David Swan

Forum Replies Created

Viewing 20 posts - 201 through 220 (of 307 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • in reply to: NASA InSight #580290
    David Swan
    Participant

    (Laughs) I had to look up ‘Calima’ – I gather a hot dusty wind not unknown at La Palma.

    in reply to: new visual comet discovery by Don Machholz #580255
    David Swan
    Participant

    Peter Carson has managed to capture a much better image (see his member’s page). Nonetheless, under poor conditions (wind ESE – straight from sea towards scope (!), and lots of condensation on the corrector in misty air) I acquired five reasonably steady frames. Comphot estimate: mag 10.4 in photometric aperture of diameter 130arcsec – but take this with a pinch of salt.

    in reply to: new visual comet discovery by Don Machholz #580233
    David Swan
    Participant

    Am I imagining things, or are there two tails in this image?

    in reply to: new visual comet discovery by Don Machholz #580226
    David Swan
    Participant

    As Nick has said, the orbit is obviously very well determined. I updated MPCORB in Astrometrica, and the comet was spot on the predicted position.

    in reply to: new visual comet discovery by Don Machholz #580225
    David Swan
    Participant

    DDP tends to bloat the stars and make them furry. Here’s a clearer image with the ion tail quite distinct. 12 x 10s, midpoint 05:14:30.

    in reply to: new visual comet discovery by Don Machholz #580224
    David Swan
    Participant

    Found this (!) frame in the set.

    in reply to: new visual comet discovery by Don Machholz #580223
    David Swan
    Participant

    Clear skies this morning – 12/11/2018 05:08. Still quite bright, with ion tail visible.

    in reply to: new visual comet discovery by Don Machholz #580215
    David Swan
    Participant

    Very nice. Hopefully I’ll be granted a half hour patch of clear skies in the morning some day soon. D

    in reply to: AGM videos #580200
    David Swan
    Participant

    An excellent set of talks. Thanks to all the speakers and those involved in getting the content on the website. David

    in reply to: Imaging comets with a OSC CCD? #580133
    David Swan
    Participant

    This is a good question – to which I can’t offer you a good answer! You might want to submit your question to the comet discussion list and Nick James or another will likely pick it up quicker.

    I would say that if your plate scale is around 1 arcsec / pixel or below then you might as well 2×2 bin and use the mono pics for astrometry. I’m not sure what you should do if you are correctly sampling or are undersampling.

    I look forward to seeing your colour pics of Wirtanen! I’ve just bought a Hyperstar (Christmas brought forward) to give me a wide field of view for the close approach.

    Good to hear you are imaging 64P – it’s nice isn’t it? And 38P is moving to a better position.

    David

    in reply to: Advice on Barlows / tele-extenders please. #580062
    David Swan
    Participant

    I would consider the Televue Powermate series. I don’t have experience with the 2in versions, but I was very happy with the 1.25in 2.5x Powermate which I used with my f/5 130mm Newtonian.

    in reply to: Supernova SN 2018gwo #580035
    David Swan
    Participant

    Thanks Robin. I submitted an image to David Bishop a few days ago now, and I was wondering when the classification would be made. Good job with such a dim one! David

    in reply to: New RCB star in Cam – call for photometry/spectroscopy #580013
    David Swan
    Participant

    I have been measuring the V mag of this star (about) every week since Gary highlighted it as ‘new’ RCB. My last measurement was V = 14.64 on 2018/09/17 20:49 UT.

    in reply to: Transient location #579994
    David Swan
    Participant

    Appreciated. David

    in reply to: Transient location #579991
    David Swan
    Participant

    I have re-stacked with more stringent quality criteria (FWHM and roundness). The noise is higher, but the stars look more round. Problem sorted I think! I’ve looked back at my determinations of transient locations, and the difference from the survey telescope position in this case isn’t unusual. Experimenting with the fit order doesn’t really change the measured position either.

    in reply to: Transient location #579990
    David Swan
    Participant

    Yes. Thanks Paul.

    The raw FITS files are archived on my external drive, so I can go back and do this. It would be nice to identify the source of the problem, as I may need to modify my workflow.

    D

    in reply to: Transient location #579984
    David Swan
    Participant

    Thanks for the image analysis. So with several ‘winged’ bright stars nearby, it looks like PSF contamination is an unlikely explanation. Maybe an artifact produced by the optics or by something weird associated with frame stacking? Hopefully someone else will image this transient at a good scale and post astrometry.

    in reply to: Transient location #579982
    David Swan
    Participant

    Hi Paul,

    The abstract is most interesting – thanks for pointing this out. I’ll read the article proper this eve. I hope Robin or someone else takes up the spectro.

    David

    in reply to: New RCB star in Cam – call for photometry/spectroscopy #579966
    David Swan
    Participant

    2018 09 05 20:35 UT

    Maxim DL Photometry on 10 x 20s stack through Baader V filter

    Ref (000-BMT-466) set as V = 13.77

    Variable (IRAS 03536+6235) measured V = 15.08

    Check (000-BMT-467) measured V = 14.20 

    in reply to: New RCB star in Cam – call for photometry/spectroscopy #579964
    David Swan
    Participant

    Still waiting on a clear patch. Hopefully I’ll get my first measurement this eve.

Viewing 20 posts - 201 through 220 (of 307 total)