that dang battery changed.
Oh, I could replace the button cell with a pair of higher capacity AA batteries
in an outboard holder, but I want to keep Charity just as she is, lookin’ factory
fresh with no homebrew hacks. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, one thunderstorm-bedeviled afternoon, I carried the girl
out to The Batcave, my workshop of the telescopes/radio shack. <b>“Ain’t
nothing to it but to do it.”</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
removed the first of two screws (which also serve as aim adjusters) and its
associated (small) spring without incident. I thought I was home free; Unk was
being extra careful, since at least one of the two springs usually winds up
hiding somewhere on the floor. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Sorry</i>. Removed the vertical screw and, <i>dadgummit</i>
(this is a family friendly blog), that cotton-pickin’ screw went flyin’.
Sometimes Unk gets lucky, though. I could hardly believe it, but that cursed spring
landed right in my little magnetic screw holder dish (a Harbor Freight special)!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I carefully lifted the top half of the finder off (there is
a thin wire between top and bottom that powers the red-dot LED) and replaced
that battery. You can bet I was cautious getting those little bitty springs
back in their respective positions. All went well, though, and now I could do—<i>had</i>
to do following an LNT battery replacement, I recalled—<b>“Calibrate Sensors</b>.”
A procedure in the hand control that calibrates the electronic compass, etc.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA32OJq44qARjBXuu80oYpAb-HSX_kxkC6kOaetjQ5c7E9k-KfdxkB_cixUAOszm4a9htw03d68v2vJM0F6bzWGOnxm4RZjgOwPXWSWqtmJxDe7SdH0pmq1jsbXqHapvv6cNwJJH2eEj9SRSjZOiLKu0iqS3TJ20AfuZ9-y2P3XNUU4_sQkNo/s4032/Charity.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA32OJq44qARjBXuu80oYpAb-HSX_kxkC6kOaetjQ5c7E9k-KfdxkB_cixUAOszm4a9htw03d68v2vJM0F6bzWGOnxm4RZjgOwPXWSWqtmJxDe7SdH0pmq1jsbXqHapvv6cNwJJH2eEj9SRSjZOiLKu0iqS3TJ20AfuZ9-y2P3XNUU4_sQkNo/w300-h400/Charity.jpg" width="300" /></a></div>Well, hell, nothing else to do, and the storm had passed. <i>Why
not take care of sensor alignment right now</i> <i>and not wait for dark?</i> Meade
users are probably laughing about now, but Unk had forgotten what the Calibrate
Sensors business entails. I just remembered it was a little like a goto
alignment, an “Easy Align,” without alignment stars. So, I plunked miss down
outside the door to the shack and had at it, connecting her to an AC/12vdc
supply I have. And, yes, she did her little alignment dance finding tilt and
all that good stuff and headed for north. What should I next see on the
Autostar, of course? <b>DOH!</b> “Center Polaris!” <i>That’s</i> what I forgot.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">While the evening was hazy in advance of yet <i>more</i>
thunderstorms, Polaris was visible most of the time. I got Charity on her
tripod in the gloaming, fired her up, and went through that sensor calibration stuff
again. <i>This</i> time I could indeed CENTER POLARIS. Done, I did drive
training, which allows the Autostar to take backlash into account, having you
center and recenter an object. The Meade manuals all say “use a terrestrial
target,” but I use Polaris most of the time and that works OK.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Done with all that-there good stuff, conditions were getting
worse and the skeeters was biting Unk’s legs (he was, foolishly, in shorts). I
needed to test Miss, though, who can sometimes amaze you with her goto
accuracy, and sometimes do the opposite. I powered the scope off, essayed a
normal Easy Align, centered two stars, and mashed the buttons for <b>Messier 3</b>,
which was fairly high in the sky, something that can sometimes give ETXes
problems.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Nevertheless, there was a big blob of glob in the eyepiece
when the slew stopped. It looked purty good given the punk conditions, and even
wanted to be “grainy.” Sometimes I reckon I’m too hard on Miss Valentine <i>vis-à-vis</i>
goto performance. I forget she is a 5-inch f/15, that a 25mm eyepiece gives you
almost as much magnification as in an f/10 C8, and that Charity is dang near 20
years old. Anyhoo, M3 admired for a bit, I decided “one more.” <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Off to M53 in Coma Berenices. This is a much more subdued
globular than M3, and I wasn’t sure 5-inches would have an easy time with it in
the heavy haze and light pollution. But there it was when the slew stopped,
shining bravely. I looked upon that as a good omen. On to Bluetooth. <i>But not
tonight</i>…the sky was closing in for real.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As you might expect, a long succession of cloudy nights
followed…during which I got bored, decided to set Charity up indoors in the
Sunroom (natch), do a fake alignment, and see how the Bluetooth widget worked. Which
was probably a good thing. As above, there really didn’t look like there was a
whole lot to it…but outside in the dark, it’s always <i>something</i>, your old
Uncle is easily confused, and it’s just better for him to at least halfway know
what he is doing. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Hokay. Got missy on her tripod, plugged the Bluetooth module
into the base of the HC (which made for something of a handful), connected the
Autostar cable to that, applied power, and did a fake indoor alignment with
Charity, just accepting the stars she offered and mashing “Enter.” The
alignment seemed perfectly normal, and I went on to the next step, pairing the
Digital Optica module with…with…<i>something or other.</i> <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I at first hoped that would be my <b>iPhone 14 Pro Max</b>,
which has a nice, big screen and is running the very latest version of <i>SkySafari</i>
Pro. I was skeptical, however, since the instruction sheet that came with the Bluetooth
module only mentioned “Android and PC.” I had a look at Siri’s Bluetooth page
anyway, but, no, no “ScopeAccess,” as the Wi-Fi thingie calls itself was
listed. Darnit. Oh, well. I’d realized from the get-go that might be the case.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, it would have to be the PC, the module’s instructions
mentioning <i>Stellarium</i>. Well, alrighty then. Fired up a PC in the
Sunroom, turned on Bluetooth in Winders, and, sure enough, was able to easily
pair the Windows 11 PC with “ScopeAccess.” Now to connect <i>Stellarium</i>
(the most recent version) to it. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Which turned out to be a wee bit confusing for your
computer ignernt ol’ Uncle.</b> Oh, there was that instruction sheet, but I
assume it must have been written for an earlier version of Stellarium or one
running an external scope control “helper” app. The instructions talk about
selecting “Type = Bluetooth.” You will search in vain for that on <i>Sterllarium’s</i>
scope set up menu, muchachos. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What works? Make sure the PC is paired with the ScopeAccess
module, then, in <i>Stellarium</i>, set up a connection for Meade Autostar. You
will see a com port associated with that (like com 3). Go with that, mash
connect, and you will be connected. The software is smart enough to establish a
virtual com port over Bluetooth and take care of ever’thing.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRmPLSPlGv0HTkpoAli_6nD1wLcbZjLPW5MYq1Iiw0AQl2YWSQWEdTq__mnmMTFn62diHG4W8B6CqJo-cW9turm4mqRT_iabq6IcnzC1hVXF0ns9-KLcNv6I_5cCFGvUHOwqC4XRisNX1dz0UUzdczazJ9X_xJHGN-tLvDp1qHAl0D5Fitf1A/s1920/cdc.jpeg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1011" data-original-width="1920" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRmPLSPlGv0HTkpoAli_6nD1wLcbZjLPW5MYq1Iiw0AQl2YWSQWEdTq__mnmMTFn62diHG4W8B6CqJo-cW9turm4mqRT_iabq6IcnzC1hVXF0ns9-KLcNv6I_5cCFGvUHOwqC4XRisNX1dz0UUzdczazJ9X_xJHGN-tLvDp1qHAl0D5Fitf1A/w400-h211/cdc.jpeg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">And...we have CdC connected!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>That hurdle in the rearview mirror, I tried a couple of
gotos, refreshed my memory on how to do that and things like “sync” with <i>Stellarium</i>,
and shut Charity and the laptop down. I pronounced the afternoon a success.
With a phone out of the picture, I reckoned I’d, yeah, start out with Stellarium
on a laptop. Which ain’t a bad thing, campers.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">If you haven’t looked in on <i>Stellarium</i> in a while,
you may be surprised. This is a much more expansive program now, and one far
more usable in the field with a telescope than it used to be, even a few years
ago. Oh, its many features are still buried in help-menu key-combination lists,
and its user guide is always several program versions behind, but it can do
what you want it to do. Like build observing lists easily. I did that, mashing
<alt>-B and making a list of objects fit for a spring night, the objects
from the “Tresses of Berenice” chapter of my book <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Urban-Astronomers-Guide-Practical-Astronomy/dp/1846282160/sr=8-2/qid=1164412170/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2/105-7982852-5120469?ie=UTF8&s=books/">The Urban Astronomer’s Guide</a></i>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I love <i>Stellarium</i>. It’s my meat and potatoes
planetarium program in these latter days. I can use it with my deep sky planner
software, <i>Deep Sky Planner</i>. It works great with the Losmandy GM811. It
is really all I need. HOWSOMEEVER…<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Its
prettiness sometimes gets in the way on late nights on an observing field, and
sometimes having functions buried in menus or only easily avalable as key combos is annoying in
that setting. That means, an old favorite of mine is still used as well, <i>Cartes
du Ciel.<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">With <i>Stellarium</i> squared away, Unk thought he’d get
CdC up and running on Bluetooth. “Shouldn’t be no big deal,” <i>he thought</i>.
The Bluetooth connection establishes a com port like any other. “Ain’t nothin’
to it.” Ha!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">At first CdC refused to connect to the scope over Bluetooth.
Every time I tried, “connected” on the ASCOM (the scope driver system Cartes
uses) window remained a solid RED. That made no sense; why <i>shouldn’t</i> it
work. Then I noticed Thomas Aquinas looking at me with that “Daddy doesn’t
understand computers” look of his. What was I missing?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Well, could that be ASCOM itself?</i> As in updating to
the latest platform? <b>V6.6SP1</b>? I did that and guess what? No workie. One
last thing to (easily) try, a new scope driver. A little looking around on the
ASCOM site turned up a link to a recent Meade “generic” driver. Installed that,
configured it, mashed “connect,” and we was in business, sending Charity on
fake gotos to various objects with Cartes.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Then followed still <i>more</i> cloudy nights (lower case).
It finally cleared, but that coincided with a fattening Moon, so following the computer
testing, I decided to make this a two-parter. I believe you’ll agree Unk has
run on long enough. Meet me back here next time and we’ll see what Charity,
Bluetooth-enabled Charity, did with the spring stars. </p><p class="MsoNormal"><b>Next Time: Using Bluetooth Under the Stars...</b></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-61853984316533943192023-04-29T13:30:00.000-05:002023-04-29T13:30:19.826-05:00Issue 591: The Moon and You Volume 2, “I Miss the Moon”<p> </p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggRVfcOKNv4oJfT88pQxheKceg8bKWIxCaKzSN_Sezz3ylq0qb06HevI0oiF1aIaJbDH2_zdyWV3gc9QJhehP6c6FspoSAgWKMoZaMV1qNZRDt6Mt4C9FlrGJOPRrzF5k8k7-xGbtMV31lhqrhQU85guLl1OqBafVDPQXzG8-HAb0A9DhySpg/s1424/MAY1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="824" data-original-width="1424" height="370" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggRVfcOKNv4oJfT88pQxheKceg8bKWIxCaKzSN_Sezz3ylq0qb06HevI0oiF1aIaJbDH2_zdyWV3gc9QJhehP6c6FspoSAgWKMoZaMV1qNZRDt6Mt4C9FlrGJOPRrzF5k8k7-xGbtMV31lhqrhQU85guLl1OqBafVDPQXzG8-HAb0A9DhySpg/w640-h370/MAY1.jpg" width="640" /></a><i></i></div><i>And I do, muchachos, I do.</i> “But Unk, the Moon is
shining bright over Possum Swamp right now, just as she always has.” Well, yeah,
but that don’t mean I’ve paid requisite attention to her. During the years of the <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2021/08/issue-576-in-memory-yet-green-herschel.html">Herschel Project</a>, all Luna was was an <i>annoyance</i>,
her shining face getting in the way of my quest for ever dimmer and more distant
galaxies. When the Project ended, I cast
about for a new observing project, trying out everything <i>except</i> our
neighbor without success.<p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Slowly, ever so slowly, I came to believe my next observing
interest would be something with a little more form and substance than yet another quest for “small, dim, slightly elongated” PGC sprites. This looking for a new
something to look at also coincided with my retirement, which I struggled with
and which had left me less than willing to haul out big telescopes to look at anything.
Then, in 2019, I suffered a near-fatal accident that temporarily rendered me
unable to set up anything but the smallest telescopes. And left me <i>permanently</i>
unable to deal with the largest ones. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">During that time, I found I wanted to look at something,
though. <i>Anything</i>. Something-anything just spelled, yes, good old Hecate.
As I related some time back, when I was a kid I knew the face of the Moon, her
mountains and craters, as well as I knew Mama and Daddy’s subdivision, Canterbury
Heights. But I let that slip away over the course of long years of deep sky
voyaging. I came to regret that, and decided <b>I wanted to go home to the Moon
I missed. <o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitWnx32_DGn-YEhKzsSI53LR90fCYfQWRDG0gUEpqkhRCV-O99GZevXI3W84CqeAD-XNJgLnX14qupcqxHcfjxITQ5BztNEZk9FHgfRug0wOtnoAXDAEm-C5PPgpi5dMsVyeX54bIX2xkKik5piU2jaAmIlfaabBjqMIvMCiBHRrjnznqty8E/s1067/MAY%206.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1067" data-original-width="800" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitWnx32_DGn-YEhKzsSI53LR90fCYfQWRDG0gUEpqkhRCV-O99GZevXI3W84CqeAD-XNJgLnX14qupcqxHcfjxITQ5BztNEZk9FHgfRug0wOtnoAXDAEm-C5PPgpi5dMsVyeX54bIX2xkKik5piU2jaAmIlfaabBjqMIvMCiBHRrjnznqty8E/s320/MAY%206.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Eloise</span></td></tr></tbody></table>And I wanted to share that with you, and, so, started this
series, a follow on from my old “Destination Moon” articles. This new series
will be different. Less rigorous, perhaps. More focused on the ineffable charm
of the Moon than on her geological history.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">You know, I’ve been thinking a lot about that charm, and
found there is another way I miss the Moon. <b>I miss the old Moon</b>. The Moon
of Chesley Bonestell and <i><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052493/">Men Into Space</a></i>.
A Moon of <i>mystery</i>, a Moon of razor-sharp peaks and crater walls. A Moon
where almost anything might happen. Oh, even when Unk was a sprout we knew Luna
was probably lifeless. But, still, who knew what strange things might lurk there?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I missed that old Moon, but it turns out she is still with
us. Yes, the landscape is a gentler one than that depicted above in an illustration from Doubleday’s old book <i>The Moon</i> (from their Science Service series),
but the mystery is still there. As I came to realize watching the recent
Artemis mission, the prelude to a new age of lunar exploration, we still don’t
know pea-turkey about the Moon. Not really.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Despite centuries of observation with telescopes, decades of
examination with spacecraft, and all too few years of manned exploration, we
haven’t even scratched the surface of our neighbor and friend. What might we
find up there? <i>Who knows?</i> Contemplating that, I grabbed a handy
telescope and got out under a just-before-First Quarter Moon. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Before I tell you what I saw on a gentle April evening in
the Swamp, though, maybe a word or two about the instruments I’ve used to explore
the Moon. <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2010/07/bombs-and-binos.html">I began with a cheap set of plastic binoculars</a><span style="color: red;"> </span>from the toy department of our local discount store ‘round
about 1960 or so. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">These were humble glasses to be sure, though they did,
unlike what you’ll likely find in toy departments these days, feature glass
lenses. Likely they weren’t really binoculars, so to speak, but actually
two Galilean telescopes side by side. But you know what? They showed, just
barely,<b> CRATERS</b> to little Rod’s amazed eyes when he thought to turn them
on the Moon (said glasses having been bought to use while playing Army). <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrxdqU98zQAuhhsHchFk8bfvahElkyGRMKqqzW9s159k06qpkfM5T-z1SE0KwBHaWIlQQl1mOtVXfYYrEmRyH5y05MydcA5tkKdG1th2jQRYD64X9TStNyvApvKjkY-2bwCbhmaDWtOKGo7IyJ7xs1U06A-lJK83LssDUT1pF0uhnCQYu6ins/s1919/MAY%202.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="986" data-original-width="1919" height="328" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrxdqU98zQAuhhsHchFk8bfvahElkyGRMKqqzW9s159k06qpkfM5T-z1SE0KwBHaWIlQQl1mOtVXfYYrEmRyH5y05MydcA5tkKdG1th2jQRYD64X9TStNyvApvKjkY-2bwCbhmaDWtOKGo7IyJ7xs1U06A-lJK83LssDUT1pF0uhnCQYu6ins/w640-h328/MAY%202.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">VMA 8.0...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Yep, they did show a little of that rough lunar terminator.
You had to use your imagination a bit…they were awful shaky hand-held even at 5
– 10x or so, but you could, yeah, see something of that strange and alien landscape.
I wanted to see more. And that is the hallmark of any astronomer, amateur or
professional, I guess, that need to SEE MORE.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Flash forward five years to my first telescope, a 3-inch
Tasco reflector. It really wasn’t much of a scope, being far inferior to most
of today’s similar instruments. I never could make out the rings of Saturn I
longed to see. The little thing did do a workmanlike job on the Moon, though.
Not just good enough to allow me to begin to begin finding my way across the
Moon’s labyrinthine surface, but to actually try taking pictures with my little
Argus box camera. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But what finally gave me the Moon? My 4.25-inch Edmund
Scientific Palomar Junior. Let me say this:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In lunar observing, more aperture is always better, <i>always</i>. But a
3 – 6-inch telescope is more than adequate—MORE than—for showing you the basic
wonders of the Moon, and to allow you to do as I did as a 12-year-old, learn
her surface (with the aid of the Moon Map in a long-ago edition of <i>Norton’s
Star Atlas</i>).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Of course, I went on to the bigger and better…a 6-inch Newtonian,
8-inch and larger SCTs, bigger and bigger reflectors, computer-controlled
electronic cameras, etc., etc., etc. Today? I am back to, yeah, 3 – 6-inch
telescopes. They show me what I want to see and they let me relax and enjoy it.
Imaging the surface of the Moon in detail with a big CAT and a camera was fun,
but the act of doing so always seemed a <i>challenge</i>, a <i>test</i>. Could
I succeed in bringing home images? Now I just bask in Luna’s silv’ry glow and
marvel at her, not unlike all those nights when I stared open-mouthed with that
3-inch Tasco.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHB6vNopREHg8Mvhj2cAc3yA4X2Choo_gE8Qqqv0jZuzF_CmlIa20A9xV_3wtZ6BDrON8mSkvfde6xcwhHVENF1SWThENfcKeHFfjNo2sKi-6-b69YcfXZPxExRp24q9f1oFPpADiAynVQWbv3BLpd84bfvyV-CXbcqUdUG-jSo6A7PUZTCeI/s1326/may6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="946" data-original-width="1326" height="228" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHB6vNopREHg8Mvhj2cAc3yA4X2Choo_gE8Qqqv0jZuzF_CmlIa20A9xV_3wtZ6BDrON8mSkvfde6xcwhHVENF1SWThENfcKeHFfjNo2sKi-6-b69YcfXZPxExRp24q9f1oFPpADiAynVQWbv3BLpd84bfvyV-CXbcqUdUG-jSo6A7PUZTCeI/s320/may6.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Unk's first Moon picture, 1965...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>And on this evening, I was, yes, back to a 3-inch. Albeit a
3-inch <i>refractor</i>, <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2011/03/unks-faux-unitron.html">a 3-inch (80mm, actually) f/11 SkyWatcher</a> who came to me somewhat unlooked for. I love this little
telescope. She is small and light and she is very effective on the Moon, taking
high magnification (for a 3-inch) well. My eyes, which now feature (still mild,
thank goodness) built-in yellow filters mean chromatic aberration, which isn’t
terrible at f/11 anyway, is just not a factor. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Anyhow, I grabbed the 3-inch, Eloise by name (who has been
with me—GOSH!—for about a dozen years now), and headed for the back 40 just
after the passage of a rather violent storm front the day before. “Grabbed”? I
was abashed to realize “grabbed” wasn’t the proper word. Maybe “lugged.” As Unk
prepares to embark on his 70<sup>th</sup> trip around Sol in a few months, it
appears the 80mm refractor and “light” alt-az mount have put on weight! <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was enough of a struggle getting Eloise and
the AZ-4 out the back door I decided to do it in two trips next time. Out back,
finally, I didn’t expect much. The Clear Sky Charts were predicting clear and
clean skies, yeah, but, in the wake of a front, as you might expect, seeing
would be so-so at best. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">With Eloise out in the driveway, how was it once dusk had come
and gone? No, seeing wasn’t great, just as predicted, but it wasn’t <i>that</i>
bad. Luna looked pretty steady in the 3-inch. That’s one of the benefits of
smaller aperture:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>you are looking up through
a smaller column of air, and the wiggles are less obvious. Funny thing, though?
Used to be on a somewhat brisk, seeing-disturbed night we could expect crystal
clarity. Not of late. There was substantial haze the front hadn’t cleared out. The
reverse is also all-too-true now. On a hazy, humid night, we’d normally have
very steady seeing. <i>Not anymore</i>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Anyhoo, I inserted one of my favorite 1.25-inch eyepieces in
the diagonal, a 16mm Konig I’ve had for 30 years (it was the first wide field
eyepiece more sophisticated than an Erfle I owned). Focused up at 57x, and had
a cruise up and down the terminator. Despite the haze, Diana was beautifully
sharp, being just past culmination. But where would I plunk down? Which area of
Selene would I concentrate on? My rusty knowledge of Lunar geography impelled
me to focus on the northern highlands rather than the crowded southern expanses.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What there was above all was <b>Plato</b>, the great walled
plain, a dark lava-floored crater that extends about 100 miles. Foreshortening
makes Plato look strongly oval, but it is actually round. What’s to see there?
The game I’ve always played is “find the craterlets,” the tiny craters (a
couple of miles across or thereabouts) that litter the floor. Replacing the
Konig with a 6mm Plössl (151x) showed strong hints of ‘em, though, as you might
expect, 150x is about where a 3-incher’s images begin to dim. But some of the little
guys were not that difficult with Plato near the terminator on this evening.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMEFKDdyH2MTQNLl8pj9ZAirEgXvMVaddnEP9sN_c_OauAeaLrtAQyIpo3uQ_OQBiU12yav8xwyXcibRAxYKkwDSggjFmwQTk0HZPn4N6w_vgWpVh1om7BvAuYQy0ZY4bI_empXJFec4v2hCie2Jm6JmQtPQcJUlIgCNhJ2IBrtkmWFSUfnwE/s1314/MAY3.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1022" data-original-width="1314" height="498" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMEFKDdyH2MTQNLl8pj9ZAirEgXvMVaddnEP9sN_c_OauAeaLrtAQyIpo3uQ_OQBiU12yav8xwyXcibRAxYKkwDSggjFmwQTk0HZPn4N6w_vgWpVh1om7BvAuYQy0ZY4bI_empXJFec4v2hCie2Jm6JmQtPQcJUlIgCNhJ2IBrtkmWFSUfnwE/w640-h498/MAY3.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">VMA has pictures aplenty!</span></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Most beautiful aspect of this giant, however? <b>The shadow
of its rough, mountainous western rim</b>. It hearkened back to that vision of
the old days, those razor-sharp peaks. The shadows of Plato’s walls, which are
relatively gentle in reality, looked just like something out of a Bonestell painting.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Next? To the south of Plato is another huge walled plain, <b>Archimedes</b>,
which is about half the size of Plato, but in other ways much like it, sporting
a dark floor and its own gang of craterlets. For some reason, lunar observers
tend to talk less about this amazing feature than Plato, but it is well worth
study.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As are the two great craters east of Archimedes, <b>Aristillus</b>
(34 mi.) and <b>Autolycus</b> (24 mi.). These are more normal looking craters
than the two walled plains, with Aristillus sporting an interesting and intricate
central peak and terraced walls. Autolycus is without a central peak but there
is still plenty of floor detail to pour over. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I didn’t really want to cross the lunar Apennine mountains,
so I turned back north, touching down on another pair of exceedingly prominent
craters, big <b>Aristoteles</b> (54 mi.) and <b>Eudoxus</b> (42 mi.).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The former looks much like the walled plains
we visited earlier, but it doesn’t quite have the “plain.” Its floor has not
been completely covered with lava. There are numerous hummocks in the middle,
the remains of central peaks not drowned in lava. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is also wall terracing and other details
that invite exploration. Eudoxus? Heavily terraced and intricately detailed
walls will catch your eye in any telescope.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I thought I’d head over to the Alpine Valley next to see
what I could see. After that, maybe a stop at that fascinating crater, Cassini?
Uh-uh. Nosir buddy. Urania had other ideas and just as I finished exploring Eudoxus,
she covered her sky with more haze that in minutes devolved into clouds. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But that was OK. I’d seen a lot. And while Eloise was
definitely not as easy to haul around as Unk remembered, it was the work of but
a few minutes before your correspondent had put Eloise to bed and was sampling the
waters of Lethe (which come from a Rebel Yell bottle) while watching TV with
the cats.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Before leaving you this morning, let me insert a plug for <a href="https://ap-i.net/avl/en/download">Virtual Moon Atlas</a>, which I’ve mentioned here a time
or two. I was embarrassed to discover I was a couple of versions behind and promptly downloaded and installed the current one, version 8.0, the 20<sup>th</sup> anniversary
edition (hard as that is to believe). <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Sure glad I did. More “textures” than ever, including one
from the famous Lunar Aeronautical charts I love so much. Oh, and something you
will find useful for deep sky observing, too, “Calclun,” which at a glance will
show you lunar phases over the course of a year or give you details for a
single night. Go get it, muchachos—it’s still free!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“<a href="https://youtu.be/xsbm3N_BIEg">THE MOON AND YOU”</a> (LeRoy Shield)<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-25023992046379149062023-03-31T13:00:00.008-05:002024-01-24T15:02:03.732-06:00Issue 590: What Has Stuck with Me?<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyCyAm0w2XdjHxP73wMPBQ-XygKbnaNlNMHOF25RNMGzFofXWJOkBZ-1w0Qqkoaow1W2dbxx_zkss0-V54KU0YRU_Usc2wcJlhBXGYi9lBgGSLLlfGQonkt8XblqezcCcS4UhHj3XSlrhNHacZEHhGHQW6WAo8Bw30cx21GSr__-oEFLnbbIU/s1910/Stellarium.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1037" data-original-width="1910" height="348" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyCyAm0w2XdjHxP73wMPBQ-XygKbnaNlNMHOF25RNMGzFofXWJOkBZ-1w0Qqkoaow1W2dbxx_zkss0-V54KU0YRU_Usc2wcJlhBXGYi9lBgGSLLlfGQonkt8XblqezcCcS4UhHj3XSlrhNHacZEHhGHQW6WAo8Bw30cx21GSr__-oEFLnbbIU/w640-h348/Stellarium.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><i>Stellarium</i>: Now that's a purty soft, paw-paw!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Which <i>astronomy software</i> has stuck with me, I mean,
muchachos. Which is not what this one was supposed to be about. It was intended
to concern my ongoing re-exploration of the Moon. Or maybe, if I got awful
sanguine, getting my big 6-inch refractor and Losmandy GM811 out of mothballs. Alas, with the
month running out, I found myself under typically gray and stormy spring Gulf Coast
skies. So, what we’re going to talk about this morning is <b>which astronomy
software I’ve found enduringly useful over the years and which I <i>haven’t</i>.</b><p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Nota bene:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>this
time we are talking only about planetarium/planner software…some other time we
can jaw about imaging and guiding programs and stuff like that.<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>What Has Stuck</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Stellarium</i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I was awful skeptical about this astro-soft for the longest
time. It was awful purty, sure. Very. And amazingly responsive on modest PCs
despite that beautiful depiction of the sky. But it just didn’t seem to offer
much beyond that. Hell, it wouldn’t control a goto scope, and its selection of
deep sky objects was quite limited. It was an “armchair astronomer” kinda thing,
I reckoned.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Not anymore</i>. This freeware program has evolved into a
powerful tool for doing many things in amateur astronomy. It has built-in
telescope drivers, ASCOM compatibility, and a huge number of DSOs. <i>Stellarium’s</i>
visualization of the sky is prettier than ever, and the performance hasn’t
suffered.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Cartes du Ciel<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKzxZInPBpi3vYJFxtha1WNehyrMjrvOMYfov22nNRAlm7qvMT5bSPSR8BD3ZZKLKtdU1Tq36urmkHlUJuhOwpCyHaFkOAd6clm-ZYpM5ECBqyjVRj3_Bd5kNhuoNmvXNUffWMgnETeV1Cd1X-nod3U_VnjvRqw78EfSivEExV1ZhoRHIW2s4/s1902/cdc.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1022" data-original-width="1902" height="215" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKzxZInPBpi3vYJFxtha1WNehyrMjrvOMYfov22nNRAlm7qvMT5bSPSR8BD3ZZKLKtdU1Tq36urmkHlUJuhOwpCyHaFkOAd6clm-ZYpM5ECBqyjVRj3_Bd5kNhuoNmvXNUffWMgnETeV1Cd1X-nod3U_VnjvRqw78EfSivEExV1ZhoRHIW2s4/w400-h215/cdc.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><i>Cartes du Ciel.</i> As pretty as Stellarium? No, but very useful!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>I shouldn’t have to tell you this is a perennial favorite of
mine. It has been since my late friend and talented observer and writer <b>Jeff
Medkeff</b> told me I should have a look at it many a long year ago. It works
simply and well and offers all the features most working amateurs could want.
