WADAS forum 4

[Dec]

1 hour ago, 2STAR said:

Last night clear at Winscar no clouds good viewing conditions, arrived about 8pm, Mark & Adam already there.

Firstly, the mount decided to play haywire, not connected message, but it was, fixed it. aligned with Altair and Capella, test to Polaris, spot on, great, NO, mount shut down again, no connection, but there was, fiddled about, aligned again. all ok, sent to Castor, spot on tracking ok for 5 mins so off i go NO, the finder scope decided to drop off, fixed it and checked, still  tracking Castor, attached camera etc, turned on software, no camera recognised !!!, unplugged, turned off laptop, refit connectios, still no camera recognized, then realise, WIN 10 had been updated that afternoon, it had failed to recognise the drivers  for my camera, I tried loading an old disk for the camera, but no luck, faffed about for near to an hour but no success, decided to pack in about 9-45, went home, uninstalled software, downloaded again from Atik , went outside set up, everything working and spot on, within 10 mins of being outside, CLOUDS, packed up, had a cup of Tea and got some tissues out in case i started crying ha ha , roll on next clear night !!!.

Eric 

ps Just after Penistone Major road closure diverted , had to follow Sat Nav to M1, took an extra 10-15 mins to get home hahaha

Haha... Must be the time of year Eric, had exactly the same problem. After using same kit for nearly a year, last night my photo capture software SGP decided not to connect to my mount and when I finally got that sorted the mount wouldn't connect to my guide camera. Uninstalled and reinstalled everything, checked cables ...after 2 hours still no joy then as I was about to call it a night, it started working???? 

Hopefully get it a bit more reliable over the next couple of nights as the forecast looks pretty good.

[nicks90]

I was out last night too - but doing some outreach with the Ossett girl guides group in support of their stargazing badges.

Unfortunately being in the centre of Ossett meant there was a lot of light pollution, but gave it a go anyway.

 

Took the club refractor on its eq mount and what a pain in the backside that was! With the tripod legs on its highest setting, when viewing andromeda you were kneeling down! It was roughly polar aligned, but still a complete and utter [very rude word removed] to track andromeda and with the eyepiece in the position it was, it was regularly being knocked as the kids got up and down to take a look and then took an age (and broken neck) to reset. Tried a few different EPs, the 24mm that was in it suffers really bad kidney beaning which meant some of the kids struggled to see anything, so stuck my 32mm revelation astro in and that was pretty bad too. plus the stars looked a bit comet like in the outer 30%. Not sure if thats the eyepiece or the lenses in the scope. but the kids were able to work around it and all got some views.

Also 130mm is just not enough aperture. I really wish i'd taken my dob now and a stable set of steps. It would have been so much easier than faffing about with that flippin thing and they would have got a much better view.

 

So all in all, the kids had fun - most of them had never seen a galaxy before and were blown away they could see 1 trillion stars from 2.5million light years away.

But as an outreach scope, its not very user friendly. Its big and heavy and the EQ mount is a nightmare and you get a killer neck if you want to look at anything over 45deg altitude. plus all your guests end up with muddy knees. Dont get me wrong, it looks the part being a 'traditional' scope - but i think as an outreach scope we would be better selling this on and getting an alt/az mounted SCT or a Dob.

If anyone wants to collect the scope from me, give me a shout as i'm in most days working from home and most weekends at the moment.

[adam_sage]

Managed to get down to winscar and take first shots of Orion, although I'm torn between stacked images and single exposures. Ive still not cracked processing and still am not overly happy with it but here they are........first I've ever done of this target......be gentle lol.

Orion001.tif

Orion stacked 02.tif

[Mark62]

54 minutes ago, adam_sage said:

Managed to get down to winscar and take first shots of Orion, although I'm torn between stacked images and single exposures. Ive still not cracked processing and still am not overly happy with it but here they are........first I've ever done of this target......be gentle lol.

Orion001.tif

Orion stacked 02.tif

Lovely image Adam well worth the trip. The colours are lovely and some great detail ?

[2STAR]

3 hours ago, adam_sage said:

Managed to get down to winscar and take first shots of Orion, although I'm torn between stacked images and single exposures. Ive still not cracked processing and still am not overly happy with it but here they are........first I've ever done of this target......be gentle lol.

Orion001.tif

Orion stacked 02.tif

Nice images Adam, I like the one not stacked to be honest although not as much detail as your stacked image

eric

[adam_sage]

1 hour ago, 2STAR said:

Nice images Adam, I like the one not stacked to be honest although not as much detail as your stacked image

eric

Yeah I've said this to mark i find a single image a lot easier to process and find it usually looks a lot better but then again I'm still relatively new to it all as i only got my gear in march so still playing around with it and learning :-) just hope we have some more clear night so i can get some more

[2STAR]

21 minutes ago, adam_sage said:

Yeah I've said this to mark i find a single image a lot easier to process and find it usually looks a lot better but then again I'm still relatively new to it all as i only got my gear in march so still playing around with it and learning :-) just hope we have some more clear night so i can get some more

Yes plenty more to come this year hopefully, just been outside for an hour and tested everything, all working !!!, sods law haha from last night.

[adam_sage]

20 minutes ago, 2STAR said:

Yes plenty more to come this year hopefully, just been outside for an hour and tested everything, all working !!!, sods law haha from last night.

