December 2011 - Utah-Astronomy - mailman.xmission.com

Posting guidlines -unofficial-
by Chuck Hards 09 Dec '11

09 Dec '11

This is intended to help streamline postings. Don't take it personally, please. Just some suggestions from a list user, nothing official here. 1. When replying to a post, please edit your response to remove as much of the prior post as possible. Only include the relevant text that you reply to. Don't include the entire thread. Delete as much as possible. Only the relevant sentences you are replying to need be included. The prior posts are already in our "IN" boxes, thanks. Those of you who subscribe to the digest version, PLEASE do NOT just hit "reply" to posts, as you will re-send the ENTIRE digest to everyone on the list. Edit your response. A little scrolling will go a long way to keeping people reading your posts. Don't do it, and most of us will just hit "delete" without reading what you wanted us to read. There aren't enough hours in the day, folks. Sorry. Yes, this means you have to do some cutting. But it makes a difference with your audience. Including the ENTIRE thread as quoted text might have the effect of turning-off your intended audience. It sure does for me. Most of us have enough email to read-through, without having to look at the same text OVER AND OVER AND OVER again. You may have a desperate urge to reply instantly, but not taking the time to delete the entire thread that you are replying to only diminishes your position among the rest of us. We have lives of our own and appreciate your efforts to deliver your message without unnecessary repetition. Reading takes time. Data often costs money if you use the list on a smart phone. Nobody wants to have to open a post that includes paragraphs of info they've already read. Many of us are guilty of this. Please take the time to edit your replies. It only works in your favor. Most of the replies on the Alton Mine fiasco included days worth of duplicated posts as quoted replies. That was ridiculious. You know who you are. 2. When replying to a post, DON'T re-label the subject as "OT" (Off-Topic). If you are genuinely replying to a post having anything to do with astronomy or the related instrumentation or science, it's topical. If you wax elloquent beyond the originial post, only then is this appropriate, in some cases. Let the Admins make the decision if you are in doubt. Patrick and Rich are the most level-headed people I know. Trust their judgement. It becomes a pain if too may replies have taken-off into "OT" branches. 3. Finally, TAKE SOME TIME to compose your reply. Replying in the heat of the moment is never a good idea. This isn't debate class. I'm guilty of this as much as anyone and am sincerely trying to mend my ways. I further pledge to never reply to a hot topic after more than one cocktail, or if short on keyboard time. Better to walk away and return later. The Internet isn't going anywhere. Your audience isn't, either, unless you've pissed them off by blowing off suggestions 1 and 2. Ok, that's just my 4 cents. I'm not an admin or moderator of this fourm, just a grateful subscriber who never has enough keyboard time to suit myself. Your suggestions and constructive critisicisms are solicited and appreciated. Thanks for your time. C.

1 0

Re: [Utah-astronomy] Alton Mine and what not...
by stormcrow60＠xmission.com 09 Dec '11

