Comet Temple 1 (p9)

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

Ok ... I had a go at this tonight with no success
This Comet is suposed to be near (8 Arc minutes to the East of the star Auva, in Virgo.
It is predicted to be Magnitude 9.6
This is the comet the probe is going to hit on the 4th July, by a projectile from probe "Deep Impact"
Anyone seem it

[cahullian]

haven't seen it but my name is on a disc that will be on the probe though : )

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

so in a sense you will be there when it happens

[iceman (Mike)]

haven't seen it but my name is on a disc that will be on the probe though

Gazza or Irish?

I'm keen to look for it over these dark days while the moon is new. Looking forward to the impact!

[fringe_dweller]

Comet 9P is currently running behind the projected ephemeris magnitudes at the mo by about a magnitude (which is very common - from my short time following comets). It is a fairly diffuse object at around DC 3 - 4 so that doesnt make it easy I guess. Averted vision is needed to see it visually apparently (from reports i have seen) i havent bothered looking as i dont live at a dark sky site - slack!! - i am happy following the images and reports on the net till it gets close to the big day. good luck! (personally i am a bit of a bright comets only snob - mag 8-7 and under is my cut off normally - except for special ones like this one!)
cheers
Fringey

[fringe_dweller]

Oh sorry, and it is only around 1.5 arcminutes in size - so pretty small!

[astro_south (Andrew)]

Nabbed it on Saturday night with the 12.5" dob at Glenore Grove. Just a faint fuzz ball with some slight hint of a condensed core. No hint of an elongation / tail.

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

No wonder I had trouble seeing it ...
I was probably looking straight at it, as it would look like a faint star I guess.

[astroron (Ron)]

I hve observed it with a 40cm dob for quite a while now and it is about 9.5 mag,in your 25cm scope it would look like a small out of shape defuse galaxy, and being in Virgo you could mistake it for one, a friend saw it in his 25cm on Sunday night from Burpengary north of Brisbane, at the same time as Iwas seeing it from my dark site in the mary valley 60kms inland from Caloundra andwe compared the view over the phone. It made a triangle with two mag 7.5 stars with a small spiral galaxy inthe same field. The comet will not get much brighter,sojust watch the images on the computer. astroron

[Dave47tuc (David)]

I'm going to hunt this one down tonight

Useing my 10", but if that fails will try with the 18"

Also going to look for Pluto Should be fun.

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

I will have another go at our dark sky site this Saturday too !

[[1ponders] (Paul)]

Current coordinates as of 9:00 EST are RA 12h 58.17min DEC 2 Deg 17.87min

[Greg Bryant]

An online finder chart for Comet 9P/Tempel 1 can be found here:

http://skyandtelescope.com/observing...cle_1522_1.asp

It's adapted from my article in the June issue (of S&T as well as AS&T).

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

Thanks Greg I have been using your article, to track it down.
Should be a bit easier as it approaches NGC 4845.
BTW: thanks for an On Time Mag with good Aussie content

I have been tracking Tempe1 pretty much since the start of the month. It is very faint in my 8" but is detectable. And was a lil washed out by Delta Virginis on the 31st. When it was sitting on Delta Virginis northern side.

I couldn't nab it last night, besides conditions didn't allow for seeing faint objects. I was too busy playing with my new 3.5 XW anyway and boy does Jup's look big, clear, natural in this sucker whats a Nagler to do? These are the locations when I did note them down.

UT 08:50/18:50 on Friday 27/5/05, RA 12h 53m 50.7s Dec +04 44’24”

UT 08:42/18:42 on Saturday 28/5/05, RA 12h 54m 09.7s Dec +04 25’54”

UT 08:42/18:42 on Thursday 2/6/05, RA: 12h 56m 55.0s Dec: +02°47'16"

Maybe you can use these to plot a possible location. Actually I find if you can nab it at least once a night over a few nights, you can pretty much guess where it's going to be on following nights.

I haven't noticed any tail, It's very faint and have only noticed a distincted coma on the 28/5/05 and again on the 1/6/05

Regards

Actually I can post a calculation for those wanting to try tonight

lemme know

regards

[Dave47tuc (David)]

Hi All,
Went out observing last night with friends, Geoff(Starkler) Mark & Julian.
Weather was clear with some high cloud but cold

Scopes on hand, 2 10" Dobs. 18" Dob with DSC(Argo Navis) and 14" Meade LX200 GPS. A nice range.

Cloud did come in at times and we got clouded out around 12.30Am.
By then we had enough.Time for bed.

Geoff was keen to try out his new 24 Panoptic, seemed a problem with the thread on the bottom of eyepiece, he was not happy Hope you get that sorted mate

On to observing. My aim for the night was to find the comet and see if i could locate Pluto.


I found the comet ok, it is in star fields that have a few Galaxy's and could easily be mistaken for one. This is why we have a Meade LX200 on hand

Once I found the comet in my 10" Dob, I used the 14" to comfirm this, by "going to" some Galaxy's near by, then useing the hand controller to star hop to the comet
Star hop with a "Go To" scope, well yes as it has not been updated for some time. The "Go To" on the scope to find the comet was out a fair bit.

Anyway we located the comet and yes we found it pretty faint and very diffuse. I can see why some have had problems finding this one.

We looked at many other objects through the night, with a lot of attention on Jupiter. The pale spot was easy and seeing was so so at times.

The next task was Pluto, I used charts out of Astronomy 2005. These charts are ok but i allways find the star patterns to squashed

Anyway once I found what I thought was Pluto or the field it should be in, we used the 18" with the DSC to find it and going by the 18" I had the right field.

As you know it is hard to say that one is Pluto So check and re check charts we guessed we had the right star. We really have to look at the field on Monady or Tuseday night to see if the Star or Pluto has moved.

We had one more challange to go, trying to split Antares
This was done no problems in the 18" and 14" but was a lot harder in the 10" scopes. Antares was flairing a lot and we could not really confirm we had it.
But Geoff and I both agreed where we thought it was. At moments thought we could just make out the secondary when seeing was alowing.

So another great night with good friends and with the weather we have had down this way, we are lucky to get a few hours in under the stars.

Take care.

[[1ponders] (Paul)]

Sounds like you had a great night Dave. Finding Pluto, now that's a challenge. Do you think you'll get out to confirm it? Any chance of getting a picture of it through the meade for posterity. Oh and nice report

[Dave47tuc (David)]

Originally Posted by [1ponders]

Sounds like you had a great night Dave. Finding Pluto, now that's a challenge. Do you think you'll get out to confirm it? Any chance of getting a picture of it through the meade for posterity. Oh and nice report

Thanks Paul
The weather may not be on our side. But hope to get out again soon.
Even if its not for a week. If it was Pluto I can see it has moved even after a week It does not move far in a week. We are not into taking pictures i just like looking

[[1ponders] (Paul)]

Pity. Maybe if I got enough of my "friends" we could convert you