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[RobbW]

Think I'm going to head out for some viewing with my scope across the lake. Joe, you wouldn't happen to be heading out tonight, would you?

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

Robb...

No....not tonight...not really.

A fellow member just got a 4" Vixen scope and we are gonna try it out on top the of Whole Foods parking lot....1550 North Kingsbury Street.

Then, when I get back, there is some maintenance on the C11 that I must undertake.

I'm hoping for a observation session this weekend sometime.

Keep an eye out....and the other at the eyepiece.

[RobbW]

Re-reading my post, it makes it sound like I was headed to Lake Michigan. Sorry, I meant the "lake" across the street from my house. Actually, it's more like a very large pond than a lake. Anyway, it was a beautiful and clear night tonight. I got a late start to my observing session due to the Hawks game. WOOHOO CHICAGO!!! So, I decided to head out with my binos rather than humping my scope across the terrain.

I set up a small folding chair and just sat there for about 20 minutes letting my eyes adjust. It was nice to sit there and soak in the night sky. There was no moon and the sky was exceptionally clear tonight. With such little clouds and haze, even the LP off to the east from Joe's neck of the woods wasn't too bad. I spent most of my two hours hunting for M51 and M101. I had great luck star-hopping and finding exactly where they SHOULD be, but either my puny binos or the LP was preventing me from actually observing my targets. My binos are only 10x50mm Bushnells. So, not the highest-quality or most powerful binos. Oh well, at least I gave it a shot and had a great time doing so. It was my first real try at hunting deep sky objects and using my sky atlas to star hop to the correct locations.

If the weather and sky conditions are good for Saturday night's new moon, I'm going to take my scope out and see if I can finally see my first non-Milky Way galaxy with that.

[Paulie pchris00]

That was the last time I remember seeing a clear sky, but there was no way I was going to miss the hockey game.

[RobbW]

Clear Sky Clock says tomorrow night should be exceptionally clear! I know what I'll be doing, do you?!?! No hockey game excuses this time!

[RobbW]

Okay, checked the Clear Sky Clock again this morning for my area (U46 Planetarium) and it's not looking quite as dark blue for tonight as it was forecasting yesterday. However, I'm kind of confused about Thursday night's forecast at the above link. It is showing black for Cloud Cover, Transparency, Seeing, and Darkness. That can't be right! I'm assuming that means they just haven't posted their forecast for Thursday night yet or there is no data, right?

Let me tell you, though, if that forecast were accurate, I think I'd need a new pair of underpants right about now!

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

Robb,

Black boxes usually mean it's too bright out - daytime.

CSC is not too accurate.

There have been times where it was solid white, and yet we still had clear skies here.

I'm hoping for clear deep skies this evening/early morning for some comet chasing.

[RobbW]

CSC has updated its charts. Thursday night's forecast is on there now. Tonight is looking much better now than it was earlier this morning! I just need to decide if I want to take out a scope tonight (would use my mom's which is much heavier and awkward) or just do some more binocular hunting like I did last night. I will probably only get a couple of hours tonight. So, it would be a lot of effort for not much time with the scope. However, I'm afraid of having the same issue tonight that I did last night with the binos. The lenses kept fogging up on me, which makes DSO hunting much more challenging! I may just take out the binos and leave the scope until a weekend night when I could schedule a lot more time.

I just need advice on how to prevent the binos from fogging up. It's not from taking them from A/C inside to the warm, humid outside. We don't have our A/C on and all our windows are open. Also, the binos didn't fog up right away when I took them outside. It was about an hour after I went outside that they suddenly started fogging up. What gives?

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

The dew menace has cut short many an observation session.

It's when the glass gives up it's heat to cold space, and like a glass of beer on a warm day...starts to accumulate water vapor. Takes a little time, but it's certain to happen.

You need to make some "extensions" for the binos. Styrofoam cups work great, look goofy, but who cares. It won't stop the dewing completely but slow down the effect.

I'm am making a large dew shield for my C11 and have already constructed one for the smaller C5:

astronomer.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=ATM&action=display&thread=2732

I am also going to use a "rear window defogger" heating element that I have in a box in the garage for years - to combat the dreaded dew.

[Paulie pchris00]

We've got some clouds at the moment, but they should be breaking up soon. I'm sitting at a coffee shop in Valpo hoping to do a little public astro a few blocks down. I'm only going to have two hours tops before work, so I really hope these clouds don't take their time dispersing.

[RobbW]

Hey paulie, the CSC for my area, at least, shows it should be nice and clear by 9pm.