May 2007 - Utah-Astronomy - mailman.xmission.com

Re: Comet Lovejoy C2007E/2 Position tonight 10-14
by Kurt Fisher 16 May '07

16 May '07

Patrick wrote: > Here it is (prepare to yawn): > http://users.wirelessbeehive.com/~paw/temp/LOVEJOY001.JPG Looks great. Only one online report mentions any tail on this outbound receding body. The Great Comet of 2007 [McNaught] has raised the asthetic comet bar. - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Comet Lovejoy / M-87 optical jet
by Patrick Wiggins 16 May '07

16 May '07

I just tried another 10 minute exposure of Comet Lovejoy and there was no joy <grin>. About the same as last night. At tonight's ATS following the SLAS meeting the topic of M-87's optical jet came up and a number of us wondered how difficult it might be to image. Well I just tried a 10 minute guided exposure through the C-14 operating at f/11 and saw no sign of the jet. So then I went to the The STScI Digitized Sky Survey and downloaded one of their images of M-87 and saw no jet there either. So I'm guessing getting the jet's picture is not easy. pw

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Meade LX200 - How to use with a DSI?
by Kurt Fisher 15 May '07

15 May '07

For this summer, I would like to use the Meade LX200s at the University Physics Building - eventually expanding to some imaging. I have a Meade DSI but am unsure how back focus works on a Meade LX2000 in terms of aligning an object to a chip using a flip mirror. My usual scopes are a 10" GEM mounted newt and a 5 1/4" refractor. For those scopes I have backfocus and target centering problems reasonably worked out - I have a flip mirror, a parfocal eyepiece set up, and for the newt, a low-profile focuser. This makes getting the image on the small DSI chip a _relatively_ easy task. A separate off-axis 70mm refractor is used for alignment and guiding. Looking at the Meade LX200 - and one equipped with an autofocus controller - it is unclear to me how there is enough back focus room on these SCTs. How much backfocus room is there? Is there enough room to accomodate a flip mirror, a parfocal ep and a camera. Most pictures that I see of LX200s and most people I have seen using them at SPOC, seem to just stick the camera directly into the visual back with no flip-mirror or parfocal e.p. That setup seems like it would make targeting the feature onto a small DSI chip quite difficult - that is aligning the feature by using the camera view. - Clear Skies - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Click to classify MRO photos - MRO HiRise images
by Kurt Fisher 15 May '07

15 May '07

The following link is a beta test of a NASA site seeking help from the general public to classify features on high-resolution camera MRO photos. http://clickworkers.arc.nasa.gov/hirise An insomnic activity for a caffene-ridden cloudy-night - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Re: Comet Lovejoy C2007E/2 Position tonight 10-14
by Kurt Fisher 15 May '07

15 May '07

Patrick, I'm looking forward to anything you get. There are not many images of this one on the web. I was working Boo doubles with 10x50 binos at Lt. Mtn tonight. All I could see was a faint averted vision smudge at the correct location in suburban light polluted skies. - Kurt ---------- Original Message ---------------------------------- Author: Patrick Wiggins Date: 2007-05-15 00:10 -600 To: Utah Astronomy Subject: [Utah-astronomy] Re: Comet Lovejoy C2007E/2 Position tonight 10-14 Thanks for posting Kurt, I was just opening my observatory when your message arrived. My planned imaging session is now on hold while I get pictures of the comet (I'll post any that are worth looking at). pw _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Comet Lovejoy C2007E/2 Position tonight 10-14
by Kurt Fisher 15 May '07

15 May '07

Comet Lovejoy should be easy to find tonight. It is midway between eta Dra and theta Dra. A report today on Cloudynights stated it is visible in dark skies with 10x70 binos and in 10" Dobs with no info on brightness. Recent ICQ observations are: COMET C/2007 E2 (Lovejoy) Total-magnitude and coma-diameter estimates (visual unless otherwise noted): 2007 May 11.55, 9.5, 4'.0 (Y. Nagai, Gunma, Japan, 0.32-m reflector); 8.94, 8.3, 8' (J. J. Gonzalez, Leon, Spain, 25x100 binos); 7.57, 9.4, 4'.7 (Y. Nagai, Gunma, Japan, 0.32-m reflector); - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Re: [Utah-astronomy] eyepiece found at SPOC
by daniel turner 14 May '07

