Posts Made By: K. Michael Malolepszy

Wow! It's surpisingly good for an unguided image.. thanks for sharing... KMM

Wednesday's Mercury Transit event at the St. Louis Science
Centers's planetarium could not have gone much better. The
weather gods smiled up on us and the day turned out to
be perfect following a couple of days of very cloudy
weather. It was sunny the entire time with almost no
clouds in the sky worth mentioning and temperatures in
the 70s. A perfect day for observing a solar rarity!
The only way it could have been better is if it had
occurred on a weekend… we had at least 9 scopes setup by
our members, with plenty of time to observe since we had a light crowd.

Something that is more meaningful than those star naming scams,
perhaps, is to find a person's "birthstar": a star that is as far
away from the earth and sun in light years as your person of
interest's age in years.

For example, the nearest star (after the sun) is about 4
1/2 light years away, meaning that it's light is
taking that long to get here. So, if you have a 4 1/2
year old child, you can look at that particular star
system - Alpha Centauri in this example - and know
that the light from that star you are seeing now left
that star at the same time that child was born. See

http://outreach.jach.hawaii.edu/birthstars/

Vixen LVW (not to be confused with the lanthanum LV eyepieces) are very, very good eyepieces. Televue Panopics aren't much better and more expensive. I know since I have a wide range of eyepieces - LVWs, Pentax XLs, UO Konigs, Takahashi LEs, Televue Panoptics & Naglers included. In fact, I like my LVW 13mm much more than my Nagler T4 12mm - the LVW has almost none of the backout issues that my 12 Nagler gives me. For me, the LVWs are the most comfortable eyepieces I have ever used.

If you get LVWs, I don't think you'll be dissappointed. The only minus they have is they are, like many 2" eyepieces, somewhat heavy - especially the shorter focal length ones. That may be an issue for a small refractor on some types of mounts.

K. Micheal M.

Too bad more of you weren’t able to see more than a handfull –
it was quite a meteoric night. I saw hundreds of Geminid meteors
from Villa Ridge, Missouri (mag 5.7-6.0 skies high above the local horizon,
with much sky glow from local light within 35-40 degrees
of the horizon)between 10:30 pm and 2:30 am December 13/14, 2006.
All of my fellow club members that did not observe it from a dark
site reported seeing only a handful.

Even before we arrived at this location we saw 5 out the car
window while driving. When we arrived and set up our chairs
it was clear that a great night for meteors was in store -
the sky was clear, temperatures were cool but not cold and we had
barely gotten set up and we began to see meteors - and a lot of them.
At times there were several per minute - it seemed like rates were
3-6 per minute or even more at times for quite extended periods.
They dropped off quite a bit around 2:00 am or so, but before that
the rates were as high as I've ever seen for any meteor shower.
Being slower moving than the Leonids, the Geminids always seem
more impressive to me than the Leonids - moving noticeably slower
than your typical Leonid, they give the eye a longer look and more
time if you catch one if it’s first noticed out of the corner of
your eye.

All together we saw at least 250 - so many that it was hard to keep
track and after awhile we just gawked while we looked up. Quite cool...

Myself and another member of SLAS easily observed comet
C/2006 P1 McNaught from heavily light polluted urban skies
in St. Louis Tuesday night. Monday night my observing friend
Randy had already done so from the top level of a 5-story
parking garage in Clayton, MO (St. Louis County). I arrived
there a little after 5 pm Tuesday evening with a pair of
10X50 binoculars and a 76mm refractor. Shorty after I
arrived Randy showed up and we were set up by 5:15,
but the sky was still too bright to make it out
(sunset was at 16:57, Civil Twilight ended at 17:26,
Nautical Twilight at 17:59).

At about 5:27 pm I spotted it quite easily in the
binoculars. It was quite bright, not very large but
appearing very much like what one wants in a good
comet showing a distinct, unmistakable tail. Through
the binculars it looked very much like the images
posted on Spaceweather.com at

http://www.spaceweather.com/comets/mcnaught/09jan07/Loznak1.jpg

http://www.spaceweather.com/comets/mcnaught/09jan07/Cook2.jpg

I alternated between the refractor at about 20X, 30X
and 70X and found the binocular view to be the most
pleasing. The tail extended towards the NE and was
easily seen through a thin cloud deck - more so than I
would have expected. The tail must be brighter than
most recent comets that I've observed to be so easily
seen through the thin clouds in the west. I had a
harder time than Randy spotting it with the naked eye,
but once it was dark enough that could be done - if
you knew weher to look. It was not at all obvious tot
he unaided eye. We were able to see if for about 20
minutes before it got too low to observe at around
5:47pm.