<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Howsomeever</i>. Understand that comes in a pretty plain
package. Oh, it has been frequently updated by author <b>Patrick Chevalley</b>,
and doesn’t look like a refugee from the early 90s, but it doesn’t worry about
an overly realistic depiction of the sky. Its display is plain but clear and it
is legible, which is often a good thing out on a dark observing field.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Skytools 3<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Author <b>Greg Crinklaw</b> has had <i>Skytools 4</i> out for
a number of years. But you know what? I never got friendly with it like I did
with 3. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe that’s because the version
of ST4 I have is the imaging flavor and is <i>far</i> more powerful and
complex than simpleminded <i>moi</i> needs. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">ST3 was the software that carried me through the Herschel Project, my quixotic quest (this is alliteration day) to observe all the thousands of deep sky objects discovered by Sir William Herschel. <i>Skytools 3</i> gave me all the tools I needn't for that enormous observing project:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>a versatile log, robust planning features, a
highly detailed sky atlas, telescope control, etc., etc., etc. I think it is
fair to say I could never have finished the huge Herschel list without <i>Skytools
3</i>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Deep Sky Planner<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“DSP,” by Phyllis Lang, now in version 8, is, like <i>Skytools</i>,
a planning program/logger. I don't doubt I coulda used this program to
do the Herschel Project if that was what I’d had on my hard drive at the time. What
initially drew me to DSP (when I rediscovered it; it has been around
for decades), however, was something simple: its large screen fonts. I found them easier to decipher
with my old eyes. Once I started using <i>Deep Sky Planner</i>, though, I
realized what a <i>powerful</i> and versatile package it is. One feature I particularly
like is it allows me to use my favorite planetarium programs for charting and
integrates very well with them. DSP is what I mostly use these days.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i></i></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-QGgduyGA5hP5bIWUNVT0G1ezeJ1yn15pi-YxJ-UDPxeUP-ijo_fQz7EfFgWeUvdnHMQQLejm3IUvGZHJo6iOElEUabVbJTpKbpJp8jMTqxAhlXkb92Ho0S_W9ST0We0tOTtQEbGWsDJqAJt3zNT4gdvvxTO4OsIrUGvpHH-OQbBZZJEgVAI/s1919/VMA.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1008" data-original-width="1919" height="210" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-QGgduyGA5hP5bIWUNVT0G1ezeJ1yn15pi-YxJ-UDPxeUP-ijo_fQz7EfFgWeUvdnHMQQLejm3IUvGZHJo6iOElEUabVbJTpKbpJp8jMTqxAhlXkb92Ho0S_W9ST0We0tOTtQEbGWsDJqAJt3zNT4gdvvxTO4OsIrUGvpHH-OQbBZZJEgVAI/w400-h210/VMA.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><i>Virtual Moon Atla</i>s. Still free and still the best.</span></td></tr></tbody></table><i>Virtual Moon Atlas<o:p></o:p></i><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As I have said many a time, for years I dreamed of lunar
observing software as detailed as the big deep sky planetariums and planners.
And once again Patrick Chevalley hit a homerun. Oh, there’ve been a few other attempts
at a computerized lunar atlas, but none has come close to this freeware
software.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What’s great about VMA? Well, the detail for one thing. It
leaves print atlases like the venerable Rükl atlas in the fricking dust. It
incorporates a lot of professional references and images like Lunar Orbiter data.
Hell, it will even send your goto scope to lunar features (I have done that and
it really works). I don’t have to dream about computer Moon atlases anymore. <i>Virtual
Moon Atlas </i>gives me everything I need and want.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>What Hasn’t Stuck<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>TheSky<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is heresy, I know, since Software Bisque’s <i>TheSky</i>
is such a long-running and, I’ll readily acknowledge, <i>powerful</i> tool.
Straight skinny on it from Unk? I used <i>TheSky 6</i> quite a bit years ago and dabbled with TheSky X, but the program was never quite silly old Unk’s
cuppa tea. It just seemed counterintuitive to the way I work. And, if’n you axe
me, overly complicated.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Another factor? I had transitioned to planners like <i>SkyTools</i>
and DSP, and didn’t really need a humongous standalone planetarium program. Finally?
<i>TheSky</i> is good software, but it ain’t cheap:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>$400 for the top-of-the-line non-imaging
version. That may be a very reasonable price for those who need its power, but
for the relatively simple observing I do of late, I just don’t need to spend
that kind of money. $400? That will pay off my bartab for quite a while.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Starry Night<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I gave <i>Starry Night</i> (6) a good try some years
ago thanks to a review copy that came my way. I was somewhat impressed. Its depiction
of the sky was unarguably even more beautiful than that of <i>Stellarium</i>—its sky was stitched together with actual images by way of the old <i>Desktop
Universe</i> software (that the <i>Starry Night</i> folks had bought out). It had
some abilities I hadn’t seen in any astro-ware, too, like built in links to weather
services—that came in right handy <a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2008/04/pursuit-for-patientand-optimistic.html">one time down Chiefland Astronomy Village way</a>. And yet…and yet…<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Starry Night 6</i> seemed a little, I dunno, “clunky.” A
little <i>sluggish</i>, for one thing. Also, even more than <i>Stellarium</i>,
it didn’t seem as legible for my tired eyes at 2am as <i>Cartes du Ciel</i>, not by a
long shot. Then came <i>Starry Night 7</i>, which I am told was pretty derned
buggy. The current release is <i>Starry Night 8</i>, which I hear is quite
good. What dissuades me from giving it a try? Mostly <b>the $259 price tag</b>.
That, again, sounds like something that does more than <i>I</i> need. I’ll use
the money I save for yet another evening at my favorite sports bar, Heroes USA.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Deepsky<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I used this venerable planning program for many years. I
believe it was the second planner on the market after Ms. Lang’s original
<i>Deep Sky Planner</i> (unless you consider David Chandler’s <i>Deep Space 3D</i>
the first planner, which maybe I do). It had some things other planners still
don’t, like the log entries of talented amateur observers like the late <b>Barbara
Wilson</b>. Unfortunately, it was never <i>quite</i> up there with <i>Skytools</i>
and DSP, lacking such simple things as a way to rearrange column order. Author <b>Steve
Tuma</b> gave up on it a few years back, but it is still available as a <span style="color: red;"><a href="https://mikehotka.com/DAS/whatis.htm">free download now</a></span>…but… <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It always had a few problems and I suspect as
Windows has evolved it has even more today.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Finally, there’s that group of programs I might still use if
they’d run on a modern PC. The above-mentioned <b><i>Deep Space 3D</i></b> comes
to mind. It did pretty great charts; it was the first astronomy software to be
able to produce maps comparable to those found in a print atlas. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Another is <b><i>Skyglobe</i></b>. Like DS3D it was a DOS
program (a semi-working Windows version was released shortly before Skyglobe sank),
and you’d have to know more about Winders than I do to get it to run there. But
there has never been a better soft for quick “What’s up?” looks to see what your
sky is like <i>right now</i>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Finally, there’s <b><i>Megastar</i></b>. After the transition
of its former seller, Willman-Bell, to the AAS, I believe this has been made into a free download by its author, but I’m not sure whether it would run on a modern machine. Be that as it may be, <b>Emil
Bonanno’s</b> software was <i>the</i> most detailed computerized deep sky atlas
ever seen when it came out in the early 1990s, and I shall remember it fondly.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">To tell the truth, y’all, astronomy-computing is in transition
here. I have switched to <b>Macintosh</b> for many of my computing tasks, including
astronomy. I am currently using the Mac versions of <i>Cartes du Ciel </i>and <i>Stellarium</i>,
but am thinking about ponying up for the Mac version of <i>SkySafari</i>. I
love it on the iPhone, I do not hesitate to say. When/if I do, you shall here
all about it.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>What else? I swear, y’all, I will get out with a scope next
month. I am about to go stir crazy here. Every night the same thing, TV with
the cats accompanied by catnip for them and cold 807s for me. I need some
photons!<o:p></o:p></i></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-22555741358725640862023-02-07T09:02:00.003-06:002023-03-31T14:27:23.636-05:00Issue 589: A Tale of Two Comets<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBDIysZojI9Zi4_Jd9qJPqGzqheZF7xGyPHkD8gfhXzbGphL9ZgobIvK9Dlht1HQAF7xMcqpyYUtGAFh326oqPmrlzivkJrQ7ZEQX6tP_FQVsWZmdrZzY8mi1bcrRXdWzLTIoc_UDCJx28Hh9i0B4EIfRY5pYClmUN4id3jBpgFgk9CZjqpYY/s1600/adventures%203.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1045" data-original-width="1600" height="418" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBDIysZojI9Zi4_Jd9qJPqGzqheZF7xGyPHkD8gfhXzbGphL9ZgobIvK9Dlht1HQAF7xMcqpyYUtGAFh326oqPmrlzivkJrQ7ZEQX6tP_FQVsWZmdrZzY8mi1bcrRXdWzLTIoc_UDCJx28Hh9i0B4EIfRY5pYClmUN4id3jBpgFgk9CZjqpYY/w640-h418/adventures%203.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Lovejoy</span></td></tr></tbody></table>What’s strange, muchachos? The effects hairy stars, visitors
from the outer Solar System, <i>the great comets</i> have on us. What’s a great
comet? Simple:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>any comet prominent
enough to be noticed by the general public.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Many minor, dim comets come and go year by year, but only occasionally
does a great comet come along and make a spectacle of itself. And when one does,
many Earthlings take it to be <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">a star of
ill omen</i>.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In fact, in the past the arrival of one has driven some humans
plumb <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">crazy</i>. Halley’s brilliant apparition
in 1910 inspired a <b>DEADLY COMET GAS</b> scare. As the story goes, some poor
mooks were so frightened by the prospect of dying from <b>AGONIZING COMET GAS</b>
(cyanide in the tail) they committed suicide. I would guess that’s an
apocryphal story—the suicide part, anyhow, yellow journalism about comet poison
gas was very real. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The maleficent effect comets have on us isn’t something of a
century or centuries ago, either. Well I remember the madness associated with
the passage of another great comet, Hale-Bopp, back in ’96. That time the
suicides were all too real. Members of a crazy-ass cult, Heaven’s Gate, killed
themselves. Why? Their whack-a-doodle leader, “Bo,” told ‘em HB was really a
spaceship carrying their other guru, the recently deceased “Peep,” and they could
board it and join her if they offed themselves by gobbling Seconals washed down
with vodka.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">A few years back…well, actually going on a decade now…your
old Uncle was excited by the visit of <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">another</span>
comet. While in no way “great”—it went mostly unheard of and unseen by the
general public—little Lovejoy, <b>C/2014 Q2</b>, put on quite a show in January
and February of 2015. At that time, your correspondent was pretty hardcore
amateur astronomy-wise and was determined to get plenty of astrophotos of the
wee, green feller, including from a dark site.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I was fairly successful in that quest, as you can read <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2015/01/pretty-little-patriot-redux.html">here</a> and <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2015/02/more-dslr-adventures.html">here</a>. That
really ain’t the point, though. The point being the effect the visitor had on <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">me</b>. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">It</i>
<i>threw Unk for a loop</i>. Those evenings watching the exposures come in
and—Shazam!—actually <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">looking</i> at the
comet occasionally with a pair of binoculars seemed to have an unlooked for
effect.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I don’t know exactly what it was. Maybe it was the lonely
nights under the stars. Or the contemplation of the fact we’d all be dead and
gone and forgotten when the little sprite paid her next visit to the inner
Solar System in, oh, ‘round ‘bout 8,000 years. Whatever it was, I entered a
period of contemplation of my years on this flyspeck of a world, focusing
mostly on the mistakes and missteps. No doubt the shock of retirement, going
from 50- and 60-hour work weeks to near full-stop, had more to do with Unk’s
mental outlook than the comet, but, still, this not-so-happy time did coincide
with the apparition of Lovejoy.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The denouement? Once the following year was out I had begun
to come to terms with Life, the Universe, and Everything—as much as any of us
can, I guess. Oh, there were changes going forward. A new mindset began to <i>crystalize</i>.
Some of that new mindset having to do with astronomy. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXl_WrHPSIueVQw-PCOz5qrW-K1eCV4qJ2gYfFCGkLn7t_JziAGsAbbmnC2bupRxCLmQtIuXdODEKyXP-K3WF9XJC3o2aN3j95Kcp3IksYe5zvYU3ARP3RbfRbTxePLRZRT_W2pP0rPGe5MLYOuFPW1o2sRX-7GbRNK8PwkyxCMijnhgiNiV4/s540/capella.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="540" data-original-width="537" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXl_WrHPSIueVQw-PCOz5qrW-K1eCV4qJ2gYfFCGkLn7t_JziAGsAbbmnC2bupRxCLmQtIuXdODEKyXP-K3WF9XJC3o2aN3j95Kcp3IksYe5zvYU3ARP3RbfRbTxePLRZRT_W2pP0rPGe5MLYOuFPW1o2sRX-7GbRNK8PwkyxCMijnhgiNiV4/w398-h400/capella.JPG" width="398" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Talk about "well placed"!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>I had actually begun thinking about downsizing the telescope
herd in the months before Lovejoy. I was coming to the realization I was fast approaching
the point where I simply could not physically handle big telescopes and mounts
anymore, but Lovejoy’s flyby accelerated that. <i>I was taken by the urge to
simplify.</i> I was happy with the photographs I’d got of the comet, but
realized I’d only observed her shimmering form visually a time or two and that
didn’t seem right.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">While I’ll still slap a camera on a telescope and fire up <i>Nebulosity</i>
and <i>PhD Guiding</i> on occasion, those occasions are fewer by far than they
used to be. I now want as little between me and the sky as possible. I don’t
want to lug equipment cases around nor spend an hour (or two) setting up a
scope. I just want to <i>see</i>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So came <i>this</i> winter’s little visitor, The Green
Comet, <b>Comet C/2022 E3 ZTF</b>. The weather hasn’t been exactly conducive to
observing of late. It’s either been cloudy or cold, real cold. These days I
find I don’t bear cold weather as well as I did in, yeah, 2015. If my feet get
cold it is <b>end of story, game over, zip up your fly</b>. Still, something
about ZTF, mostly its passage exactly eight years after Lovejoy’s, seemed
auspicious. The sky cleared, and despite the presence of a full Moon,
I determined I’d have a look at the new comet.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">When that Moon began to rise a little later, I thought I’d
better get a move on. The possibility of clouds is always with us down in the Swamp,
and I knew capricious weather could easily spoil my chances of seeing ZTF while
she was still bright. One other thing the last ten years has brought is
cloudier winters. It used to be unusual for us to get lines of vicious
thunderstorms this time of year. Now? Not so much. So, I’d get out to see the
comet right away. But, <i>how</i> would I see it? Not with DSLRs and goto
mounts and laptops, that was sure. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">My first thought was to leave it at simple-as-simple-can-be
with my beloved <b>Burgess Optical 15x70 binoculars</b>. These excellent
glasses have shown me much over the <gulp> 20 years since I bought ‘em at
the <span style="color: red;"><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2012/02/my-favorite-star-parties-alcon-2003.html">2003 ALCON convention</a> </span>in Nashville. Their
larger aperture and higher magnification compared to 10x50s allows them to do a
pretty derned good job in my suburban backyard. But, I dunno, that just didn’t
seem to be <i>enough</i>, somehow.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What would have been perfect or nearly so for a little comet
like ZTF? My old Orion StarBlast Richest Field Telescope, Yoda. A 4.5-inch
reflector capable of low magnification and wide fields makes comet-snaring as
easy and pleasant as can be. Unfortunately, when I was thinning the scope herd,
the StarBlast went to a new home. I just wasn’t using him and am thrilled his
current owner gets him under the stars frequently, which he deserves, being a
Good Little Telescope.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisxvOobq05dQvgdFQATvn8eDi4zZ0YDuPXim0_Z5sNMw5pdoMMt5wbZZ7ArgjPq4ciA2z9AcODhaB7qjITc5Lq_hjoqG327xT6JlWni6cIaCUvszRY5feAnZorW1jGlh8IugfEjLR9buV_c5akSwlesl1EibG-1bVXfZEEvtcwI8NQ3fQTLok/s4032/029.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisxvOobq05dQvgdFQATvn8eDi4zZ0YDuPXim0_Z5sNMw5pdoMMt5wbZZ7ArgjPq4ciA2z9AcODhaB7qjITc5Lq_hjoqG327xT6JlWni6cIaCUvszRY5feAnZorW1jGlh8IugfEjLR9buV_c5akSwlesl1EibG-1bVXfZEEvtcwI8NQ3fQTLok/s320/029.JPG" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Tanya...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>But now I’ve got <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">another</i>
StarBlast for all practical purposes. As you read last time, a new, small
scope, <span><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2023/01/issue-588-uncle-rod-and-rescue-telescope.html">Tanya</a></span>, has come to live with me. She is
much like Yoda despite the fact she is mounted on a little tripod with an
altazimuth mount. She is also a little different optically.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She is of an identical aperture, 4.5-inches, but
has a slightly longer focal length and slower focal ratio, f/5.1, compared to
Yoda’s f/4.0. While that narrows up Tanya’s field a bit, that’s a good thing
for me. The somewhat higher magnifications she delivers eyepiece-for-eyepiece
are a plus for my suburban skies. She’s still just about perfect for
eye-popping widefield views; a 25mm eyepiece delivering 23x.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Getting Tanya into the backyard was, of course, nothing. She
weighs maybe 10 pounds sopping wet with dew, if that. When darkness finally
came, that’s just what I did, waltzed her into the back forty. Well, it was
dark <i>enough</i>, nautical, not astronomical, twilight having arrived. With a
big Moon on the rise in the east and already illuminating a wide swath of sky,
I figgered I’d better not wait and quickly positioned Tanya’s OTA on the proper
spot using her red-dot finder.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Finding the comet’s position was trivially simple since she
was just a smidge, about a degree and a half, northwest of bright Capella. In
went Tanya’s cheap Celestron 26mm Plössl and to that eyepiece Went your Uncle’s
eye. Seeing was typical for winter—punk at best—but coulda been worse. At first,
I saw…nuttin’ honey. But I continued to look, slewing the little scope around a
mite…and…there it was! ZTF was subtle at first, just an unassuming patch of
nebulosity, but, yes, <i>there</i>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I didn’t settle for just having <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">seen</span> the Green One (who was, not surprisingly, gray in the little
telescope’s eyepiece), I continued to watch, and as it got a little darker ZTF
took on form and substance. The coma became brighter and larger and a small
nucleus popped into view. W<i>as I seeing a hint of tail?</i> Maybe, maybe. ZTF
was good enough that I hopped inside and retrieved the Burgess binocs. At first
the comet wasn’t easy in the glasses, but soon it was looking marvelous with that
3D effect only binoculars can deliver. I went back and forth between RFT and
binocs for quite some time. Until the Moon got high enough to ring down the
curtain on the show.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Takeaways? Tanya, the Celestron 114-AZ really is <i>quite</i>
a little telescope. Every bit as capable <i>optically</i> as the StarBlast—the
StarBlast’s mini-Dobsonian mount is somewhat steadier. I suspect she’ll get a
fair amount of usage here. Well, every once in a while, anyhow. A suburban
backyard sky is really not much of a place for a Richest Field Telescope. As I
said last week, she’ll, like Yoda, likely eventually be passed on to some
deserving scope-less person.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The comet? It’s a pretty li’l thing; get out and see it
before it is too late. Your ol’ Unk was feeling pretty darned good after his
night of comet watching and takes ZTF’s passage as that rarest of things in
comet lore: a <i>good</i> omen.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-4682247445822858362023-01-28T17:36:00.004-06:002023-02-07T09:02:46.591-06:00Issue 588: Uncle Rod and the Rescue Telescope<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwdTPP2XbgOTPBgwQl24ckKcGKJJL77w9cJxAl4W1FKUomOUJMAjCTZr7846YaIJccOuRJTtxg3LuZG-klu-LMA_dUTU7ecFlcwiLk3XxUxHoNtua9XuQcPJUdKoi8X9qN5Hoq7eEEXJyaHK3FrnBrjV4Mb9j6DPpf88abUVU23Gwz90Gu4Dk/s4032/029.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwdTPP2XbgOTPBgwQl24ckKcGKJJL77w9cJxAl4W1FKUomOUJMAjCTZr7846YaIJccOuRJTtxg3LuZG-klu-LMA_dUTU7ecFlcwiLk3XxUxHoNtua9XuQcPJUdKoi8X9qN5Hoq7eEEXJyaHK3FrnBrjV4Mb9j6DPpf88abUVU23Gwz90Gu4Dk/w480-h640/029.JPG" width="480" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Back in her natural element...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Sounds like the title of the next Disney Channel animated series,
don’t it, muchachos? I bet you thought Unk would be writing about the comet
nine-day-wonder, Comet 2022/E2 ZTF, dincha? That will come. Up to now it’s been
too cloudy or too cold and the comet has been rising way too late (early, that
is) for your lazy Uncle. Today, the subject is Uncle Rod’s latest rescue telescope.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What in pea turkey is a rescue telescope?! A “rescue
telescope” is most often a modern iteration of the Department Store Telescope that
has fallen on hard times, has fallen about as far as a telescope <i>can</i>
fall. Maybe it began as a Christmas or birthday present to a young person or an
impulse buy by an adult. It was quickly found to be deficient in that its images
didn’t rival those of the Hubble Space Telescope. It was under the stars a few
times and brought its owner a pretty Moon but was soon found to be Too Much Trouble.
The briefly loved scope, its wonderfully gaudy box long discarded, finds its
way into a closet where it sits bereft of starlight for a long, weary time. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The scope’s descent doesn’t stop there. Sooner or later, it
becomes an annoyance, taking up room in that closet, crashing to the floor every
time the owner retrieves their galoshes, and making a general nuisance of
itself. Sometimes it’s given away and the story thus far repeats itself. Most
often, it is put on the curb, to be either plucked by the trash pickers or sent
to its final demise. <i>Sometimes it gets lucky, though</i>; the owner donates
it to a charity thrift store and sometimes, just sometimes, someone comes along
and gives the poor thing a second chance.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Anyhoo</b>, one recent Thursday evening, Unk found himself
arriving a little early for a radio club meeting held at a Goodwill Community
Center adjacent to a Goodwill Thrift Store. The previous week I’d found a <b>Simpson
260</b> multimeter in there for the grand sum of nine dollars. With a little
time on my hands, I wanted to see if I might get lucky again and headed for the
back of the store where the electronics are kept…but didn’t get that far.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">At first Unk thought he was going crazy(er). I seemed to be
hearing a plaintive little voice. A little <i>female</i> voice: “<b>HELP ME,
UNCLE ROD! YOU’RE MY ONLY HOPE!</b>”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My
puzzlement turned to understanding when I spotted a 4.5-inch Newtonian sitting beside
the aisle on her spindly tripod.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“Hello, little one. How long have you been here?”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“<i>Oh, Unk, I’ve been here the longest old time!”</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“Well, let’s have a look at you.” What was before me was a current
Department Store Telescope (DST). You thought they were gone? No, they, the telescopes
in-between toys and genuinely serious but inexpensive scopes like the Orion
Starblast, are still with us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are
still sold in actual department stores, but also in hobby shops and, of course,
online. Most of them are the ubiquitous 114mm (4.5 inch) Newtonians, 60mm refractors
being less numerous than they once were.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">How is the current crop compared to those of yore, like the
famous <span><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2008/07/good-tasco.html">Tasco 11-TE</a></span>? Compared to 60s – 70s DSTs,
they are mostly worse. The big and debilitating problem is their mounts are
shakier (and they weren’t the Rock of Gibraltar way back when), wooden tripods
having given way to extruded aluminum jobs barely adequate for low power. Eyepieces,
however, are <i>definitely</i> much better now. Most are fairly good 1.25-inch
oculars that blow the doors off the .965-inch horrors of the past. Finders have
improved, too, red dot jobs having displaced small-aperture, stopped-down optical
finders or the dreadful “reflex” finders Jason-branded scopes once sported.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiniQrIQROJq7F8CkFtU6h600YHlchobUDJ9WUvaU0l6TEn3xB0IfPE30oJ3nx4QcKTrB-n94MLd1GuTG7hGUssrfGiXmjt4KR9cxMZfClh7A2SJb4ak5gnmrLA6-AOP_zGfhkGW0rgSXwDHOaGe0o-iXBYIOeOm18T9zad4lvDWdU2a1V7Fqg/s1600/114%20sr%20box.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="821" data-original-width="1600" height="206" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiniQrIQROJq7F8CkFtU6h600YHlchobUDJ9WUvaU0l6TEn3xB0IfPE30oJ3nx4QcKTrB-n94MLd1GuTG7hGUssrfGiXmjt4KR9cxMZfClh7A2SJb4ak5gnmrLA6-AOP_zGfhkGW0rgSXwDHOaGe0o-iXBYIOeOm18T9zad4lvDWdU2a1V7Fqg/w400-h206/114%20sr%20box.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">That glorious box promising wonders...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>“But how about the optics?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They are generally well-made, <b><u>BUT</u></b>… Back in the glorious
day, 114mm reflectors from Japan, and, later on, 114mm reflectors from China,
had spherical primary mirrors, yeah. <b>But they also had focal ratios of f/8</b>.
At f/8, a 4-inch spherical mirror is quite close to ¼-wave of wavefront error
and can perform very well. Alas, most DSTs now possess f/5 – f/6 spherical
mirrors. At that focal ratio they approach a half-wave of error. Not horrid,
perhaps, but worse. Why the move away from f/8? I guess f/5 tubes may be
cheaper to produce and cause less stress for today’s pitiful DST mounts.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Looking at the waif before me, I noted the label on her
(plastic) focuser read, “<b>Celestron 114-AZ SR D=114, F=600, F=5.2, MADE IN
CHINA</b>.” I almost walked on, knowing the limitation that would impose given
the spherical mirror I knew this little girl would have. <i>But I didn’t.</i> I’ve
seen Celestron 130mm scopes with spherical mirrors do OK on the Moon and other
subjects at similar focal lengths, so why not? <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’ve also gotta admit the Celestron tugged at my heart
strings, looking sad and pitiful with her banged-up steel tube tarted-up with
paint to make it look like carbon fiber.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And I am always on the lookout for scopes to pass on to enthusiastic young
undergraduate astronomy students. Also, there was the price tag on her, “$19.99.”
Finally, paraphrasing Charlie Brown, I said out loud, “<b>Besides, I think this
little telescope needs me</b>.”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The Celestron, who told me her name was “Tanya,” begged to
be taken home: “Uncle Rod, my red dot finder alone is worth 20 bucks. <b>PLEASE
GET ME OUTA THIS PLACE!</b>” I took a look at her primary, which appeared
bright and clean, and surveyed the rest of her. She looked complete with a
couple of cheap Plössls, one in her focuser and one in her little eyepiece tray.