09 Dec '11

Hi Folks, After my initial response to this thread, I laid low, not wanting to contribute to the fact that some are leaving this list. But, I have to respond to Don's statements. Don, I don't know where you get your information, but to say natural gas has no pollutants is absurd. Natural gas is primarily made of methane, which, as a global warming pollutant, is 20x worse than carbon dioxide. There are several reasons, based on fact that make the effort to "frack" unjustifiable. One, vast amounts of water need to be used. We can not afford to waste our most precious resource on this planet for dirty fuels. Two, having methane, as opposed to fracking fluid in your drinking water is not anymore desirable. Would you drink it? Three, just because "fracking fluid" has not leaked into water tables now, does not mean it will not happen in the future. How many times have we heard the oil companies say oil spills can not happen and they would bear all the cleanup responsibilities? False and false. Besides, I would dispute the thought that fracking fluids have not contaminated water tables. Four, fracking has been proven to cause earthquakes, although they are small. But whats happens in the future? Five, huge federal subsidies are needed to make any fracking projects economically viable, as all fossil fuel is subsidized. If Americans really paid the true cost of producing fossil fuels, we would be paying $5/liter. Six, if these subsidies were put into green technology, we would not need to "frack". Seven, saying the Sierra Club is impartial is true. But, not having billions of dollars at stake, I tend to believe they are being more open and honest regarding their stance on fracking than the fossil fuel industry. Eight, obviously, fossil fuel industries are not impartial either. To quote a line in a TOOL song.... They "Lie, cheat and steal." We can go on and on as to why fracking is not a good energy policy. I am sure I will never convince you of my beliefs in the realm of fracking, the environment and political philosophies, but there is no way I could let your last statements go without a response. My Three Cents, Jon The situation I mentioned is just reinjection of water from one producing formation into another depleted formation. A very routine process. However, I need to respond to some of the things you may have heard about fracking. 1. The technology is not new and is well understood. The first fracs were done in the late 40's and early 50's. During the 1980's several thousand fracs were performed and during the 1990's and up to the present day several hundred thousand wells have been fracked. 2. During this whole period there is not one documented case of frac fluid getting into a water aquifer. Some of the reasons for this are that the formations fracked are almost always deeper than 5,000 feet, well below most fresh water aquifers, and government agencies require that the fresh water zones, which are typically 1500 feet or shallower, be sealed off by cementing surface casing through them. Frac fluids are not flammable and some fracs consist only of fresh water and sand. Others contain cross-linked gels and other chemicals. 3. There are cases of methane getting into drinking water. This can be caused by not having proper integrity in the surface casing and a leak developing in the production casing and gas leaking into the aquifer but this has nothing to do with the frac. Another common cause of methane in drinking water is caused by culinary water wells that are drilled in areas of shallow coals. After producing gas free water for a period the coals "dewater" and produce methane which gets into the water supply. This is a very common occurrence particularly in areas like Wyoming, Utah, Pennsylvania and West Virginia which have shallow coals associated with fresh water aquifers. 4. The frac basically enhances the producibility of gas from the existing gas reservoir. 5. Much of the hysteria about fracking has been promoted by organizations like the Sierra Club which opposes the drilling of ANY new wells ANYWHERE in the U. S. They can hardly be objective. 6. Natural gas contains no pollutants and is far preferable to coal or oil from any environmental viewpoint. It also has the smallest production footprint. The United States has sufficient natural gas resources to become energy independent and I believe it is the height of folly not to develop them. Don Quoting utah-astronomy-request(a)mailman.xmission.com: > Send Utah-Astronomy mailing list submissions to > utah-astronomy(a)mailman.xmission.com > > To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit > http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy > or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to > utah-astronomy-request(a)mailman.xmission.com > > You can reach the person managing the list at > utah-astronomy-owner(a)mailman.xmission.com > > When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific > than "Re: Contents of Utah-Astronomy digest..." >

5 10

Favorite eyepieces
by Chuck Hards 09 Dec '11

09 Dec '11

What are your favorite eyepieces? Two categories. 1. Modern. Designed and marketed from about 1985 to present. This category includes Televue for our purposes 2. Classic. Old-school designs and makers, up to about 1980. I'll start. I have no modern eyepieces worth mentioning. My favorite classic eyepieces: 1. Universtiy Optics 32mm Wide Scan. With an 82-degree FOV in a 2" format, it's given me some incredible views of extended DS objects. 2. University Optics 16mm Wide Scan. Same design with half the focal length, in a 1.25" format. The eye relief is on the short side, but the views are outstanding. 3. University Optics 40mm 7/70. 70-degree FOV, 2" format, another great low-power eyepiece. The above 3 eyepieces work best with objective f-ratios of 5.5 and slower, from my experience. I also have the modern UO 25mm MK-70 (misspelled "Koning" on the barrel, lol) but it is not of the same caliber as the classic UO wide-field designs. Avoid it. 4. My old mixed set of Jaegers and University Optics classic Japanese-manufacture orthos. I have them in 4mm, 6mm, 7mm, 9mm, and 18mm. Narrow 40-45-degree FOV by today's standards, but a wide field isn't much of a bonus on planetary targets and double stars, my usual application for these oculars. Extremely sharp resolution, and they work well with most f-ratio objectives. Tiny eye lenses and short eye relief as you approach the higher power end of the series, but sharp all the way. I don't need my glasses at the eyepiece (my astigmatism isn't bad in my dominant eye) so the lack of eye relief isn't an issue. 5. My old set of U.O. Erfles. 16mm, 20mm, 25mm, and 32mm. A reasonably wide 60-65-degree FOV (except the 32mm which is closer to 50-degrees due to the restrictions of the 1.25" format). With ojectives of f/5.5 and slower, they are good performers and the edge distortions minimal. It's also fun to say "Erfle". ;-) Using these old eyepieces with modern fast mirrors means a coma corrector is required. I have the orginal Lumicon 2" coma corrector which works well down to about f/4, but was optimized for f/4.5. But they all work very well with SCT's (f/10), and my mid-size Newts operating at f/5.6 up to f/8, and the innumerable small refractors that I like to challenge my visual skills with when observing in the backyard. What are your favorite eyepieces of today and yesterday?

