David Swan

Forum Replies Created

Viewing 20 posts - 241 through 260 (of 302 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • in reply to: Nova in Perseus #579476
    David Swan
    Participant

    I’ll be looking as often as I can. I had trouble getting access to this patch of sky too!

    in reply to: Nova in Perseus #579474
    David Swan
    Participant

    V392 Per is noticeably dimmer than the nearby TYC star now. Here’s an image from this eve (13 May) – UV/IR block only. Time in filename is UT. I have measured the mag as 9.8 (CV).

    in reply to: Nova in Perseus #579473
    David Swan
    Participant

    I am perhaps extending this frivolous sidetrack beyond its natural life … notwithstanding this, the New Scientist for a long time ran letters on nominative determinism in its Feedback section. Weedon and Splatt published lots of urology research.

    in reply to: Nova in Perseus #579416
    David Swan
    Participant

    I took some frames through the StarAnalyser 100 this evening. I’m pleased to see that my spectrum looks very like yours – the expert’s – but of course mine is lower res. The Halpha emission was indeed striking in the images!

    David Swan
    Participant

    Thanks Robin. Hopefully the nova will remain bright enough till the weekend for me to deploy my C8 + StarAnalyser on it. I was a bit tired yesterday to attempt some low res spectroscopy. Your stuff looks great – I look forward to seeing how the spectrum evolves.

    in reply to: HUGE sigh of relief #579401
    David Swan
    Participant

    Unfortunately my experience is that fate is rarely on my side on these sorts of matters!

    in reply to: Nova in Perseus #579397
    David Swan
    Participant

    Wow, it is bright!

    in reply to: Nova in Perseus #579395
    David Swan
    Participant

    Thanks for pointing this out – and I see Denis has put an image of the nova and field on his member’s page. Time to get my StarAnalyser out!

    in reply to: New active region. #579355
    David Swan
    Participant

    Yes, it will be great to see something in white light again. Latest SOHO image is promising…

    https://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/hmi_igr/512/

    in reply to: M51 imaged Saturday #579351
    David Swan
    Participant

    Yes, of course it could indeed be real. I just posted my image up in case it turned out to be a longer-lived phenomenon. Point meteor may be a good candidate. Transparency last night was excellent.

    in reply to: M51 imaged Saturday #579345
    David Swan
    Participant

    50 x 10s frames, median stack, midpoint of imaging run: 20:40 GMT. Unfortunately no bright signal at the same position.

    in reply to: M51 imaged Saturday #579343
    David Swan
    Participant

    I’ve scrutinised my 10th March image of M51 and indeed there’s no evidence of this transient. I’ll try to get some images this evening. It’s clear skies in Tynemouth at the moment, but of course this is unlikely to remain the case as the sky darkens! David

    in reply to: Telescope control #579334
    David Swan
    Participant

    I have some experience with this.

    The latest version of the Nexstar + handset has a serial to USB converter built in. The handset connects to the mount via the telephone-style cable, and you connect your PC to the Nexstar + handset with a mini USB cable.

    IMHO, the free Celestron handset emulator software that runs on the PC is dreadful. I have also been unimpressed by other software that is capable of controlling the scope (pointing model, goto) such as Skysafari.

    I prefer being at the scope, eyepiece in, and aligning and finding objects with the handset. I then swap out the star diagonal plus eyepiece with the camera when all is good.

    So you can do operation via PC, but the Nexstar mount is not up to remote control like the very much more expensive mounts such as the Paramount series.

    in reply to: Latest Deep Sky Newsletter available #579319
    David Swan
    Participant

    Good job all – submitters and editorial team. An enjoyable read on Sun. David

    in reply to: Ooops! #579304
    David Swan
    Participant

    Very good paper ;). The authors state that the very high apparent magnitude of the host star (-27) precluded further studies of the host star and planet with their telescope. I aim to follow up the authors’ work with my own observations of this mystery planet as it comes to opposition, even though its southerly declination will be a problem.

    in reply to: Mare Humboldtianum #579287
    David Swan
    Participant

    An amazing image. Consider posting it in the Observing Community area.

    in reply to: Ooops! #579242
    David Swan
    Participant

    This is hilarious. Thanks for pointing it out!

    in reply to: Psi Persei, emission lines in Fe II ? #579149
    David Swan
    Participant

    I am no expert, but according to the Spectral Atlas for Amateur Astronomers (Walker), you see Fe I/II emission lines in Be stars of classifications e3, e3+ and e4 – maybe weak in e2 class (psi Persei).

    in reply to: Psi Persei, emission lines in Fe II ? #579150
    David Swan
    Participant

    Tony Rodda has posted his spec of the star. He sees the Fe emission too. Click spec database on the right, type psi per into the box and click fetch spectra. David

    in reply to: Bright supernova in NGC 3941 #579143
    David Swan
    Participant

    So the weather there is no different to here then! I have my fingers crossed for a bright supernova (mag 11-13), well separated from the host galaxy nucleus, and present in a relatively sparse star field. I would like to try to get a spectrum using my slitless StarAnalyser. Is this too much to ask? 🙂

Viewing 20 posts - 241 through 260 (of 302 total)