Well, almost complete; her aperture cover was long gone. I scooped the girl up
and headed to the checkout, <b>“Oh, thank you, Rod! I know we’ll be <i>great</i>
friends!”<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZWq8dWYd1J_sx1xlZfIiWJq10OuFAO5gKhK_RUOLkSt8JohVBBn293QZzbSIzUj6l4TTjFIHvwxfNFuVKbrf5OAcA9cCNxsor3SgJeuTLSpQcClJqEMBy8qOoyABjzK3cmXBkqqgKi1ogiM1Q55YADLOA8abbJgM5b28hD1fgGMz2KaP_dm0/s4032/003.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZWq8dWYd1J_sx1xlZfIiWJq10OuFAO5gKhK_RUOLkSt8JohVBBn293QZzbSIzUj6l4TTjFIHvwxfNFuVKbrf5OAcA9cCNxsor3SgJeuTLSpQcClJqEMBy8qOoyABjzK3cmXBkqqgKi1ogiM1Q55YADLOA8abbJgM5b28hD1fgGMz2KaP_dm0/w300-h400/003.JPG" width="300" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">A hard-knock life.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Back home after the radio club meeting, Miss Dorothy wasn’t
too surprised to see me come in with yet another wayward scope in my arms. She <i>was</i>
rather surprised by the 20-buck price, though.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>You know, <i>so was I</i>. Sitting in the kitchen, Tanya looked far
better than she had under the merciless fluorescents at the Goodwill store. Next
step was seeing precisely what was up with the girl.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">My initial examination showed one of the two eyepiece
locking screws was jammed. It was so tight I had to resort to (carefully) unscrewing
it with a pair of vice-grips. To my surprise, it wasn’t cross-threaded and
stripped, just screwed down awful tight. When it was loose, I was able to extract
the 9.7mm Plössl (both eyepieces being Celestron’s extra-cheap ones with metal barrels
but plastic bodies) and examine the secondary mirror. A look in the now empty
focuser showed several big blemishes on it. Might just be dirt or might be
damage to the coating—there is no telling what a kid who got a telescope
instead of the battery-powered scooter they really wanted will do to torture the
poor thing. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Otherwise, it was clear Tanya had indeed led that proverbial
hard-knock life. There were several small dents and dings on the tube, and
something—who knows what?—had been sprayed on it here and there. There was also
plenty of the dreaded Chinese glue-grease (apparently made of ground-up weasels),
which had migrated from focuser, to tube, to mount, to tripod with the aid of
young fingers. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There was a crescent Moon in the sky, so naturally I got little
Tanya into the backyard for a look. Before doing that, I gave both her oculars
a good cleaning—they were filthy. How was that Moon? <i>Not bad.</i> It was sharp
<i>enough</i> given the obvious mis-collimation of the un-cooled-down optics, poor
seeing, and the only fair quality of the eyepiece (these plastic-bodied Plössls
are used on many of Celestron’s/SkyWatcher’s lower-priced scopes). Anyhow,
Tanya did well enough I declared she had possibilities and told her we’d get
her cleaned up in the morning. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That morning, if not too <i>early</i> that morning, I set
off to obtain something I knew I’d need, paper-reinforcers to make a center dot
for her primary mirror so I could collimate her. To my astonishment, Publix had
none. Neither did Walgreens. Nor did the Walmart food store. I finally turned
some up at CVS drugs. Is there a paper-ass*&^% shortage or something?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p>Back home, out in the Batcave, my radio shack cum-workshop
of the telescopes, I thought my first task would to be to clean the secondary.
As you can see in the image below, the secondary’s spider is an integral part of the
plastic fore-end of the tube, as is the finder mount.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I spotted a few Philips-head screws and
removed those. It was apparent the focuser would also have to be removed to get
the plastic section loose. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I did that, which was just as much of a pain as removing the
other screws, since all were held in place by tiny nuts and Unk couldn’t get
his fingers very far into the tube due to the thick plastic spider vanes. Finally,
all screws were removed, but the plastic assembly still refused to budge. It
was pretty obviously glued as well as screwed into place. One of the problems
with this and similar little scopes is they are not made to be maintained—they are
like Chinese puzzle boxes. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpKmUZBqaeNt10G4tQy6VEgG_LQftExyqUGxH7LEgMWamqjd5ph3kWhwKuwVoTQHuNlnrBHgdGLA4eq26EeiBk1qgkl6b97YNXh_t18PBPUqnAeBxQ74zh3AE15-jqBXfQ6TsDydQrx6TF6MEOZ3Nl-bnZtHmPGgN_H6Y_0FAfP81TsMom1c0/s4032/009.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpKmUZBqaeNt10G4tQy6VEgG_LQftExyqUGxH7LEgMWamqjd5ph3kWhwKuwVoTQHuNlnrBHgdGLA4eq26EeiBk1qgkl6b97YNXh_t18PBPUqnAeBxQ74zh3AE15-jqBXfQ6TsDydQrx6TF6MEOZ3Nl-bnZtHmPGgN_H6Y_0FAfP81TsMom1c0/s320/009.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Ready for collimation.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Rather than try to defeat the glue, I decided I’d clean the secondary
<i>in situ</i>. With the focuser removed, the hole in the tube was large enough
to allow that. To my surprise, gentle cleaning took care of the multiple spots
of dirt or whatever (it almost looked as if—horrors—someone had spat on the secondary!).
It was now clean and pretty, and I was able (with some difficulty) to get the
focuser back in place.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Next up was collimation, but to do that, I’d have to center-dot
the mirror. I was surprised not to see a dot on the primary. Even Celestron’s
lower-priced “amateur astronomy class” scopes like the aforementioned Starblast
have ‘em. I suppose they don’t bother with those like the 114AZ bound for
hobby/toy/department stores. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">How do you center dot a mirror that ain’t got one? Grab a
compass, draw a circle the same diameter as the primary on a piece o’ paper,
fold it into quarters, snip off the apex of the cone formed, unfold it, place
it on the mirror, and carefully make a dot on the primary through the hole. Center
the paper reinforcer on the dot. If you’re as OCD as Unk, you’ll then take a Q-tip
moistened with alcohol and gently remove the sharpie mark.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I collimated the little thing using the Celestron combo
sight-tube/Cheshire I’ve had for years. If you want to know how to do Newtonian
collimation, see <span><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2009/07/zen-and-art-of-telescope-collimation.html">my blog entry on the subject</a></span>.
Having done a Newtonian fairly recently, I did not have to reference my own
article. <i>Denouement</i>? Secondary and primary were both off a considerable
amount but were easy enough to get “in” in just a few minutes. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Done for the moment with the OTA, it was time to see what I
could do to improve the mount. The azimuth axis had a healthy dollop of that glue-grease.
So much of the viscous stuff the tube tended to continue moving in azimuth when
I stopped pushing it. A little of my favorite cure, DeOxit, and the application
of some Blaster synthetic lube freed up the motion quite a bit. There was only
so much I could do, since the azimuth axis was pressed into place and would
have been difficult or impossible to remove, but it was better. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Wasn’t a whole lot to be done for the altitude axis. A
little lube in the trunnions and that was it. The altitude slow-motion arm
(talk about a blast from the distant past) did not need any attention. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Finally, I used some 99% isopropyl alcohol,
DeOxit, and WD-40 to banish the many patches of weasel grease on mount and
tripod. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJQU1II0752dWqxi_vMJ0LBe7PDFKh97Ehut5hdUrLrWaNufySoJxIvsiX_YjFH83OfjtMWVTvJFs_eJZhs4jIExO4UofG8JDQzHhtoILB23mjKeb6_xNNvPpb923a4IJ8bBl1OT-DYryZnvCoaOcfGsT1iVLoVDGUcYAU9V0vbFhSZCg0-EQ/s4032/012.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJQU1II0752dWqxi_vMJ0LBe7PDFKh97Ehut5hdUrLrWaNufySoJxIvsiX_YjFH83OfjtMWVTvJFs_eJZhs4jIExO4UofG8JDQzHhtoILB23mjKeb6_xNNvPpb923a4IJ8bBl1OT-DYryZnvCoaOcfGsT1iVLoVDGUcYAU9V0vbFhSZCg0-EQ/s320/012.JPG" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">The spider is part of the end assembly of the tube.</span> </td></tr></tbody></table>I then returned tube to mount and proceeded to see if I could
do sumpin about the stiff, wobbly plastic focuser. Replacing its glue-grease with
synthetic lube helped. I was also able to make its motion easier by adjusting
the two screws on the rack and pinion focuser’s underside. However, it was clear
the focus tube would always be floppy. Like the similar plastic focuser
SkyWatcher uses on its “tabletop” Dobsonians, there is no lock screw, and mechanical
tolerances are large. I thought if the scope performed halfway decently, I’d
think about some Teflon shims or something.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Last thing? <i>I tried to make poor Tanya pretty again</i>
and was partially successful. I was, with mucho scrubbing and application of Pledge
furniture polish, able to remove most of the nasty-looking spots on the OTA.
Oh, she’ll never look like she did the day excited hands pulled her out of her
Technicolor box, but, yeah, she looked <i>much</i> better. I picked her up,
cradled her in my arms, and took her to the backyard to acclimatize ahead of
darkness. You know what? The little scope positively <i>glowed</i> sitting there.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">While waiting, I thought I’d learn a little something about Missy.
It turns out she is a currently sold scope retailing for about 100 bucks at—fittingly—Kohl’s
department store. Seems to me I may even have seen a 114AZ in the Kohl’s up the
street last Christmas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I also solved a mystery:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>what the “SR” in the telescope’s model number
means. The 114AZ SR is <i>smartphone ready</i>. What does <i>that</i> mean? As
she came from the factory, the scope was furnished with a little cell phone
mount so you could take pictures through the eyepiece. That mount, which apparently
involved rubber bands, was not with Tanya at Goodwill, and had no doubt gone
missing along with the aperture cover (and a pack-in DVD of the Starry Night software)
long ago. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I sat and waited for it to get dark enough. But you know
Unk; I got “go” fever: “Hail, it’s dark enough to look at the Moon.” And it
was. The difference between bedraggled Tanya the previous night, and tonight’s
prom-queen Tanya was more than palpable. The just before first quarter Moon was
simply scrumptious. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">At 60x with her so-so (or maybe <i>not</i> so so-so) 10mm
eyepiece, Selene was a thing of wonder. With darkness having arrived, I thought
I’d push her a small amount. I plucked one of Celestron’s slightly better Plössls,
a 6mm, out of its case to see what she could do with 100x, a more practical magnification
for observing the Solar System. With a little more power, the trio of craters,
Theophillus, Cyrillus, and Catharina, was simply breathtaking.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Was the wee scope perfect? Hardly. Even at “just” 100x,
there began to be problems. Not with the optics, but with the mount. At that
modest magnification, it began to border on unusable. Oh, I could get the
telescope in focus, but it was quite shaky and I had to exercise a light touch.
Combine that shakiness with the shallow depth of focus of its fast focal ratio,
and a scope like this challenges the very people it is supposedly designed to
serve, children and beginners. However, it is definitely at least OK with the
two supplied eyepieces, which furnish 23x and 60x.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjJPxaYYGHrsacDZH4eO2xbWjAxLRYHQDl_IYNkvEQ6ptZwxZlTkYmkBNlN85A2NsWoJhF6Wmq5mAiEqCiW4Hndgb01fWl6MWywlxnbx_NfG3jnkz3rg964G1OZj8gVW1uiJ2kRvR7U2FtIq9GhagZq2-V-1Ao4p-v_HIi-_H2eQzyr0L_gCQ/s4032/001.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjJPxaYYGHrsacDZH4eO2xbWjAxLRYHQDl_IYNkvEQ6ptZwxZlTkYmkBNlN85A2NsWoJhF6Wmq5mAiEqCiW4Hndgb01fWl6MWywlxnbx_NfG3jnkz3rg964G1OZj8gVW1uiJ2kRvR7U2FtIq9GhagZq2-V-1Ao4p-v_HIi-_H2eQzyr0L_gCQ/w640-h480/001.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Looking and feeling much better!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Maybe the biggest surprise of the night was ol’ Jupe. He is
not an easy object for small telescopes, really, and is where many cheap ones
fall completely apart. “Is that Jupiter or a custard pie?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With the 6mm in place we headed for the King.
I didn’t expect much and was frankly amazed. The four Galileans were sharp,
sure, but the big deal was I was seeing banding, plenty of it, on the disk, and
maybe the even Great Red Spot, too (I wasn’t sure whether it was visible or
not; I checked later and it was). <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">While the sky was beginning to haze over, as it had been
since sundown, I just had to take a look at M42. The Trapezium was easy and
there was as much nebulosity on view as I’d expect any 4-inch to show on a
less-than-average night. Oh, we made a few other stops as well. The ET Cluster,
NGC 457 was pretty if more subdued than on a good evening. But we ended on Luna
again. I couldn’t stop marveling what at what this formerly debased little
telescope was showing me.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Frankly, I was thrilled I’d been able to bring this sad little
refugee back to life. Unfortunately, while the sky wasn’t looking any worse
than it had, and the winter stars were glittering bravely in the haze, the one
thing that always indicates it is time for Unk to end an observing run occurred.
<i>My feet got cold</i>. When that happens, it is end of story, game over, zip
up your fly. I picked the little scope up, deposited her in the Batcave (her
aperture covered with a shower cap), and was inside watching television with
the cats in just a few minutes.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">When the time is right, yes, Tanya will undoubtedly go to
some deserving young person, but till then, yeah, it’s just as she said; <i>we’re
going to be great friends.</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-48158835379489666802022-12-24T20:25:00.005-06:002023-04-28T17:43:59.776-05:00Issue 587: An Uncle Rod Merry Christmas 2022<p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaSHW1EOH-u0fh1uQf8SjFQCSnORWOl8caW0T0q5MyhEqskLx2tv4vFrE7pnLtAx2u8UvoxGYRED3s7LyV2LXdKn7gJRfphpkrYjb-wezekNU8SQU9xU1f88J9o8te2dEwMteE0Fldzk0Hks6Zhv9snpE0wHVnoVikApNFkJHc12OqWsUc0Bg/s640/269546587_4810564618963944_6666021919985796885_n.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="427" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaSHW1EOH-u0fh1uQf8SjFQCSnORWOl8caW0T0q5MyhEqskLx2tv4vFrE7pnLtAx2u8UvoxGYRED3s7LyV2LXdKn7gJRfphpkrYjb-wezekNU8SQU9xU1f88J9o8te2dEwMteE0Fldzk0Hks6Zhv9snpE0wHVnoVikApNFkJHc12OqWsUc0Bg/w268-h400/269546587_4810564618963944_6666021919985796885_n.jpg" width="268" /></a></div>Well, muchachos, another Christmas Eve is upon us, and as
usual I choose to spend it with <i>y’all</i>. Well, <i>part</i> of it, anyhow. In the
wake of the covid, this was a more normal Yule's Eve for me and Miss Dorothy. As “normal” as it ever gets with your somewhat odd old Unk in the mix, anyhow. But,
yeah, a <i>little</i> more like those grand Christmases of yore at Chaos Manor
South. Oh, no little kids running the sainted halls, all excited by the
imminent arrival of St. Nicholas, but more normal than it’s been, nevertheless.<p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In witness of that, I hoped we could take our Christmas Eve luncheon at <b>El Giro's Mexican Restaurant</b>, just as we used to all those long years ago (it
seems strange to say that, but, yes, those days are 25 years or more up the
timestream, though it doesn’t feel like it). Anywho, that's what Unk <i>planned</i>, El Giros, the <i>new </i>El Giro's out here in far west Possum Swamp. <o:p></o:p></p><i>Ma Nature had different plans for Unk as she often does, though</i>, plans in the form of a screamer of a winter storm named "Elliot" (when did they start naming winter storms?..musta missed that). We did make it to Whataburger for the Mobile Amateur Radio Club's weekly breakfast. I am the president of the club, so I figgered it was incumbent upon me to face the elements (to the tune of 24F) bravely. <div><br /></div><div>After arriving back at the New Manse and thawing out, I decided lunch at home would be just ducky. That was OK. Like many other things post-covid, I suspect El Giro's might not be quite the same, anyway. I still hope to find out sometime soon.<br />
<p class="MsoNormal">Be that all as it all may be, back home, I ruminated on Christmases Past. Not those at Chaos Manor South, but those of long, long,
<i>long</i> ago. Christmases I’ve recounted in this here blog a time or three.
Two of those reminiscences, I think, sum up my feelings about this most
numinous time of year better than anything I could write on this Eve:<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“<b><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2013/12/uncle-rods-christmas-carol.html">Uncle Rod’s Christmas Carol</a></b>”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And…<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“<b><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2010/08/stars-instead-of-cars.html">Stars Instead of Cars</a></b>”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Unk puttered about the place the rest of the afternoon. While it was comfy up in the main house, out in the radio shack, aka "<b>The Batcave</b>," the little heater struggled to keep the temperature at around 65F. But you know what? The cold made it seem a bit more like Yuletide than the usual Possum Swamp t-shirt weather does. While we can still have cold at Christmas, it's less frequent than when Rod was a boy. Hell, it's now getting rare for us to even have a hard freeze. Unk spent the remainder of Christmas Eve day with a wary eye on the sky. <i>Clouds had begun to roll in just after dawn to his dismay.</i></p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRPthTYENREfeQ1_HfYtL6HUT20H5S6zNJgiEu_uqkcktX1PyU_2SR4pPCHgc1pUnFYhCXHmJIkIaewziBqDRs_f64t-H432o2DqSOQA1UhMnhohT3VtNdQPIt6T94pqRBs2GWbC5geOGIzgv0fwZR_oFC8eYOgthOM2qysobkskkArw0XXFM/s4032/pal%20jr.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRPthTYENREfeQ1_HfYtL6HUT20H5S6zNJgiEu_uqkcktX1PyU_2SR4pPCHgc1pUnFYhCXHmJIkIaewziBqDRs_f64t-H432o2DqSOQA1UhMnhohT3VtNdQPIt6T94pqRBs2GWbC5geOGIzgv0fwZR_oFC8eYOgthOM2qysobkskkArw0XXFM/w300-h400/pal%20jr.jpg" width="300" /></a></div>As <i>A Charlie Brown Christmas </i>wrapped up on TV
(thanks to a DVD), I found myself growing drowsy—couldn’t have that!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wasn’t at <i>all </i>interested in hanging out with any of those dadgum Christmas ghosts this year! I jumped up—badly startling the felines. I wasn’t
gonna fall asleep and miss my <b>Christmas Eve tradition.</b><p></p><p class="MsoNormal">That's something that’s
been a constant over many years:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i>My Christmas Eve look at that greatest of
all ornaments, Messier 42, the Great Orion Nebula. </i><b>IF IT WAS CLEAR. </b>Was it? Unk poked his head out the Sunroom doors. Despite being assaulted by an icy blast that near-about blinded him with tears...it was obvious it was, yes, clear. Time to get about my business.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">How would I look at M42? “Simple” would have been my 80mm
f/11 SkyWatcher achromat. Given the insane temps, that would have been understandable. Understandable, but still<b> The Way of the Astro-wimp</b>. <i>No</i>. I would do it right, really right,
for the first time in a long while. With my ancient and beloved <span><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2008/12/me-and-my-pal.html">Edmund Scientific Palomar Junior</a></span>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I had got my Pal outside in late afternoon before the cold and a few eggnogs sapped my will, as I was pretty sure they would. I am a lot older and weaker than I was in <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2011/09/my-runs.html">these days</a>, and the Palomar Junior sure didn't feel like she'd lost any weight over the intervening six decades. Getting the heavy old mount and pedestal out the door wasn't a<i> bit</i> easier than way back when (Luckily, I didn't have to worry about bashing Mama's prized mahogany coffee table in the process!). I got the scope to a spot on the turnaround with a clear view to the east, just as I might have in days of yore.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p>And then it was <b>time</b>, about 2000 local, when the Great and Glorious Cloud had ascended above the neighbors' trees. How was it? Well, IT WAS COLD MUCHACHOS. Otherwise? Sometimes these sorts of things are anti-climactic. Not <i>this </i>time. The way M42 looked in this little scope over half a century ago is locked in my mind, and you know what? Despite my fading eyesight, it looked exactly the same on this night. Maybe the eyepiece I used, an inexpensive Celestron Plossl, was better enough than the Kellner I used on those long-lost nights to make up for my poorer vision. I don't know. <i>And I don't care.</i> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p>What I know is the feel of it was so much like those ancient December nights that I could almost feel my old friends, Wayne Lee and Miss Jitter Jones, standing by my side. Was it just my imagination that Jitter exclaimed at the beauty we were witness to, or that Wayne Lee begged for a look? I choose to think not. </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p>Anyway, what this all means, my friends, is <b>MERRY CHRISTMAS, EVERYBODY!</b></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p></div>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-89318676966463955972022-11-08T17:49:00.002-06:002022-12-03T15:54:15.256-06:00Issue 586: The Moon and You Volume 1<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc_wl-a7xuuQ0FURGOmsuwO50Rxg6vojQP8cNgmFM0VBeOhwS6ArBH6sy3LiHtXGUBtvN3pjvLKx5OBTGK4q_42RVodaxLzRyD5hwwS17Piqkhg057R9CskUGAZzdO8A3a3dtBFWqkADSAit_E9QMAybhpl9v4W10VXnExu9DqjKeDzK3Ml_U/s1024/99A0417A-EA32-4499-9D24-316F1EE84583_1_105_c.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="769" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc_wl-a7xuuQ0FURGOmsuwO50Rxg6vojQP8cNgmFM0VBeOhwS6ArBH6sy3LiHtXGUBtvN3pjvLKx5OBTGK4q_42RVodaxLzRyD5hwwS17Piqkhg057R9CskUGAZzdO8A3a3dtBFWqkADSAit_E9QMAybhpl9v4W10VXnExu9DqjKeDzK3Ml_U/w300-h400/99A0417A-EA32-4499-9D24-316F1EE84583_1_105_c.jpeg" width="300" /></a></div>I’ve remarked here a couple of times how fast the days,
weeks, months, and years seem to fly by at your Old Uncle’s increasingly advanced
age. However, you could have knocked me over with the proverbial feather when I
realized <b>Charity Hope Valentine</b> has been at my side for some seventeen
years now.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>“What in pea-turkey is Unk going on about <i>now?”</i></b><i>
</i>It’s like this, muchachos. With a waxing Moon in the sky, I thought it was
time to seriously revisit her. For me, like for many of you, Luna, Selene, Diana,
Hecate, <i>Artemis</i> was my first love in astronomy, a love I’ve never quite got
over. So, I thought I’d drag a scope into the backyard for a quick look. But <i>which</i>
scope?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“Quick look” is just about synonymous with “3-inch alt-Az
refractor,” and I could certainly have used my SkyWatcher 80mm f/11 on her AZ-4
mount. I wanted “easy,” yeah, but I wanted <i>more</i>. I wanted to kick up the
power on an evening predicted to deliver good seeing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The scope that would excel in all those
things? Charity Hope Valentine is an f/15 125mm aperture Maksutov-Cassegrain
with excellent optics, an OK drive, and at least some claim to portability—if
not anything approaching that of the SkyWatcher reflector.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As above, I was gobsmacked to realize how long Charity had
been with me. That one of my first blog articles about her, “<a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2008/05/two-and-half-years-after-honeymoon.html">Two-and-a-Half Years After the Honeymoon</a>,” had been
written in <gulp> two thousand and fracking eight! Not only has she been
with me for a long while, it has been months since Charity was out
of her case, and it was time. So, one morning out here in suburbia, where every day (they say) is like Sunday on the farm, your Unk determined to give the scope a checkout prior to lugging her into the backyard.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Protected by the decent aluminum case Meade used to sell for
the ETX scopes, Charity is in good physical condition. Frankly, she looks brand
new and has weathered the near two decades since she came to stay with Unk
better than <i>he</i> has. My main concern was her <b>LNT battery</b>, a button
cell that keeps date and time current among other things. I found a 12-volt
power supply with a cigarette lighter style connector, plugged Charity in, and
fired her up. I was hoping the battery was OK, since replacing
it ain’t no fun, lemme tell you. It had been over two years since I’d swapped
it out, so I wasn’t hopeful.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Power up, mash “Mode,” scroll down to time…and… <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was <i>way</i> off. But the fact the
Autostar HC displayed the date of the last time I used the scope, January
of this year, not something random, led me to believe the battery might have
some life left. I entered the correct date and time, cycled power, and, yeah,
it stuck. I figgered if time were off by evening, I’d have to bite the bullet
and replace the cell—“soon.” I’d manually set in the correct time if necessary
and keep on truckin’.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Some months back, I talked about resuming my lunar series, <b>Destination
Moon</b>. So how come up top it says “The Moon and You,” not “Destination Moon Night
Umptysquat”? A good reason. That series
was largely concerned with me imaging lunar features. I planned to do 300 of
them, the prominent ones shown in the old Moon map in the mid-sixties edition
of <i>Norton’s Star Atlas</i>. I got a lot of ‘em, but not all of ‘em. The
holdouts were those of unimpressive nature visible at inconvenient times. So… I
didn’t quite make it. Just like when young Rod<span style="color: red;"> </span><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2011/09/my-runs.html">resolved
to <i>draw</i> those 300</a> and also got much of the way there…but <i>not quite
all the way</i>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">My conclusion was if I failed to finish those particular
300 features twice, it meant I was likely <i>never</i> gonna do ‘em all. Also,
I wanted this series to be a little broader in scope. If I wanted to capture
Selene’s beauty with my ZWO camera, cool. But if I just wanted snapshot Moon
pictures with a cell phone, that would be good too. Heck, if I only wanted to
<i>look</i>. Or maybe make a quick little sketch of a feature than interested me like
I used to do all those years ago, I’d write about <i>that</i>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">After essaying Destination Moon’s multiple installments, I
was left knowing the Moon a lot better than I had during my deep-sky-crazy
years. Heck, I now probably know her surface almost as well as I did when I was
a kid and it was as familiar as Mama and Daddy’s subdivision, Canterbury
Heights. But I’d still need a map. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’ve got several, including the outstanding Rukl <i>Atlas of
the Moon</i> (autographed by its late author at a star party, the Peach State Star Gaze, right after he
finished enjoying the Moon in my old Ultima C8, Celeste). But if you use a star
diagonal with your scope, as I do with Charity (she has a built-in diagonal),
be it refractor or CAT, printed maps will <i>never</i> match what you see. You
get an upright but mirror-reversed image.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Also, once you get beyond basic lunar touring, the level of detail in
Rukl is a mite low.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What to do? Easy-peasy. <i><span style="color: red;"><a href="https://ap-i.net/avl/en/download">Virtual Moon Atlas</a></span></i>. Yes, this (Windows) program by the author of the <i>Cartes
du Ciel</i> software, Patrick Chevalley, and lunar expert Christian Legrand is
still around and better than ever. I talked about it frequently in the Destination
Moon days, but suffice to say it’s the program I always dreamed of for lunar
observing. In addition to displaying crazy-detailed charts that can be
customized to match the view in any scope, it will even send your goto mount to
lunar features. It’s free, and if you are interested in the Moon, it should be your
number one observing tool.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixKoBH4NQmFxhS7U42dCvKKhoD5MyKfOJ9NrPgVooMsiFTXI7khBKGmXSLOeIatqOaUNNsIHrfxjn-qroT7UAPILy1LWhoIRmI8qkriknMjGLAJ_uxfPHqNSMcUwu_3qYwohVn3dvLsvwcHMRceM5jOoVOzTQt3rXUrSXFW-JDrDKvo2jSWIU/s1024/85928383-B2F4-45B2-8544-0C2BE87E37B0_1_105_c.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="769" data-original-width="1024" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixKoBH4NQmFxhS7U42dCvKKhoD5MyKfOJ9NrPgVooMsiFTXI7khBKGmXSLOeIatqOaUNNsIHrfxjn-qroT7UAPILy1LWhoIRmI8qkriknMjGLAJ_uxfPHqNSMcUwu_3qYwohVn3dvLsvwcHMRceM5jOoVOzTQt3rXUrSXFW-JDrDKvo2jSWIU/s320/85928383-B2F4-45B2-8544-0C2BE87E37B0_1_105_c.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div>It seemed an appropriate week to resume my wandering of the
Moon, what with her being in the news and all over the Internet. The reason for
that, of course, was the upcoming total lunar eclipse. The news goobers waxed
enthusiastic despite this being an early-early eclipse, at 4-5am-ish at mid
eclipse for the eastern half of the country. Nevertheless, I hope many were
impelled to arise for it. As of this writing, the Friday before the eclipse on
Tuesday, November 8, your old Uncle wasn’t sure if he was game to get up at
that hour or not. If I do, a recap and an image (if any) will appear at the end
of this here article.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, on a gentle Gulf Coast early-November evening, one on
which the Moon shone down turning the landscape to silver, I set Charity up in
the driveway, a spot with a good view of the eastern horizon. All ready to go,
I turned the on-off switch to “on” and checked date and time. The date was still
good, but time was already off by over six hours. I set it correctly and
returned inside for a box of eyepieces.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What sort of oculars would I use with Charity this evening?
Nothing fancy. I didn’t feel the need to drag out any of my heavy-metal TeleVue
or Explore Scientific eyepieces. Instead, I grabbed the box of Celestrons I won
years ago at one of the last Deep South Regional Stargazes I attended. They are
all 1.25-inch (Charity is limited to that format anyway) Chinese Plössls that
perform just fine. Frankly, it’s been quite a few years since I’ve seen a truly
bad ocular from any half respectable vendor.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In went a 32mm for alignment. I coulda grabbed a crosshair
reticle eyepiece out of Charity’s case up in the house, but I didn’t feel like
going inside again, and a so-so alignment would be good enough for lunar work
anyway.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Anyhoo, Charity is a PE model ETX, which means she can
perform an automatic alignment not unlike a GPS scope sans GPS. Set her in home
position and she does a little dance, finding north and level. This took a
couple of minutes, but eventually she headed for alignment star one, Vega. It
wasn’t in the eyepiece, but just outside it. The next star was a problem,
though. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Because of my position in the backyard, many of Charity’s
choices were in the trees. I rejected one star after another till we got to
Enif and could finish up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How was the
resulting alignment? Saturn was in the eyepiece at 60x when Charity stopped, no
problem. OK, <i>OK!</i> I’ll fess up. That was the result of my <b>SECOND</b>
alignment. In typical Uncle Rod fashion, I kicked the tripod by accident,
ruining the first one just as I finished centering Enif. In my defense, the
legs on Charity’s tripod are more wide-spread than on most. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg04wzW72rBNlcYps23Pf4AFRR6S1dbMiyhzJkMFywY8hoKyF5XlrDLjBvwzzACvgfcXMtCdVn3kJ1fW5rOZRhejOnmu8FCpeDXtsgo3mIFFwYpe5cgcvOTnw9Uzk2aI0HxoUomh9PdyWfurHa0xNsvHNLsjU0kKOHWnGS9m9LlYbM2ECmc_hI/s937/Eratosthenes.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="744" data-original-width="937" height="318" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg04wzW72rBNlcYps23Pf4AFRR6S1dbMiyhzJkMFywY8hoKyF5XlrDLjBvwzzACvgfcXMtCdVn3kJ1fW5rOZRhejOnmu8FCpeDXtsgo3mIFFwYpe5cgcvOTnw9Uzk2aI0HxoUomh9PdyWfurHa0xNsvHNLsjU0kKOHWnGS9m9LlYbM2ECmc_hI/w400-h318/Eratosthenes.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>Where to begin? With the most striking crater near the
terminator of this young 8.5-day old Moon, <b>Eratosthenes</b>. Oh, all the
pictures here are from <i>Virtual Moon Atlas</i>. North is up, but I’ve flipped ‘em
east-west to match what was in Charity’s eyepiece. My first look at this great
crater was a bit of a disappointment. The seeing was nowhere near as good as
had been predicted, it was fairly lousy in fact, with 250x being a bit of a
stretch. 150x was more like it, and when the seeing would briefly settle,
Eratosthenes looked purty danged good. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It shouldn’t be surprising mighty Eratosthenes was my first
stop. It was perfectly positioned at 8.5 days, just a bit off the terminator.
