Another quickie with stars & friends

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Pete
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Joined: Fri Jun 13, 2003 9:03 pm

Another quickie with stars & friends

Unread post by Pete »

Dan Chieppa wrote:Just checked the sky (11:45PM) and it's clear now. However, after a hard day of watching TV I'm a little bushed so I'll probably skip setting up any telescope tonight. :lol:
Clear skies,
Dan
My dome was frozen, so without my knowledge Dave went out and poured a couple of buckets of warm water over it and freed it up for me. When he told me about it I went out to check and noticed a CLEAR SKY. Not believing my eyes, I verified that we were good for no cloud and good transparancy until at least midnight. I hadn't been planning on observing but did feel sociable. Lou and George live nearby and hadn't experienced the dome yet, so I placed two calls and 15 minutes later we three were observing.

We calibrated our eyeballs using the 4" separation of Castor using my occluded 9mm eyepiece (395X) and then tried to separate Sirius from the Pup - 7" out (and at 4 o'clock with my setup).

The sky isn't as transparent as I thought as I'm having great difficulty seeing the 11th mag star 15" out at 2 o'clock and have no sight of the 12th mag star another 6" out from that. The DSS survey is back on line, but as expected, the area around Sirius is completely burned out with zero detail. So these stars I've been observing are on no charts of photos that I know of. If anyone has any clues as to where to find a chart or pix of stuff within 10' of Sirius please let me know.

Anyway, we once again came away Pupless.

The wind was blowing strongly and the sky seemed to be getting whiter as we switched to M42 at 115X thru the Ultrablock. With the light haze the contrast wasn't up to its usual excellence. We then examined the black cloud immediately to the E of the Trapezium. At 296X in the Nagler type 4 17mm you can study and ponder this thing for a long time. As noted earlier, I don't think it has a Bernard number or a formal nomenclature.

Saturn was good at 296X but the seeing required some patience. And finally we eyeballed M37 and, for contrast, M35 at 115X. Although we could have continued sky conditions were'nt the greatest so I demo'ed my 3-minute shutdown.

We weren't out for much more than an hour, but it was an unexpected treat. Thank's to Dave's melting off the ice.
Pete P.
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james and james mceachern

Unread post by james and james mceachern »

Nice Report, keep on looking for that pup :wink: .

James
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Bruce D
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Unread post by Bruce D »

Good effort guys, nothing like a surprise window of opportunity!
Bruce D
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Paul D
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Unread post by Paul D »

Pete,

Next time you get out and decide to look for Sirius B dont use the occulting EP but try your Hydrogen-Beta filter. This should kill the glare of Sirius A and also enhance the glow of Sirius B. This is what I am planning to do my next clear night.

As far as a chart or picture the only one that I know of is the Hubble shot of Sirius and the Pup. The only thing I am not sure of is the orientation of that picture.
Paul...

16" f/5 Night Sky Truss (Midnight Mistress)
10" f/5 Home built Dob with Parks mirror.
Pre-Meade PST
Celestron Skymaster Binos 25-125x80
Meade Travelview Binos 10x50

See that 16" in the sleek black dress? She is all mine. :)
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Pete
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Unread post by Pete »

As far as a chart or picture the only one that I know of is the Hubble shot of Sirius and the Pup. The only thing I am not sure of is the orientation of that picture.
Hi Paul,

Where is your HUbble shot posted? If it has a wide enough fov it would be very helpful.
Pete P.
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Bruce D
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Unread post by Bruce D »

I think this is the image, amazing contrast in size!

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl= ... n%26sa%3DG
Bruce D
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Paul D
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Unread post by Paul D »

Pete,

This is the picture from the Hubble telescope. The FOV is very narrow and doesnt show any out laying stars. This is the same picture that Bob S showed in his "Whats Up" program at the meeting. The pup is barely visible in the left hand lower corner of the picture. http://content.answers.com/main/content ... _photo.jpg
Paul...

16" f/5 Night Sky Truss (Midnight Mistress)
10" f/5 Home built Dob with Parks mirror.
Pre-Meade PST
Celestron Skymaster Binos 25-125x80
Meade Travelview Binos 10x50

See that 16" in the sleek black dress? She is all mine. :)
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james and james mceachern

Unread post by james and james mceachern »

This website has a lot of detailed info on Sirius A and B, and even more... http://www.answers.com/topic/sirius

James
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james and james mceachern

Unread post by james and james mceachern »

Also, this website has some mathematical equations that I find usefull sometimes when you are out observing and don't have any access to a computer to find information. They are quite simple to memorize and they are useful if you need to know a the brightness of something and you only have a little data to work with. To see them check out this website, http://www.answers.com/topic/luminosity
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