Search Results for 'espin telescope'

[Dr Paul Leyland]

“Is anyone else making different observing plans in the current situation?”

Yup, I’m trying to get hold of a telescope to use until I can get back to La Palma. See the “Telescope wanted” thread.

Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines.
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way.
The time is gone, the song is over, thought I’d something more to say.

[Andy Wilson]

Hi Nick,

I remember I had problems parking my Astro-Physics mount with the SkyX, so I wonder if you problems might be related to parking. As the mount doesn’t actually need to be parked I simply slew to a safe position and then turn it off. Of course your pointing problem might be something different but I thought I’d mention it.

Other possibilities to check are whether your location is set to come from the hand controller or the computer.

I’ve never pointed at Polaris as it is not a good star to use for syncing the telescope position. You have good latitude information but the longitude precision is about as bad as it could be as a tiny movement gives a massive shift in longitude.

Good luck, I’m sure you will get there.

Andy

[Mr Nicholas John Atkinson]

Hi

You were right to conclude that I have bought a new lap top in fact a HP computer with Widows 10

Maxim DL is working without any problems which I use for imaging as is PixInsight. I have been in contact with Mathew at Pulsar who is fixing some bugs in his observatory package resulting from Windows 10

I have a real problem with Sky X though, It will Park the telescope in position 1, 2 and 3 but when I point to polaris it has the notion that it is in New Zealand. I have the latest version 12034.

Initially my thoughts were it must be a timing issue so double checked the location date and time were set correctly. It makes no difference using the hand paddle, connecting via the serial port or using Astro Physics APCC to connect via ethernet. However, should I manually move the scope to Alkaid and synchronize to that position the scope will point to Alcor or M101 and slew there.

Requesting a park position 3 results in a slew to  somewhere else.. I have asked George at Astro-Physics is he has any ideas but I think the problems lies with SkyX.

Cheers

Nick

[Mr Nicholas John Atkinson]

Hi,

I have a 6″ Triplet made by Beacon Hill the is now surplus to my requirements having recently bought a Takakaski scope. It is fitted with an electronic focuser and a Baader Planitarium 60 mm finder scope.

|Cheers

Nick

[Denis Buczynski]

Paul how about this which is currently on the ASTROBUYSELL website:

159452 For Sale Active No Photo
Zhumell Z12, 12″ Dobsonian Refector Telescope with F5 focal ratio £150 2020-03-09 13:34:57 YORK, England

I have no link with the seller, I do not know what the condition is.
Denis

[Dr Paul Leyland]

It looks like I am not going to be returning to La Palma any time soon as the entire island is in lock-down. Accordingly, my telescopes there are not going to be used by me or by anyone else. Although a good deal of historical data is on disk and needs analysis or re-analysis, it would be nice to be able to do some more VS estimates in the interim.

Accordingly, I’m looking for a scope in the 15-30cm aperture range, preferably on a portable mount such as a Dobsonian. The back garden is a lousy site and I can’t justify anything which requires outdoor housing.

Does anyone have anything suitable I could purchase or, perhaps, borrow? Proximity to Cambridge would be a big advantage.

Paul

[Grant Privett]

Thanks for the info. How long did it take you? I could be in trouble if the kitchen table is a telescope mount for more than a day or two… 

I will probably take the opportunity to do a general strip down….

[Eric Watkins]

A little while ago I purchased an AE 12″ F:5/20 Cassegrain telescope with an 3″ diameter secondary mirror which I plan to use for lunar and planetary imaging.

The  owner sold it in the Newtonian mode and had forgotten the primary-secondary  optimum mirror separation for this particular telescope.
I plan to renovate the OTA by using carbon fiber tubes to replace the original  6 aluminum tubes that form  the skeleton OTA. Also I will  add  a modern focuser.
Does any member still have a similar telescope or can recall the mirror separations?

I have contacted Martin Mobberley who once had a 14″  similar telescope. However, the separation came already set upon delivery and needed no additional  thought.
As Martin suggested I could plate solve images to determine the plate scale making any necessary adjustments until I obtain the expected F:20 focal length.

Hopefully, any owners past or present may already have the information to give me a head start.

Best wishes,
Eric 

[owen brazell]

Hi Peter the 90″ talked about was a professional telescope no longer used for that purpose and bookable by amateurs. The other telescopes are amateur ones. I have not heard of anybody in the UK seeing this  Having said this of course M87 is a lot higher in the sky for them than it is for us and they have high altitude sites to observe from rather than sea level as we have here. There is a lot of difference with an extra mile of polluted crud on top of you. I suggest that at the next Kelling you try and persuade Andrew with his driven 24″ to have a go.

[Peter Carson]

I read with interest the article in Sky & Telescope by Howard Banich about visually observing the relativistic jet in Messier 87. The article states “sightings are possible with scopes in the 12 to 16 inch range.” But then the article goes on to describe visual observations using telescopes from 28 to 90 inches in aperture. (Yes, I suppose these sized scopes do exist in amateur hands!)
Does any BAA member claim to have seen the M87 jet visually in a 12 to 16 inch telescope? Members of my local club have 16 and 20 inch dobs and I’m wondering if I might stand a chance of seeing it.
Peter

[Tim Haymes]

I have measured it at 12.7 (unfiltered CCD) using the AAVSO chart (X25129DUM) and AstroArt 5.  The telescope was the CHI-1 (Chile) on the Telescope Live network (Planewave CDK24, 60sec) – date 2020-02-03.360

[Jeremy Shears]

The 2019 December BAA Journal and the Variable Star Section Circular 182 contains an article about the curious variable star, U Leonis. Although U Leo has been linked to a possible nova in 1885, this is by no means certain and its identity remains something of a mystery.

