Cambroon Observatory Night - 1/4/06

[1ponders] (Paul) · #1 26-03-2006, 10:15 AM

Ok seeing as we only have a week I thought I'd better get this up and going now.

Astroron's place next Saturday and let's hope for the same conditions as last Saturday night.

Those coming so far:
Astroron
[1ponders]
Xeelee and dad
Zubenel and tribe
Gargoyle_Steve and brother Don
Moonshine
Striker (if he

enough)

Any other takers?.

ps there will be another one some time this month, new moon on the Fri 28th (Hmmm might have to look at a long weekend out there

and do both Friday and Saturday night

and then another night at home on the Sunday

). Looks like a good month.

Moonshine · #2 27-03-2006, 10:58 AM

I think I can actually make this one

Don

Striker (Tony) · #3 27-03-2006, 01:15 PM

I'm working on this one....will keep you posted

I think I only need 1 more browny point off the wife and I'm a goer.

Gargoyle_Steve (Steve) · #4 28-03-2006, 11:15 PM

I have to say that tonight even here in the middle of Caloundra suburbia the sky seems surprisingly clear ..... the Milky Way is defined and some smaller star clusters are easily visible through my rough binocs. All this from my front yard which is surrounded by bright orange merc vapour streetlights and is less than 2km's from the surf.

Roll on Saturday Night!!!!

Oh yeah .... someone

squandered all his money this morning on a new Guan Sheng 10" Deluxe scope. It should be arriving Friday with luck.

[1ponders] (Paul) · #5 28-03-2006, 11:25 PM

In that case you can kiss Saturday night good bye. Maybe the AGs will forgive you for one night an let you get first light in.

Yeah it wasn't too bad tonight. Saturn looked pretty good at 300X for brief periods. The air was nice and clean and the seeing wasn't too bad, but dodging that high cloud was a real pain. Plus the reflected light of those clouds made if fell like a cresent moon night. I spent the evening up at the Mapleton Observatory playing, the skies aren't too bad up there. They'd be better if everyone on the coast turned their lights out though.

At least we were out. That's 4 nights in a row now. It' a miracle.

Well if it's fine on Saturday night well teach you how to spend money on eyepieces

That's always good fun. There should be a good range of Televue plossls and naglers there for the night

#6 29-03-2006, 10:56 PM

Well I'm back form my wanderings and I will be there with the 4" and the 12". Look forward to catching up with you all.

[1ponders] (Paul) · #7 29-03-2006, 11:11 PM

G'day Dennis. Welcome back mate. How were the hols?

#8 29-03-2006, 11:17 PM

Hi Paul,
Well, after caravanning 4500 Klms in 3.5 weeks taking in Grafton, Port stephens, Canberra, Melbourne, Albury, Sydney and Grafton again, spending more than I care to mention and certainly more than I earn, I have come home for a holiday. I think a nice peaceful night at Ron's is in order. Tell you more about it there, see ya.

#9 30-03-2006, 04:21 PM

OOOps, sorry but I wont be there, I double booked myself (again) I already promised a friend I would pit crew for him at the race track on Saturday, wont be home till late. Bugger. However tonight looks promising so I am going to set up in the driveway for a late nighter tonight instead.

Gargoyle_Steve (Steve) · #10 01-04-2006, 12:27 AM

Ok guys gals and others - what's the deadline for deciding if it's a go or a no show? Obviously if it's raining cats and dogs I can (probably) work it out for myself, but if it's sorta-kinda-maybe when is decision time?

[1ponders] (Paul) · #11 01-04-2006, 08:06 AM

Cambroon can brew funny weather compared to the rest of the coast Steve. It can be cloudy on the coast but clear out there. It's handy having a small mountain range between yourself and the coast.

If in doubt give Ron a ring.

I might be a bit late this arvo, but as long as it's fine I'll be there.

Gargoyle_Steve (Steve) · #12 02-04-2006, 02:22 PM

Well first light for me last night was a fantastic event - was so great to examine even that thin wedge of moon in such detail before she set, and then followed immediately by my first real view of saturn ever! I doubt I will ever forget just how beautiful and graceful she looked moving across space that way!

SO many great sights, so many great peole helping us find them in the heavens ... thanks to all: Paul, Ron, Terry, John, Wes & his great family, William, etc ... wonderful to meet other newbies too like Alan & (Mrs Alan) - sorry!