It would be hard to miss even if this 60Km diameter crater didn’t display such
beautifully sharp, terraced walls. It is located at the termination of the
lunar Apennines; your eye just naturally follows their arc to this stupendous formation.
Despite blah-blah-blah seeing Charity easily revealed the complex central peak
and the rough floor of this great crater.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Where next? I moved north, flying over a tremendous amount
of territory LM style with a push of an Autostar direction button. I skimmed over many
wonderful destinations, but something had caught my eye; that “something” being
the amazing 101Km crater (or is it really a walled plain?), Plato. While Plato,
lying at the other terminus of the huge arc of mountains that begins as
Apennines and winds up near Plato as Alps, looks elongated due to its position,
it’s, like almost all craters, actually round. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What does every observer long to see of this
giant? Some of the craterlets that pepper the dark lava-floor. At eight and a
half days, the crater is a little far from the terminator to make that easy but running up the power to 250x and waiting for good seeing stretches revealed
a few spots that mark the (relatively) tiny pits.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What else is of interest in the area? Plenty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Only beginning with the Alpine Valley, which
runs for over 130 Km through this mountainous area of the Moon. It’s beautiful
in any telescope, but the prize is the rille down its center. About a mile
wide, this sinuous “channel” is a high challenge for a visual observer even
when the Alpine Valley is perfectly placed. I’ve seen it at those times, but,
frankly, the best way to view it is really in images with a planetary camera like my little ZWO.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjchQM9S_Vgn6rsPDvVQ7mdaET3eK7DUkWBRFSWVz5Jp4d7ips1WaRPIIO3K46D2vP2m-cdYBi7rCSNVpxtV8aHXBb-EVUHZsnCTzb-Ky7Q5lvL42vdp9ETpel7N05hom9BT3F0MWDhvbPpxKOgJPA8Bn98vgBhovqgcUmj9ZkGSDAhdb9ooyU/s919/Plato.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="724" data-original-width="919" height="315" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjchQM9S_Vgn6rsPDvVQ7mdaET3eK7DUkWBRFSWVz5Jp4d7ips1WaRPIIO3K46D2vP2m-cdYBi7rCSNVpxtV8aHXBb-EVUHZsnCTzb-Ky7Q5lvL42vdp9ETpel7N05hom9BT3F0MWDhvbPpxKOgJPA8Bn98vgBhovqgcUmj9ZkGSDAhdb9ooyU/w400-h315/Plato.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>At this point, I was frankly feeling a mite overwhelmed. Yeah, I’m more
familiar with Luna than I was in the days when I’d deserted the Moon for the
outer depths of the Universe, but I’d had a long layoff, from Moon-watching and
was feeling confused (so what else is new?) trying to orient myself and
remember what was where. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">One more, though. That “one more” was mighty Tycho. When the
Moon approaches full, Tycho is the most prominent feature on Luna thanks to its
draw-dropping system of lunar rays. End of story, game over, zip up your fly. But
even at this phase, it stood out like a sore thumb in the rough lunar
highlands.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What makes Tycho so prominent even when its rays don’t shine
is it is <i>sharp</i>, and it is <i>young </i>(the reason its rays are still so prominent). This
86Km diameter formation’s imposing walls contain a complex and interesting triple-central
peak. Anyhow, Tycho just looks <i>young</i> (it’s less than 1 billion years old) and is eye-catching at any phase.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And that was that. I could have kept going, but I decided to
savor what I’d seen and visit more old friends “next time.” One of the beauties
of Miss Valentine, of course, is she’s easy enough to get back inside and in
her case despite bringing quite a bit of horsepower to the observin’ field.
Soon, I was in the den watching TV with the cats, sipping a portion of Yell,
and strategizing about the upcoming eclipse…<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Great November 2022 Total Lunar Eclipse<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Nah, not as good as a <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2010/12/christmas-moon.html">Christmas eclipse</a>, but this one <i>was</i> pretty spectacular from the ‘Swamp. Course,
there would’ve been no eclipse at all for Unk if he hadn’t been able to drag
himself outa bed at freaking <b>4am</b>. Amazingly enough, he did!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’d stationed a tripod bearing a Canon DSLR with a medium telephoto lens by the front door so things wouldn’t be too painful at
that now unaccustomed early hour (I went about ten years getting up a 4:30
every morning for work, but that seems a long, long time ago). I’d just waltz
into the yard with the rig, shoot some pretty pictures, and that would be it. <i>I
hoped.</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6DBhkH6cSZmRB2w4tqvYQCjS24vnXlGYKUn3TkLj0PAeSPZFlJKdZ3IY8coCZdDSzHA3s3tOEBqppaIAjDnMm3wmnOmr4qYHi9WexYF8bGyxytacm66yhNZBM8fXv3Gmg3cCCtEJtKvozaVNdoQze4YtndE5Wejl7xFkqmuFIXBSwxM1Gbmk/s5184/FB%20MOON.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3456" data-original-width="5184" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6DBhkH6cSZmRB2w4tqvYQCjS24vnXlGYKUn3TkLj0PAeSPZFlJKdZ3IY8coCZdDSzHA3s3tOEBqppaIAjDnMm3wmnOmr4qYHi9WexYF8bGyxytacm66yhNZBM8fXv3Gmg3cCCtEJtKvozaVNdoQze4YtndE5Wejl7xFkqmuFIXBSwxM1Gbmk/w640-h426/FB%20MOON.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>Arising at such a ridiculous time wasn’t as bad as I feared.
In fact, the only pained individuals were the cats, who believed it should be
breakfast time as soon as I walked into the den despite it being four in the fricking
morning. I asked for some temporary forbearance, and got tripod and camera into
the front yard, on the driveway, where I had a good look at Luna, who’d soon be
entering totality as she sank in the west. Not only would the Moon be at just
under 30-degrees altitude as totality began, the sky was dead clear. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There’s not much more to tell. It had been a while since I’d
shot a lunar eclipse, but I still remembered how. Lens wide open, ASA 1600,
exposures under a second, 250mm of focal length, lots of shots. Despite my bleary
eyes, I could tell the images displayed on the Canon’s little screen were
pretty good. One nice thing was Luna was in a fairly star-rich area (and Uranus
was nearby), making her <i>extra</i> photogenic. It was a pretty dark eclipse,
too.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Done just before five, I downloaded the images to a laptop
to make sure all was well and uploaded one to Facebook to share with my
friends. Yep, looked <i>purty darned good</i>, I told Miss Dorothy, who was bustling
about, serving the felines their breakfast at their <i>strong</i> insistence. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">To be honest, I’d been sorta dreading the morning…having to get
up so early, get a camera outside, and see if I remembered how to take lunar
eclipse photos. But it all went amazingly smoothly…the whole thing was, to
quote the poet, “simple — neat…no trouble at all — not the least.” I was glad I’d
imaged (and experienced) this grand eclipse. <o:p></o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-52959316404694222172022-10-28T17:31:00.005-05:002022-10-28T17:33:02.908-05:00Issue 585: My Yearly M13, the 2022 Edition<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWlCaWA_aFjW-wZlVnRH1-WFUjFQALa_dFRkepXvc4fAy5781x0qCrvh5kWLvw_oTiQYJ0mOWeORaYIVUDlN94eL1IBxUSSZtcVlanNFWGkm1vvhTzXxaMtQXQwTdsR6IpQgfzCs06fQ0o89rXQJgeRIbkL9WZEqypbhKIYsH-RZ8KGiZyOdU/s1489/sam%20brown%20all%20about%20telescopes.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1489" data-original-width="1161" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWlCaWA_aFjW-wZlVnRH1-WFUjFQALa_dFRkepXvc4fAy5781x0qCrvh5kWLvw_oTiQYJ0mOWeORaYIVUDlN94eL1IBxUSSZtcVlanNFWGkm1vvhTzXxaMtQXQwTdsR6IpQgfzCs06fQ0o89rXQJgeRIbkL9WZEqypbhKIYsH-RZ8KGiZyOdU/w313-h400/sam%20brown%20all%20about%20telescopes.jpg" width="313" /></a></div>Well, muchachos, ’21 turned out to be a stinker of a year;
not much better than that cursed annum, 2020. I sure was hoping <b>2022</b>
would be different. I even dared hope the world, or at least <i>Unk’s</i> world,
would get back to something resembling life before covid.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i>Heck, maybe I’d even get out for my yearly
ritual of imaging Messier 13, which I missed in 2021</i>.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Alas, ’22, while it started off promisingly enough, was the
year your Old Uncle got the covid. Purty ironic, I thought, after two years of taking
precautions, even to include staying out of <span style="color: red;"><a href="https://heroessportsbar.com/locations">Heroes Bar and Grill</a> </span>for the longest time(!). And having had <i>four</i> shots. Luckily, no doubt thanks to those shots I had an extremely mild case and was soon feeling almost normal enough to
contemplate <b>M13</b>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As the year wound down and the Great Globular sunk ever
lower, though, the less likely that began to seem. You may have heard about
that post-covid tiredness some sufferers report. After I’d recovered from the plague,
I felt pretty good. For a while. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I went
from not just thinking about taking my M13 snapshot to at least considering getting
back to our local star party, the <b>Deep South Star Gaze</b>. Then—BOOM!—I was
suddenly wondering if I could even get up from my desk and walk out to the truck
after I was done teaching my university classes. I began to think I wouldn’t
get M13 this year much less travel to the DSSG.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But… (sometimes that inevitable “but” is a <i>good</i>
thing) over the last week I’ve begun feeling a lot more like my old self. No, I
<i>wasn’t</i> going to pack up and head for the dark piney woods of Deep South but getting a telescope and camera into the backyard for some quick imaging of
M13 didn’t seem downright impossible anymore.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Ah, yes, “imaging,” “astrophotography.” If you have never
attempted it in at least semi-serious fashion (“semi-serious” being your Uncle’s
beat on a lot of things) you don’t know what a complex set of tasks it is, and
how easy it is to forget what to do and how to do it after even a short layoff.
Unk hadn’t shot a guided deep sky image in a long time, and figgered there’d be
plenty of hiccups, but I bravely began to move gear from the sunroom to the
backyard, anyhow. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">‘Course, before I could move anything into the backyard, I
had to decide <i>what </i>to move. If you’re a regular reader of the Li’l Ol’ Blog
from Possum Swamp, you know I began reducing scope headcount rather
dramatically seven years ago. But that don’t mean Unk is exactly scope <i>poor</i>.
I have a brace of refractors in addition to my old friend, Emma Peel, my <span><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2013/05/the-herschel-project-nights-41-and-42.html">Edge 800 SCT</a></span>. I also have a pair of GEM mounts suitable
for imaging, a Celestron Advanced VX and a Losmandy GM811G.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Choosing a scope wasn’t difficult. “Feeling better” does not
mean “at the top of my game.” I wanted a telescope that’s easy to take pictures
with. One that almost takes pictures by itself. That’s my 80mm William Optic
Fluorite Zenithstar. She’s an F/7, meaning the focal length is short enough
guiding is not overly necessary with reasonably brief exposures. One night a
few years back, I was out clicking off subframes with the scope, “<b>Veronica
Lodge</b>” by name, and thought “Man, PhD sure is guiding well tonight!” Till I
realized I’d forgot to start the autoguiding program! The images Ronnie produces
are absolutely color-free, too. Down checks? 600 millimeters of focal length
ain’t a lot for smaller targets like globular clusters.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipN8AjEyd6lInOCuHWroYRtqhst1Bit7izoAr-W6xO4r2la0GgbQ6Tq_2rjWIZfdpaF2MZqaC3UhSbev7H-aPnD43YERS4gZSMFaAsWVfnt9ySDv79fUNmqgqzC93rQQJEdY3MIreYgXGZsLdyFuI5VTxnsPqkyLrW6N2bGes7Zged3I7epes/s4032/IMG_9345.jpeg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipN8AjEyd6lInOCuHWroYRtqhst1Bit7izoAr-W6xO4r2la0GgbQ6Tq_2rjWIZfdpaF2MZqaC3UhSbev7H-aPnD43YERS4gZSMFaAsWVfnt9ySDv79fUNmqgqzC93rQQJEdY3MIreYgXGZsLdyFuI5VTxnsPqkyLrW6N2bGes7Zged3I7epes/s320/IMG_9345.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Ronnie: Still pretty after all these years.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Choosing Veronica made picking the mount easy, too. The
Losmandy is a wonderful GEM, I love it, and it’s amazingly easy to lug around
and set up despite its impressive payload capacity. There’s no denying,
however, the AVX is <i>easier</i>. I’ve had the Celestron mount for nearly a
decade now, and it has never let me down.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p>Remember what I said about “complex” tasks? Setting up an
instrument for imaging is one of those. Getting telescope and GEM into the yard
is just the beginning. Gotta mount a guidescope and guide camera for starters.
I could probably have eschewed guiding, but since I <i>could</i> auto-guide, I
thought I probably <i>should</i>. Perfect for the 80mm is the Orion 50mm
finder-guide scope I bought years ago. The guide cam is a QHY5-LII I’ve had for
quite a few years as well. The monochrome QHY is sensitive, and the wide field
of the 50mm guide scope means there are always plenty of stars in the field.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The main camera, as it often is, would be my Canon Rebel XTi.
The chip size and resolution and sensitivity of the old-timer are a good match
for the 80mm. Nearly 15 years down the road, the Rebel just keeps on keepin’ on
like the dadgum Energizer battery. I mounted the Canon on the scope with the
aid of a Canon T-ring that attaches to my <span><a href="http://www.hotechusa.com/category-s/4.htm">Hotech SCA Field Flattener</a></span><span style="color: red;"> </span>(highly recommended).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In place of a battery, the Canon is powered by an AC power supply. Since
I normally operate the camera with a computer program, <i><span><a href="https://www.stark-labs.com/nebulosity.html">Nebulosity</a></span></i>, she is tethered to the laptop with a
nice cable I got from, yep, <span><a href="https://tethertools.com/">Tether Tools</a></span>. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Yeah, cables. That is one of the prime aggravations of the
imaging game. I’ve got a cable from the camera to the PC, a shutter control cable
from the Canon to the computer (the older Canons could not be triggered over
USB; I use a <span><a href="http://www.store.shoestringastronomy.com/products_ds.htm">Shoestring Astronomy DSUSB</a></span><span style="color: red;"> </span>to do
that), <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>a USB from the guide camera to
the PC, an ST-4 cable from guide cam to the AVX’s guide input, the power supply
cord for the mount, the HC and its cable, and—well, you get the picture. It is <i>extremely</i>
important to be diligent about cable wrap issues. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Computer software? I’d keep that to a minimum. I’d use <i><span><a href="https://www.sharpcap.co.uk/">Sharpcap</a></span></i><span style="color: red;"> </span>to get the
mount precisely polar aligned, the above-mentioned <i>Nebulosity</i> to acquire
and store photos, and <i><span><a href="https://openphdguiding.org/">PhD (II) Guiding</a></span></i><span style="color: red;"> </span>to guide the mount. I decided not to use any mount
control software like <i>Stellarium</i>. I’d only be after a single target and
I figgered the good, ol’ NexStar hand control would suffice.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQGveq0eflsgqd5BKuO1Kfv76OcuGTVpp0HwtSamYJeufiMRWnXXPraVnlfeSDucDm3-PUdPBb29kdE05vVnxjmVUFHZ6VJ_ePmsZOyUW2X2AIeGq6caYKQPiDoWjnLPae7s7rUWnCM7nBSE2RDNtywTCXcdsMZLwTlsuG5PYqAjIUVKrXDqI/s2016/IMG_9347.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1512" data-original-width="2016" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQGveq0eflsgqd5BKuO1Kfv76OcuGTVpp0HwtSamYJeufiMRWnXXPraVnlfeSDucDm3-PUdPBb29kdE05vVnxjmVUFHZ6VJ_ePmsZOyUW2X2AIeGq6caYKQPiDoWjnLPae7s7rUWnCM7nBSE2RDNtywTCXcdsMZLwTlsuG5PYqAjIUVKrXDqI/s320/IMG_9347.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Cables? I has a few...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Whew! I got All That Stuff set up only scratching my head a
couple of times over how somethin’ went together or what I’d obviously
forgotten. Now to wait for darkness, which would thankfully be arriving at a
reasonable hour for your old Uncle for whom 2300 local time is a freaking late
night.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">With the stars beginning to wink on on a frankly chilly—as we
judge such things—Possum Swamp evening, came Job One, polar alignment. I used
to hate polar alignment, which, when I began astrophotography, involved either
the drift method of alignment, or using a polar finder with a polar alignment reticle.
The former took as much as a half hour, but was accurate. The latter was quick
and easy, but yielded so-so polar alignments. I’d often find myself in a hurry
to get exposures underway, and usually opted for a polar-scope alignment, which
meant my pictures suffered.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Flash forward to the turn of the last century and relief was
in sight. Almost all of us were using CCD cameras by then, so polar alignment
was slightly, but only <i>slightly,</i> less important. Yes, exposures were
shorter, but our imaging chips were small and the “magnification factor” inherent
in that meant field rotation due to polar misalignment showed up easily and
would make your pictures ugly. So, I still had to drift align? Nope. <i>Celestron
automated the polar alignment process. <o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As the NexStar hand control matured, Celestron began to offer
a polar alignment routine in the firmware. It worked simply, but pretty well
with my old CG5. Set the mount up with the RA axis at least roughly pointed at the
Celestial Pole and do a good goto alignment. The polar align routine would then
slew the scope to where Polaris should have been if I had a perfect polar
alignment. All I had to do then was use the GEM’s azimuth and altitude
adjusters to center Polaris in the field of a reticle eyepiece, and, <i>voila!</i>
Perfect polar alignment.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Well, <i>not quite</i>. The quality of the goto alignment (and the particular
alignment stars used) could and did affect the quality of the polar alignment.
Celestron improved the routine over the years, though, and <span><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2009/01/chiefland-redux-redux.html">about a dozen years ago</a></span> debuted the version that’s in
their hand controls to this very day, “<b>AllStar polar alignment</b>.” AllStar
allowed you to use a larger number of stars (though not <i>all</i> stars as
implied) for alignment. Improvements in the mount’s goto alignment algorithms made
an AllStar alignment good enough for most imaging tasks.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhz0pSwBR4_N_d08C7CXBprXiz2oQ6DchAb6NDfraNO-r813BHL3a2c9xnKpq5p1jFm50c9hvmf1ICc3uLMYNhkRIQ79Te2lqxi43WL_nG7NHBmePtoHjHNKbXg6uI0538RTOMpBt-R0BDsIiigZnupcs2jURy-gl89C2duRQ9CQepDeFDQnI/s2483/long%20ago%2013.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1751" data-original-width="2483" height="283" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhz0pSwBR4_N_d08C7CXBprXiz2oQ6DchAb6NDfraNO-r813BHL3a2c9xnKpq5p1jFm50c9hvmf1ICc3uLMYNhkRIQ79Te2lqxi43WL_nG7NHBmePtoHjHNKbXg6uI0538RTOMpBt-R0BDsIiigZnupcs2jURy-gl89C2duRQ9CQepDeFDQnI/w400-h283/long%20ago%2013.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Typical Unk film image from a long, long time ago.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>The main problem I had with it was that in order to preserve
goto accuracy with the mount, you had to do a new goto alignment following
AllStar. Kind of a pain, and while not taking the time a drift alignment would,
it <i>was</i> time consuming. Especially if you wanted maximum accuracy, which
involved doing a <i>second</i> AllStar polar alignment after doing your second
goto alignment. Oh, and you’d better do a <i>third</i> goto alignment after the
second AllStar if you moved the mount much. You might be aligning on as many as
18 stars. Sheesh!<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Then came <i>Sharpcap</i>. You can read all about it in <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2017/03/issue-533-new-way-to-polar-align.html"><span>this blog </span>entry</a> but suffice to say it has made
AllStar obsolete for me. The <i>Sharpcap</i> software uses your guide camera
(or your main camera if you’ve got a wide enough field) to do the polar
alignment. In my opinion, it’s as accurate as a good drift alignment, and much
quicker. I can have a <i>Sharpcap</i> polar alignment done in five minutes now.
And since it <i>is</i> quick and easy, <b>I will do it.</b> Especially in the
beginning the most important thing you can do to improve your pictures is a good
polar alignment. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, yeah, with stars winking on, it was time to get polar
aligned. I set up a little aluminum camp table next to the scope, plunked the
laptop onto that, plugged the guide camera’s USB output into the laptop,
started Sharpcap, and we was rollin’. I was gratified to see the guidescope was
still in focus and picking up plenty of stars just past 7pm. Hit “next” a
couple of times, Sharpcap had me rotate the mount 90 degrees in azimuth, and it
was time to actually adjust the polar alignment.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The AVX is a nice mount for the price, quite an improvement
on the old CG5, but it has one problem it shares with most other imported
mounts. The bolts used for altitude and azimuth adjustment are a little course
and demonstrate a little backlash. That didn’t prevent me from getting a polar
alignment Sharpcap pronounced to be within 10” of the NCP; it just took a little
longer than it would have with my Losmandy mount and its much better alt-az
adjusters. Maybe closer to ten minutes than five. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Then, it was time to shut down and head to the local radio
club meeting. I’d wanted to get polar alignment out of the way, at least. That
would save time the following evening—I was pretty sure I wouldn’t feel like
taking pictures when I arrived home after a couple of hours with all the
friendly OMs and YLs.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The next night, as predicted, was again clear and cool, if
a little hazier and a lot damper than the previous one. It was time to screw my
courage to the sticking place and get some subframes in the can. First order of
bidness was getting the scope goto aligned. To that end I replaced the guide
scope with a red dot finder temporarily. Next, I fired up <i>Nebulosity</i> in Frame
and Focus mode, and it began clicking off exposures with the camera. The mount
had stopped with the telescope obviously pointing in the right direction, and I
was hoping the first alignment star would be in the frame. <b>Nope</b>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Went over and peered up through the finder. Vega was near
centered. What the—? Back to the deck (the PC is on the deck on a patio table
under a dew-reducing umbrella). A look at Neb revealed the problem. It was
taking exposures alright, <i>exposures of 0 seconds duration</i>. Doh! Changed
that to 1 second and back at the scope used the HC to center Vega while peering
up at the laptop. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQ9p39i4RI3p2dGAM-LzIUenUzksHBhQ7y8UT3bg2qJS-BJor-DiEgoQFDoDfZztqWyOZsbqxKZOlp3LJ-TJMWQ2wWkdGWwrG8qOSwKJtxQFcV_KDLOG2qC1Qkd51AFNuzQMlmqTJ7iV2sgeX57s_RQkvQV6OjifUICk1ymhbQubOlthQWccM/s4032/IMG_9343.jpeg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQ9p39i4RI3p2dGAM-LzIUenUzksHBhQ7y8UT3bg2qJS-BJor-DiEgoQFDoDfZztqWyOZsbqxKZOlp3LJ-TJMWQ2wWkdGWwrG8qOSwKJtxQFcV_KDLOG2qC1Qkd51AFNuzQMlmqTJ7iV2sgeX57s_RQkvQV6OjifUICk1ymhbQubOlthQWccM/s320/IMG_9343.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Rebel XTi</span></td></tr></tbody></table>The second alignment star was also in the frame when the AVX
stopped, requiring just minor centering. I decided to add a couple of “calibration”
stars (which improve the AVX’s goto accuracy). Probably didn’t have to, but I
did. Enif required a little slewing, but cal star two, Caph, was dead center
when the scope stopped. I figgered alignment was done and punched “M013 into
the NexStar HC.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Like the alignment stars, M13 was dern near centered when
the slew stopped, and focus, amazingly, was pretty much dead on without
adjustment. Guess someone up there was takin’ pity on your benighted Uncle who had
been rather worried about getting all this workin’ after not taking astrophoto
one for many, many months.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p>Time to set up <i>PhD Guiding</i>, then. Again, there was
little to do. The last time I’d used the software, it had been configured for
the AVX and the QHY guide cam, so all I had to do was connect equipment to camera
with a single button mash, choose a guide star, and watch while PhD slewed away
from and back to the star for its calibration. I let PhD settle down for a
minute or two, and it was soon guiding at just a smidge over 1 arc-second RMS
without PPEC turned on in the mount. That would be way, <i>way</i> better than I
needed with Veronica and the DSLR.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Finally, I set <i>Nebulosity</i> to take 20 1-minute lights
and 20 1-minute darks. I usually try to get 30 minutes on the Great Globular,
but it was only at about 30 degrees altitude and by the time 40 minutes had elapsed
would be real low and fuzzy. Watcha gonna do? 20 minutes was better than none. I could have gone much longer on the individual subs, but with the target down in the west in the brighter sky near the horizon, I figgered a minute would be best. I watched PhD for a while, but there weren’t nothin’ to watch. It was locked on
a guiding without complaint. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Image subframes clicking off, I strolled back into the house,
poured out a dollop of Yell, and then walked back out into the yard and stood there
next to the scope gazing up at somewhat hazy skies that were not a lot
different from those I had in <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2011/09/my-runs.html">Mama and Daddy’s backyard some 55 years back up the timestream</a>. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Those familiar-looking skies encouraged my mind to wander back
to the long-ago days when M13 was new. New to and quite a <i>pain</i> in the
rear for the young Rodster. I wanted to see M13, maybe more even than a spiral
galaxy. But when I finally got it in the field of my puny 4-inch Edmund
Scientific Palomar Junior, I was badly disappointed. <b>It was just a fuzz-ball</b>…none,
not a <i>one,</i> of its hordes of stars were visible. Which might sound
strange. Hell, Veronica will resolve some stars in M13 with her 80mm of aperture
at high power. So why couldn’t I see a one with my Pal?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">First, I didn’t know how to observe.
Most of the amateur astronomy books I had read warned against high power. Patrick
Moore practically preached against it. That being the case, I mostly just used
my 25mm focal length Kellner at about 45x. If I’d tried my 12mm eyepiece, maybe
with my Barlow, I probably would have seen some stars, but I just didn’t know. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Perhaps as importantly, I didn’t know <i>what</i> I should be
seeing. Sam Brown in his famous <i>All About Telescopes</i> tried to give ideas
of what objects would look at in amateur telescopes, but he was a little ambiguous when
it came to M13. His wonderful little picture tells us M13 is just a fuzzball in
a 3-inch…and goes on to say a 6-inch is needed to resolve stars in the marvel. But what
could my 4.25-inch hope to do? Maybe at least a star or two? Sam was silent on that.</p><p class="MsoNormal">Be it all as it may have been, I kept trying with
M13 and loved it despite my continuing disappointments—which were not to be
alleviated for some years, not till I built a 6-inch and got it to some darker-than-suburban
skies.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihAqxXDxCVzVybfGtETR3NpZBzae-hZsVIbItMXUexpqEOs7wcPqkW7hlfbzJsB0VlrcF1HcgKC73wqstH7kCIRt-Xv6hO6HAFsMTDMmWFKz3nNI0n1MKKFrlfix0rYmPbp9Z1f8Z-41YsvV99ilyxtfsVNveBG5DiHff7kc_I5EUAIghvPjI/s3907/2022%20m13%201.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2611" data-original-width="3907" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihAqxXDxCVzVybfGtETR3NpZBzae-hZsVIbItMXUexpqEOs7wcPqkW7hlfbzJsB0VlrcF1HcgKC73wqstH7kCIRt-Xv6hO6HAFsMTDMmWFKz3nNI0n1MKKFrlfix0rYmPbp9Z1f8Z-41YsvV99ilyxtfsVNveBG5DiHff7kc_I5EUAIghvPjI/w400-h268/2022%20m13%201.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>It seemed I’d been standing out there beside Ronnie for only a few minutes when I heard the laptop emit the little fanfare that is Nebulosity’s
way of saying “Exposure sequence is done, Unk!” I covered up the scope, being
careful not to move focus. It needed to remain where it was so I could take flat field frames on the morrow. I grabbed the laptop, shut off the desk
lamp with the red bulb in it, and strolled inside for a wee bit more yell and a
mite of cable TV with the felines.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Next day with the Sun setting, the task was getting those
flats done. I am not fancy in that regard. I make them with a couple of layers
of t-shirt material rubber-banded over the end of Veronica’s tube. It’s easy enough to
make flats, and they really do make a huge difference in processing. Unfortunately, something didn't go quite right with my flats. I'm not sure if the exposure was too short, or I didn't apply them correctly in <i>Nebulosity</i>. Oh, well, tomorrow is another day, I guess. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Anyhoo…<i>how I do run on.</i> To cut to the chase, I obtained the flats,
stacked them into a master flat, subtracted that from my lights (which had
already had dark frames applied to them), and we was done. The result? Nothing Earth-shattering,
that’s for dadgum sure. About what you’d expect for a DSLR shot from a suburban
sky with an 80mm refractor operated by an old coot who can best be described as
“astrophotography dabbler.” <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But you know what? The shot is mine. I made it with my telescope.