The VSS has launched a CCD photometry campaign on U Leo during the current observing season with the aim of shedding light on this enigmatic star.

I have recently been alerted by Professor Boris Gänsicke (University of Warwick) that he hopes to get some spectroscopy on U Leo during February 2020 using the Isaac Newton Telescope. This might allow measurement of the radial velocity of the F-type star in the system. It would therefore be helpful to obtain ground-based photometry in support of his observing run from now onwards.

Given this star is rather faint, at mag 17.3, it is a target for CCD observers. It will require long and unfiltered exposures to get a reasonable signal-to-noise ratio.

A chart and sequence for U Leo is available from the AAVSO website. Please submit your observations to the BAA VSS or the AAVSO database. U Leo is located at RA 10 24 03.81 Dec +14 00 25.9 (J2000.0)

The campaign is already running and will continue until the end of the 2020 observing season. Many thanks to all who are already observing this star.

If you have any questions, please contact me.

Jeremy Shears

Director, BAA Variable Star Section

[Mr Paul Richard Spurr]

Hello, now I have built an Observatory permanently housing a telescope, my insurance company will not continue to Insure House & Contents (incl. the Telescope). Does anyone know of companies that specialise in Telescope/ Observatory Insurance?

Potentially then I could set that up separately and retain the incumbent insurer who I’d prefer to keep if at all possible.

Surely, this must be a common problem for many BAA Members?!

Thanking All, Paul

[Dr Richard John McKim]

Yes, there is still a lot of interest in her, and as Archivist I have been asked to supply her portrait on several occasions. We still have the telescope she used for her sunspot observations: well, the tube at least. The BAA library archive does not have any copy of the 1880s books she wrote under a pseudonym, about her eclipse expeditions, but I gather they can now be ordered as reprint editions. We must also remember that she was Director of the Solar Section of the Liverpool AS before 1890. It would be interesting to hear a little more about her activities in the LAS.

[Mr Michael Alan Frost]

Anders Nyholm from the Department of Astronomy, Stockholm University, emailed me to ask if I knew the whereabouts of a replica telescope built by former BAA member Peter Fay (who we think is now deceased, although obviously we’d love to hear otherwise!).

In 1996, Peter Fay and Sally Beaumont translated “Observations Concerning the Planet Venus” by the early-eighteenth century astronomer Francesco Bianchini of Verona. As part of his research, Peter Fay constructed and tested a telescope similar to the one Bianchini had used.

Anders asks “Does anyone in the BAA know where the aerial telescope replica described by Fay in  https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1996ocpv.book…..B/abstract could be now? In some museum, perhaps?”

Mike Frost

[Jim Verner]

Hi Grant, yes there’s an awful lot of ‘junk’ up there, thankfully it doesn’t seem to cause much of a problem, but add another 50,000 satellites and who knows. They are relatively small though, so the impact may be minimal especially if 1130 is a success and the albedo of future satellites is reduced. It will be interesting to see what the results of the trial are.

Wouldn’t mind some time on the INT myself never mind anything larger, alas the impact of work and time precludes any such venture for the time being, so I’m stuck in the ‘back yard’ for now or at least when sky and time permits.

[Tony Rodda]

Well, when it’s raining again you have to do something with your time…

Slit spectroscopy on the cheap.

A 3D printed “Tragos” spectroscope using a Star Analyser 200, a 3D printed 50mm F7 telescope, an EQ3 Pro Synscan, a Meade DSI3, a chinese copy of a chinese copy guide camera and a 10 year old Samsung mini-laptop running PHD2 and Meade capture software (it’ll run CdC and run the mount too).  Even the “Vixen/Skywatcher” mounting bar is 3D printed.

Resolution should be above R=350 according to the designer (18 years ago!).

Easy to set up even for grab-and go, which is the intention for a Newcastle Astro Society workshop next week on Spectroscopy.

Yes, I know, it’s still raining.  

Clear Skies!

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[Dr Paul Leyland]

I am now at the telescope taking a long series of exposures and a satellite or meteor just went through a frame.  Very faint.  Stars down to 17th mag are easily visible but the trail only just shows up above the sky noise.  Guess 15th or so?  It is going to be completely invisible in the final stack.

Not sure how relevant this is to the current discussion but it shows that we don´t need Starlink to be able to pick up the present vermin of the skies.

[Dr Paul Leyland]

Good point.

Presumably one could monitor the field and avoid taking data during the satellite pass. Could be an interesting exercise writing software for motion detection in the autoguider camera.

How do you deal with satellite trails now?

Depending on whether I am doing photometry or imaging (which includes astrometry for present purposes) I either discard the sub before average-stacking or rely on median-stacking to discard the satellite for me.  In either case, such concerns are of interest only when the satellite passes inconveniently close to the objects of interest, otherwise it is just ignored.

There again, I take as many 30 to 60 second subs as are needed to reach a satisfactory SNR (which depends on sky brightness, for instance) and then move on to another target. A cheap and simple way of optimizing the productivity of telescope time. Vary rarely does a single exposure exceed a couple of minutes.

[Denis Buczynski]

It is interesting that the LSST is to be named after Vera Rubin.Her interest in astronomy has been life long and she has always been an active observer. Here are two pictures of her as a young woman one with her homemade telscope and the other using the refractor at Vassar College. So from humble instrumental begginings to the largest telescope in the World. There is progress for you!