No way!! after it not playing ball last night?!?

[Mark62]

2 hours ago, 2STAR said:

Yes plenty more to come this year hopefully, just been outside for an hour and tested everything, all working !!!, sods law haha from last night.

Sods  law really lol ? 

[Ryan P]

If the weather stays on track I will be heading out to Winscar tonight. 

[rockystar]

1 hour ago, Ryan P said:

If the weather stays on track I will be heading out to Winscar tonight. 

you going to finish off that horse's head you started last week?

Is it the Leonids meteor shower this weekend too? @Ryan P do you reckon they were a couple of early Leonids that we saw last week?

 

[2STAR]

3 hours ago, Ryan P said:

If the weather stays on track I will be heading out to Winscar tonight. 

I may join you Ryan

eric

[Soupy]

Great images chaps and good to see so many of you getting out observing. 

Nick I presume the scope wasn't tracking well as you don't have the full setup. Vicky has part of it.

Also you do realise that you shouldn't be using it, if it gets damaged on an outreach event that is not linked to the society you are solely responsible and it is not covered by our PLI. On another note, we will need it for Saturday night at the RSPB event so if you could drop it off to one of the members this week that would be great. Cheers mate. 

[Ryan P]

5 hours ago, rockystar said:

you going to finish off that horse's head you started last week?

Is it the Leonids meteor shower this weekend too? @Ryan P do you reckon they were a couple of early Leonids that we saw last week?

 

Yes hopefully should be getting more data of m33 and the hh. That’s the plan anyway lol. Adam is joining me. Would be great to catch up with others. More the merrier as per..

[2STAR]

25 minutes ago, Ryan P said:

Yes hopefully should be getting more data of m33 and the hh. That’s the plan anyway lol. Adam is joining me. Would be great to catch up with others. More the merrier as per..

Will load the car now, fingers crossed I may have a lucky night at Winscar ha ha

[2STAR]

29 minutes ago, Ryan P said:

Yes hopefully should be getting more data of m33 and the hh. That’s the plan anyway lol. Adam is joining me. Would be great to catch up with others. More the merrier as per..

What time you going for ??

[2STAR]

Arrived at Winscar 8pm Ryan & Adam already there, around 8-45 the bits of cloud went and left us with a great Crystal clear sky for the next 5 hours !!, Ryan commented it was the best Sky he had seen at Winscar and I wouldn't argue with that, very still atmosphere and slight breeze in between made it cold, very cold haha but the views kept us going, even I with my eyes could clearly make out Andromeda, all the targets viewed all night were good, although I wish I had brought my SCT as I got M97 on the laptop easily even with 102mm Frac plus my initial alignment a bit out, should have calmed down and realigned when I first set up ( another lesson there !!) although very small it looked well and some nice colour showing through, will look at my images later today, but in any case well worth shivering for hahaha

Eric

[procky1845]

Glad you all had a good night up there. I am extremely jealous, I've been wanting to get back up to Winscar since the evenings started getting darker again and haven't managed it yet. Baby number 2 likely to make an appearance in the next couple of weeks so driving out to middle of nowhere with no phone reception not really on the cards at the minute! ?

Hopefully might be able to make a trip up there in the new year.

Lee

[rockystar]

 It did look lovely out there when we got home at 11:15, but after a couple of beers and feeling tired, it was bed for me

It also looked lovely at 2:15 when I had to go pee.

Imagine what that sky would have looked like in Galloway... :whimsical brian cox emoji:

 

[Uplooker]

47 minutes ago, rockystar said:

Imagine what that sky would have looked like in Galloway... :whimsical brian cox emoji:

 

You and me both, very sad that Galloway didn't happen. Damian and I did console ourselves with a couple of nights camping in the Yorkshire Dales ( not North Yorkshire ?). The Thurs was the best night, plenty of Leonids, galaxies, nebulae and Uranus.

[2STAR]

2 hours ago, procky1845 said:

Glad you all had a good night up there. I am extremely jealous, I've been wanting to get back up to Winscar since the evenings started getting darker again and haven't managed it yet. Baby number 2 likely to make an appearance in the next couple of weeks so driving out to middle of nowhere with no phone reception not really on the cards at the minute! ?

Hopefully might be able to make a trip up there in the new year.

Lee

There is phone connection on the lower part of the car park, quite good to be honest, I always phone my wife to let her know I have got there.

eric 

[Mark62]

Glad you had a good night Eric. Sorry I did not get out had things to sort out at home.

[Soupy]

Sounds like a great night. Looking forward to the images!  

[mapstar]

On 19/11/2017 at 10:48, Uplooker said:

You and me both, very sad that Galloway didn't happen. Damian and I did console ourselves with a couple of nights camping in the Yorkshire Dales ( not North Yorkshire ?). The Thurs was the best night, plenty of Leonids, galaxies, nebulae and Uranus.

It was good. Shame our feet fell off on the Thursday night and we retired early.

Friday night and the company and optics were top notch 

[nicks90]

On 18/11/2017 at 16:01, Soupy said:

On another note, we will need it for Saturday night at the RSPB event so if you could drop it off to one of the members this week

Guys,

I'm absolutely chocker this week with a project before I go to Poland Thursday.

So if someone could come collect ithe scope from me either tomorrow or Wednesday - drop me a message on here or email me nickclayton0@gmail.com and I'll give you my address to come get it.