Posts Made By: Paul Maxson

Art,

That sounds very similar to how my 9.25" works too. When seeing is steady, the images are really awesome!! The 9.25's seem to have very good optics. I got a set of Bob's Knobs and it makes collimination even easier and it seems to stay even more solid.

Enjoy!!
Paul Maxson

I haven't had the scope out in a while, I've been quite busy getting retired and everything that goes with it. Seeing has been miserable as well. However, I decided to give some imaging a try and came up with the following three images. The first is Mons Rumker on the moon, it kind of stood out last night begging to be shot.

http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/Moon/Moon0629-rumker.jpg

Next is Uranus. It's been almost a year since I took my first image of Uranus with the C8, and this is with the C925. Sure is a tiny little thang at prime focus. I tried to take an image at F/25, but I had to crank everything all the way up to get an image and it was totally washed out. As soon as I find the funds for a 50cm scope, I'd be trying again....LOL!!

http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/OuterPlanets/Uranus0630.jpg

Lastly is an image of Venus, my first since it moved into the morning sky. The sun was fully up, but behind a house when I took this. I was debating on waiting another couple of hours for Venus to get higher in the sky, but even at that, this isn't too bad. It was shot with a UV filter.

http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/Venus/Venus0630txt.jpg

It felt good to be behind the scope again!!

Paul Maxson
Check out the Imaging processing Exercise
http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/index.htm

This is a little OT, but I thought I'd bring news about the wild fire that is threatening the 8.3M bino telescope on Mt Graham here in Az. The fire is about 1/4 mile from the observatory, the fire crews built a back fire to try and stop it. At last report the main fire has reached where the back fire was burning and with luck, the black area and road will stop the file from engulfing the buildings which contain the 8.3m bino scope and the 1.8m Vatican scope. The images from the news choppers is amazing and very scary!!

Here is a link to what is going on, I'm not sure when they change the page. Let's hope for the best!!

http://www.azfamily.com

Paul Maxson
http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/index.htm

A ffew days ago I decided I needed another telescope...what else is new . I wanted a scope for solar imaging specifically and large scale lunar. I decided to order an Orion ED80.

The Orion ED80 arrived safe and sound about noon today. According to the instructions, it takes about 1/2 hr to put the the scope together, so and hour and half later I had it done!!! Not bad for me...LOL!! Naturally, as soon as I finished the sun went behind a cloud. I took it outside and tried it out anyway. The images with my Radian 17mm eyepiece were very nice!! I needed to tweak the scope some more, set the latitude and such. I was disappointed that the drive runs off batteries only, especially since I didn't have any on hand. I decided to give imaging a try anyway and hand guide. So about 2:30pm local time I took it and the toucam out and set it up. I had to remove the 2" diagonal and insert a 1" extension tube to get the sun to focus. I shot a couple of 30 second images using the manual slow motion to guide. Surprisingly, it was fairly easy to do. I just need to find a better way to cut the glare on the computer screen and I'll be better. Anyway, here is the first light with the ED80 on the sun. I used a Baader solar filter and the toucam to get the image, stacked from a 30 second exposure. This is group 652, it's not as good as the image at Spaceweather, but all things considered, I'm quite happy. Now to get some batteries to make the job easier. The seeing was not good, it was very windy and broken clouds.

http://tinyurl.com/558a4

Clear skies!!
Paul Maxson
http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/index.htm

I'm getting more familar with the ED80, I got batteries so the clock drive works now...what a difference!! Here is an image I took this morning (8:28am local time, 1528UT) of spot group 652-653. I shot it in the strangest of conditions...right off my cement patio (the yard had just finished being watered and I didn't want to tromp in the wet grass). Surprisingly the image isn't terrible. I found out that my baader solar filter has some very bad spots and isn't producing as good of images as it should. I have a new one on order.

This was shot with a Toucam, Baader homemade filter and the Orion ED80. I had K3CCD judge the quality of the images and I selected the best as a reference and processed the avi in Registax 2.1. This is a stack of 598 images, processed with wavelets and in Paint Shop Pro 8.1, then converted to greyscale.

http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/Solar/Sun0719-4-652.jpg

Thanks!!
Paul Maxson
http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/

Here is my attempt at AR 652. Shot with the ED80. Seeing was fairly decent this morning, even if the afternoon temp is going to 113 degrees (F)!! I just got confirmation that my new Baader filter has been shipped, so maybe in a couple of days I will have that to play with.

http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/Solar/Sun0721-652-9.jpg

Paul Maxson
http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/

Here is an image I made of the large sunspot group AR 652. It is almost dead centre on the solar disk now. An hour after imaging, the clouds rolled in. That's what I love about the ED80...I can set it up, image and be done in 1/2 hr!! This was shot at about 1533UT with a Toucam 740, 5fp, baader filter and #8 wrattan at prime focus.

http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/Solar/Sun0722-652-4.jpg

Paul Maxson
http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/

I come in here daily and see these fabulous DSO's taken with 75-110mm objectives and am totally blown away!! I am breathless at the amount of detail you folks are capturing!! Thanks for sharing.

Paul Maxson

Seeing wasn't as good this morning as before, lots of clouds and it's getting quite humid (for Phoenix anyway). Still, I got this image this morning. A 60 sec shot with the Toucam and ED 80. This was shot at 1458UT. I used a Baader filter, #8 wrattan and 10 FPS. My new filter is due here 7/28, probably just in time to catch AR652 heading around the limb.

http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/Solar/Sun0723-652-4.jpg

Paul Maxson
http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/

I had oddly decent seeing today and got these two images of AR 652. When I first looked through the scope, the sun was not clear and the spots did not focus. I rotated the solar filter about 90 degrees and lo and behold, I had nice sharp images. Not wanting to miss an opportunity I got the images. I noticed something interesting in the image. If you look at the third largest spot, the one at about 7 oclock from the main group, you see a very bright "line". At first I thought it a processing reminant, but when I processed the image shot with the 2.5x powermate, it was still there. Perhaps a white light flare?? I have seen one many years ago when I was the ALPO Solar Section Recorder (verified by Rik Hill and his wife). What ever it is, it sure is interesting.

Shot at 1512UT (prime) and 1525UT with the Orion ED80. First at F/7.5, the second with the 2.5x powermate. Toucam 740, 60 second images, stacked 432 and 456 images respectively.

http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/Solar/Sun0726clprime-2-652.jpg

http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/Solar/Sun0726cl25x-5-652.jpg

Clear skies!!
Paul Maxson
http://glory.gc.maricopa.edu/~pmaxson/