Some Doubles in Andromeda

Perhaps there are some who think doubles are merely two stars close together and they may be right, just as one may be right in saying great music is only a bundle of notes strung together or that literature is just a large collection of words. But as with most things in life, if you spend time with doubles, hunting them out and learning from them, you come to realise that the grand majority radiate an aesthetic beauty quite unlike anything else.

As with any art, there need not be any purpose in splitting stars, just as there need not be any necessary purpose in strolling through a forest at dawn, viewing a beautiful sunset or writing a poem to your loved one, but we can also highlight some of the more utilitarian reasons for undertaking such a pursuit:

• star systems are among the very few objects in the night sky to show you any real colour, in some cases majestically bright and vibrant. This gives the pursuit a rather pleasing aesthetic appeal.
  

• tracking down doubles gives you excellent practice in the art of star hopping and in reading and using star maps and charts.
  

• seeing conditions will often influence your success, so by observing doubles on different nights you can gain familiarity with how how appear in your telescope under varying conditions.
  

• like lunar and planetary observing, you can observe doubles from your own garden or roof top under quite heavy LP, so you don’t need to be hanging around for perfectly dark nights or sites.
  

• searching for double stars teaches you something about your telescope’s resolving power, its ability to provide you sharp and detailed viewing, even of objects that upon initial appearance come across as a single source of light.
  

• by comparing the double and multiple star systems you can practice your understanding and skills at recognizing differing star magnitudes.
  

Andromeda is a fascinating constellation in itself with many beautiful objects to discover. The following are a few sketches of some of the wonderful double stars it conceals.

I hope you enjoy them and I will see you all after a little holiday break. Should be back at the end of the month.

Bye for now.