Quadrantids 2015

[Bill Ward]

Hi William,

Thanks for the offer, I had to dig out my old manual and notes, and nearly called as I was tearing my hair out a one point but I think I’ve got it sorted out.

Analyser classifys it as a sporadic! (it classes the spectrum as a ” -6 flash”). I don’t know how reliable it ultimately is, only a handful of reference stars.

 

So, there’s at least the possibility that previous professional work might have been based on erroneous assumptions.

Score one for the amateur 🙂

I suppose the next thing to do is to have a look at the Quadrantids parent body. In a previous post I said “sodium deficiency” but that should have been “sodium defficiency with respect to magnesium” as there is no prior knowledge that the material isn’t just like that! The issue with the gemininds is that the sodium has been some how lost due to its orbit and low perihelion distance.

Of course it could all be a lot of nonsense! 😉

 

cheers,

Bill.

[Alex Pratt]

Hi Bill,

There will be some uncertainty in the result from Analyser if its profile was created from a small number of reference stars.

Analyser sometimes categorises a meteor as a sporadic (or other shower membership), giving an unexpected result. Two reasons for this can be the meteor’s angular velocity and its distance from the radiants stored in its internal catalogue. The meteor’s estimated velocity is an important factor and if this falls outside the expected ranges (for each known shower) it can fail the shower membership tests and be categorised as a sporadic.

Have a look in the UFO Analyser Uty tab and tick the ‘analyzelog’ box. This creates a txt file when analysing a meteor clip. The file contains details about the reference stars, the meteor’s angular velocity and how well it matches against currently active slowers.

Clear skies,

     Alex.

[Bill Ward]

Hi,

Thanks, that is very useful to know. The velocity of the meteor appears significantly greater than what was expected for either a daD or Qua.

Cheers,

Bill.

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