7 9

Comics
by erikhansen＠thebluezone.net 09 Dec '11

09 Dec '11

http://www.gocomics.com/bc

1 0

Unsubscribes continue (moderating posts is an option)
by Patrick Wiggins 09 Dec '11

09 Dec '11

Come on folks. What the "frack" (pun intended) does all of the recent fracas have to do with astronomy? I don't think anyone here has a problem with the occasional off topic post but this is getting ridiculous and it's driving people away. The stuff about the mine near Bryce was borderline on topic because of possible effects on Bryce skies. But oil and gas exploration? Earlier today Steve Fisher (no stranger to debate) left the list and now I've received notice that Kurt has signed off. We're at over a dozen who have left now. More in a few days than have left in the entire year. In my years of overseeing this list I've never used my admin powers to censor anyone. I've just gotten really good at deleting the kind of stuff so many are starting to think of as spam. But with this many subscribers (and now two very prominent subscribers) leaving I'm really starting to think that some people are either going to have to stay on topic or find their posts being blocked until one of the moderators sees they are on topic.

4 3

Fw: video
by Joe Bauman 09 Dec '11

09 Dec '11

Hi All, for a change of pace, here's a nice video my little sister, Terry, sent to me, showing some great time-lapse Milky Way views. -- Joe http://science.memebase.com/2011/12/04/funny-science-news-experiments-memes…

2 1

Need ride to Transitional Board Meeting
by D P Pierce 09 Dec '11

09 Dec '11

I would like to get a ride to the SLAS transitional board meeting Tuesday night. Just me and my 36 lb fold up wheelchair which fits in most trunks, many back seats and hatchbacks and all pickup truck beds. I could ride TRAX to the 450 S & Main St station but being in that part of town after dark makes me nervous. I live near 6200 S & Bangerter. Deloy Pierce, Large Bored Member

1 0

Astronomy in Utah
by Jay Eads 08 Dec '11

08 Dec '11

For fun, I created a new forum called Astronomy in Utah. You can find it at this link: http://astronomyinutah.forumer.com/index.php It's purpose is to have a forum that differs from an email group. It's not designed to replace Utah Astronomy but to offer a forum and threads on different topics, ones that can be viewed easily. If you want to add a thread, let me know and I'll add it. I'm looking for a couple of other people to Mod it. Contact me at my email if your interested at jayleads at gmail dot com (regular email need to be substituted). -- Jay Eads

1 0

VirtualDub - DSLR images into video
by Canopus56 08 Dec '11

08 Dec '11

Virtual Dub is a free option for turning multiple DSLR jpegs into a video file, like in those of the night sky that you see on the internet. Download site http://virtualdub.sourceforge.net/ http://virtualdub.org/ A tutorial http://www.setvak.cz/timelapse/timelapse-movie-guide.pdf I haven't used it, but have seen it recommended for this purpose. May be useful for processing lunar pictures for Saturday's eclipse, assuming it is not clouded out. Clear Skies - Kurt

2 2

Alton mine update
by D P Pierce 08 Dec '11

08 Dec '11

Closer to home the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument was created by presidental decree. "The Monument was declared in September 1996 at the height of the 1996 presidential election<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._presidential_election,_1996>campaign by President Bill Clinton <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton>, and was controversial from the moment of creation. The declaration ceremony was held at Grand Canyon National Park<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Canyon_National_Park>in Arizona <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arizona>, and not in the state of Utah. The Utah congressional delegation and state governor were notified only 24 hours in advance. This was seen by many as a transparent political ploy to gain votes in the contested state of Arizona. That November, Clinton won Arizona by a margin of 2.2%, and lost Utah to Republican Bob Dole <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Dole> by 21.1%" (quote from Wikipedia) I thought at the time Clinton did it to screw Utah because Utah was the only state he had come in 3rd pllace in his first election. I think Kanab High School woke up the next morning to find out half of their football field was in the new national monument. Nobody from Utah was invited to the ceremony. It was especially a slap in the face for former Demcratic senator Frank Moss who had worked diligently to get more national parks in Utah. Deloy

11 29