In my backyard. Even better, I took it as a sign things are getting back to normal for Unk, and I hope for y'all too.<o:p></o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-57627903426533116272022-09-28T10:08:00.021-05:002022-10-27T09:54:12.100-05:00Issue 584: Return to The Trio of Fall Globulars<p><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5hfeP8F8BpmoD_PvdfbQ-pwupk_Z-zSiwN7EhOll_O-MkBUNk_pH9L43FlOHDbaY0pr6EXYNAIO2NZwoQ553OdGTy6o_adXIue_ATSD3xU_S5vHtbtqcaUQzqIfa89GZFYhBmcNTuJ4vTy757MnGJMUytOH9pglE7Bor8Cckj1JpIB5eQOvU/s1101/autumn.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1101" data-original-width="811" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5hfeP8F8BpmoD_PvdfbQ-pwupk_Z-zSiwN7EhOll_O-MkBUNk_pH9L43FlOHDbaY0pr6EXYNAIO2NZwoQ553OdGTy6o_adXIue_ATSD3xU_S5vHtbtqcaUQzqIfa89GZFYhBmcNTuJ4vTy757MnGJMUytOH9pglE7Bor8Cckj1JpIB5eQOvU/s320/autumn.jpg" width="236" /></a></b></div><b>It’s been hot and stormy down here on the borders of the
Great Possum Swamp, muchachos.</b> <i>Real</i> hot all summer long, and <i>real</i>
stormy, as in nearly daily thunderstorms. Now, though, September is dying and
summer with it; the Autumnal Equinox is upon us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What better time for stargazing can there be
as the nights grow cool, but not cold (at his advanced age, your Uncle dislikes
cold even more than heat)? <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Yeah, what makes autumn great on the Gulf Coast is the
blessed relief it offers from the heat and humidity (and bugs) of summer. We <i>are</i>
prone to equinoctial gales, and it can still get hot as September wanes—your
Uncle well remembers the sweltering, un-airconditioned Possum Swamp classrooms
half a century ago—but it’s often drier, and the nights <i>can</i> be cool and
gentle.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Those milder nights are one of the two things that
encouraged Unk, who’s spent most evenings the last three months in his cool
den, to get into the backyard. The other thing? A new telescope,<b> the
SkyWatcher Virtuoso GTi 150P </b>6-inch Newtonian I’m writing a <i>Sky &
Telescope</i> Test Report about. You’ll get to read that in the magazine in due
time, but tonight our focus is on where I went, not how I got there. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our destinations are the three fabulous autumn
globulars I wrote about in <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Urban-Astronomers-Guide-Practical-Astronomy/dp/1846282160/ref=sr_1_1?crid=31V0MMPIQ0KYH&keywords=the+urban+astronomers+guide&qid=1664377151&qu=eyJxc2MiOiIxLjIwIiwicXNhIjoiMC4wMCIsInFzcCI6IjAuMDAifQ%3D%3D&sprefix=the+urban+astronomers+%2Caps%2C497&sr=8-1">The Urban Astronomer’s Guide</a></i><span style="color: red;"> </span>years ago.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As I said then, one of the best things about early fall is
you get the best of both worlds:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the autumn
objects are on the rise, but the multitudinous wonders of summer are still available
under more comfortable conditions. As I also opined in the book, on these nights
who <i>isn’t</i> going to make Hercules’ Great Globular, M13, the first stop on
a sky tour? I hope to come back to it in the next few weeks and take my yearly
portrait of the Great One, but on this night, I would just see what a “little”
6-inch Newtonian could do for it with your aged Uncle’s fading eyes.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The only question was “when?” <i>When</i> would I see much
of anything? We were experiencing the same heatwave much of the country was
under, as in “feels like” temperatures over 100F. Then, a nasty tropical storm,
Ian, which quickly developed into a hurricane, drew a bead on the Gulf, heading
for our neighbors in Florida. The strange thing? The downright weird thing? That
coincided with cool temperatures (upper 50s) and clear skies in the Swamp. You can bet
I wasted no time getting scope to backyard.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>M13<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Telescope goto-aligned, I mashed in M-1-3 (on my iPhone,
not a hand paddle), and we were off. When the slew stopped, there was M13
looking pretty bright and bold. Now, it is fall and this is a “summer” object,
but as above, the summertime wonders hold on well into deep autumn. The King was 50
degrees above the horizon and was really perfectly placed for viewing with an
alt-azimuth telescope.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRMhhkGIcbEay9nDdG4qBF9hnPdLAHzh17XLl1UH-hgOvQmsVbeNbBIKUNT9GtvgxHfYk3FWcO1XQbGMBP-VAC9qRHv14TP-P9PiwkbbmnPdt6Jz8bJofLuspD5PVwlyvAFKevv3IU4DXCYgz6ZD1hmK4H7AX7NJcYJ8dev3GoM4U_wgQPKEA/s1833/m15%20sketch.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1830" data-original-width="1833" height="319" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRMhhkGIcbEay9nDdG4qBF9hnPdLAHzh17XLl1UH-hgOvQmsVbeNbBIKUNT9GtvgxHfYk3FWcO1XQbGMBP-VAC9qRHv14TP-P9PiwkbbmnPdt6Jz8bJofLuspD5PVwlyvAFKevv3IU4DXCYgz6ZD1hmK4H7AX7NJcYJ8dev3GoM4U_wgQPKEA/s320/m15%20sketch.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">M15 in the Palomar Junior</span></td></tr></tbody></table>How was he looking? <i>Very good indeed</i>. The ground truth
is while a 4-inch telescope—of any design—is a portable, handy instrument,
M13 just ain't much in one in the suburban skies many of us labor under. In the 6-inch this evening, on the other hand, the cluster was large at 75x, and I didn’t have to guess
at stars…resolution was obvious. A higher power ocular would no
doubt have delivered more, but it was a satisfying view.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">M13’s lustrous beauty admired for an appropriate length of
time, the little scope and I bopped over to neighboring Herc glob M92 for a
look-see. And looking good it was with a scattering of resolved stars. Of course,
despite what you may hear down to the astronomy club, M92 is <i>not</i> in M13’s
class—or in M5’s. If M13 weren’t there, it would still be a second-stringer. Next
up? <i>That trio of globs…</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>M15</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">M15 ("The Horse's Nose Cluster") in Pegasus is one of those objects that always look good in smaller scopes from city or suburbs, but never approach what they can be from a dark site. As I wrote way back when: “Unfortunately, under the poorest
skies with telescopes 6-inches in aperture and smaller, all you may see is M15’s
preternaturally bright core.” As I also wrote, an 8-inch in the suburbs can
bust this glob into hordes of stars under decent conditions.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">How did the 6-inch fare from the noticeably better skies I have in West Possum Swamp? As you might expect, it was between the two extremes. Even out here under reasonably OK skies, in a 4-inch at low power the cluster can look like
not much more than a fuzzy star. But in the 6er, even at just 30x, it was obvious
there was a globular in the field when the slew stopped. I’d be lyin’ if I didn’t
say I missed that extra two inches of aperture oomph of an 8 inch, though. But, still…<i>not
bad. </i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Increasing magnification even revealed a scattering of tiny,
tiny Suns, though not many. However, yeah, the view was better than what I get in any
4-inch in the backyard, game over, end of story, zip up your fly. And
resolution or lack thereof notwithstanding, M15 was beautiful, glowing like a
dying ember in the subdued autumn heavens.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>M2<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgYAHl73cLriA-JWoZ0dSrWwnghVt2yNc3LM7_vPTPuhoWMsaS-UlSKC97cgI57m-JzLctr6dCrT5ZnLRL1ox8rHMOOnqVwe-gD1OLphESYuKJWCfJ2MItLwETugMWgk8OMEP2j39I_XEXbzsck6qoibNYXzP6_UIAMkUxKbSAtN3MGI8fRSQ/s3923/m15.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2615" data-original-width="3923" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgYAHl73cLriA-JWoZ0dSrWwnghVt2yNc3LM7_vPTPuhoWMsaS-UlSKC97cgI57m-JzLctr6dCrT5ZnLRL1ox8rHMOOnqVwe-gD1OLphESYuKJWCfJ2MItLwETugMWgk8OMEP2j39I_XEXbzsck6qoibNYXzP6_UIAMkUxKbSAtN3MGI8fRSQ/s320/m15.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">The Horse's Nose Cluster with camera and refractor...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>Aquarius’ monster glob is a spectacle with almost any
instrument, though in a 4-inch Newtonian like I used for my Urban Astronomer
observation of it, it is as I said in the book, more <i>tantalizing</i> than
anything else. In my old Palomar Junior from Chaos Manor South’s backyard
downtown, it was nice. Good, even. It obviously <i>wanted</i> to resolve, but
nary a star did I see. On this evening from the better skies of suburban Possum Swamp with two more inches of aperture, the graininess
resolved into hordes of Suns. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">When I was a young observer, I didn’t visit M2 as often as I
should have. It was to the south in the star-poor “water” constellations of
fall, which were often down in the haze. You young’uns with your gotos and computers
don’t have that problem. You can visit M2 anytime you like with the push of a
button. Do so; you will be rewarded. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>M56<o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Great googlie-wooglies! <i>Did this one ever give me fits
when I was a kid</i> out in Mama and Daddy’s backyard with the Palomar Junior.
It was a Messier, and it should have been easy to find in the little
constellation, Lyra, but I couldn’t see even a trace, not a dadgum <i>hint</i>
of this globular star cluster. The problems with this one are <i>it is loose and
it is distant</i>. I never saw it, as a matter of fact, until I’d moved up to a
homebrew 6-inch from the Pal Junior.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This lovely evening? Oh, there was no doubt in my formerly
military mind it was <i>there</i>. But it was, as I expected, just <i>barely</i>
there. It wasn’t even a fuzzball; it was largish smudge on the sky. It was a “been-there,”
one of those objects where you tell yourself you have to be happy just having
been there. Frankly, to make this one look decent takes a 12-inch telescope far
deeper into the suburban-country transition zone than my backyard is. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And that was a wrap, muchachos. The clock was
creeping on past ten, which is late-late for your now-aged uncle, and the call
of the den and the TV and maybe a sip of the Yell was strong. If you have
the Urban book, you know I visited a number of fascinating objects beyond the
trio, but I think maybe we’ll save that for a part 2 where I’ll give those even
more subdued objects a better chance to shine, maybe with my 8-inch SCT…or
maybe I’ll even get the 10-inch, Zelda, into the backyard after a long, long layoff.
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja97-pxqFSloEEEdCVSYYmyXS6xIbnv0cM2ZTD6b4QSJDltHyLIyXrFTXsl-45THC6ilqvld6ImXEPoMk2vcBBMDbte2LnZDWiG0oaNl4ml2-oOVJYc0ZwGdVKRx8d0k5o6KVGF-aRsDfx6pUSJUI_vzojw-5Cj9zhQnIm5Qzv49-wsIcW16k/s552/astro%20tour%20bus.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="374" data-original-width="552" height="217" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja97-pxqFSloEEEdCVSYYmyXS6xIbnv0cM2ZTD6b4QSJDltHyLIyXrFTXsl-45THC6ilqvld6ImXEPoMk2vcBBMDbte2LnZDWiG0oaNl4ml2-oOVJYc0ZwGdVKRx8d0k5o6KVGF-aRsDfx6pUSJUI_vzojw-5Cj9zhQnIm5Qzv49-wsIcW16k/s320/astro%20tour%20bus.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>And so ended my evening. One thing this 6-inch f/5 certainly
has to recommend it is it’s a joy to bring inside: no disassembly required.
Picked her it up, hauled her into the sunroom, and in five minutes I was on the
couch drinking a cold 807 and watching television with the cats.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What else? As I said last time, I’m getting my tabletop
space program back underway. <b>Artemis</b>, it seems, has re-lit a little of
the old fire for space in me. One change:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I decided to set the Gemini aside for now and build a Saturn V to make
up for the one that was lost in our move (apparently; it seems nowhere to be
found unless it’s in the attic, and it’s been too hot for me to check). I also
intend to do a Launch Umbilical Tower for it. I’ll let you know how it goes
when I make some progress. For now? Back to that aforementioned TV and those
frosty 807s…and maybe if I dare…even a little of the old Rebel Yell…<i>ciao! <o:p></o:p></i></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-6767937506724757022022-08-22T12:30:00.003-05:002024-01-26T15:09:37.615-06:00Issue 583: Covid Ain’t Nuthin' to Mess With <p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZtPQnFxjFYRdwRW3Q4iPx9e-LAci6oqjKuddSL5fBX_kW01eC2crZ12yxY-65hPeASCYK3RmP2PSqeXzEno9fgG54Lz_SQTR7w93YLrIpEGO4Zy074i4wMzZqzk0xKUQ3Kmf7D6TPbh6R6r3T6aCuDTH5S-MNMFdc542y16hD8aki34ivRao/s1440/Welcome_to_the_LOD.webp" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="810" data-original-width="1440" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZtPQnFxjFYRdwRW3Q4iPx9e-LAci6oqjKuddSL5fBX_kW01eC2crZ12yxY-65hPeASCYK3RmP2PSqeXzEno9fgG54Lz_SQTR7w93YLrIpEGO4Zy074i4wMzZqzk0xKUQ3Kmf7D6TPbh6R6r3T6aCuDTH5S-MNMFdc542y16hD8aki34ivRao/w400-h225/Welcome_to_the_LOD.webp" width="400" /></a></div>Muchachos, this is going to be a short one without much to say about our shared passion. I didn’t want to
let August go by without a blog post, but most assuredly didn’t feel like getting
out and doing any observing. The reason wasn’t weather or my aversion to biting
bugs and humidity, it was the dang <i>covid 19</i>.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">You know, I really thought we'd dodged a bullet when it came
to the plague. Miss Dorothy and I made it through the peak years of 20 and 21
unscathed. Hell, I taught in the classroom last fall and spring and didn’t even
come down with the sniffles. Did I let my guard down a little? Not in any
egregious way I don’t think, even though I was hoping my total of <i>four</i>
vaccine shots would be enough to keep the virus at bay.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Nevertheless, a couple of weeks ago I was sitting out in
Chaos Manor South's vaunted <b>Batcave</b> (my radio shack/workshop of the telescopes) and began to realize I didn’t feel worth a
<i>crap</i>. At first, I attributed that to allergies or just some kinda dadgum
general malaise, but I went steadily downhill from there. Mostly it was nausea,
though I recalled I’d awakened that morning with a somewhat scratchy throat: “Musta
been them leftover tacos…I ain’t coughing…this <i>can’t</i> be the covid 19!”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Uh-huh.</i><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As the
evening wore on, I began to feel like, well, <b>pounded puppy poop</b>. Even
that magical elixir, Rebel Yell, didn’t help. I sat in the den with our rascally
black cat, Thomas Aquinas, watching TV for a while, but had a hard time absorbing
what I was seeing. By the time I decided I was better off in bed, around 9pm, I
was feverish and had the chills. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Sunday night was truly rotten. I had weird dreams, if they
could even be described as “dreams;” they were more like the strange impressions
you sometimes get (<i>well</i>, <i>Unk does</i>) in that odd space between waking
and sleeping. <i>Long night</i>. At one point, I thought it surely must have been 4am. Nope, the clock said “11:00pm” …sigh.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Next morning, I knew it was time to do a covid test (we’d
got quite a few of the free ones the gubmint was sending out some time back).
After fumbling with the little test-tube and test strip, I waited the prescribed
15 minutes for a result. And, yep, “<b>positive</b>.” I really wasn’t
surprised.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The good thing? Over the ensuing weeks, I never really
felt <i>that</i> sick. Oh, Sunday and the Monday that followed I was not feeling
great, but after that first night I was able to sleep with the aid of that
wonder drug, Nyquil. I never felt bad enough to think about ringing my physician
(a fellow amateur astronomer).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had a cough,
but my throat was never even scratchy again after that first day. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZvf9JgKb1gDPwkNcag1WvXZyIbFnPirfCbqCpT2RfzRJoKTZkCEL97iaPOqTfoJ4QH4pNTbQrZUQJER8qiSyQ5xFJ-h8wTd-MbCjG80OAIRPiKQmfrpqqRTXf3QxjiARfkaUNd9oNhtHQeG0BEJFtTdVZvbfhWjCy3CLW5I0GS_B3yNOd4jU/s431/zwo%20am5.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="413" data-original-width="431" height="307" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZvf9JgKb1gDPwkNcag1WvXZyIbFnPirfCbqCpT2RfzRJoKTZkCEL97iaPOqTfoJ4QH4pNTbQrZUQJER8qiSyQ5xFJ-h8wTd-MbCjG80OAIRPiKQmfrpqqRTXf3QxjiARfkaUNd9oNhtHQeG0BEJFtTdVZvbfhWjCy3CLW5I0GS_B3yNOd4jU/s320/zwo%20am5.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>In hopes of not infecting Miss D, I spent most of my time out in the Batcave.
What did I do all day? I went through boxes of Kleenex and watched all sorts
of silly videos on the YouTube to amuse myself. I even saw some pretty interesting
ones, like some on the new <a href="https://astronomy-imaging-camera.com/product/zwo-am5-harmonic-equatorial-mount">ZWO strain-wave telescope mount</a>. Unfortunately,
Miss D., tested positive several says later despite being boosted <i>three</i> times. Thankfully,
like Unk, she was never sick enough to need medical attention, though she was
maybe a little more ill than I was.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And, finally, after two long weeks I tested <b>negative</b>.
I still have an occasional cough but feel <i>OK</i>. I won't sugar coat it, though: <b>I am tired, real tired, and fuzzy headed and don't feel up to doing anything productive.</b> </p><p class="MsoNormal">Where did I pick up my
case of the plague? Best we can determine, it probably came from the grocery
store. I haven’t been out that much otherwise. As always, I take summer off
from my teaching gig with the physics department here, and even my normally minimalist social life is currently at a low ebb. I do do my weekly foray
to Heroes, but usually sit at the bar on my lonely barstool watching the game. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Takeaways? If you haven’t had the boosters, <i>get them</i>.
If you haven’t been vaccinated, for God’s sake, <i><b>get vaccinated</b></i>. I
had a mild case, undoubtedly thanks to the vaccine, but it was still no fun.
Final word? Same as with Harley Quinn’s crew (while I was sick I watched the whole Kaley Cuoco series again):</p><p class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">“Covid 19 ain’t nuthin' to f*&k
with!"</span></b><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>See y’all sometime next month, maybe a couple of times next
month, you never know…</i><o:p></o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-39004301467303266192022-07-19T09:08:00.000-05:002022-07-19T09:08:11.074-05:00Issue 582: Space Summer Redux, Redux<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8XdQTpyOA_htEIuua5EgWZh3Q20RazXtlM0x0ev9wKDDPKJ4vDE2X6tZjGAsBWWIeVCBcHpk19byWXOTIsMm2zVbVLRIlhoYsjls-u3hdtXMfUxPzZuA4paohh8gN0xhTTYPIlG83ligekHEHy0mqO5dac8DAIceidTVvfwtE9tdfeTvzaIE/s600/Gemini-8-mission-50th-anniversary_1_1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="600" height="512" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8XdQTpyOA_htEIuua5EgWZh3Q20RazXtlM0x0ev9wKDDPKJ4vDE2X6tZjGAsBWWIeVCBcHpk19byWXOTIsMm2zVbVLRIlhoYsjls-u3hdtXMfUxPzZuA4paohh8gN0xhTTYPIlG83ligekHEHy0mqO5dac8DAIceidTVvfwtE9tdfeTvzaIE/w640-h512/Gemini-8-mission-50th-anniversary_1_1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>The years just seem to <i>fly</i> by of late, muchachos. I
simply cannot believe <a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2012/08/space-summer-redux.html">this little epistle</a><span style="color: red;"> </span>on my
wonderful space summer is from <b>10 fricking years ago</b>! You’ve heard
oldsters remark how the days speed by for ‘em. Well, according to
neuroscientists, that might be real and not just our imaginations or the
effects of <i>ennui </i>out in the suburbs (with which I am well acquainted). <i>Maybe</i>,
as we age, the brain’s “clock” slows down, causing external time and events to
seem to speed up…<p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That sure sounds reasonable to me. I cannot fathom how that
birthday week of Unk’s in July recounted above could possibly be a decade in
the rearview mirror. <i>But what a week it was!</i> As you’ll learn if you read
thatun, I spent those days in July recreating the Race to the Moon on Chaos
Manor South’s dining room table, drinking margaritas and eating Mexican food,
and…to cap it all off, driving hundreds of miles to Chiefland, Florida and
imaging hundreds of Herschel objects. Today, just <i>thinking</i> about all
that makes me tired.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Back then, though, it was a <i>good</i> tired by the time my
week was out. I was only on the verge of my 60s, still pretty hardcore as an
observer, and able to stay up till the wee hours—under the stars or not. Ten
years down the line? Heck, y’all, I am lucky to make it to 2300 on or <i>off</i>
the observing field (my backyard, not the CAV’s Billy Dodd Field these
nights).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Still, this week was once again my birthday week, and what’s
a birthday without involving astronomy, or at least “space”? It looked like the
former was o-u-t. The weather here on the borders of the Great Possum Swamp was
and is horrible. Even if it ain’t cloudy (or thundering and raining, more
like), it is <i>miserable</i>. It’s not dark enough to do anything till 2100 at
least, and it is <i>miserably</i> hot and humid (and hazy) even then. Oh, and
the bugs? They just love your old Uncle—as a square meal!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So…that left…<b>SPACE, THE FINAL FRONTIER</b>. Not with the
crew of the fictional <i>Enterprise</i>, but with some <b>real space</b>
heroes. <i>What in tarnation is Unk goin’ on about <b>now</b>?</i> <i>Has being
over the hill and ready to proceed down the opposite slope deprived him of what
little sense he had?</i> <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwFpRKkmxH23l7KOItPZ2daB8hKQyD5_Xk8tLySCbhImAMT2iYi7u3Gp905y52cZ17E6Ri0tzydom1yDiZ3xoqUhQvKq8ZExDL_cT9B_sxjc0lkyGdZGdG8REQqiSDIY4AMS0d9dVnh3OdLPf3tBz5QDuAu5f4fMDsbvEOyEOMdTZpYLLcnmo/s4032/006.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwFpRKkmxH23l7KOItPZ2daB8hKQyD5_Xk8tLySCbhImAMT2iYi7u3Gp905y52cZ17E6Ri0tzydom1yDiZ3xoqUhQvKq8ZExDL_cT9B_sxjc0lkyGdZGdG8REQqiSDIY4AMS0d9dVnh3OdLPf3tBz5QDuAu5f4fMDsbvEOyEOMdTZpYLLcnmo/w400-h300/006.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Found it!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>I was vaguely thinking the other day I might get my plastic
space program going again. It would if nothing else be something <i>spacey</i>
I could do in comfort indoors. That thought was quickly followed by me
recalling I’d lost the kit I really wanted to build, Revell’s 1/24<sup>th</sup>
scale Gemini spacecraft, when we moved from Chaos Manor South to suburbia. That
kinda drew a pall over <i>that</i> idea. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">No replacing the Revell either. The long out of “print” kit
can be had on eBay but expect to pay a hundred bucks for it. Which didn’t seem
reasonable to cheap ol’ Unk given current economic conditions. Oh, well…I
guessed that meant the closest I could come to recreating that fondly remembered
10-years-ago week was drinking a Margarita or two at <b>El Giro’s</b>…or maybe just an
Ultra down at <a href="https://heroessportsbar.com/">Heroes Sports Bar and Grill</a>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And then…and then…sometimes the stars align. I opened the door to the closet in the New Manse’s office to get something—I
can’t remember what and it does not matter—and for some unknown reason, looked
up. What should I spy? A familiar box on the very top shelf. Could it be? No…no
way! Yep, my “lost” Gemini capsule. And the box next to the kit? The <b>Realspace</b>
add-on accessories to fix the mistakes Revell made and add the things to the
kit they left out. I figgered this <i>must</i> be some kinda sign I really <i>should</i>
build the Gemini capsule.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What to do first? Well, I take this rather seriously. If I’m
gonna build a spacecraft model, <i>I’m gonna build a spacecraft model</i>. I’d
need to do some research. I still had the excellent DVDs mentioned in the
above-linked blog entry, DVDs from <b>Spacecraft Films</b>. I wondered, though,
if they might have some more Gemini-related films available…<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="tab-stops: 387.0pt;">I was actually somewhat surprised
to discover their website is still on the air in this mostly post-DVD age. It is,
but has an untended, near-ghost town look and feel to it. Trying to order any
of their products takes you nowheres. But that was OK, I still had their Gemini
disks and, more importantly, found there’s tons of material on Project
Gemini—documentaries, old NASA films, you name it—on cotton-picking YouTube. <i>Tons</i>,
campers. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGjP40up6bBGIfPVZujACmOgpaH0F1aUe5dIAAr3Y613Sj2cdFeKDrMQzDzNyx05ZIEw1ITFJcigIb_k-e1ZRxOTYOEOEEVS0P0q4W282XFaa_qS3pcCNYKu2pa5maj1ysNWoyPpgDq6sugVI-z-3NO53Mua7dxOEty-Ri4QbxFVZWqOpoAL8/s3000/gemini%20spacecraft.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2147" data-original-width="3000" height="286" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGjP40up6bBGIfPVZujACmOgpaH0F1aUe5dIAAr3Y613Sj2cdFeKDrMQzDzNyx05ZIEw1ITFJcigIb_k-e1ZRxOTYOEOEEVS0P0q4W282XFaa_qS3pcCNYKu2pa5maj1ysNWoyPpgDq6sugVI-z-3NO53Mua7dxOEty-Ri4QbxFVZWqOpoAL8/w400-h286/gemini%20spacecraft.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Gemini was a hot rod compared to Mercury...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>It was reassuring there was plenty of reference material available,
since Gemini (pronounced “Jiminy,” like the cricket, not <i>jeh·muh·nai</i>
like the constellation, young’uns) is the redheaded stepchild of NASA. Almost
everybody knows about Project Mercury. It was there first, sending Alan Shepard
and John Glenn and the rest of the legendary Mercury 7 into space just slightly
behind the Russkies. Even folks who don’t know as much about NASA as my cat,
have likely heard of <b>Apollo</b>. Gemini? <i>Not so much.</i><o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Truth is, that One Small Step of Apollo would have been far
too large a leap from Mercury. There had to be a program in-between. Something
that allowed us to perfect the vital arts of <i>rendezvous and docking</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But not just that. Mercury was a primitive
little spacecraft that depended on batteries. The longest duration Mercury mission
was Gordo Cooper’s Mercury 9, <i>Faith 7</i>. After less than a day and a half,
the Mercury spacecraft was on the ropes with multiple failures. We’d have to do
better to get to the Moon.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Gemini was a considerably more advanced spacecraft. Oh, it
wasn’t roomy. There <i>was</i> no room for the crew to speak of. The two
astronauts (one of the reasons the program was named “Gemini”) had to endure
something akin to spending an entire mission in the front seat of a VW bug.
But, yes, the Gemini capsule made Mercury look like a Wright Flyer. All but the
earliest spacecraft were powered by fuel cells rather than batteries, and the
capsule was much more “flyable,” which it would <i>have</i> to be for
rendezvous and docking.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Gemini and the Gemini pilots delivered on that. Not only did
Gemini VI and VII rendezvous in space, there were highly successful dockings
with the Agena Target Vehicle, five of them over the course of the program.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first, done on Neil Armstrong’s Gemini
VIII mission, was a near disaster, not due to Agena, but due to a stuck
thruster on the Gemini spacecraft itself. Armstrong dealt with it in his accustomed
cool and competent manner and the mission was deemed a success despite an early
landing being dictated by Mission Rules after the thruster problem. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It was with Gemini we began to first catch up with and then
surpass the Soviets. Gemini set some impressive records. In addition to those
docking missions, Pete Conrad and Richard Gordon’s Gemini XI set an altitude
record of 739.2 nautical miles (with the help of an Agena’s engine). On the
last Gemini, Gemini XII, Buzz Aldrin made a record-breaking 5-hour and
30-minute EVA. Maybe most importantly, Gemini VII, crewed by Frank Borman and
Jim Lovell, set an endurance record of nearly 14 days. That proved NASA’s spacecraft
and astronauts could hold up for considerably longer than the time required for
a lunar mission.</p>Post-Gemini, it looked as if it were full-speed-ahead to the
Moon for NASA and the consarned Russkies would be left in the dust. Alas, then
came the disastrous Apollo I fire that claimed the lives of Gus Grissom (who
was the odds-on favorite to be the first man on the Moon), Ed White (the first
NASA space-walker on Gemini IV), and Roger Chaffee. That set the Apollo program
back twenty months and turned the space race into a <i>little</i> bit more of a
race (at least we thought so; the Soviet lunar program was in real trouble).
