Hi all, the other day I disassembled my Losmandy G-11, cleaned it thoroughly, adjusted the worms and re-greased it in the hope of improving its tracking performance which has indeed noticeably dropped over the years.
Voila - after firing it up again I have been able to take unguided 1 minute exposures with perfectly round stars. Since I don't have any guiding equipment this ability is rather essential for me...
(Lately I have been limited to around 30 seconds max before stars were getting blurred).
So armed with my newly regained tracking ability I went hunting for an object which have previously eluded me: Trans-Neptunian Object 50000 Quaoar which is currently traversing through Serpens Cauda while shining at a measly magnitude 19.
Image is available here:
http://www.pbase.com/rolfolsen/image/126160527/original
Image details:
Taken 02/07/2010 @ 22:30 NZST with 10" Newtonian f/5 and ToUCam Pro SC1, no filters, no guiding.
The image is quite noisy, but this target is really at the very limit of what I can pick up with 1 minute exposures. I wasn't even sure if I got it until I started processing.
Quaoar was discovered on June 4, 2002 by astronomers Chad Trujillo and Michael Brown at the California Institute of Technology.
Quaoar is currently estimated to be 890 ± 70 km in diameter and orbits at about 6 billion kms from the Sun with an orbital period of 287 years. Quaoar has one known moon, Weywot, which was discovered in 2007. Weywot is estimated to have a diameter of 74 kms, orbiting Quaoar at a distance of 14,500 kms.
Quaoar is the largest body that is classified as a cubewano, which is a Kuiper belt object that orbits beyond Neptune and is not controlled by an orbital resonance with the giant planet. Cubewanos have semi-major axes in the 40-50 AU range and do not cross Neptune’s orbit. The name "cubewano" derives from the first trans-Neptunian object found after Pluto and Charon: "(15760) 1992 QB1". Later similar objects were called "QB1-o's", or "cubewanos".
Hope you enjoy!
Comments, critique etc welcome as always.
Regards,
Rolf