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Some double stars in the moonlight


Piero

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Luckily the sky was clear and stable last night. With an almost full Moon, I decided to go for double stars, a type of object that I do not have much familiarity. 
Eventually, I had a nice session out there looking at classic but nice targets. I re-observed Izar, and concluded that I could really split it although the companion was located at the first diffraction ring. Not a full split, but the two stars were distinctly observable.
Writing down these notes was a bit tricky though. When basically only double stars are observed I found it difficult to remember the different features for each couple (e.g. small tint changes, brightness, separation). I think that next time I will take some notes during the observation instead.
Anyway, below is my report for this little session. 
Hope you enjoy it,
Piero
Date 27/08/2015   
Time 21:10-23:00   
Temperature 14C (10 km/h)   
Seeing 1 - Perfect seeing   
Transparency 5 - Clear   
Alpha Sco Dbl Star 28x, 69x, 103x, 129x 
Antares. I could not split Alpha Sco into two stars. However, already at 103x, two different colours were distinguishable. The low part was orange-red, whereas the upper part was green-ish. The two stars were somehow merged together. This difference in colour was striking at 129x and 257x. 
Epsilon Boo Dbl Star 28x, 103x, 129x 
Izar. As for the previous night, the separation was observable at 129x, although detectable with difficulty already at 103x. The companion had a grey-blue colour and was located on Izar first difraction ring.
Rho Her Dbl Star 28x, 103x 
Located ad 28x, I could split this at 103x. The components have a white-grey colour and their brightness was similar.
Delta Ser Dbl Star 28x, 103x 
Their brightness was quite similar, possibly one slightly brigher. Colours were yellow and white.
Gamma Ari Dbl Star 28x, 103x 
Mesarthim. Nice double star. One was white, the other was grey.
Gamma And Dbl Star 28x, 69x 
Almaak. Wonderful double star. The main component is a yellow star. The companion was smaller and blue. The two were clearly separated at 69x.
Gamma Per Dbl Star 28x, 103x 
Quite large yellow star. Unfortunately, I do not remember this observation. I will repeat it.
Eta Per Star 28x 
Miram. Although not a double star, there is a far dimmer star next to Eta. The couple shows a nice contrast. Quite pretty.
Moon Satellite 103x, 129x, 257x 
Waxing Gibbous, phase 95%. Very nice view of the Moon, particularly near the terminator at East. At the North Pole, I visited the crater Philolaus where inside there was a lovely illuminated hill. Then at West, it was the turn for the crater Cavalerius and Hevelius A. 129x was the best view I had tonight for the Moon, although the flyby at 257x was just spectacular.
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