Apollo I notwithstanding, Gemini prepared us for the Moon.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That’s a brief summary of NASA’s Gemini. If you want the
complete story, there are plenty of resources including the above-mentioned
NASA documentaries to be found on YouTube. Want a book? There are many. Some I
can recommend? If you’re a space nut like ol’ Unk, you probably know about <a href="https://www.cgpublishing.com/">Apogee Books</a>. They are still in business and offer an
outstanding volume on Gemini. They also have individual books on some separate Gemini
missions.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What did Unk need to do to get his own Project Gemini off
the ground? I needed a few inexpensive supplies…the usual things required for
building plastic models. Much of what I was using 8 - 10 years ago—paints,
putty, glue, airbrush propellent—was ready for the trash. Luckily, our local
hobby shop (we have a real hobby shop, Hobby Town, in addition to the strange
and execrable Hobby Lobby) fixed me right up. Those things obtained, I thought
I’d go ahead and do something about the <i>decal situation</i>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCt7ZqJ2clZ2iLFvAn7DqiH4fZdZNu1BGyVdWtyKGz7Iz91opTnxSmEF2FFi89rsIOgNKxiuQU77WtW1oZuraI57xFtmRv_cEmxKA6YXAG2ZHkpbSr6QGRcEq78-SoXaVv7Au3N2E8f92TVv5q_-_unpsqW3QI5jTpNpsjMSQSN3LZ7wy6t2Y/s4032/022.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCt7ZqJ2clZ2iLFvAn7DqiH4fZdZNu1BGyVdWtyKGz7Iz91opTnxSmEF2FFi89rsIOgNKxiuQU77WtW1oZuraI57xFtmRv_cEmxKA6YXAG2ZHkpbSr6QGRcEq78-SoXaVv7Au3N2E8f92TVv5q_-_unpsqW3QI5jTpNpsjMSQSN3LZ7wy6t2Y/s320/022.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">The washing of the parts...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>The Revell 1/24 Gemini comes with a tiny, maybe 2” x 2”,
sheet of decals. Not only are they few, the included decals are mostly <i>wrong</i>.
Also, not surprisingly, the sheet was yellowed and looking brittle nearly 10
years down the line. Luckily, <i>another</i> space modeling goto, <b>Steve, the
<a href="https://www.culttvmanshop.com/">CultTVMan</a></b><span style="color: red;">,</span> is
still in business, too. He got me three big sheets of authentic Gemini decals
in just a few days…<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Just before Unk’s birthday</i>. Which arrived as it
always has with fun and foolishness. How did your increasingly aged Uncle
celebrate <i>this</i> year? It was not that different from the space summer
that decade ago. Oh, no Chiefland…I haven’t been <a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2015/11/nights-of-living-star-party.html?m=0">Down Chiefland Way</a> these seven years, so I suppose that is <i>finis</i> for
me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, no, not <i>that</i> different;
there <i>was</i> even an expedition of sorts.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">On my birthday eve, I did a <i>sorta </i>spacey thing for Apollo 11 anniversary week by
watching Sandra Bullock in <i>Gravity </i>on HBO Max. When it first came out, I
remarked here that, while I appreciated being able to watch the pretty Ms.
Bullock cavort in her skivvies, I was disappointed in the scientific <i>faux
pas</i> in the movie. I hadn’t watched it again since it was in the theatres
(which I was amazed to realize was nearly 10 years ago).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i>This</i> time? The film looked beautiful
on the 4K TV…and…I must be gettin’ less critical and cynical in my old age,
cause I <i>really</i> enjoyed it. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The big day brought that expedition, to Meaher State Park
here on the Causeway across Mobile Bay. Why there? It’s a nice place to activate
for (amateur radio) <a href="https://parksontheair.com/">Parks on the Air</a>. Miss
Dorothy and I drove out to Meaher State Park on Mobile Bay, which is only about
half an hour away, and I made contacts all the way from Maine to Texas and
everywhere in-between with my battery-powered 20-watt Xiegu G90 transceiver.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And as a suitably appropriate finish to the day? Well, there was Mexican food. <b>El
Giro’s</b>, our ancient haunt back when we lived at Chaos Manor South (and often the
site of our legendary Christmas Eve dinners), burned down many years ago. Not long after,
they built a <i>new </i>El Giro’s out in west Mobile, which, we found after we moved
out here, was barely three miles away from our new home. Yes, sometimes the stars, yes, really <i>do </i>align. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>But what about that Revell Gemini spacecraft, huh, what
about that?</i> I got it underway, beginning the Saturday before my birthday
with the ritual Washing of the Parts (to get rid of any lingering mold-release
lubricant). But…I decided what I want to do is <b>Gemini VIII</b>, the
Armstrong mission. To that end, I ordered the Apogee book on that mission to
use as reference and am cooling my heels until it arrives. Rest assured; I
will update you as we go along, at least occasionally. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>I thought I was done with long, long
blogs, but I’ve just kept going and going like the dadgum Energizer Bunny. We
are well and truly out of time and space. Almost…<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSEqA2EHjLrwHjE5nQDHKaIZ3HYpcN8tPKhAIMW7qMSZHN9BYLikPyUeDDfA1EATNDZmw6yPc9OW5AmZBdIINBfWWfhqhuvWUfr9nNThKSlJtkxf3HGnj9PN1L_rJBbeSZT3YzkcnpK3WH2mOmlNUJYN1NLFtkzXd6A3LHp1uj2atYIImxRAU/s4032/024.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSEqA2EHjLrwHjE5nQDHKaIZ3HYpcN8tPKhAIMW7qMSZHN9BYLikPyUeDDfA1EATNDZmw6yPc9OW5AmZBdIINBfWWfhqhuvWUfr9nNThKSlJtkxf3HGnj9PN1L_rJBbeSZT3YzkcnpK3WH2mOmlNUJYN1NLFtkzXd6A3LHp1uj2atYIImxRAU/w400-h300/024.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">El Giro's!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>What’s next? For my personal space program? When I finish
Gemini VIII? As I mentioned <a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2013/10/space-race-redux.html">here</a>, the Launch Umbilical
Tower I build for my Airfix Saturn V was destroyed during our move to the
suburbs from Chaos Manor South. And at this time, it appears the Saturn V may
be gone as well. Oh, there are a few more boxes for me to look it and I have my
fingers crossed, but I am not overly hopeful. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, while it might be covering old ground, I <i>think</i> I
might do another Saturn and that LUT too. I have the feeling being able to work
on the latter for longer stretches and without any pressure to finish may make
it a more fun and less harrowing experience. Be that as it may, Uncle Rod’s
Little Space Museum is opening up again.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Astronomy-wise? </b><i>Amateur</i> astronomy-wise? I have but
two words: “<b>Destination Moon</b>.” Unless the weather becomes a lot more
comfortable and clear a lot sooner than I think it well, deep space, the deep
sky, will wait a few months more.<o:p></o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-43452467547653988922022-06-20T13:00:00.009-05:002022-10-27T16:04:04.242-05:00Issue 581: The Thirty-Seven-Year-Old Telescope Redux<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbsveSsqlnDAGSk4b-SWpJVdHQfyF79Ai3Vd-MKqez4i0fbVi6O3c6h5SCtKdscqdNWqkFCV9A253FU7q73C5NHLTxerkyL3qKaY0w_ADQ5wvUgzqbokf3NbeHqorv2bf9PABD0o5aa2dcC0cOQTHBnPnJdag9p37hgA0iyfVgFcfDDbqeObE/s4032/015.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbsveSsqlnDAGSk4b-SWpJVdHQfyF79Ai3Vd-MKqez4i0fbVi6O3c6h5SCtKdscqdNWqkFCV9A253FU7q73C5NHLTxerkyL3qKaY0w_ADQ5wvUgzqbokf3NbeHqorv2bf9PABD0o5aa2dcC0cOQTHBnPnJdag9p37hgA0iyfVgFcfDDbqeObE/w480-h640/015.JPG" width="480" /></a></div>I <i>could</i> have called this one “<b>The Fifty-Year-Old
Telescope</b>” or maybe “<b>SHE LIVES!</b>” Perhaps even “<b>Sometimes You
Haven’t Moved on After All</b>.” <i>What in tarnation is Uncle Rod goin’ on
about <u>now</u>? Has somebody been spikin’ his Geritol with Rebel Yell?</i> <div><br /></div><div>All
shall be revealed, muchachos, all shall be revealed…you just have to exercise a
little patience with your increasingly addled old Uncle. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Anyhow, I wanted to get a June 2022 issue of the blog up,
but it was clear now was not the time to try to continue one of my two current
observing projects, “Urban Astronomer” and “The New Herschel Project.” Why? You
know how it’s been in most of the country in mid-June—hot, and I do mean h-o-t-t
hot. It’s probably been bad enough in your part of the USA, so you can imagine what
it’s been like way down here on the borders of the Great Possum Swamp.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">If you can’t, I’ll spell it out for you: “Feels like 95F (plus)
<i>way</i> after sunset.” Oh, and that light pollution-scattering haze from
stagnant high-pressure systems? Lookin’ up at the sky has been like seeing stars
immersed in a bowl of milk. So, it ‘peared it would be “<b>No blog for you!</b>”
Till early one hot evening I was walking back to the main house from my radio
shack/workshop, the vaunted <b>Batcave</b>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It can be boring out in here suburbia if’n you’re retired…well,
<b>unless you have an amateur radio license</b> (your ol’ Uncle Rod has had one
since 1969). There is no shortage of things to do on hot days and hazy nights
if you can get on the air. Especially if you can do so from the air-conditioned
comfort of a shack like the Batcave, which I had a contractor finish-off about four
years ago (it began life as a detached garage). Anyhoo, having pulled the Big
Switch on my beloved <b>Icom IC-7610</b>, I was heading back to the house to
inventory the Rebel Yell <ahem>, when my eyes lit upon the Thirty-Seven-Year-Old
Telescope.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I wrote a blog entry about this old instrument some 14 years
ago. If you’re interested, read the story of <a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2008/09/37-year-old-telescope.html">the telescope that began life as a mirror kit I received as a graduation gift in 1971.</a><span style="color: red;"> </span>Ol’ 37 was a good telescope, and I used her purty frequently for six
years. But then she met her near demise. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Miss Dorothy and I decamped from legendary <b>Chaos Manor
South</b> for the suburbs following my early retirement at age 59 in 2014.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ol’ 37, of course, went with us, but I never
quite found a place for her. She spent some time in the not-yet-finished
Batcave. And she spent some more time in a corner of the sunroom. Until…<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’ve made no secret in these pages I had a difficult time
adjusting to retirement. <i>Very</i> difficult. I went from 30 years as an
engineer working plenty of 12-hour days to “Well, whatta I do <i>now?”</i> I won’t
say more about that today, since I’ve mostly come to terms with it, and you’d
just find the details boring. Be that as it may, 2015 was a <i>particularly</i>
tough year for your old Uncle…<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">One afternoon in the summer of that misbegotten annum, I
nearly knocked Ol’ 37 over in the sunroom. At the time, I had very little
patience for anything, had had enough of the scope being constantly underfoot, grabbed
her up, took her to the carport, and stashed her on a shelf. A shelf open to
the elements, though, of course, partially protected in the carport.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXdJLPs9SMYniHzrrjmIPPgkcV0X0lxu9UJ8Gx9h2yV8TgNqonZEZfTZiHRN0SE61fl3pJOo-4pnJ5i4ixAwGo9k2zFI9i8PRlCoC02xSPd45CKAI18uyjVY3CtJIuH7FDtmr0rc1-XzxxPRyegn5fHHv9F9SCoJIjKwWqcBj_SacpIrSS4eY/s4032/006.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXdJLPs9SMYniHzrrjmIPPgkcV0X0lxu9UJ8Gx9h2yV8TgNqonZEZfTZiHRN0SE61fl3pJOo-4pnJ5i4ixAwGo9k2zFI9i8PRlCoC02xSPd45CKAI18uyjVY3CtJIuH7FDtmr0rc1-XzxxPRyegn5fHHv9F9SCoJIjKwWqcBj_SacpIrSS4eY/w400-h300/006.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Operating Position Number One at W4NNF...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>By the time 2016 was half over, your correspondent was beginning
to feel better, but I kinda forgot about the scope. Oh, I’d see her when l’d
drive in, and sometimes I’d think, “Really ought to do something about poor Ol’
37,” but usually I looked right through her. The only good? On that day in ’15 I
had at least exerted some effort to seal both ends of the tube with plastic sheeting
and masking tape. And the shelf was, yeah, somewhat protected. But… Nearly seven
years passed with my old friend sitting on her dusty perch.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Then, just a few days ago, as above I was walking back to
the house from the shack and my eyes lit upon the scope as they often did. <i>Something
was different this time, though.</i> I began to think about the wearyingly long
years the poor thing had sat on that wretched shelf waiting for a taste of
starlight that never came. I was suddenly overcome with remorse and the resolve
to <i>do</i> something about it. I grabbed a step ladder, got her down, and
brushed some of the thick layer of dust and grime off before heading to the ‘Cave
with her. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As you won’t be surprised to hear, after seven years the plastic
and masking tape sealing the tube had deteriorated to the point it all crumbled
when I began to carefully remove it. Frankly, I was afraid of what I might
find. Would I be years too late to save her? <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Nope…looking down the tube I could see the primary mirror
was dusty and badly in need of a bath, but not far gone at all. The same was
true of the secondary. I removed the primary and the secondary from the tube by
the simple expedient of pulling the whole spider assembly (a nice curved one that
produces no diffraction spikes) and primary cell. I stashed ‘em in the kitchen
for cleaning after I did something about that horribly grimy tube. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I didn’t take a picture of the tube in “before” condition, campers.
Frankly, I was <i>embarrassed</i> to share that with you. The dust of years…spiderwebs…bug
poop… It was so bad the only way to attack it was with a garden hose and rags and
a bottle of Dawn dishwashing detergent. As you can see, she cleaned up rather
well. Oh, the girl will never look as good as she did in just-painted condition,
but is fine. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I could grab a can of Krylon and repaint the tube. However, I
have decided against that…maybe it’s best to let the OTA be and serve as a cautionary
tale for your old Uncle concerning being too hasty. I should have stopped,
counted to ten, and returned Ol' 37 to the Batcave rather than exiling her to
the carport. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Would the optics live again? I cleaned them carefully with
water and a little Dawn and, <i>yes, they would</i>. They are no longer
pristine. There are a couple of spots on the secondary. And on the primary too.
There’s also a “sleek” that’s actually more of a scratch on the periphery of
the main mirror. However, that has been there since the mirror returned from
the fricking-fracking coater, Spectrum, who <i>put</i> it there. Luckily, it
affects nothing.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpK3cdBFnBub2-Bi6hyxQ6mxmla0aqeBb_OMTu421WbnM-9BpwTnmN1cnvaoPagm5CLtZiDOgAbGiyFJNa0S2cqYLiX2O4OmqQaMNrTy_dsXRqTqItYmJiS4CRmXs0Y4vP0vxQBS0Fqs76SomC_JizT2I87LyosrCpsa8s0uhnwJpu_3wHMFA/s4032/001.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpK3cdBFnBub2-Bi6hyxQ6mxmla0aqeBb_OMTu421WbnM-9BpwTnmN1cnvaoPagm5CLtZiDOgAbGiyFJNa0S2cqYLiX2O4OmqQaMNrTy_dsXRqTqItYmJiS4CRmXs0Y4vP0vxQBS0Fqs76SomC_JizT2I87LyosrCpsa8s0uhnwJpu_3wHMFA/s320/001.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">On the operating table...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>What else? The focuser was in surprisingly good shape,
though the nice rubber friction-strips on the knobs had long since rotted away
and fallen off. Focus action was as smooth as ever. A couple of the eyepiece setscrews
were a mite rusty, so I blasted them with a staple in the shack, <b>DeOxit</b>,
and they were, if not like new, at least better. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Finally, I mounted a Synta-style finder shoe on the tube
with double-sided tape. Yeah, there was a Telrad base on the OTA already, but I
was surprised to find I no longer have a working Telrad (!). I’ve switched over
to Rigel Quick Finders and didn’t have an extra base (I could locate) for one.
I figured a Synta red dot sight would be enough for goto alignments. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Time to get the old gal’s optics reinstalled. Assembly was
easy enough…though it was a minor struggle to get the wooden primary cell back
in the not quite round tube and screwed down. Nothing a few minutes and a
little <b><i>patience</i></b> couldn’t see to, though. Naturally, after
removing and reinstalling both primary and secondary mounts, the scope would
need to be collimated. I went up to the main house and fetched my Celestron
combo Cheshire/sight-tube. <i>And stopped dead in my tracks.<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It had been a long, long time since I’d collimated a Newtonian
that needed anything more than a minor touch-up. My single other Newt, Zelda, a 10-inch GSO Dobsonian reflector, holds her
collimation remarkably well. Since we haven’t traveled to any star parties or
even the local dark-site since Covid began, she hasn’t needed any attention at
all. So…to my embarrassment, I realized I’d kinda forgotten what to do. Embarrassing,
yes, but I recalled I’d done <a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2009/07/zen-and-art-of-telescope-collimation.html">a detailed article on collimating</a> in these very pages years ago. My own words would see me through.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Indeed, they did. The secondary was only off a mite. And the
same was true, rather surprisingly, for the wooden primary cell. In about five
minutes collimation was done and it would be possible to get the old girl under
the stars and see how she might fare. Frankly, even after rereading the above article
on ol’ 37, I didn’t have much memory of what her images were like. So, I was curious
to say the very least.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">When would <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">I</span>
satisfy that curiosity? Why, the very next evening. I had initially intended to
wait till late afternoon to set the scope up, but knew if I did, it might not
get done at all. The heat and humidity at the tail-end of a Possum Swamp
afternoon would be just too much for your increasingly feeble Unk. Now, when I
was a boy, setting up a telescope early was usually a recipe for disaster. I’d
get distracted by a TV show, and when it was over, I’d be reluctant to walk out
into a completely dark yard for fear of <i>what might be waiting</i> <i>with
the scope</i>. Better to assemble the Pal Junior in early evening and stick by
her side as the shadows lengthened.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQGuqROnYE2PI-rzVUceC3TTodVIR7myfYUS_hHd7fm1cHufzYiFFB1LIMhQ7mZbOF4soZR5SqPq36KFAp4UlEDg8rS5-QBnL0vt50la4wLPUe4K-5HdBRFMpcttwi6ygeOCvfKH7ixRadgGxu-tZ_ED3Oi4pG0Tb0Bj4U6CDEcG8drOnNvCw/s4032/017.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQGuqROnYE2PI-rzVUceC3TTodVIR7myfYUS_hHd7fm1cHufzYiFFB1LIMhQ7mZbOF4soZR5SqPq36KFAp4UlEDg8rS5-QBnL0vt50la4wLPUe4K-5HdBRFMpcttwi6ygeOCvfKH7ixRadgGxu-tZ_ED3Oi4pG0Tb0Bj4U6CDEcG8drOnNvCw/s320/017.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Not lookin' bad at all...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>In these latter days, though? Neither TV, nor the Little Grey
Dudes from Zeta Reticuli II, nor Mothman, nor Lon Chaney Jr’s Wolfman has a
hold on me. That’s one benefit of getting older, I suppose—if magic of any sort,
good or bad, going away could ever be a good thing. So, up went Ol' 37 on the cusp
of a morning that wasn’t yet violently hot.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">No, it wasn’t terribly not, not yet…but it was hot enough I
went for “easy.” My beautiful Losmandy GM811G ain’t tough to get set up, but <i>nothing</i>
(well, no goto-equipped GEM) is easier than the Advanced VX. So, the Celestron mount
it was. In addition to the ease of erecting it, it has the advantage I know its
hand control and its quirks in general so well I can practically align it with
my eyes closed. On a hot and breathless evening like the one sure to come, I
didn’t want to fool around with remembering which button to push. OK, mount up, Ol’ 37 on mount…a little balancing, and we was <i>done</i>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Well, almost. I hopped down to Publix on this warm Sunday
morning for a 2025 button cell battery for the SkyWatcher red-dot finder and a
couple of shower caps to serve as Ol’ 37’s aperture covers. That accomplished,
I had to admit she didn’t look half bad. No, not bad at all. But the only proof
in the astro-pudding is an evening under the stars. I’d wait for that before
getting more excited about the old telescope’s apparent resurrection.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And <i>wait</i> Unk did. This time of year, it’s almost
2100L before it’s dark enough to begin a goto alignment. “Oh, well, maybe it’ll have cooled off by Astronomical Twilight.” Nope. Walking out of the house was
like walking into that proverbial steam bath. But I did persevere, for a while anyway.
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">How did it go? I’ll give ya the good and the bad…<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>The Good…<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As above, I honestly didn’t have a clue what to expect of this
old mirror begun by <i>moi</i> and finished by talented ATM, Pat Rochford. But
it was just fine. No, <i>more</i> than fine, darned good as a matter of fact.
As is strangely often the case down here of late, the seeing wasn’t really
great despite the high pressure we were under. Advancing front? I dunno, but
near as I could tell, the star test was pretty good.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The focuser worked as well as it ever had, easily coping with
a 35mm TeleVue panoptic. Due to the quality of my alignment (below), I figgered
I’d better stick with a low-powered finding eyepiece.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Maybe best of all? Being on the field with a white-tube
Newtonian telescope brought <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2011/09/my-runs.html">a flood of memories</a><span style="color: red;"> </span>rushing
back. Ol' 37's aperture was larger than that of the Pal Junior and the mount far
more sophisticated, but all-in-all, the experience was much like what I
remember of that long-gone eve in the Swamp.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>The Bad…<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The SkyWatcher BB gun red-dot sight was <i>nowhere</i>. I
could only get it adjusted roughly, so it barely coincided with what was in the
eyepiece. And the more I fiddled with it, the worse it got. With sweat dripping
into my eyes, I decided a “good enough” goto alignment was, well, <i>good enough</i>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_er7enaNa_anG-_JiyYTEVOtOIxorFVGNpThDwJwXlfRMghJultos03Q-nrq3-vpJJOL2b21LXRSi5vdkKBWnCOdXCCxFw_SJ4FgWDoBHJNAyW8t1NnF7UrOBNRUgUsuSR81XKbJ4IlH3E-cRCZ5XOpRjWJEAtuVDEemJzETTA9IPsczTA_Q/s4032/009.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_er7enaNa_anG-_JiyYTEVOtOIxorFVGNpThDwJwXlfRMghJultos03Q-nrq3-vpJJOL2b21LXRSi5vdkKBWnCOdXCCxFw_SJ4FgWDoBHJNAyW8t1NnF7UrOBNRUgUsuSR81XKbJ4IlH3E-cRCZ5XOpRjWJEAtuVDEemJzETTA9IPsczTA_Q/w300-h400/009.JPG" width="300" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">She lives!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>It had been a long time since I’d used a Newtonian on an
equatorial mount, and, <i><b>good God</b></i>, those changing eyepiece positions are a
pain. Yeah, I could rotate the tube in its rings, but the rather plebian
Synta-made tube-rings on Ol’ 37 mean doing so is a recipe for disaster. The
tube will want to slide out of ‘em and I will want to kick the tripod in the process, ruining
my goto alignment.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The collimation could stand a touchup, but I wisely decided
this miserably close night was not one for essaying that.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Did I mention it was hot and humid?</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Which doesn’t mean I didn’t see a couple of cool things.
While the haze was growing steadily, both M13 and M3 were nice. Going from the 35mm Panoptic
to the 8mm Ethos (once I figured out I’d need an extension tube for it to come
to focus) delivered some rather convincing resolution, even of tight M13.
Certainly, I’d have been thrilled to see the ball of stars actually looking
like a ball of stars on the long-ago night recounted in the link above. Going
from 4-inches, even to include a 4-inch refractor, to 6-inches really <i>does</i>
make a difference.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">M13 viewed for a fair length of time, I decided to pull the
Big Switch. Observing is supposed to be fun, after all, and I was beginning to
feel miserable. Inside with a cool sarsaparilly, I recovered and planned what’s
next for the old telescope.</p><p class="MsoNormal">"Next" is order a Quick Finder base (from <b>Scopestuff</b>, my
usual source for such things). That will make a huge difference. When will I
give Ol’ 37 another chance? I won’t wait for cool weather—which might be a long
time coming—but I <i>will</i> wait for better than <i>this</i>.<o:p></o:p></p></div>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-37485371752164112272022-05-08T12:58:00.017-05:002024-01-26T15:35:09.696-06:00Issue 580: Urban Astronomer Night 1, Burning Heart of the Hunting Dogs<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy8_hx9Cs_FCGKyiKwpose6HDHlCYb-ak3U0QHyrYBAFTsBCD5IfOA8L2f8sOSDh5iULnIaPuT7k9oN7UcJfC6tMq5ywp86K9524T35r9UfbjkH7h4nhZxkjAR70lnahqIz4P-jvNl7vsL9MKJpQz2BeL_cOkCGPJkDY-MTmpplkhlhsx6v3o/s552/astro%20tour%20bus.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="374" data-original-width="552" height="271" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy8_hx9Cs_FCGKyiKwpose6HDHlCYb-ak3U0QHyrYBAFTsBCD5IfOA8L2f8sOSDh5iULnIaPuT7k9oN7UcJfC6tMq5ywp86K9524T35r9UfbjkH7h4nhZxkjAR70lnahqIz4P-jvNl7vsL9MKJpQz2BeL_cOkCGPJkDY-MTmpplkhlhsx6v3o/w400-h271/astro%20tour%20bus.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>Yeah, you don’t have to tell <i>me</i> the ol’ AstroBlog
missed another few months. I was all fired up to get back on a regular schedule
in February, but... That obviously didn’t happen, and we missed February, March,
<i>and</i> April. None of which was by design, muchachos. <p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Alas, in February and March your broken-down old Uncle’s
health or lack thereof was once again a factor. A big one. In April, I was
feeling better, almost like my old cantankerous self, but I had a <i>big</i>
responsibility that month, the 2022 Mobile Hamfest. I am the president of the
Mobile Amateur Radio Club, and the hamfest, which we’ve been putting on at
least since the end of World War II, was job <i>numero uno</i> for me and my
fellow officers.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But now it’s May, and I actually feel even better than I did
during hamfest month (knock on wood) and am ready to get the blog on the road
again, <b>THIS TIME FOR SURE</b>, with a brand new (in a way) observing project.
So, what happened to Unk’s<i> last </i>big observing idea<i>, </i>“<a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2020/11/the-new-herschel-project-night-3-29.html?msclkid=4b5ef3d9cef411ec9a439538a2632ea0">The New Herschel Project,</a>”<i> w</i>hich was to be my
quest to observe the Herschel 400 objects from my backyard with a 6-inch
telescope? “<b>Nuttin’ honey</b>” <i>is what</i>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Those lingering health issues that stretch all the way back
to 2019 <i>is why</i>. It is still going to happen, though, and will run
concurrently in these pages with the new one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I’ve found my observing is most productive these days when I’ve got a
couple of things to work on. So, expect to see “The New Herschel Project Night
4” here before long. But the new one? Unk’s <i>new</i> quest? It came to me in
a flash one cloudy evening.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The thing with your old Unk when it comes to observing projects?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The successful ones are rarely those I
struggle with and dig for. They are the ones that come as if by magic. Like the
morning a few <ahem> years ago I awoke with the idea of observing every
Cassiopeia open cluster my 12-inch Dobsonian, Old Betsy, could reach. An
abbreviated version of that project appeared some years later as a chapter in
my book <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Urban-Astronomers-Guide-Practical-Astronomy/dp/1846282160/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3CPBU9P5WOIHK&keywords=the+urban+astronomer%27s+guide&qid=1652031005&s=books&sprefix=the+urban+astronomer%27s+guide%2Cstripbooks%2C572&sr=1-1">The Urban Astronomer’s Guide</a><span style="color: red;"> </span></i>(2006).