14 May '07

Mystery solved. It's Siegfried's. DT ____________________________________________________________________________________ Looking for earth-friendly autos? Browse Top Cars by "Green Rating" at Yahoo! Autos' Green Center. http://autos.yahoo.com/green_center/

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Trace solar movie DVD Attn PWiggins
by Kurt Fisher 14 May '07

14 May '07

Patrick, I went out to SPOC tonight for an Ealing session that was aborted due to high-wind. But I did thumb-tack an envelope to the bulletin board with your name on it. It contains two data DVDs. The first is a 1.5 gig DVD containing the TRACE "Filaments" movie DVD. http://trace.lmsal.com/Public/Gallery/Movies/ The second DVD data disk contains a partial copy of the Active Regions DVD. There are three TRACE DVDs: Filaments (1.5 gigs), Active Regions (3.1 gigs) and Flares (3.6 gigs). All the DVDs are images only - no audio. After two attempts, I was unable to get a Mac to burn a copy of the Active Regions and Flares disks. I was able to download the three disk image files (2 1/2 hours of download time on a T1 connection at the UofU) onto a Mac, to mount the image files and then view them with the intended media viewer - the open source VideoLan viewer ( http://www.videolan.org ). However, the Mac did not seem to be up to actually burning a full 3.6 gig DVD without aborting on a CRC error. I do not know whether this was inherent to a Mac or there is a CRC error in the TRACE source files. In any event, I have left you what I could download and burn. Unfortunately this does not include the coolest disk - the Flares DVD. For your educational school stuff, the Filaments DVD contains an overview of all the DVDs, a solar science movie and a movie on the physical TRACE satellite. Individual Quicktime movies of flares can also be downloaded, e.g. this monster X14.4 flare - http://trace.lmsal.com/POD/TRACEpodarchive8.html#movie33 (11Mb) To run the Filaments DVD, copy the root directory "Filaments" to your hard drive. (It runs too slow off the disk.) Install the VideoLan media player - which I can represent to you as the best open source media and streaming player available. For the VideoLan open file menu, choose the option to play a directory. Point to the "Filaments" directory. VideoLan will load a DVD-type movie menu. The Filaments DVD also does not contain a descriptions of the individual movies - it only lists the date of the event. You can sometimes find the description for the same date on the TRACE POD page: http://trace.lmsal.com/POD/ See the POD movies section For lurkers, there are also directories to download individal "big" and moderate sized Quick-time movies. http://trace.lmsal.com/POD/ See the POD movies section http://trace.lmsal.com/POD/bigmovies/ - Enjoy Kurt P.S. - It may be possible to burn good copies of the other DVDs. You'd probably need someone with some pull at a college computer media center - like Dr. Palen - who can ask someone with the time to download the disk *.img files, convert them disks and to burn them on a high-end machine. The directories and files involved are: http://trace.lmsal.com/POD/bigmovies/DVDs/ http://trace.lmsal.com/POD/bigmovies/DVDs/ActiveRegionDVD.img http://trace.lmsal.com/POD/bigmovies/DVDs/FlaresDVD.img _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Refractor house
by Chuck Hards 14 May '07

14 May '07

Patrick, we got a notice from Bruce that Andy was down for repairs. Something about a damaged polar axle. Can you shed any light on the situation and give us an estimated time for repair completion?

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Re: [Utah-astronomy] Friday night at the Wedge
by Chuck Hards 14 May '07

14 May '07

Joe, I have insulated overalls that I just keep stashed in the car all the time. Primarily for observing, but if I have to change a flat, they also keep my clothes clean. I find that they have fewer "cold spots" than a parka...they keep the bottom half warm as well as the top. If you get too warm, it's easy to just peel-down the upper section. On 5/14/07, Joe Bauman <bau(a)desnews.com> wrote: > > You know Chuck, I thought I had learned that lesson too, but > obviously not. Next time (probably tomorrow night) I'll definitely > pack cold-weather gear! -- Joe >

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