Anyone fancy a marathon?

AstroJunk (Jonathan) · #1 17-01-2007, 12:05 AM

Out of sheer clouded-out frustration I've amused myself by creating an Aussie Marathon of 109 well placed Messier/Caldwell/(and an NGC fave) objects which should be readily visible between 8pm and 3am

The list is ordered in a rough viewing order (only the first few are critical as they will be setting fast).

There are 2 files: IISAC Matathon.txt which can be loaded into Argonavis, and IISAC Marathon Autostar.txt that can be, you guessed it, loaded into Autostar (but don't forget to rename the extension to .mtf)

Either file can be read in notepad or whatever to see the full list in all its glory. If anyone is interested I'll post up the Astroplanner file.

I can't get down to IISAC this year, but if anyone is up to the challenge...

rmcpb (Rob) · #2 17-01-2007, 04:31 PM

Thanks for the list Astro. If it ever clears I will have a go at it from Linden on Saturday.

Cheers

jjjnettie (Jeanette) · #3 17-01-2007, 04:39 PM

I like lists.
Thank-you.

ving (David) · #4 17-01-2007, 04:46 PM

its good to have some sort of objective when observing, thanks.

jjjnettie (Jeanette) · #5 17-01-2007, 05:05 PM

My main objective is to find a break in the clouds.

rmcpb (Rob) · #6 18-01-2007, 08:48 AM

I'm with jj on that. Clouds to the west EVERY evening so the comet is not an option at present. Very frustrating especially since they are not producing any of the wet stuff!!

AstroJunk (Jonathan) · #7 19-01-2007, 12:15 AM

I managed a half marathon tonight!

The clouds finally cleared and I tested the script as far as I could.

In two and a half hours I viewed 54 of the first 66 objects - those that I couldn't see were obscured by various imovable obstacles in my back yard, or hadn't risen yet. I gave up when the remainder were still below the horizon.

One things for sure, I need to sort out the order of a few of the objects - a bit too much zig-zag slewing really

Still, it was rather good fun on an ordinary sort of night, and even though I didn't spend long on each object, I saw a few for the first time, and have a list of some really nice objects to revisit on a better night (NGC2362 for one).

For those on their way to IISAC tomorrow, Have a great one!