I tried to spot it this morning but had no luck - it
may be too low to see in anything less than perfect
conditions in the mornings.

K. Michael Malolepszy

There's a thread about it at

http://www.cloudynights.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/1429067/Main/1427549

K. Michael M.

One thing to consider is after the sale support. Uncle Al will service/repair just about anything made by Televue from my limited experience. I've heard that Meade won't - but I have no personal experience with that.

BTW, I have the 17 Nagler T4 and it is a pure joy to use - everytime I look through it, I sigh just a little bit, whether it's in my 20" dob or my 3" (TV) refractor. I have owned a huge number of premium eyepieces and the 17 nagler is one of my all time favorites - the view is so transparent, wide and encompassing that I almost feel like I'm going to fall through it.

I have not used any of the Meade 5000 UWA eyepieces, though...and I am curious about them.

KMM

Darren Drake said:


I have a good budy who is trying to make a decision towards these two eyepieces. I have been trying to get him to go with Uncle Al but the price of the Meade is quite tempting for him. Are there any direct comparisons or reviews of the Meade out there? Thanks.

I once bought a used Tuthill 80mm finder and the owner thought it was a non-mirror reversed image, but he was mistaken (how one could miss that escapes me). Luckily, I did find an amici prism diagonal that converted the Tuthill into a RACI (Right Angle Correct Image) finder.

Even though amici prisms degrade the image, I think it's a small, small price to pay for getting an natural, map-compatible image that makes sense to me at 3 in the morning. I love my RACI finders - I too have absolutely NO interest in doing the mental gymnastics to un-reverse a finder image...

Now I *always* ask that question just to clear up any such doubts. As far as what the phrase "upright image" means, I've long assumed that doesn't necessarily mean upright AND non-mirror reversed. Probably a thought that occurred to me only after the above incident.

K. Michael M.

Wow!

Everyone who finds this interesting should check out the New Horizons Jupiter gallery at

http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/gallery/missionPhotos.html

Jupiter Flyby News Conference Graphics and Presenters images at

http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/news_center/news/050107_pressGraphics.htm


Another FYI - the St. Louis Astronomical Society's speaker this Friday (May 18, 2007) will be outer solar system specialist Dr. William McKinnon talking about New Horizon results at Jupiter:

"New Horizons at Jupiter and Its Satellites", an illustrated lecture by Dr. William McKinnon, will be featured at the May meeting of the Saint Louis Astronomical Society. The meeting will begin at 7:30 pm Friday, May 18, in McDonnell Hall, Room 162, on the Washington University campus, Saint Louis, MO 63130. McDonnell Hall is accessible from Forsyth Boulevard via Tolman Way. The presentation, cosponsored by NASA's Missouri Space Grant Consortium, is open to the public free of charge.

The Pluto-bound New Horizons spacecraft encountered Jupiter on February 28, 2007. The primary reason for the fly-by was to get a gravitational boost from the giant planet that will save literally tons of fuel. As Dr. McKinnon will explain, this was also an opportunity to use the spacecraft�s instruments to obtain new views of Jupiter and some of its satellites. The result: not only the newest, but the most detailed views of the huge jet streams and storms of the gas giant and also of the craters, volcanic eruptions, and other surface features of its large satellites. In addition to a guided tour of these spectacular pictures, Dr. McKinnon will present a preview of the New Horizons mission to the distant ice world Pluto and its three known satellites.

William McKinnon is a Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences and a Fellow of the McDonnell Center For the Space Sciences at Washington University. He is also a member of the Science Team for NASA�s New Horizons mission. His research interests include impact cratering processes and the study of the distant ice worlds of our solar system. These are the satellites of the giant planets, as well as Pluto and the other small worlds that orbit the Sun at distances of billions of miles.