PeterW

on my way. peter

Wondering about the tripod specs, portability as my camera tripod doesn’t seem to hold my mak steady at high powers… Peter

First time I’ve seen that meteo sensor in the flesh. Peter

… better be some good deals left! 😉 Peter

Good luck! Peter

Probably shorter session than yours, with a bright moon and brighter light pollution there isn’t a whole lot more about to look at. Forgetting the monopod my chunky 10x50 seem to gain weight rapidly….. good thing the comet is easy to find. If it was nicer weather I’d have lain down on the grass and looked up, easier to view near the zenith… but the ground is soggy! Great to catch this once in 50,000yr comet, sure there’ll be another round soon… 😉 peter

Easy find up right if Polaris tonight from a nicely light polluted London suburb using handheld 10x50, looks like a bright messier object, decent sized coma, tiny little false nucleus. Peter

TFL are unaffected, seems like mainline issue only. Iocally we also have intermittent bus outages too, though only some lines… seems like I should go Friday and hoover up the bargains… 😉 peter

Sounding like an accountant there @Captain Scarlet!! There is also the case of selling off kit and then realising you shouldn’t have…. Peter

Look at libration charts to determine when it is best to go peeling round the different edges of the moon. I caught parts of the Mare Orientale last year for the first time, helped by the nasa page to work out which little smear was which. Peter

Not yet thank you! @Captain Scarlet got the hat from Uncle Al as he’s such a good customer….;-) ! Is filling ones collection with secondhand kit allowed on this thread or is it for full-price acquisitions only… Peter

Jan2nd, you were looking at the mare australae, which would have been on the lower right on the edge of the moon as you looked at it, the top right as your scope rotated it 180degrees With craters oken and lyot (and surrounding ones) visible. I have marked the region on an image taken from NASA dial a moon which gives a photo realistic image for any date and time. https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/5048 Peter

Thanks, nice early start, nice walk from Earls Court, get in before the crowds… Peter

https://europeanastrofest.com/conference-programme/ Non scrolling version with times. So probably opens before 10…. ?! Peter

Jumping for side to side to confuse you. What time does it open in the morning, tried finding out and couldn’t see last time I looked. Peter

Oh, lookie, no-one had posted a review, so I fell to temptation and picked up the new moon atlas on the block. If you’ve not got a lunar atlas then this is definitely recommended. Uses the same maps as the 21st century moon atlas with larger scale, but without the non-atlas bits. The paper looks nice and may do better with dew than normal paper atlas. no longer do you need to find an over priced copy of Rukl…. Peter

OK, I’ll let you off ;-)!! I’m looking for an erecting image, right angled, wide field 3-5x finder with a nice illuminated reticle for daytime use… not coming up with many options. I think I threw out the remains on an old 5x50 I could have Franken-modded… 😞 just have to live with the 1x. Peter

@Captain Scarlet Looks like you are going to be doing some imaging…, thought you were a visual observer?! Peter

PAS?? Not come across that one. There’s room for more than one, go to one, go to many… Peter

… and consider adding a desiccant plug to sealed tube scopes to avoid the inside having issues. Heavy dew can yield some pretty “spectacular” artistic imaging effects… Peter

No, also not sure when it opens. I go to catch up with people at clubs I’ve been a member of years ago and see what the latest stuff is, maybe pick up a small something. Never attended any of the talks though. Got meet-ups planned with a few people already. I agree it’s hard for people north of the Watford gap, but the IAS (which I always mean to get to, but haven’t) can help. Maybe someone should start another one further north, you got much better skies than round London. Peter

Apps like clear outside can tell you the risk of dew, depends on the humidity level. If the object cools below the dew point then dew will form, not all nights or locations are equal. Maybe only occasionally it strikes. A clear night sky is around -40C or so (measured with a thermal camera), still plenty colder than your surroundings, so things will radiatively cool if exposed to it. Some weather monitors measure the sky temperature as clouds will be warmer and so you close the dome as clouds risk rain. I bought some short dew strips for some binoculars and they plug into a use power and 2.4A per channel. You could get a d ew controller to allow you to vary the heating, but you’d need a 13v supply, which is less available than USB. Peter

It goes UP rather fast, hence the maps with time to visible. More useful would have been some indication of what time period and what elevation would have been available…. Maybe needing a 4D plot. peter

Someone will have to go and find where the satellites landed so they can have another go, at least they were small and so easier to rebuild. Peter

I wondered @sorrimen, I did have a quick look about in case you were doing some outreach. Peter