Space Station with attached Shuttle?

[erick (Eric)]

Apparently visible from Melbourne this coming Thursday morning:-

"ISS, Thur Dec 21, 04:58am, 2 min, 11 deg max elevation, approach 10 deg above NE, departure 10 deg above ENE"

If I got out with my 20x80 bins, what chance of seeing anything other than a fast moving spot of light? And probably too low?

[davidpretorius]

naked eye is easy with this guy as long as it is not in the earth's shadow. I tried capturing with my 10" dob at 208x and it was very very difficult.

binos should be ok i reckon

good luck

[stephenmcnelley]

I have also heard reports of structure detail from those that observe the ISS, but have not been there myself.
Some kind of mounting might be a huge help whatever our viewing weapon of choice.

[sheeny (Al)]

Guys,

I have observed the ISS (and other satellites) several times with 20x80 binoculars, but unfortunately there just isn't enough magnification to see detail even on favourable passes. I have read, however, that people who have observed the ISS at about 50x mag through an 8" scope have seen "good" detail.

Driving my C8 to track the ISS is beyond me... ... If I was going to have a go I suppose my weapn of choice would be an 8" or bigger DOB (if I had one). ...Find a star within the FOV of the flightpath and wait till the ISS enters the FOV and hope you can hang on!!!! I practically had bugs in my teeth observing with the 20x80s , so at 50x it'll be really fast!

Best I think the best I can hope to do with my C8 is to find a star in the FOV of the flightpath and watch it zip through... I have tried once so far without success...

Best of luck!

Have a go and let us know how you go!

Al.

[mojo (Terry)]

If you have the patience, try this to track satellites with your scope.

It's a fantastic satellite tracker. (but then it's the only one I've ever used, so I could be wrong)
It's a windows program but works perfectly with Linux under Wine, as well.

The satellite tracker works best with some type of joystick to be able to make find adjustments to get it into the eyepiece. Without a joystick, the closest I've managed to get is to track satellites in the finder

[jjjnettie (Jeanette)]

...Find a star within the FOV of the flightpath and wait till the ISS enters the FOV and hope you can hang on!!!!

I like that, so true.
I sometimes track planes with the Dob, so I might put the practice into good use.

[Rob_K]

Had a great view just after sunset a couple of months ago of the ISS (very bright - brighter than Jupiter) being chased across the sky by the shuttle (less bright). No time to try to set up a telescope as it moves quite fast - just a couple of minutes from horizon to horizon. I think it'd be very difficult to find and track with a scope. Didn't realise at the time that detailed structure could be seen by those skilled enough to follow it. Here's a few web-links to galleries of detailed ISS photos & videos, mostly taken with web-cams & backyard telescopes (down to 114x900 newts!):

http://www.satcom.freeserve.co.uk/one.htm
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMY46XAIPE_index_0.html
http://iss-transit.sourceforge.net/

The last link includes sun & moon transits by ISS, which give a good idea of the relative size of the ISS. There are lots more sites.......

Cheers -

[erick (Eric)]

I think I'll admire the photos from the sites, then sleep in that day




Maybe another time when it is going more directly overhead - at 10 deg elevation it probably won't clear the neighbour's roof and certainly not the city glow.

[sheeny (Al)]

Originally Posted by mojo

If you have the patience, try this to track satellites with your scope.

Thanks Terry! I might have to investigate. Looks like it supports the LX200 well... I wonder about ASCOM for Celestron scopes? And then I need to sort out my Lappy to scope cable - I have the wrong one!

Originally Posted by jjjnettie

...Find a star within the FOV of the flightpath and wait till the ISS enters the FOV and hope you can hang on!!!!

I like that, so true.
I sometimes track planes with the Dob, so I might put the practice into good use.

JJJ... go on! You know you want to! You have the skills, you have the technology... The detailed charts are available on Heavens-Above... LOve to hear how you go!

Originally Posted by erick

Maybe another time when it is going more directly overhead - at 10 deg elevation it probably won't clear the neighbour's roof and certainly not the city glow.

Yeah 10 degrees is not a very favourable pass!!!

This is the first time I've tried the multiple quote feature. Cool!

Al.

[Omaroo (Chris Malikoff)]

I've tracked the ISS successfully through the 12" after updating the satellite ephemerides via the Meade website. Autostar 2 did a pretty admirable job in predicting the horizon injection position and time, and then took off on the right vector when it appeared after the countdown. The object stayed within the FOV of a 25mm EP for pretty-much the whole pass. It's a dizzying experience though......

[erick (Eric)]

It's all academic now. Heavy smoke over Melbourne for the next day or two.

Makes a really effective sun filter. I can report no naked eye sunspots are visible today - unlike the big one last week.

[sheeny (Al)]

Originally Posted by erick

It's all academic now. Heavy smoke over Melbourne for the next day or two.

Makes a really effective sun filter. I can report no naked eye sunspots are visible today - unlike the big one last week.

Yeah... you get that!

No better here. Smoke about fro the bushfire at Mt David and plenty of cloud (and it just rained... for about 30 seconds!!! )

Al.