I didn't have a logbook to keep records but I KNOW I saw all of the following:
Moon, Saturn, Jupiter + 3 moons, Mars (the standard bodies , but thrilling none the less!) Aldeberan (SO beautiful, my first truly magnificent star!!!) Betelguese, Sirius, Canopus (?), Antares, Castor & Pollux, Crux (examined each point in detail), The "Jewel Box", ("the" or "a") Globular Cluster, the Leonid Triplet(hope I got that right), Etta Corinya (will have to upgrade spell check to include all of these), the Orion nebula, in fact I spent quite some time examing much of Orion ..... I know I saw many other stunning sites I just can't remember them all.

Thanks to everyone who made us feel so welcome - look forward to seeing you all again soon!
Steve (& Don)

[1ponders] (Paul) · #13 02-04-2006, 02:46 PM

Glad you enjoyed your night Steve. It was a beautiful night if a bit wet at times (read dew), though it didn't seem to bother the optics.

Here's a few piccies to remember the night.

[1ponders] (Paul) · #14 02-04-2006, 02:50 PM

And a bit of Earthshine to go with it.

Dennis · #15 02-04-2006, 04:02 PM

Thanks Paul and the rest of Ron's gang for the excellent reports and piccies - it was great reading about your exploits and seeing the photo's to add that extra dimension.

Cheers

Dennis

Striker (Tony) · #16 02-04-2006, 05:14 PM

Bit jealous it was a good night....would of liked to have been there.

I had a bit of a personal problem at home even though I had the car packed ready to go.

There is always next time.

Moonshine · #17 02-04-2006, 07:57 PM

I am soo sorry I missed it - again!!! I will never learn stuff from you all at this rate. One of the problems with being a medico is that sometimes people will not get sick on week days. Oh well...like Striker, I guess there is always next time

Don

astroron (Ron) · #18 02-04-2006, 11:39 PM

The night was a great sucess with a total of 16 astronomers attending,( yes I include Wes's wife children as they observed along with the rest of us and are very keen)
Except for the dew the observing was very enjoyable, with Bill(ARGO NAVIS) and his 25" and me with my 16" finding and comparing views of deep sky objects, I made a point of looking for and finding the local group galaxy PGC29194 (aka ATLIA DWARF ) the irregular galaxy only discovered in the last ten years, this galaxy is in the same FOV in the 13mm as the 12.5 mag spiral galaxy IC2537, it is very faint with a given magnitude of 14.56.
The 13mm nagler view at 140 mag showes a fine specle of 14mag plus stars merging into the background very little desernable shape but clearly visible, Bill was able to confirm the observation with the 25", the galaxy was clearly seen as like a faint open cluster, I think the eyepiece used was a 22mm?.
I will be sending a more comprehensive report to David Frew of AS&T mag from which I got the idea to find this galaxy.
Paul and a few of the others left before midnight, leaving Bill, Steve and Don, Chris and Dad Mike and Myself to continue on observing till they called it a night abut 02:30.
I eventualy retired at 0:4:00 after observing numerous galaxies for S/N.
The seeing and transparency had iproved as the tempreture went down (13deg) Venus was a brilliant beacon in the east as I put the cover on the scope and trundled of to bed
Thanks Paul for the photo's

Zubenel (Wes) · #19 10-04-2006, 09:52 PM

Hi All ,
Just read the rap up from our last session at Ron's. 16 observers might be stretching it a bit Ron although My youngest, levi ( 2 years old) did look at the Moon so I suppose you squeek it in!! Whilst peering into the eye piece a got a Big WOW and then a WOE DUDE out of him. ( Very cute).I was very interested ( Read Jealous)in your report on the Antila Dwarf Ron.May be during our sessions we can report on some very /rarely / almost never observed DSO's.
The night was special for me as my two eldest , Susanna and Joel pulled up early which freed me up for my third ,ABI 6 years , who missed out the week before. She now knows the difference between an edge on and a face on spiral and degrees in between. We compared the Leo Triplet to the pc JPG!. The Jewel Box was her favourite.
While Terry was having a look at Jupiter ,sitting low in the observing chair Abi came back form the Loo and unashamedly says "OK Dad , What's Next to Look At" . I hope I didn't turf Terry out too quick!!
A great night was had buy all!! Cheers from Zubenel