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[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

Rapture Moon Plus 24 hours

22 may 2011

For the second evening in a row, the skies were clear after midnight and I though I would do some more front step imaging of the moon - but this time with the C5, rather than the 90mm Refractor...

Temps were clean and cool and the end times fell flat - and urban astronomy goes on.

The Moon was still rather low, over my neighbors roof line, but had cleared a clean patch of sky...

Hanging around Mare Nectaris again, the chain of craters have a more steeper shadow relief a day later.

Zooming into "Thophilus" we catch the central multi-peaks and Madler at 7 O'clock.

I had the 90mm Refractor handy from last night and I thought I would test a 1.25" focal reducer I have, but never really experimented with. (I tried working with the C5, but the central obstruction was too apparent. ) So together with a 25mm Plossel we compared the FOV without...

and with.....

The increase in the FOV is readily apparent, but with the Moon being so bright, the exposure time was not dramatic. We need to try this on other targets.

We revisit Mare Nectaris again with the 90mm and the focal reducer...

And scout around....

Although the C5 is 5 inches and the 90mm is only 3.54 inches, I seem to like the refractor slightly better...at least for lunar observing. What we need is a shoot out with DSO's and see how they compare.

And so, day one after the 2011 rapture.... was a good one.

Now....for 2012...

[patrickm]

Been enjoying your Moon shots! Took dog for walk at 1030 and only a small open patch to ESE with thin, high haze. Must have cleared later, but I was too tired to see it. If only I'd had something like a Dob!!!

On 1/1/2013, as on every New Year's Day, I look forward to our traditional day of pajamas all day, Hoppin' John, board games, and old movies on AMC with check-ins on college football.

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

As cool as the C11 is, the smaller aperture scopes get used quite often.

I'm thinking about installing a dovetail to my old 4.5" reflector and mount it on the GEM.

Versatility.

[atomant]

Hey Joe,

That focal reducer will make your 90mm fract a nice wide field scope.

Your Canon point&shoot camera is a keeper for solar system stuff because of built-in zoom lens and no mirror to slop and cause vibrations.
A DSLR will give decent DSO pics due to sensor but you will have to barlow like crazy to get close up shots of moon and planets, ugghhh..

The 90mm refractor is a nice complement to C11 beast.
The 5in SCT only has theoretical visual contrast of a 3.5in.
Can't wait for a shootout with your 4.5 newt. You should be pleasantly surprised!

[Paulie pchris00]

I went out to the observatory the Friday night (well, technically Saturday morning) before rapture, and caught the Moon rising just before I arrived. I didn't drive all the way out there for lunar observing, but by the time I had the roof open, a thick haze was developing. It left me with not much else to see, so I spent some time exploring Luna with the 16" scope. Man, oh man. On a better night, all that aperture spent roaming the lunar surface would have been a waste, but not with so poor transparency. Actually, I don't mind using all that power for big ol' Luna, because when it's quiet on the observing deck, I can get lost in the eyepiece. It almost feels like being in lunar orbit, I feel that close. It's hard to call that feeling a waste of aperture, even though many astronomers would...

[patrickm]

Why? Detail is detail! With that scope and a 23mm eyepiece, you're seeing detail greater than 7/10 of a mile! That is intense. Much better than that and you start seeing golf balls...I could happily get lost there.

Who cares what the cool kids think?

No luck with Saturn?

[Paulie pchris00]

I actually joked on Facebook that I found Alan Shepard's golf ball that "went for miles and miles and miles," as he put it. I think put a 2x Barlow on a 26mm eyepiece, well past the practical limit of resolution, and I was still floored. I forget what crater I was looking at, but what would look like just a crater rim in my Dob showed many terraces leading down into the crater. If nobody else is wanting to use the telescope, I will never feel too bad about using it on the Moon. One of the guys at our Girl Scout outing saw in the log book that I was out there from 12:30-4:00 and asked what I observed. When I said I spent quite a bit of time on the Moon he said, "You could have done that in your backyard."

My reply was, "Yeah, but not with a 16"." It wasn't my plan, but there wasn't much else too see, and I wasn't going to let telescope time go to waste.

I spent quite a bit of time with Saturn, too, but the difference with the big scope isn't nearly as dramatic on it as with Luna. The views I've seen of Saturn with your scope compare quite well to the 16". Not that the 16" doesn't handle it well, but it's an older telescope, and the collimation is off a little. I'll be spending as much time as I can with Saturn at the observatory, especially since I can have that telescope almost to myself once the Moon starts getting big again. Shame to see that thing go unused when the sky starts getting bright.

[Paulie pchris00]

I actually joked on Facebook that I found Alan Shepard's golf ball that "went for miles and miles and miles," as he put it. I think put a 2x Barlow on a 26mm eyepiece, well past the practical limit of resolution, and I was still floored. I forget what crater I was looking at, but what would look like just a crater rim in my Dob showed many terraces leading down into the crater. If nobody else is wanting to use the telescope, I will never feel too bad about using it on the Moon. One of the guys at our Girl Scout outing saw in the log book that I was out there from 12:30-4:00 and asked what I observed. When I said I spent quite a bit of time on the Moon he said, "You could have done that in your backyard."

My reply was, "Yeah, but not with a 16"." It wasn't my plan, but there wasn't much else too see, and I wasn't going to let telescope time go to waste.

I spent quite a bit of time with Saturn, too, but the difference with the big scope isn't nearly as dramatic on it as with Luna. The views I've seen of Saturn with your scope compare quite well to the 16". Not that the 16" doesn't handle it well, but it's an older telescope, and the collimation is off a little. I'll be spending as much time as I can with Saturn at the observatory, especially since I can have that telescope almost to myself once the Moon starts getting big again. Shame to see that thing go unused when the sky starts getting bright.

[tomlee]

Paulie and Patrick,

Good to see someone also feels that way. I am so glad now I am not by myself. It's also partially why I am not getting a telescope for the planets. Even if and when I did bought one it would not be for the reason of not to waste aperture!! There's only not enough.

[tomlee]

Joe,

What is your adapter configuration for your S3 in this case?

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

Tom,

All the S3 set-up details are here:

astronomer.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=ps3

Paulie,

"he said, "You could have done that in your backyard.".....

Utter Nonsense.

[patrickm]

May 29, 2011 3:31:15 GMT -6 Paulie pchris00 said:

When I said I spent quite a bit of time on the Moon he said, "You could have done that in your backyard."

Hahaha. What an ultramaroon!

I hope he was mostly joking!

[atomant]

Looks like I was late to the End Times party again.