The point is I didn’t <i>agonize</i> over anything; “The Cassiopeia Clusters”
just bubbled up out of my subconscious.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>And speaking of that book</i>, while I will readily admit
it’s not perfect, I think it is pretty darned good and is the one book of mine
I am 100% happy with (though the Second Edition of <i>Choosing and Using a New
CAT</i> comes close). Does it sound like Urban Astronomer had been on Unk’s
mind? It really hadn’t. Nevertheless, just as on that long-ago dawn at old
Chaos Manor South, an observing project, one involving that book, sprang from
Unk’s mind (such as it is) Athena-like.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEdcVWBhVWiH-j6UuFsfDyzBY0gXpsTa8fZhR6VZZMbYmKoxE-x1Stm8JTv7zyb-5OojYogYQoYwOQ8zDWRTdAbZfuI_KiApeMnUXSjM8X68e6aqpsB1Kmvnj9QVWBKEiBvkuu5vyhgGGQC4_a_02LtcDE9WQhhha9D9inGm6c0GpvaeVXTKA/s612/ua.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="612" data-original-width="406" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEdcVWBhVWiH-j6UuFsfDyzBY0gXpsTa8fZhR6VZZMbYmKoxE-x1Stm8JTv7zyb-5OojYogYQoYwOQ8zDWRTdAbZfuI_KiApeMnUXSjM8X68e6aqpsB1Kmvnj9QVWBKEiBvkuu5vyhgGGQC4_a_02LtcDE9WQhhha9D9inGm6c0GpvaeVXTKA/w265-h400/ua.jpeg" width="265" /></a></div>Like Pallas, this idea was fully formed and didn’t take any ruminating:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i>I’d revisit all the objects from Urban
Astronomer. </i>I’d also try to stay true to the book’s small scope emphasis. While
some of the Urban objects were observed with my (now gone) 12.5-inch Dobsonian
and C11, most were viewed with 8-inch and smaller telescopes, many with 4-inch
and 6-inch Newtonian reflectors.<i><o:p></o:p></i><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Unk figgered a 6-inch <i>refractor</i> would be a good compromise.
More oomph than Urban Astronomer’s old 6-inch Newtonian, but still true to the
small-aperture spirit of the book. Of course, my 8-inch Edge SCT, Mrs. Emma
Peel will get her share of starlight. If neither of those two proves sufficient
for a target? I still have one larger-aperture instrument, my 10-inch Dobbie, Zelda,<span style="color: red;"> </span>to call on if and when needed. But the idea of
using the 6-inch refractor, <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2016/11/issue-516-big-ethel-gathers-photons-at.html?msclkid=a91c43c2cef411ec90dc9d8525a3edb5">Big Ethel</a>, for at
least part of the project was appealing. I was curious to see what she could do
with the urban objects from my backyard—and curiosity is a <i>very</i>
necessary ingredient in any of my projects.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">First step in getting The Urban Astronomer Project off the
ground was putting together an observing list of the book’s objects. I had a <i>SkyTools
2</i> format observing list posted online for years. Unfortunately, its location was the
files section of the Yahoogroup devoted to my book, which is, of course, long
gone, vanished into the ether with the rest of the vaunted groups. I searched
my hard drive, but didn’t find a copy. What I <i>did</i> find was a Word format
list of the book’s DSOs.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Being lazy, Unk really didn’t want to sit down and manually
key-in every one of those dadgummed 154 objects, though that wouldn’t have been
that bad.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, I said to myself, “Self,
the <i><a href="http://www.knightware.biz/dsp/index.php?msclkid=c7a57464cef411ecad7a16d455ff7ba9">Deep Sky Planner 8</a></i><span style="color: red;"> </span>program is supposed to have a pretty good import
function. Worth a try, anyhow.” I saved the Word file as a plain text document,
opened DS8, went to “import,” and <<b>boom</b>> I had a DSP observing
list in just a minute or two. Frankly, I was amazed it had been so easy, but I
shouldn’t have been. <i>Deep Sky Planner</i> is one of those few astronomy
programs that do everything right.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’d already decided on a scope for the project, Big Ethel.
The only question was <i>the mount</i>. But that wasn’t much of a question either.
The big refractor is usable on my Celestron Advanced VX GEM mount. She’s a
little shakier on the VX than I’d like, but not bad at all. More
problematically, if you send the AVX to an object above about 75 – 80<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;">°</span> altitude,
you run the risk of crashing the OTA into a tripod leg. So, my Losmandy GM811
GEM it would be. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>Or so I thought.</i> My latest assignment for <i>Sky
& Telescope</i> wrought an immediate change in gear lineup. I was engaged
in doing the S&T Test Report on Celestron’s new dew heater system for SCTs
(look for it soon), and I’d obviously need to use an SCT, a Celestron SCT, for that.
Checking out their Smart Dew Controller’s Celestron-specific functions would
require a Celestron mount and Celestron software (CPWI), too. So… <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Since, I’d be out with the Edge 800 and the AVX mount working
on the Test Report, I thought I might as well piggyback the first night of <b>The
Urban Astronomer Survey</b> on that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
do need to get the refractor and Losmandy mount into
the backyard and check them out after another long period of disuse, but that
will be “next time.”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Equipment settled, all that remained was to decide upon my
starting place in the sky. I’d originally, back in February, intended that to
be Orion. Specifically, <b>Chapter 9, Tour 1, “Return of the Hunter.”</b> But, suddenly,
it was May and the big guy was down on the horizon at dark. It was spring…glorious
<i>spring</i>…and where better to start than <b>Chapter 6, Tour 1, “Burning
Heart of the Hunting Dogs”?</b> Not only does that include some truly
archetypal spring deep sky objects, it’s the first of the book’s sky tours and
thus seemed a perfect place for us to begin our journey.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">If you have the book, follow along with it. If you ain’t got
the book, <i>why ain’t you?</i> <b>Just kiddin’</b>…all are welcome to join our
little expedition whether they have contributed to your parsimonious old
Uncle’s Rebel Yell fund or not.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So came a clear night. One of those currently rare clear nights
down here on the borders of the Great Possum Swamp. Oh, it wasn’t perfect…there
was a thin crescent Moon riding high and casting shadows on the Earth below, humidity
was at 60% and rising, and there was haze aplenty. But it was OK. And it had been
obvious enough it was going to <i>be</i> OK to impel me to get Emma and her AVX
mount into the backyard late that afternoon. It was hot as the day waned, not
punishingly hot, but a foreshadowing of things to come in just a month or two. I
got the scope set up without breaking <i>too</i> much of a sweat.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL3_4JyO5by6gajl0uAxot0oJCtHvFDo4-YdDt_H_uFgU8_X_8ydtVikfesBNxiHNk27NYFL4LlSs3r-7acBXewiQopw2yRCJ4ApHqNRZSV134APfLuegrIR_0NXd66Jlboes_eqGRNp0gt-o4JZpG_o9BENlwrNGMKZCjg0fOWZZJFctcwKk/s4032/emma.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL3_4JyO5by6gajl0uAxot0oJCtHvFDo4-YdDt_H_uFgU8_X_8ydtVikfesBNxiHNk27NYFL4LlSs3r-7acBXewiQopw2yRCJ4ApHqNRZSV134APfLuegrIR_0NXd66Jlboes_eqGRNp0gt-o4JZpG_o9BENlwrNGMKZCjg0fOWZZJFctcwKk/w400-h300/emma.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Were we ready to go? I hoped so...</span></td></tr></tbody></table>When darkness finally came—damn this DST—I threw the switch
on the mount and hoped for the best. I was worried, you see. What was to worry?
Well, that afternoon I’d been reviewing the manual for the above-mentioned Celestron
dew controller. It mentioned that in order to monitor the heater system with a
NexStar+ HC, <i>I had to upgrade to recent firmware</i>. <b><i>“Oh, here we go…”<o:p></o:p></i></b><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’ll admit I hadn’t updated the AVX MC or HC in years. In at
least five years, y’all. There really wasn’t any reason to. Mount worked fine,
and none of the minor improvements in the Celestron firmware I’d read about seemed
to apply to me. Last time I’d upgraded anything was shortly after I got a
Celestron StarSense. I did update that, since I’d been told it was a must for
the thing to work right. But that was well before 2017<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Hokay, what will be, will be. I downloaded CFM, the Celestron
Firmware Manager. I vaguely remembered the last time I updated an HC that
Celestron had gone to a Java app that somewhat automated the process, but recalled
no details.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">“Alright. Got ‘er downloaded. Zip file. I’ll just extract it
into a new directory and have a look-see. Wait. What the hail is this? <i>A .jar
file?!</i>”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What was I supposed to do
with <i>that?</i> How did I extract it? With what? I started looking for an app
to expand such files, but then a small light went on in Unk’s increasingly
confused noggin. <b>Celestron’s instructions were clear: Click on the jar file
and CFM will run. No extraction required.</b> So why was I getting “Which app
do you want to use to open this?” instead? Wait. <i>Did I even have Java installed
on the laptop?<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">A quick visit to the Java website revealed, no, there <i>was </i>no Java on this here computer. Installation of the latest version got us back on the road again. Sure was glad I'd gone over the manual one last time that afternoon and found I needed that update. If I hadn't, 'twould have made for a disastrous comedy of errors out in the dark.</p><p class="MsoNormal">Anyhow, I connected the AVX HC to
the Windows laptop (with a serial cable; it’s an old +HC), powered up the
mount, and started CFM. It immediately found a NexStar+ HC and began the upgrade.
Only fly in the ointment? During the process, Wilbur, our rascally ginger cat,
tried to bite the serial cable in two.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Wilbur
corralled and HC done, I instructed CFM to look for another “device,” the
mount (the mount's motor control board, that is), and update it. Which it did. Or <i>said</i>
it did anyhow. You know your ol’ Unk is all about “<b>trust, but verify</b>.” <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I disconnected AVX from the PC and booted the Advanced VX and
it came right up, albeit with a sign-on message a little different from the old
one. But a sign-on message nevertheless. I checked my location in the HC and
sure enough, it was somewhere way to the west. Maybe Torrance, CA. I reentered
lat/lon, time, time-zone, etc. and thought we might be ready to go. I did make a
note to myself that the update had probably wiped-out my <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2017/07/issue-544-to-pec-or-not-to-pec.html?msclkid=e9cfb88acef411ec9091f827ba8f138a">PPEC recording</a>, but I would worry about that some
other day—er… “night.” The mount seemed OK with the new firmware, but only its
behavior under the stars would tell that tale.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The Celestron dew system, which you’ll learn all about in
the aforementioned Test Report before long, had taken little fiddling or
head-scratching on the part of your Uncle to get going. But it was Something New, and by the time I was done
setting it up, it was dark and I was anxious to begin wandering the spring stars...<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Power turned on, the AVX started her alignment, and we were
off. I had to reject an alignment star here and a calibration star there thanks
to spring foliage, but that was just OK. When I punched “M 003” into the HC,
the AVX whirred, took off, and when she stopped the king glob of spring was
centered in my 13mm Ethos and looking mighty nice. Plenty of resolution, which
increased when I switched in my ol’ 8mm Ethos—under the haze-scattered light
pollution, more magnification rather than less was better. That was something I
learned on those long-ago nights in the early 1990s when I was beginning the observing
that would eventually go into the book. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I spent some time thereafter experimenting the heater
system, to include viewing its status—things like its current-draw and the dew-point
temperature—on the HC and, later, on Celestron’s CPWI software running on the
laptop. Worked jus’ fine, but I’ll say no more about that here, though. If’n
you’re interested, read all about it in a forthcoming issue of <i>Sky & Telescope</i>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That done, it was time to tackle my little list, which I did
in almost the same order they are presented in <i>The Urban Astronomer’s Guide </i>(I've reversed M81 and M82 here; everybody looks at M82 first).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>The Objects:<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b></b></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_hEO_g2XF8S2faT-yP_Wj9zylXwRfmJHpWPq9QwFjUkNoGUVyrFCrNnlwjlUVxXDUqMxnj1NqwtgUHZD9iGlqzWVLkqbZz5Ms6i8jFL1dnNYiNMKFFtdudZbi6s5CjIQzmwRj0Z4Ib9TPk5HgcCwC_WrixhaGxu_564MLl6IH-wARZtxLws0/s524/m94%20sketch.png" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="524" data-original-width="515" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_hEO_g2XF8S2faT-yP_Wj9zylXwRfmJHpWPq9QwFjUkNoGUVyrFCrNnlwjlUVxXDUqMxnj1NqwtgUHZD9iGlqzWVLkqbZz5Ms6i8jFL1dnNYiNMKFFtdudZbi6s5CjIQzmwRj0Z4Ib9TPk5HgcCwC_WrixhaGxu_564MLl6IH-wARZtxLws0/s320/m94%20sketch.png" width="315" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">The Croc on a long ago night..,</span></td></tr></tbody></table><b>M94: </b>Back in
the Chaos Manor South days, I called this magnitude 8.2 SA galaxy “Old Faithful.”
That’s because this 10’ across magnitude 8.2 fuzzy is small enough and bright
enough that it pops out of the poorest skies in almost any telescope. In the
book, I mention how easy it is to find, positioned almost midway between Canes Venatici’s
two bright stars Cor Caroli and Chara. Of course, in these latter days when
everybody’s CAT uses a goto telescope, that doesn’t matter. What matters is how
<i>easy</i> M94 is to see. If you live under compromised skies and want to see
a spring galaxy, this is where you begin.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">How does it look? Back in the supposedly glorious day, I commented the galaxy
looked distinctly stellar in a 4-inch telescope at low power and that at higher
magnifications the small disk brightened smoothly to an almost stellar center,
the galaxy’s fiercely bright elongated core, which has given this object its
common name, The Croc’s Eye Galaxy. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Another comment I made in the book concerned how much this galaxy
looks like a small, unresolved globular star cluster. And that just how it
appeared at 175x in the Edge 800. There was that preternaturally bright core (the
“burning heart,”) and haze surrounding that, fairly <i>extensive</i> haze. If I
stared long enough, I could almost convince myself I was resolving <b>stars</b>
in that haze. Just as astronomers of old, like Willie Herschel, convinced
themselves they were seeing stars in far distant galaxies.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Wow! What a trip down memory lane. I hadn’t viewed 94 in a
long, long time, and it almost felt as if I were reliving one of the nights of “From
City Lights to Deep Space,” the columns in my old <a href="https://skywatch.brainiac.com/newsletter/skywatch.htm"><i>Skywatch</i> </a>newsletter upon which (some of) Urban Astronomer is
based.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>M51</b>. Next up, a toughie. Messier 51, the Whirlpool Galaxy,
is such a renowned and beloved object and one that presents such detail from
dark sites we forget it’s a challenge for urban and suburban astronomers.
In the book, I warned my readers the Whirlpool looks nothing like its pictures
if you’re observing from compromised skies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In the city, it and its interacting companion, <b>NGC 5195,</b> were merely
<b>two blobs</b>, a bright one and a dim one; nothing more.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk7RkuBUdEvybWLEfSSIpINvD-IZvgcyBt_YjueHDwXkSWg7ce3oU-6HkWN0cy6oYP_Z4njB_R4IHHGoEzfbR3E7fDy_3UPv0AtEzAIudSwzx6yDuZaQCDmolm2aLi8OR5cSfxea41d6ggLiFMlAodHuAB2ZOSPIGwFg4XTE6oKQHdJ0gM25o/s1158/M51.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="977" data-original-width="1158" height="270" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk7RkuBUdEvybWLEfSSIpINvD-IZvgcyBt_YjueHDwXkSWg7ce3oU-6HkWN0cy6oYP_Z4njB_R4IHHGoEzfbR3E7fDy_3UPv0AtEzAIudSwzx6yDuZaQCDmolm2aLi8OR5cSfxea41d6ggLiFMlAodHuAB2ZOSPIGwFg4XTE6oKQHdJ0gM25o/s320/M51.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Don't expect this from your bright backyard.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>On this latter-day night, the story was, alas, the same.
Given the haze and my no doubt much less acute eyes 30 years down the line, I
didn’t <i>expect</i> much better. Even with an 8-inch and Ethoses in place of a
6-inch and Plössls.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wasn’t
disappointed, then, to only detect two blobs. On a better night here,
especially with Zelda, I can see a little more than just the bright cores of the
two, but not <i>this</i> night. That was OK; I’d successfully visited M51 and NGC
5195 (which was <i>not</i> easy to see).<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>M106</b>, a big, 17.4’ x <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>6.6’, but bright, magnitude 8.3, SAB galaxy, is,
as I opined in Urban Astronomer, less frequently visited and probably less well-known
than nearby M51. Which is a shame, since it really looks better in small city-bound
scopes. With my homemade 6-inch Newtonian back in the day, the galaxy was
visible with direct vision. It was mostly just a bright, round fuzzy, but I
thought I noticed some elongation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The same was true at first with Emma. But then I began to
see <i>more</i>. The core wasn’t just elongated, but <i>strongly</i> elongated.
And there was a patchiness that hinted at 106’s somewhat odd-looking spiral. If
you haven’t visited this one in a while, do yourself a favor and get after it
with a scope tonight.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>M63</b>, the famous Sunflower Galaxy, can be a real
beauty, showing off at least hints of its big spiral and the dust patches that
give it the sunflower appearance. On the time-washed Chaos Manor South night I
viewed M63, a magnitude 8.6 SA spiral that subtends 13’ x 7’, I did it in style
with long-gone <b>Old Betsy,</b> my beloved 12.5-inch Dobsonian. In that telescope
in a 12mm Nagler eyepiece on a relatively good city night, I was astonished to
see not just a bright core and a strongly elongated disk, but considerable hints
of spiral structure.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This night? I stayed with M63 for some time, struggling for
detail, but the best I could come up with was a subdued core, an elongated
disk, and the barest hints of some sort of dark detail in that disk. I think I’ll
revisit this distant giant with the 10 inch, Zelda, before spring is out.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b></b></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqq6m6rfOWaA4YyoP161Pdw-p1FDTze2_q9r8Z0kKR3S_HX9Wlg6zogaKjfQ5OBnSvIiUvPJuQm-Tsu9Wx-KQRSx-pVytek37OQ12cCnccABwI1jNF6tseUMqLHKyCKn7VyI5n9hzCbaeoGF1mutONryEc--qjTuYDAhcQCjhT9wV6ce-EB4w/s1186/M82.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="951" data-original-width="1186" height="257" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqq6m6rfOWaA4YyoP161Pdw-p1FDTze2_q9r8Z0kKR3S_HX9Wlg6zogaKjfQ5OBnSvIiUvPJuQm-Tsu9Wx-KQRSx-pVytek37OQ12cCnccABwI1jNF6tseUMqLHKyCKn7VyI5n9hzCbaeoGF1mutONryEc--qjTuYDAhcQCjhT9wV6ce-EB4w/s320/M82.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">The EXPLODING Cigar Galaxy...</span></td></tr></tbody></table><b>M82</b> is even more well-known than M63. This is the
Cigar Galaxy—the <b>Exploding</b> Cigar Galaxy, my daughter Elizabeth used to
call it. It’s a magnitude 8.4 near-edge-on
that’s been badly disturbed by an encounter with another galaxy (likely M81).
There are dark dust lanes crisscrossing the disk, and, with the color
Mallincam, I’ve seen red-hued matter spilling out of the center and coursing across
countless light years.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">On that Urban Astronomer night of the Hunting Dogs, the
galaxy was much more modest, but still a treasure. Most of the time, M82 was
just a featureless cigar, but by sticking with it and doing my best to keep
ambient light out of my eyes and off the scope, I was sometimes able to pick up
those crazy dust lanes and patches. It was the same <i>this</i> night. Oh, M82
was bigger and brighter with Mrs. Peel than it had been with my 4-inch <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2008/12/me-and-my-pal.html?msclkid=351f59becef511ec8079931fbfb74441">Palomar Junior</a><span style="color: red;"> </span>reflector, but initially that was all. It was at first just that gray whisp of a
cigar, but the dark patches put in an appearance as the night grew older and a
little darker.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Back in the Chaos Manor South days, there were times M82’s
companion galaxy, <b>M81</b>, was completely invisible with the Palomar Junior
or my 6-inch Newt. I did get an OK look at it with the NexStar 11 GPS one
night. Oh, I couldn’t see those far-flung gossamer spiral arms—the only
superior visual look I’ve had at those has been from the Texas Star Party—but it
was good enough. A big, elongated disk that wanted to reveal <i>some</i> sort of
detail<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I was frankly surprised what Emma did with M81. I expected
to have to fight for the galaxy on this night, but no. The big magnitude 6.9 SA
spiral was starkly, and I do mean <i>starkly</i> visible with the 13mm Ethos at
107x. Not just that; I’d say it was easier to pick up a little detail in the
galaxy than it had been with the C11 at (the original) Chaos Manor South. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>M101, the Pinwheel Galaxy,</b> is what I called a “been-there”
in the Chaos Manor South days. An object difficult enough you have to be satisfied
you’ve seen it at all, that you’ve <b>been there.</b> The problem with the Pinwheel
Galaxy? It’s not that it’s dim. It’s a respectable magnitude 7.9. It’s that this
SAB is face-on to us and is large—28’ x 26’. “Big” and “face-on” galaxies are
the toughest of all. Their light is badly spread out and their surface
brightness terribly low.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">From an observing site in the Possum Swamp suburbs only a
little worse than my current digs here in Hickory Ridge, M101 was nearly
impossible with the NexStar 11 GPS. All my tricks—dark hood, jiggle scope,
averted vision, etc.—were required to turn up a “[A] vague, nebulous ball 10’
across.” Would Emma do as well? She did, or at least I <i>think</i> she did…I
am pretty sure I saw an elusive <i>something</i> in the field of my 16mm “Happy
Hand Grenade” 100-degree AFOV ocular. Maybe.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">We end this excursion with the famous Owl Nebula, M97, a relatively
large 3’ diameter magnitude 9.9 planetary. This was another Urban object I
turned my old C11, Big Bertha, on. With an OIII filter it was not a problem. I
could see the nebula easily, and the big prize, the two dark patches than form
the bird’s eyes, were, while not exactly easy, visible—they tended to swim in
and out of view. Guess what? The same maintained this night with 8-inch Emma.
In fact, I’d say the eyes were <i>easier</i> than on that evening of yore. Was
the seeing steadier? The OIII filter I was using better? The eyepiece (Ethos)
superior to my old 12mm Nagler? Maybe all of the above.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>And, so, our cosmic tour bus has pulled into the station.
Thanks for travelling with us. Be careful getting off the bus; the night is old, and the Moon is down and it is <b>dark</b>. Rebel Yell will be dispensed in the
lobby to all comers. And please join us for our next big outing, <b>“Lion’s
Den.”<o:p></o:p></b></i></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-20019848324264780272022-01-28T11:09:00.000-06:002022-01-28T11:09:54.308-06:00Issue 579: Welcome to 2022 aka “What Could Happen?”<p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEibTrCHYR54NW5KoHnA11hc7y2lNhNYfSYue_rj3028fwSW7iWZP2JhmhFt0D7eEJDZNOdAi09hQmzbcRH8ONW9Bg7l7z2cxVihLBuKRlCYCS2yoRcs072iYr9qUyQxs6uKAKSQIm7SvSCTv3sOpmPwYVKsxUTxzUs-CTwyXl9EwlCwcv7u5Ik=s2309" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2309" data-original-width="1600" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEibTrCHYR54NW5KoHnA11hc7y2lNhNYfSYue_rj3028fwSW7iWZP2JhmhFt0D7eEJDZNOdAi09hQmzbcRH8ONW9Bg7l7z2cxVihLBuKRlCYCS2yoRcs072iYr9qUyQxs6uKAKSQIm7SvSCTv3sOpmPwYVKsxUTxzUs-CTwyXl9EwlCwcv7u5Ik=w278-h400" width="278" /></a></div>2022? I hope things will, <b>barring an alien invasion, the zombie
apocalypse, or an asteroid strike</b> (and I don’t discount <i>any</i>
possibilities anymore), be getting back to normal. Course, that’s what I thought
2021 would bring. It obviously wasn’t quite that, but it <i>was</i> Year Two of
The Return of the Little Old Blog from Possum Swamp. I’d got this-here
Astroblog stabilized on a mostly, if not quite, monthly schedule, and that was at least one thing that <i>was</i> getting back to normal, muchachos.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Anyhow, I’ve got what I think will be an exciting series of blog articles lined up for 2022. They will be observing-oriented,
and will depend on the weather to some extent, but I hope “at least every month.”
IOW, “steady as she goes.” This time, however? January is the annual recap of
my blog-centric astronomy year. Hey, y’all, I’m just happy there’s anything <i>to</i>
recount.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2021/01/">January 2021</a><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">January was just what you are getting’ here today, a recap of your old Uncle Rod's past year. Which was not a bad one. The lockdown
definitely encouraged me to start thinkin’ about this blog again, and slowly,
ever so slowly, bringing it back online more regularly. I was pretty sure 2021
would not bring a return to normalcy, as in me going to star parties. I foresaw
yet more staying at home and observing from the backyard, but I was used to
that already. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’ve been more of a backyard/club-site observer since 2016 than
a star party monster. 2016 was what a dear friend (you know who you are) dubbed
“Uncle Rod’s Farewell Tour.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I did star
party after star party as a speaker, seemingly spending more time in the air
than on the ground. I found as my mid-sixties came over the horizon, I didn’t
want to do that anymore.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2021/03/">March 2021</a><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Missed February but was back in March for the return of my
old friend, <b>Charity Hope Valentine, </b>an ETX with whom Unk has shared more
than a few <span style="color: red;"><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2008/05/two-and-half-years-after-honeymoon.html">adventures</a></span>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After she had been in her case at the New Manse
untouched for several annums, Unk finally had the good sense to get her out in the backyard
again. Before doing that, I had replaced Charity’s LNT battery (she’s an ETX
PE), never a pleasant task, and figgered she was ready to go. Unfortunately, under the
stars the little Mak had <i>fits</i>. Her Autostar display would disappear. Sometimes
the HC buttons wouldn’t work. Occasionally, the Autostar would reset itself. <i>Bad
juju</i> for sure.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgE5ERYmGL1lqThtd6Ha7bRNnTcAvIpJeQYWyIKv4OBe9kU_aSrtrymL9Lsln_c5Ffe9fVom7Cojf5xdg4eU44kKDMqRuJPQYetkF43DlLnEtwQ5bQZ1iTcxiZsn4zAmS4TAk3i_vy6P9yPoo0jsfDAUJCMeAyRTGtws14LqgYOXHj352xCNvY=s2048" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgE5ERYmGL1lqThtd6Ha7bRNnTcAvIpJeQYWyIKv4OBe9kU_aSrtrymL9Lsln_c5Ffe9fVom7Cojf5xdg4eU44kKDMqRuJPQYetkF43DlLnEtwQ5bQZ1iTcxiZsn4zAmS4TAk3i_vy6P9yPoo0jsfDAUJCMeAyRTGtws14LqgYOXHj352xCNvY=s320" width="320" /></a></div>A little troubleshooting right there out back with
the yard floodlights on revealed the problem. Fifteen years down the line, the Autostar’s
cable was <i>finis</i>. The insulation was dried and cracking and in places
entirely gone. One of my long-time goto astro-dealers, Agena Astro Products,
supplied a new one. With it plugged in, it became clear Miss C is ready for
another 15 years in her inimitable neurotic fashion and might even outlast ol’ Unk.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2021/06/">June 2021</a><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">No April or May either, but that was pretty much due to the
incredibly punk spring weather here on the borders of the Great Possum
Swamp. June was not much better, but Unk was at least back with an
update on doings ‘round the New Manse. Chief among those things? How much I was
enjoying Phyllis Lang’s new version of her long time hit, <i><a href="http://www.knightware.biz/dsp/index.php">Deep Sky Planner</a></i> (8).<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’ve long been a fan of observing planners, which are
essentially huge databases of objects that allow you to produce observing lists
easily (and do, as they say on TBS late at night, “Much, much more!”).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, the vaunted Herschel Project could
not have been done in just three years without the aid of a planner, which
easily showed me what I’d observed, what I still needed to observe, and when I
could observe what I needed.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Much of the Project was done with <i>SkyTools 3</i> (now in
version 4). And it is a fantastic program. However, my more casual observing
programs of today are really a better match for <i>Deep Sky Planner</i> (not
that you can’t essay the most ambitious projects with it). Which is a way of
saying the new <i><a href="https://skyhound.com/">SkyTools 4</a></i> is kinda over your silly old Uncle’s head.
Things I really like about DSP? <b>Large fonts</b> that are easy on my aged eyes, and
the fact it works with my fave planetarium program, <i>Stellarium</i>.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal">There was also some not-so-good I reported on. My Edge 800 and Advanced VX had taken a bath in the backyard thanks to a failing Telegizmos cover. Said cover was admittedly five years old, but I didn’t expect it to give up the ghost in such dramatic fashion. Both the C8 and the mount head had considerable moisture inside.</p><p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal">The C8 was easy enough to fix, Unk pulling the corrector plate—something he’s done a few <ahem> times to SCTs over the decades—and drying Mrs. Emma Peel off. The AVX was a bit dicier. Unk disassembled the mount head, dried the PCBs out, and hoped for the best. Indoor tests revealed the AVX was fine, but due to a stormy Gulf, testing under the stars would have to wait a while.</p><p>
</p><p class="MsoNormal"><b><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2021/07/">July 2021</a><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Unk was on schedule with an entry that recounted
some good times with yet another edition of <i>The Reminiscences
of Uncle Rod</i>. This time about the <b>2000 Deep South Regional Star Gaze</b>.
