Just wanted to note that conditions were pretty rare up here last night with humidity staying below 35% until after midnight. Even at 1am when i closed the Obs the humidity was still below 40%. Given this massive Lake just down the street, i rarely see it this dry. I can only attribute it to the very slight breeze out of the North-West. I hope Sydney guys got the same dry breeze.
Clouds cleared from the South West around 10.30pm last night so just used the 12” GoTo Dob last night to view some clusters, M42, Eta and a few others plus the wind was up
Tonights looking very very good for imaging down here ( near Ulladulla)
Low humidity, overnight temp of 14 deg and Jetstream at around 35kt
Going to image Eta again after a rain affected night last Wednesday
Monday and Tuesday nights are looking ok too but tonight is the pick of the crop
Cheers
At Terrey Hills it was windy all night till at least 12:30 when I went home. Big band of cloud based over about 10 and the temperature dropped somewhat. Seeing was atrocious - no point going past 100 or 120X - but the transparency was OK.
Setup tonight, everything is plugged in and working, already focused on sirius. Transparency is good, wind is slowly dying. Planning to do a bit of ha on the rosette and cone neb. Fingers crossed.
Western Sydney week-end looks pretty good as far as clear skies go. Seeing looks awful Saturday but Sunday's not bad so far in the forecast. Anyway got to get the mount out at least once before the SPSP so I don't end up like a goose at the house trying to remember what to do.
I spent last night out until 2:00am when clouds rolled in from the west. The seeing was good enough to test my mount at long FL but it was extremely wet after midnight. I did a couple of hours on NGC6188 and tested all the new software installed on a windows 10 laptop I just got. My old windows 7 notebook has been having increasing issues lately. I'll probably have to blank it and reinstall. I'm hoping to do some more tonight. The mount is behaving now. I have to go through all the PEC training again but it was good enough last night and a lot better than my last attempt.
Similar here Marc, last night was good for a few hours, then a high cloud band moved in from the northwest, but the Moon was getting up by then anyway. It was dry up till then as well. Agreed that there are some good looking night's coming up.
Anyone was out last night? It was a good one in western Sydney. Went down to 12c, a little wet. Seeing was so so until 3:00am when it turned to sh|t but overall a good night. No wind this time. Friday was windy well until after midnight. Tonight looks good again. Been out every night since Friday now.
Yes was out last night at Terrey Hills... quite chilly and the seeing was fair but transparency not great. No good for galaxies or nebulae. Light northerly breeze was enough to keep the site free of dew.
Only pain was having the RFS turn up at 9pm to try their new toy - a fire engine equipped with a set of monster floodlights on a long boom ! Thankfully they turned it off and packed it away.
I was out last night until 1:00am. I think it's the end of the run now. The front is coming from SW. Once it passes we might be clear again but the jetstream is bloody roaring next few days.
I started this morning at 3.30 and went till dawn on the planets and luna. Once the clouds cleared the seeing seemed ok naked eye but actually only supported 280x in the C11 and 224x was better on the moon. With patience I managed some nice moments on each object. I'm going to save up my sleep and hope to get away over the weekend.
Tonight the jetstream is screaming along at over 100kt
Saturday night look much better only running around 50kt and dropping
My screen shots of ( CFN ) Cloud Free Night
There was an amazing hour or two last night where I was getting 0.5"rms guiding - I've never seen that on my cgem before.
Then if popped back up to 1" later on and started there for the rest of the night. Damn.
