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Re: Observing Report, April 13
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Bruce McGlashan
Great report, Matt. Your marvelous descriptions of things that I had looked
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at too revealed to me the difference that experience (and maybe better eyes) makes in observing. Gotta get me more of that experience! Here are my newbie additions to your report: First off, a galaxies-worth of "thank you"s to Mike Wirths for his hospitality and the use of his facilities. I had heard about Equuleus from past reports, and my experience exceeded the high expectations I had formed. Mike let me set up my new G-8 in a corner of the observatory, and what a wonderful way to observe! Carpet on the floor (no muddy knees using the telrad against high objects), no wind to speak of, no dew (does the observatory act as a giant dew shield?), and the heated break room! While the highlight of the evening/year/hobby were the amazing views in the 25" Dob, a close second had to be locating for the first time on my own M3, M13, M92 and Eta Lyrae, using Roland's excellent directions. M3 in particular was a thrill, because I had been looking for it since you (Matt) showed it to me during the winter. The icing on the cake was showing Mike Z how to find M3, M13 and M92, and he found them. Roland spent a good portion of the night helping Mike and I with various things. The first thing he said to me when he arrived was that he had brought his observing chair for me to try. It worked great, and I can add another item to my "must get" list now. Roland explained the collimation process to me, and we worked on tweaking the collimation on the G-8. We talked about star colours, and looked at Albireo (Beta Cygni), the famous Double-Double (Eta Lyrae), and the "Garnet Star" Epsilon Lyrae (shortly after I had looked at Mars in the binocs, for comparison). We also discussed sketching, and I showed him an erasing shield, a tool I used to use in drafting to erase small, specific parts of a diagram without erasing the surrounding area. Somebody else was in on that discussion (sorry, I've forgotten who), and I think he thought it was a shape template. It isn't, and it doesn't work well as one (from experience), because the stamped steel shreds the pencil point. Anyways, Roland, thanks a million. For the second night in a row, you have progressed my understanding of astronomy and observing by an enormous amount, and I am very grateful. One other thing that we all found amusing was a new technique for helping newbies like myself find an object. We borrowed Attilla's laser pointer, located the target in one scope, guided the pointer operator to the target using that scope, then had the other person find the green line in the other scope. Sounds silly and impractical (which it is), but we had fun doing it regardless. It actually degraded into a game of who can locate invisible (naked-eyed) objects most accurately, and who has the steadiest hand on the pointer. Attilla also pointed the laser into the EP of the 25" scope, to show us what it was aimed at. I had no expectation that it would work (getting the laser aligned that accurately), but it did! As expected, it was weaker, but somewhat illustrative. The more I see that laser pointer, the more I think it is much more than a toy or curiosity; it is a valuable and versatile teaching tool. After two consecutive late nights observing, I was a little worried about the drive home. Turns out, I was so buzzed from the great time we had, I was wide awake long after I got home. Thanks again to everyone who made this such a memorable session. Let's be sure to do it again sometime soon! -----Original Message-----
From: Matt Weeks <mweeks@...> To: OAFs@... <OAFs@...> Date: April 14, 2001 13:16 Subject: [OAFs] Observing Report, April 13 Hello All, Here is my report: Equuleus Observatory Report Date: April 13, 2001 Time: 9:00pm-2:30am Limiting Magnitude: 6.4 Seeing: 8/10 Transparency: Excellent Roland Prevost, Attilla Danko, Bruce McGlashan, Mike Zielder, Rob Robotham and myself joined Mike Wirth at his most excellent observatory in Perth for a night of wonder. The drive out to Perth was one of held breath, as the sky was mostly cloudy all the way there. Bruce and I arrived to find Mike W and Mike Z already in the observatory, a look up confirmed that the sky was indeed clearing nicely. Roland, Attilla and Rob soon joined us. By 9 PM the sky was mostly clear and very transparent. Later, remarks were made that this was one of the best nights ever at the observatory. The combination of very transparent skies and good seeing made for many memorable views of the spring's showpiece objects. Conversations ran the gambit from Monty Python to the age of the universe ("some of those scientists are just plain wrong!."ad) to that rush you get when you have a night like this. Great company!!! Most of what we saw I can never hope to describe accurately but I'll give it a try! M51: Holy S**t!!!!!, Good God!!!!, "catch me I'm gonna fall off this ladder!!!!", these were a few of the catch phrases most commonly used to describe this site the whole evening, we just kept going back to it! When I first leaned in to have a look I couldn't breathe for a second. The spiral structure was EASY to see! The arms were tightly wound and were mottled in appearance. I rolled my eye around and absorbed all the detail I could all the while listing off all the descriptive swear words that came to my mind. Then Mike W said " yeah, isn't it cool, you can even see detail in the companion!", The companion! I hadn't even paid any attention to the companion I was so enraptured with M51, when I focused my attention there I almost fell off the ladder again! I could see a definite thick bar like structure with a curved arm off each end, one was very obviously attached to M51 proper! Talk about the "observers high", what a rush!! M101: Huge!! This is a big galaxy. The spiral structure was easy to see here as well and all the same descriptive words apply!! The spiral structure is not as compact as M51 but the arms showed almost the same amount of mottling. Attilla said to have a look around and you should find some satellite galaxies. So, I did, and found many! Later in the night when it was placed in a darker portion of the sky, we returned and there were many more galaxies to be seen in neiborhood. Very cool! NGC 2392: The Eskimo nebula. Very cool!! Viewed with high power through the 18 inch it was stunning. The nebula, I felt, had a greenish tinge to it. The central star was easy and when the seeing was at its best the inner hood was visible with direct vision! NGC 2371/2: Planetary neb. This is a double lobed or Bi-polar planetary. Viewed through the 18 inch the two lobes were quite obviously connected and I could detect the central star 50% of the time. Not very colourful, but a neat sight none the less. "The Double Quasar": With guidance from Mike W and Attilla I was able to locate this very distant object. I was able to hold the "fuzzy star" about 70% of the time and when the seeing was its best it most defiantly split. This quasar has a red shift, which suggests it is 8.5 billion light years away. It is being gravitationally lensed by a galaxy cluster between it and us which is why it appears double and is bright enough for the 25inch to pick up. I believe I heard someone say it has a visual magnitude of 15? This is by far the most distant object I have ever seen, I still can't believe I have seen about half way back to the Big Bang!!! M81 and M82: Very cool!! Using Rob's "Termi-nagler"(aka "the holy hand grenade") 81 and 82 were fit in to the same field of view in the 25 inch. M82 was obviously a galaxy that has had something bad happen to it. The fact that it is an irregular galaxy was easy to see with this view. The dark lane, which slices across the middle, was obvious and the whole galaxy looked very textured. I then swung my attention to M81. When looked for, I could see two spiral arms, one on either side of the bright nucleus. There were other very memorable sights seen this night, like the sombrero with its very interesting dark lane, the spindle, the black eye and a new "mystery" galaxy companion to 4565? I'll let the others comment on these and the other amazing events of the night!! Matt "where's my hat?" Weeks Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to |
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