That was notable because it was perhaps the last good DSRSG at its old home at
the wonderful Percy Quin State Park in Mississippi. Of other interest? Mention
of <b>George Kepple’s Astro Cards</b>—index card finder charts for locating deep sky
objects. Unk purchased a deck of ‘em at
the star party and has been using them frequently for two decades since. They,
in fact, deserve a blog entry of their own someday.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2021/08/">August 2021</a><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjNW2JTKUXJdj6_L2UdynXDxG6t-mqHfldaNuuG552SpDxMO1xaqlGQGzzk46W8hrGgrK4PIxC97do5zhlVSDDVo9SN5uIuNMnNq8o_qguRjIlZ_0DXF7nYisioYmcE8zXzBS-SPsWq-a6yqBwV6kW8hwXSGIA3zqHJmkBfLvQZvi7q1ARLFDA=s1024" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="1024" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjNW2JTKUXJdj6_L2UdynXDxG6t-mqHfldaNuuG552SpDxMO1xaqlGQGzzk46W8hrGgrK4PIxC97do5zhlVSDDVo9SN5uIuNMnNq8o_qguRjIlZ_0DXF7nYisioYmcE8zXzBS-SPsWq-a6yqBwV6kW8hwXSGIA3zqHJmkBfLvQZvi7q1ARLFDA=w400-h300" width="400" /></a></div>I summed it up right from the get-go: “Another hurricane,
Hurricane Ida, has come into the Gulf to trouble your silly old Uncle,
muchachos…Nothing has changed since July regarding the endless nights of
clouds.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, there was no observing to
be done. What was on Unk’s mind otherwise? <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>The Herschel Project</b>, thanks to a couple of nights
watching some old DVDs recorded during the go-go days of the Big Enchilada. As
you know, I never got around to assembling the Project blog entries into a book
ala’ Julie Powell’s <i>Julie and Julia</i>…so this article will have to do, an
executive summary of the Herschel Project, Unk’s quest to observe all 2500
objects discovered by Will and Lina. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2021/11/">November 2021</a><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Despite Unk’s best intentions, the Astroblog was not
back till November. Yet <i>another </i>round of health problems ensured that (this Getting
Old bidness is hell). November <i>was </i>a rather important entry. Night-to-night, my
most used telescope mount is my Celestron Advanced VX. If my old bones are weary and
hurting, I can still get myself to set it up in the back 40. As above, however,
the mount had been drenched in an unlooked-for storm, and I needed to give it a
full checkout outside under the stars. If the mount was a goner, I’d have to
replace it with a similar-sized one, and I sure didn’t want to be faced with “decisions-decisions.”</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Thank goodness, the AVX was just fine. Heck, even the RTC
battery was still good. I plugged in the HC, fired the mount up with my 5-inch APO,
Hermione, onboard, and had <i>quite </i>the time eyeballing the late summer to early
winter showpieces. What would I have replaced the mount with had she been
kaput? That would have been the big question. Another AVX? An iOptron?
Something higher-toned? Thinking about that makes my head hurt, so I sure am
glad I <i>don’t </i>have to think about it.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2021/12/">December 2021</a><o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgWFw6yMeARr_OqCWFc6sOHDzvtgoOIUgxlsWTbgo8RBy04sKB-h5kUMeZPXsGnYqEbjnchY5IRt39w5Ek6yujT4RVMFOjl1wuk9jCbZf0Mdgqx9JYfBwe4Ui-YEuIGMgn2Gjc3VK0VbrftVQQ5X0lpPjNgargv3t-FPowimNwUTTvOcTEKqCE=s1600" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1067" data-original-width="1600" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgWFw6yMeARr_OqCWFc6sOHDzvtgoOIUgxlsWTbgo8RBy04sKB-h5kUMeZPXsGnYqEbjnchY5IRt39w5Ek6yujT4RVMFOjl1wuk9jCbZf0Mdgqx9JYfBwe4Ui-YEuIGMgn2Gjc3VK0VbrftVQQ5X0lpPjNgargv3t-FPowimNwUTTvOcTEKqCE=s320" width="320" /></a></div>December is always my Christmas Eve message, which is
usually shorter and more sentimental than other articles. Anyhoo…with the thermometer
in the mid-70s, December 24<sup>th</sup> in the ‘Swamp didn’t exactly have a Christmas
feel about it. Despite that, Unk was looking forward to one of his yearly
astronomy rituals, my Christmas Eve look at M42.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">How did I do that this year? For a while,
it looked like the answer would be “not at all.” Clouds were everywhere. By mid-evening,
however, they cleared somewhat, and Unk took a look with another MCT that hasn’t
got much use in many a weary year, my little Orange Tube C90. The <i>denouement</i>
was M42 looked wonderful it the small (but high contrast) view of the 90,
and that, along with a bottle of a certain potation, put your old Uncle in a rather jolly holiday mood.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>So, that was the year that was, muchachos.</b> This year? As
above, a fun observing project is in the offing. What’s it about? I will give you
a hint: <i> </i><i>It concerns one of Unk’s books.
</i>See y’all soon where all shall be revealed!<o:p></o:p></p><br /><p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-71294193842852837072021-12-24T20:16:00.015-06:002022-06-19T12:23:52.897-05:00Issue 578: A Possum Swamp Christmas Eve 2022 ...<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh5SP9wetQqvzKx1bPkCRHj5RVDjNsl39KRhuVMKg0siYZOZMs986ngTl1DGYnFzht3Q4NJhUHnArcR9j9YiVZPM8K1EpeY35MZACLoue0u4lyxx-R5Z4mtuFWnbtARQkGS58YLQrsXUJtrM_ziaYX_voIc18iPM_rzy2nsdc7po2Ni09vEQ_4=s4032" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh5SP9wetQqvzKx1bPkCRHj5RVDjNsl39KRhuVMKg0siYZOZMs986ngTl1DGYnFzht3Q4NJhUHnArcR9j9YiVZPM8K1EpeY35MZACLoue0u4lyxx-R5Z4mtuFWnbtARQkGS58YLQrsXUJtrM_ziaYX_voIc18iPM_rzy2nsdc7po2Ni09vEQ_4=w640-h480" width="640" /></a></div>All I can say is “<b>Merry Christmas, muchachos</b>.” I know
I’ve been remiss about getting new blog issues to you over the last couple of
years. That did improve <i>some</i> this year, though, and I will see to it that
continues into the new year. I am planning a series, in fact, on the Losmandy GM811
mount, which, despite it having been out for several years now, many are still
curious about. And, no, I haven't forgotten The New Herschel Project, my quest to observe the Herschel 400 from my modest backyard. <p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But that’s next year. How about <i>this</i> year? How about <i>now?</i>
Even in the sparse years, 2019 – 2020, for the little old blog from Possum
Swamp, I have always managed to get the Christmas Eve edition out. And so it
is this Christmas Eve in the strange and alien Year of our Lord 2021.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What exactly is going on at the New Manse here on the
borders of the Great Possum Swamp this Yuletide? As you can imagine, it is a quiet
Christmas Eve. Until the plague well and truly takes its last bow, no festive Christmas
Eves like those of yore drinking Margaritas and eating fajitas at El Giro’s
Mexican restaurant—though there is still an El Giro’s, which is barely two
miles from Unk’s suburban digs. That will wait for next year (I hope). <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What’s it like on this numinous day? Well, it don’t <i>feel</i>
very Christmassy. Now, I don’t expect a white Christmas in the Swamp, but I do expect
something with more of a Christmas feel than <i>this</i>. A glance at the weather
station display in Unk’s radio shack shows it’s 73F outside and <i>climbing</i>.
Whatev’. <i>Unk will not let the cursed weather gods spoil <b>his </b>Christmas Eve</i>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i>You know what?</i> In some ways, I’ve always preferred Christmas
Eve to Christmas. There’s that wonderful sense of anticipation of wonders to
come that maintains even in these latter days. And one of those wonders is one
of your old Uncle’s astronomy traditions. To wit, my Christmas Eve viewing of that greatest of all ornaments, M42, The Great Orion Nebula.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, what was up with that this Xmas Eve? In the days leading
up to the glorious 24<sup>th</sup>, Unk had been purty derned sanguine, “Hell,
why not get the GM811 and C8 out into the back 40 and get started on the
articles about the mount?” But in addition to temps in the 70s and rising
humidity, the weather had brought <b><i>clouds</i></b>. Not in overwhelming
numbers at first, mind you, but they were flowing in from the southwest. So, the Losmandy,
C8, and laptop might be a bit much. But which scope <i>wouldn’t</i> be a bit much?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>My beautiful little C90, "Stella</b>." I’d been thinking I needed
to get her out of her case after the long, weary spell she’s spent in there.
And she’s about perfect for a humid, hazy night where the light pollution is amplified
and I only want to look at bright stuff anyhow. Under those conditions, her
90mm of aperture and f/11 focal length can surprise.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgYaJQzT1_e3EV6nYSOq0i_YefUoELJqh4G3VKIgOWsUve-pnu_Cu0zPeXe7varEahaDJHL-zXqPWZ0BJg2Da7J8PXf6XbnBQ0Y5fWmXWADEbcLl4-BGIiADRr-3cLqbyBxmKWtQyEIs6SeGIeqMGenZMJC1Eat42qh4ZyN00FTWVWmlIW1UdQ=s4032" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgYaJQzT1_e3EV6nYSOq0i_YefUoELJqh4G3VKIgOWsUve-pnu_Cu0zPeXe7varEahaDJHL-zXqPWZ0BJg2Da7J8PXf6XbnBQ0Y5fWmXWADEbcLl4-BGIiADRr-3cLqbyBxmKWtQyEIs6SeGIeqMGenZMJC1Eat42qh4ZyN00FTWVWmlIW1UdQ=w400-h300" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Miss Stella's optics still look good all these long years down the line.</span></td></tr></tbody></table>What’s the C90 story? If you want to learn about how Unk’s C90,
a classic orange tube model from ancient times, came to him, take a gander <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2010/03/mighty-c90.html">here</a>. But the C90 in general? It’s been a perennial with Celestron, whether the original California company, the Swiss-owned
mutation, or the current Chinese iteration. In fact, the C90 is still around
and popular today, as a stroll through a very long-running thread on the Cloudy
Nights BBS website will show. A small and portable but capable MCT like the 90 is
always useful. But there are C90s and <i>then</i> there are C90s.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Many have been the permutations of Celestron's little (Gregory) Maksutov
Cassegrain. In addition to the orange tube, there’ve been black-tube models,
chrome-plated ones, rubber armored scopes, and the current dirt-cheap (f/14) Synta
version. It’s been a spotting scope, it’s been on fork mounts, it’s been sold
with GEMs. And most have been good little telescopes. The optics, including
those of the current bargain-basement model, have always been good—though you
often hear the opposite about the original orange-tube models.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There is a reason for that, campers, and it has nothing to
do with the telescope’s actual optical quality, but with its focusing method.
You see, the earlier C90s don’t focus by moving the mirror forward and back
like SCTs or the current Chinese C90. They focus by moving the <i>corrector</i> and
secondary forward and back. You twist the front part of the OTA to focus, not
unlike a camera lens. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That works well, but you have to learn to exercise a light
touch, or you get terrible shakes. Especially since the temptation is usually to
under-mount this small but long focal-length scope. Those “bad optics” are usually
due to owners not being able to attain sharp focus due to the shakes. Mount the
girl on a sufficient mount and you will see how sharp C90s can be. My own orange
tube is dead sharp with excellent optics. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgJXDyEsZW8x_Ch4wHyPw8YeJlM_HWimIHzDD6lIlSlF4AiTTIF--p6UT8T7voTRnKmIYOk50OZ5-Qq0BL10iHcDkUR2ySqNlczdt-mI4pZ-HJ38NOu4kmaJOK09CvHT9EkMWXtxf9C0g2OCzJzQ008Ugo3pMD-hNM4051ATiHm8UN1sGxJU_0=s1600" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1067" data-original-width="1600" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgJXDyEsZW8x_Ch4wHyPw8YeJlM_HWimIHzDD6lIlSlF4AiTTIF--p6UT8T7voTRnKmIYOk50OZ5-Qq0BL10iHcDkUR2ySqNlczdt-mI4pZ-HJ38NOu4kmaJOK09CvHT9EkMWXtxf9C0g2OCzJzQ008Ugo3pMD-hNM4051ATiHm8UN1sGxJU_0=w400-h266" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Overkill? Not at Chaos Manor South it wasn't!</span></td></tr></tbody></table>While most C90s have had similarly impressive optics over
the years, my heart still belongs to the orange C90 She’s just so fricking <i>pretty</i>.
And there’s that luxurious custom-made case. And the beautiful retro-style aperture cover. And
amazing build-quality in general. Not that it's all gravy, alas. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The original telescope used the old Japanese Standard .965”
eyepieces. Since you won’t want to mess with those if you, like me, acquire one
of the original C90s, you have to rectify that one of two ways:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> W</span>ith an adapter called an “LAR,” a Large Adapter
Ring, or with a hybrid .965” – 1.25” diagonal. I have an LAR and can even use
2-inch diagonals with the li’l C90, but most of the time there’s no reason to do that.
My (Scopestuff.com) hybrid diagonal is just fine.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, I grabbed the C90 case out of the sunroom closet where
the astrostuff (sorry Rex) lives. And also, my SkyWatcher <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2011/03/unks-faux-unitron.html">AZ-4 altazimuth mount</a>,
which is perfect for the little gal. However, to mount my spotter-heritage C90,
which sports only a ¼-20 tripod block, on the AZ-4 I’d need a Vixen dovetail on the
scope. I have one from Orion that has an integral 1.25-inch bolt for easy mounting
to the OTA. But nowhere could it be found. I know I have it still—I saw it
not long ago—but <i>where? </i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">While, as my loyal readers know, I’ve divested myself of a
lot of unused astrostuff over the last six years, I still have a <i>lot</i>. Including
a heavy-duty William Optics Vixen dovetail with a captive 1/4 20tpi bolt. Way overkill
for a C90, but it would work fine. Slapped that on the girl, mounted her on the
AZ-4, and out to the backyard Stella went to wait for darkness and for Orion, who, according to <i>Stellarium, </i>would be high enough for a look by 8:00pm.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There was no denying that by 2pm <b>the scent of skunk was in the
air</b>. Clouds weren’t just flowing in; they were <i>pouring </i>in with the sky almost
totally overcast. I didn’t stress out. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d been
cheated out of my M42 on Christmas Eve. But the Clear Sky Charts was still predicting mostly clear. Anyhow, if there weren’t even sucker holes by
your old Uncle’s (increasingly early) bedtime, I’d just bring Miss Stella back inside,
the work of maybe 5-minutes, one of the prime attractions of the little
critter. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">So, Unk settled in with a bottle of sarsaparilla to watch
television with the cats and see what would happen. I peeped out at the sky every once in a while. By 6pm, it was looking a <i>small</i> amount better, and I actually got a look at Jupiter in a sucker hole. Naturally, the seeing was dreadful, but Stella had no trouble showing the equatorial banding on the disk and four Galilean moons nicely spread out on each side of Jove. Then the clouds came again, and back inside I went. </p><p class="MsoNormal">Finally, it was 20 hours local. The sky had opened up a largish sucker hole in the Orion area and it was time. Best look I have ever had at M42? No, of course not--the drifting gangs of clouds saw to that. But it was there. My little telescope was showing the wonder to me, <a href="http://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2013/12/uncle-rods-christmas-carol.html">just as my Palomar Junior had showed it to me many, many long Christmas Eves ago</a>. The clouds came, and the clouds went, and it was enough. </p><p class="MsoNormal">What more is to be said? <i>Have a wonderful Christmas everybody</i>. These are tough times, but steady as she goes. I'll be back here again, soon. I promise!</p><p class="MsoNormal"><b><i>Nota Bene:</i></b> Want some Christmas Eve Cheer in the <i>old </i>Chaos Manor South Tradition? This <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2010/08/stars-instead-of-cars.html">here</a> is one of my favorites.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><b><i>Nota Bene 2:</i></b> I appreciate all your kind comments. Unfortunately, the university email system pretty much prevents me from replying to them. Feel free to email Unk direct, however. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30526922.post-28458299651481606512021-11-27T10:27:00.003-06:002024-03-26T08:10:47.797-05:00Issue 577: Unks’s Advanced VX Rides Again<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6z9UINsnZcY/YaJatnJFySI/AAAAAAAAKfg/_h4VvLrWuKAIzyGk9gzvaRJE38-YGYz7wCPcBGAYYCw/s2048/006.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1536" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6z9UINsnZcY/YaJatnJFySI/AAAAAAAAKfg/_h4VvLrWuKAIzyGk9gzvaRJE38-YGYz7wCPcBGAYYCw/w300-h400/006.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>Yeah, <i>I know</i>, no blog entries for September and
October and we’ve barely squeaked in for November. I hate to disappoint my readers,
but there just wasn’t no way, muchachos.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The weather was nasty all through September and into October. On those infrequent
occasions when the clouds parted, there was a big, fat Moon in the sky.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Your broken-down old Uncle had also been experiencing some health
issues that made him reluctant to hit the backyard. You know, this “getting old”
stuff is for the birds. Finally, just as clear weather came and Unk began to
feel more like his old self, a third shot of Moderna had him laid pretty low
for a couple of days.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Thankfully, all that is now past, and I am indeed close to being my old self again for good or ill. In fact, this past week I felt Good Enough to tackle my number
one astronomy priority, checking out my Celestron Advanced VX GEM
mount. If you’re a faithful reader of the Little Old Blog from Possum Swamp,
you know my AVX took a bath some months ago. I’d left the mount outside under a
Telegizmos cover. Said cover was beginning to show some wear five years down
the line, but it had not had a <i>huge</i> amount of use, and I thought it would
be OK.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That’s what I get for <i>thinking</i>. I noted some
gathering clouds as I covered scope and mount following my backyard observing
run, but it didn’t look like seriously bad weather was on the way. Unk was soon
snoozing peacefully and was not fully awakened by the sound of heavy rain and
thunder. Oh, I came somewhat to my senses, but thought, “The scope will be fine
under that cover,” turned over, and went back to sleep. The next morning, I
found that dadgummed Telegizmos cover had leaked and mount and scope were truly
drenched. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What to do? I first addressed the C8, Emma Peel, my Edge 800
SCT who’d been riding on the mount. There was a little water in the tube. But
as you know, your ol’ Unk is nothing if not experienced in pulling SCT correctors.
In just a few, the scope was dry and snug again in her case. The mount? <i>That</i>
was a different story. It looked wet enough that I thought there was likely
some water intrusion. Removing the plastic cover of her electronics enclosure, I
did note some dampness. Rut-roh Raggy…it doesn’t take much to cause problems.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What I did was dry the boards off with gentle heat from my
heat gun, and leave the mount head open in the air-conditioned sunroom of the
New Manse. For several days. I then had another look. Didn’t notice any signs
of corrosion, soo…. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I applied power and
the AVX <i>appeared</i> to function normally for an indoor “fake” alignment.
However, nothing would tell the tale like a long evening under the stars. And
there things rested for a wearyingly long time.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Finally, just the other day, the Clear Sky Charts and other weather
resources indicated I might get some clear—if cold—weather following a front
passage. Maybe one night. I was determined to take advantage of that, and despite
some high haze I got the mount into the good old backyard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the interest of keeping things simple, I
left the StarSense camera and hand control in their box and just plugged in the good, old
NexStar+ HC. It had been so long since I’d done a non-StarSense alignment, I
wondered if I’d still remember <i>how </i>to do one. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Which telescope went on the mount? My SkyWatcher 120mm APO.
It had been way too long since I’d used this pretty telescope and was anxious
to point her—Hermione Granger is her name—at Jupiter before it was too late. It
was pretty clear seeing wouldn’t be too hot, not hardly, but I wanted a look at
Jupe anyhow. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zWG8wpZFwlk/YaJc3sA8HBI/AAAAAAAAKf0/9fdwvRrVSY8otPSSxpuJKWQ18xQH_jO-wCLcBGAsYHQ/s804/goodbye%2Bherc.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="701" data-original-width="804" height="349" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zWG8wpZFwlk/YaJc3sA8HBI/AAAAAAAAKf0/9fdwvRrVSY8otPSSxpuJKWQ18xQH_jO-wCLcBGAsYHQ/w400-h349/goodbye%2Bherc.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>As darkness fell at a blessedly early hour—if Unk stays up
till 2200 local time these days, that is a <i>late</i> night—a look to the west
showed for the first time in some years I was going to miss one of my rituals, “<span><a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2015/09/my-yearly-m13.html">My Yearly M13</a></span>.” I wasn’t surprised. I’d checked
<i>Stellarium</i> the previous morning and it showed M13 would be <i>really</i> low as
astronomical twilight came in. That was sorta OK. To tell the truth, though I
was feeling better, I still didn’t feel up to messing with cameras and laptops
and guide cameras and etc., etc., etc.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">OK, <b>power on</b>…the NexStar display came to life with only
a slight delay despite the cold weather (it was in the fricking <i>40s</i>, y’all).
I was gratified to see the mount's real time clock was only off a few minutes despite
it having been months and months since I replaced the little internal battery
and not having used the AVX frequently. Not at all. Hokay, let’s get aligned. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">By “aligned,” I mean the Autostar 2+4 alignment. I planned
on nothing more than some casual looking, and, so, my polar alignment consisted
of merely eyeballing Polaris through the mount’s hollow polar bore. One of the
great things about the Celestron NexStar goto system is that it is quite immune
to goto errors caused by polar alignment. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">It turned out I <i>did</i> remember how to do an old-fashioned
alignment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Got it started and the HC
requested Vega, which was pretty far off center, but still in the finder. Centered
it up in the eyepiece, remembering—shazam! —to do final centering with the up
and right keys only. Altair next. That sparkler lined up, the NexStar+ axed if
I wanted to add calibration stars “Sure, why not?” The first, Fomalhaut, was
behind a tree, so I picked another. Calibration star three was near-centered in
the eyepiece of the main scope when the mount stopped, but I did one more anyway…well…just because I <i>could</i>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The resulting alignment? It was a good one. For a while,
anyway. Anything I requested was in the center of a 12mm eyepiece. Heck our
first target, Jupiter was centered in a 7mm when the slew stopped. And
that’s the way it was until I decided to fetch my observing chair, and in the
course of placing it at the scope bumped the tripod, but good. Henceforth,
objects were toward the edge of the 12mm, but always in view. <i>And…that’s just
the way it goes on an Uncle Rod observing run</i>, as you surely know if you’ve
been reading here long. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-gzM8sep4rM4/YaJatr3J_iI/AAAAAAAAKfo/MjvWdE6T8bIHbDlwXFW0-Z3rcALZkKo4wCPcBGAYYCw/s2048/004.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="240" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-gzM8sep4rM4/YaJatr3J_iI/AAAAAAAAKfo/MjvWdE6T8bIHbDlwXFW0-Z3rcALZkKo4wCPcBGAYYCw/s320/004.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>How was Jupiter? The wind had laid down at least, but, no,
the seeing was not very good. He was reasonably sharp and showing off
multiple belts, but conditions were reducing the contrast of those belts. The Galilean
Moons were dancing around most of the time. Not a bad image in the 7mm UWAN
(William Optics) wide field, but nothing to get excited about. What <i>was</i>
exciting? Just being able to get out and run an eye across the King, no matter
how he looked. <o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Next up? If I couldn’t take a picture of the Great Globular,
maybe I could get a parting glimpse of him as he plunged into the west. By this
time, <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2011/05/my-favorite-fuzzies-m13.html">M13</a> was maybe 15-degrees above the horizon. Alas, when the slew stopped
and I inserted the 13mm Ethos I saw exactly <b>nuttin-honey</b>. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I wasn’t about to give up. I suspected the problem was the
focus difference between the 13 and 7mm eyepieces. I should have focused the 13mm
before I left Jupiter. Down here in the horizon muck, no bloated stars were
visible in the field to use for focusing. So, off I went to Vega to focus. There
I sharpened things up. Did I note the utter lack of false color displayed by
the SkyWatcher APO? Nope. After this long, I just take it for granted.
Vega was a pure, icy blue sapphire.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Back to M13. I spotted the cluster the moment the slew
stopped. Not bad, really. Dim, sure, but grainy and wanting to show a little
resolution. Would more magnification have helped resolve more stars? Perhaps,
but the cluster was dim as it was. Pouring on more aperture would have helped,
but I wasn’t about to lug out the 10-inch Dobsonian, Zelda. The SCT? My
observation is there’s not a huge difference in visual images presented by the
8-inch SCT and 5-inch APO, not enough to justify me changing OTAs, anyhow.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">What next? How about M57? OK. To Lyra we went. The Ring
was just that, a perfect little donut displaying plenty of contrast. Since the
constellation was riding high, I thought we might essay the somewhat dim globular
cluster M56. It was actually pretty good, looking much like the horizon-bound M13.
My observation over the years has been it takes about 10-inches of aperture to
make this somewhat neglected glob look good. And 12-inches is better. My
long-gone old friend, my 12-inch Dobsonian <a href="https://uncle-rods.blogspot.com/2012/02/old-betsy-rides-again.html">Old Betsy,</a> could make this seemingly
nondescript object into a freaking showpiece.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The next target, M76, the Little Dumbbell is thought by some
to be “difficult.” Not so. I once viewed this little sprite with my old 60mm
ETX from deep in the light polluted suburbs, at my old observing site at the
public schools’ Environmental Studies Center. The secret is an OIII filter. But
it has to be the <i>right</i> OIII filter. I walked into the sunroom and fished
a little box labeled "OIII" out of my accessory box. Onto the 12mm it went--with some difficulty. I was nonplussed that for some reason it didn’t want to thread onto the
eyepiece properly. With the filter finally in place, still no M76 did I see. What
the—?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">My red flashlight revealed the problem. On the edge of the
filter-holder was inscribed “Lumicon.” When I bought this one in 1995, I
thought it was the bee’s knees. But either it has somehow degraded over the
years (possible, I guess), or I just know more about filters 25 plus years down
the road. At any rate, this old thing (one of the pink-hued Lumicons) doesn’t work
very well, and the filter threads on it were never quite right. In I went and
retrieved my Celestron (Baader) 1.25-inch OIII. Ahhh…<i>there</i> it was. Not
only was the mini-Dumbbell visible, it even showed off its twin-lobed shape.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">After that? Hermione and I hopped around the sky, me occasionally
looking at SkySafari on the iPhone for inspiration. In no particular order…<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>M103</b>. This oft-overlooked small (6’) but brilliant galactic cluster
was just beautiful.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>M31 and company</b>. M31 looked maybe a bit better than it
usually does from the suburbs. M32 was a brilliant little thing, naturally.
M110 was something of a surprise. It was easily visible despite sometimes being
a trial from compromised skies.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>M27</b>, the (big) Dumbbell was attractive, especially with
the OIII. Unfortunately, haze was developing in Cygnus area, and I had a hard
time seeing nearby M71, the loose little globular star cluster once thought not
to <i>be</i> a glob.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>NGC 457, The E.T. Cluste</b>r. Does this little guy ever look
bad? Well I remember showing him off to Miss Dorothy from the urban backyard of
old Chaos Manor South. He looked good there, and he looked great here, a little
stick figure awash in a sea of stars.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><b>M15, The Horse's Nose Globular</b>. Haze was creeping into the Pegasus area now, so I didn't expect much from this little glob. Surprise! In addition to M15's preternaturally bright core, quite a few teeny-tiny stars were on display at the edges of this wonder.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-roESwfHgkhc/YaJatoeaA7I/AAAAAAAAKfw/fKEPe7aWJ30H2ga7XbZm4pg1hJhTWBuiQCPcBGAYYCw/s2048/002.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="300" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-roESwfHgkhc/YaJatoeaA7I/AAAAAAAAKfw/fKEPe7aWJ30H2ga7XbZm4pg1hJhTWBuiQCPcBGAYYCw/w400-h300/002.JPG" width="400" /></a></i></div><i>And on we went</i>. Me and Hermione wandering the late autumn
stars, going wherever our fancy took us. You know I strongly endorse having a
detailed observing list. Which I didn’t have on this night—I was just going to
do a quick check of the mount on an object or two, I thought. I probably would
have seen more if I’d made one up or had dragged out a laptop running <i>Deep
Sky Planner</i>. But you know what? For once, just tramping aimlessly across
the sky was kinda fun…kinda <i>freeing</i>, actually.<o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Alas, before long, old Unk had reached his infamous “<b>I
have had enough</b>” stage. Those of you who know me or who’ve been aboard
this blog for long know that happens once my feet get cold. When they do it is
time to throw the big switch and cover the scope. Which I did. Said cover being
a new one, which I hope proves to be better than the lastun. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">As for the mount, the Advanced VX, I was satisfied all is
well with it. Not a single hiccup from power up to power down. Which is a very
good thing. I need a mount in this weight/payload class, and with anything that
comes from China—as the AVX and her cousins do—being nigh impossible to get
these days, I certainly wouldn’t want to go mount-shopping right now. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>Alrighty then. See y’all next time. Which will surely be
by Christmas Eve for our traditional blog post. But I do hope “sooner.” <o:p></o:p></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>Rod Mollisehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275087136637544969noreply@blogger.com6