Jupiter SEB outbreak 14th Nov 2010

[chrisrnuttall]

Hello again,

Here is Jupiter from Sunday night. It is a little out of date already as the outbreak is changing fast....

The SEB outbreak continues to spread dark stuff accross the SEB. It is elongated across the full width of the belt and is starting to look 'S' shaped as the winds shear its two ends in opposite directions.

I was still unable to clearly make out the 'extremely bright white spot' which appears in webcam images despite examining the area with four different colour filters to try and tease it out. This is possibly due to the fact that i have not had conditions better than average yet.

The NEB was similar to my last observation with two reddy/brown ovals and the white rift to the RHS, except that this time the boundary between the belt and the EZ seemed a little more busy with grey festoons projecting into the EZ, one of which stretched all the way across to the SEB.

I also saw a white bay in the northern edge of the NEB, I have since realised this is in fact a large white oval, which shows what kind of conditions i had I suppose.

14/11/2010

22:20 GMT

Orion SPX 200, TV X2 barlow and TV 8mm Plossl = 300X

seeing average with increasing boiling through the session, quite cold, sharp frost formed later.

[Talitha]

Thanks Chris, it'll be interesting to see whether the pulling motion will make the ends of the 'S' fade, or if the spot's strong enough to withstand it. BTW, what's that white notch in the upper edge of the NEB? I saw it on 31 October... how long do the surface features last?

[Ags]

That's a wonderful sketch, it gives me aperture fever! It must be a case of limited aperture, but my scope shows Jupiter as very subtle greys with the NEB strongly brown. sometimes I get hints of color in the other zones, but never clearly enough to put in a sketch.

I also admire the care with which you have drawn the very subtle detail in the souther hemisphere.

[chrisrnuttall]

Carol

It's a white oval which is close to the edge of the belt, the conditions meaned that the bridge of brown belt material which makes it into an oval not a notch, melted away in the eyepiece.

Ags

I used to own an ETX125 a few years ago, the optics were really sharp but Jupiter only ever looked to have two belts and two polar regions with little detail. Much of the detail on Jupiter is low contrast which needs a bigger scope with better contrast.

There are a few things you can do to stop Jupiter looking grey;

My ETX used to show it as grey if i started to get dew on the corrector plate, I made a dew shield with an integral heater strip of resistors set into the foam at the telescope end. Do you use a dew shield and/or heater? Dew can wash the contrast out of an image before you can see it on the optics. Also check your eyepiece for dew it can build up there because of the moisture from you eyeball!

Also if you become dark adapted the colour sensitivity drops off out of your vision, look at the window of a house where there is a light on inside every few minutes to prevent dark adaption.

Lastly the most difficult thing to do is get a bigger scope with a smaller central obstruction, It'll knock your socks off! I don't want to feed your addiction but i dare say you could get a used 8" dob or newt for the value of your setup!

[Ags]

Thanks for the advice Chris, on another thread I've been persuaded of the benefits of a 200mm or 250mm dob. I really want one with tracking and/or goto (goto is not so important, but you can't upgrade the skywatcher tracking dobs to goto, so I'd rather just buy a goto one). I'm relocating to Holland right now so I don't have any spare pennies, but hopefully by the end of next year I will have more aperture somehow. I'd ideally like to have something better for the next arrival of Mars.

I do manage to see some traces of detail outside of the NEB and polar regions with my Mak, but it is at the absolute limit of my telescope's abilities (not to mention my eyes!). Once I even glimpsed banding on Saturn...

Yes, I must get a dew shield sorted out. I will try to improvise something with the packing tape and cardboard lying about the house.

Your point about dark adaptation is interesting and surprising!

[dweller25]

Excellent observation and drawing Chris. I have not yet had chance to see the outbreak but will keep trying.