A new comet

[RapidEye]

Good for you guys!
From what I can tell, by the time it clears the southern horizon for us, it won't be so good anymore =-(...

Comon Levy or Macholtz - find us northern folks another good one!

[astroron (Ron)]

I observed Comet C/2006 A1 this morning at 04:15 in my 16"dob, it was very low in the south east and was just like a bright Globular Cluster with a very bright core/nuculas, no hint of a tail was visible I only had a very brief look because of thin cloud and mist coming up.
I wasn't able to see it in either 7x50 or 15x65 binoculars due to the mist and the brightening dawn sky. astroron

[fringe_dweller]

Clouds finally gone, got to see it monday morning, from a dark site.
Did some obs with large binos on tripods (we had three wicked tripods with two sets of 20x80's - tried out the triplet 20x80's yay - and my kunming 25x100's - would of been a good photo hehe) A1 had a faint half a degree tail in 100's. In 20x80's i got a pretty firm mag of 6.25. About 3 and a bit arc minutes in size, and i agree Ron very condensed GC looking head, not much outer coma. we thought we could see a green hue to head in the 100's.
Tried to be first to spot it, and report it, naked eye in the world - but too iffy to say - very small and hard to distinguish from nearby small star. Also caught a few centaurid candidates and some nice sporadics in the bargain earlier on.
i wouldnt be so sure it wont be nice for northerners RE - after all you get it after perihelion - thats the best time usually
Excellent session!

[ving (David)]

dang, and i was out last night too... gotta get my lappy out with cartes and track it down

[fringe_dweller]

David, it is almost exclusively a morning comet on the border of Telescopium and Indus, low in the south eastern sky, reaching an altitude of 14º before summer twilight hits like a sledgehammer at a bit after 5 am for us here.
ahhh those exclusive bright far southern, morning comets - its what I live for astronomically speaking, and by far is the best thing about living in the far south of oz to me
gave up using 'scopes on bright comets a while ago now - (visually) big bino's from dark sky sites crap on everything else for bright comets most of the time IMO, even cheap ones! (on a sturdy tripod) - wide field in a scope might be cool tho - wasnt as impressive in anything under the 100mm binos - although there was some tail in 20x80's but nowhere as clear or good.
still got a nice afterglow from nearly two days ago mmmmmmmm :-)))))
ps better hurry if ya wanna see it, moons gonna be a spoiler in a few days!

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

I think I may be able to see it at about 4:30am, just !

[Greg Bryant]

Now here's a comet that is surpassing expectations. From the initial visual brightness estimates of around 11th magnitude a month ago, it has rapidly brightened to be between 6th and 7th magnitude currently. That makes it easily the brightest comet we've had in over a year - since C/2004 Q2 (Machholz) - and there's still the potential for it to brighten further.

Its current morning visibility (and difficult at that) is a downer, but I'd certainly encourage anyone who feels inclined to go observing before dawn to do so.

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

I tend to agree Kearn, some of my best comet views have been with Bino's.
Our club has a set of 16x60 Pentax Bino's, these are great for comets!

[fringe_dweller]

Saw it again this morning - still around the mid sixes and looking like a condensed glob in bino's.
You would love the big 100mm's Ian - I cant imagine what a $10 000 pair would be like dreamy!?

[ving (David)]

morning!!! i hate mornings
I dont want to get up early to se it

whens the next night time one?

[fringe_dweller]

No - Maybe midnight for 73P in May - sorry Vingo!
I made a crude quicktime movie of the daily morning positions of C/2006 A1 as seen from Adelaide with horizon just visible (and 35 south-ish) at 5 am - if you have a scroll wheel on your mouse each gentle click will be a days movement (in theory anyway) starting position from this morning today the 9th local time - to 5th of Feb here -
Please dont rely on this as an accurate guide - just a rough one

http://southern-x.org/so_x/a1/a1_35south.mov 350K d/l

Check out Michael Mattiazzo's site latest pics from yesterday morning - sweet
http://www.yp-connect.net/~mmatti/ Michael has more detailed charts too

But my wide field pic from same morning, I have posted here, is prolly more of a reality check as far as non-comet ppl are concerned visually hehe

details:FWIW - I was messing around with a Canon 350D at the dark site whilst
there this morning just gone, only using a tripod, and no remote, plus
hand/eye focus. single 25 sec exp. 1600 iso with the god awful kit f/5 zoom
lens that comes with 350d, also my first attempt at a long exposure at
a dark site with it.
My 350D seems to be one of the ones with the bad banding - although
that can be processed out of course.
FOV = 30º across
Processing - very (non-biased) stretched and some usm - ,
as I am unfamiliar with the practicalities of deep sky dslr processing atm. stacking ect. still a film person really - as someone said all of that is already done in a film shot plus its not as conveniant with the mac

[astroron (Ron)]

I observed the Comet this morning at 03:45 through my 20cm SCT and 15x65 and 7x50 Bino's , in the SCT the comet showed a thin 1.25-2deg thin tail,bright Nuculus wih fainter outer halo,. a quick attempt was made to take a piggyback 300mm telephoto image but think the twilight beat me. In both the bino's the comet was only a bright fuzzy "star". It was a beautiful morning and it was worth getting up for with Jupiter and Venus gracing the Dawn sky.astroron

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

Well I am Going to go out and give this one a go in the morning, should be about 5deg above the SE horizon just before 1st light at 5am.
A challenge to be sure, but if I can spot it I will be a happy chappy

[cometcatcher (Kevin)]

It's always the way, my neighbour's tree is in the exact position of where this comet will rise from my observing spot.

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

Had to go up a local hill & find a clear vantage between the trees, but I saw it
Through my 16x60 Binos it was a greenish fuzzball !
I will have to see if I can find a vantage point where I can set up the richfield scope !

[cometcatcher (Kevin)]

Ok now I'm jealous. Everything went wrong that could go wrong this morning. Clouds, tree, me. I forgot to calibrate the declination setting circle so was probably looking in the wrong spot. I used the wrong frame rate capturing something that wasn't the comet. It's been too long since my last comet and I've forgotten how to use a telescope!

Mike, can you please change my name to cometloser. Thanks.

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

I wouldn't stress too much Kevin, you have more time to see it than me !
I lose the comet here in the next 7 days.
I do however have a trip to SE Qld planned in a weeks time, so I might get a 2nd chance!

[cometcatcher (Kevin)]

Found it this morning! Not sure how bright this is but it's very condensed. Sighted through a 6 inch F5 Newtonian and 30mm eyepiece. Pic here http://www2.iceinspace.com.au/forum/...0707#post90707

It's so condensed I followed it for about 55 minutes well into twilight to about 5:25am EST.

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

Nice capture on the thin tail Kevin
I hope I can get to see that tail visually !

[cometcatcher (Kevin)]

I didn't see any visual sign of tail on the 6 inch scope but typically tails are usually very faint.

How come you lose the comet in the next 7 days? From Mackay I calculate the comet will actually gain some height as it heads north, although the moon will interfere. The comet appears to lose height on charts but they don't take into account that everything rises 4 minutes earlier each day.