The Peak Star Party

Yesterday afternoon, I spent a lovely three hour's at Shallow Grange, (the venue for this years PSP).
A committee, has been formed with the event organiser as chairman.

The camp site is excellent with everything you need to make the PSP a success. All the camping field's offer very good unobstructed views, with particularly good views towards the south, where Orion will be rising at that time of the year.

The site owners, are bending over backwards to make this event a success. The owner, although not an amateur astronomer, is very concerned about light pollution, and the effect's it has on the environment. And with this in mind, he has agreed to cover all, naked white light's. This will give us a totally dark environment.

We are also planning to have lecture's and we were shown, a very spacious shed, that we can use for this. We already have two speaker's booked, and it is hopped to find possibly a third.

The event is officially open for booking in on Friday October 21st, with a meet and greet station inside a marque, that will be kindly provided by a local scout group. It is also hopped to have hot water for drinks.

The committee all agreed that we need to be there on site from Wednesday 19th, to get everything ready.

There will be facilities provided, for a small fee (50p) for charging of batteries or mobile phone's and laptops during the week-end.

If people wish, they can stay on after October 24th.

I have agreed to give, new comers to astronomy, tour's of the night sky, and a tour, during day time of the telescope's. I am also planning a co-ordinated meteor watch on Saturday 22nd for the peak of the Orionid meteor shower.

Everything is looking, positive. All that we need now is you're support. 

Please take a look at our web site.

http://www.peakstarparty.co.uk/ 

And please sign UP.

If we can get a full compliment of 40+ the owner has agreed to close the site!

Supernova in Galaxie NGC2655

I have another report for you all , by my guest observer/imager Paul Cannon.

Paul was lucky enough, to image SN 2011B after being alerted by myself, after I received an alert from the BAA.

I how ever have not been so lucky, with work and fighting continue cloud coverage.

NGC 2655 Supernova

 

The images show a Supernova taking place in Galaxy NGC 2655 as it was on the 3rd of February 2011. The first picture is a wide field  image of 300s and the second a composite of

3 x 300s stacked images cropped to emphasise the action. Both were taken taken with a Canon1000D through a Celestron 8" SCT.

The Supernova was first discovered on 7th January 2011 by Koichi Itagaki and  Masaki Tsuboi

Macclesfield Astronomical Society; Observation of Occultation of mag 4.8 Zeta Arietis

Five members from the observing group, of Macclesfield Astronomical Society, were able to witness the disappearance of the 4.8 magnitude star Zeta Arietis by the dark limb of the Moon on Friday 14th January 2011.

It was touch and go whether or not we would actually see the event. The skies were, by 22:30 becoming very milky, making Zeta Arietis difficult to see visually.

I timed the disappearance at 23:06, whilst observing through my 10" Orion Optics Dobsonian with a 24-8mm Vixen LV zoom (16mm) X75.

The location was Kerridge Cricket club, Kerridge, Bollington, Cheshire. The NLM  here is normally +5.6 but tonight, we were struggling to see +3 because of the approaching cloud but also the wide gibbous Moon. The seeing was variable ANT IV.

The observers were.

Chairman: Andrew Greenwood WO Zenith star 66 "OG"
Paul A Brierley 10" OD250 f4.8
Paul Canon 4" Celestron "OG"
John Tipping Home built 6" Newtonian
Richard Lowe 8" Meade LX200.

We all confirmed the disappearance at 23:06. And we were all greatly relieved when the star finally disappeared . The Moon was, by 23:04 beginning to make some of the observers eye's water, because of the intense concentration needed, to see the slowly fading star. We had all been watching from 22:50.


Occultation observing and timing is one of the few aspects of Amateur Astronomy that doesn't require any high tech equipment or knowledge. All you need, especially for Lunar occultations are an accurate time piece, (in my case I have a radio controlled watch) and a telescope ( minimum aperture 2") or large tripod mounted binoculars.


Below is a link, to  the SPA's Occultation section web site, which gives you a full listing of occultation event's concerning the Moon.

http://www.popastro.com/sections/occ/lunarocc.php

Perseus Galaxy cluster

It was  very clear, but also very cold here in East Cheshire on Monday night. I don't know what's up with our weather, I think somebody had better tell the big man, it's still only Autumn.

It was -5 with Snow on the ground!!

Last night, I decided I would concentrate on imaging galaxies in Perseus, so I decided, I would spend a couple of warm hour's (I can image from the comfort of my conservatory now) imaging NGC1275 or Perseus A, together with it's accompanying galaxy cluster.

I feel very humbled when I look at this image, as it shows you I think, just how vast and complex our Universe is. NGC1275 is a staggering 300mly from Earth. It is a radio galaxy and has a radio source at it's core, this is known as 3c84.

This image is a 1hr 44min exposure (cloud's buggered any remaining  exposures) composed from the usual 4min30second subs. Taken through the SPX 200-800 f4 with my Atik16ic. And guided by the QHY5 and PHD. The seeing was very bad Ant 4.

Perseus A is the galaxy just left of centre. You can, if you look closely, see that I was just starting to bring out the filaments that surround this fascinating object. These I think are caused by the galaxy's black hole at it's nucleus.

Here is another image only this time showing the catalogue number for each galaxy.

My other offering, is from Friday night. Again I decided to image galaxies and this time selected NGC1023. This is a beautiful galaxy that is over looked. I suspect the reason is NGC891 and the Andromeda spiral.

A double cluster for the early Winter evenings

I am now beginning to get active again, with imaging DSO's. I've not done any of this for a while, because I was starting to find imaging, stressful.

I was spending more time trying to figure out why my guiding was all to cock, than actually doing any imaging.

I am now feeling better  thanks to an easy fix.

I am now using my old and very small and light weight, 60mm finder scope which I've had for 16 years. The finder allows my guide camera to see considerably more stars because of the very short focal length (200mm) and a very wide field, than my WO ZS66SD could ever do, and this makes for better guiding with less stress, and more fun.

I wish I had done this sooner. Maybe I could have done something with my Vixen GP-DX, who knows.

Yesterday evening and quite by chance, the skies here in Macclesfield cleared suddenly, and I was able to take advantage of this break to try my Nikon D40 dslr.

The subject, because at 8pm it is very high and on the meridian, was NGC 884 and NGC 869. Both of these open cluster's fit nicely on the CCD imaging sensor of the D40, which makes a huge difference over my Atik 16ic.

I was imaging through my fast SPX 200-800 F4 "AG" deluxe, using a Baader MPCC with out a CLS pollution filter. The exposure times were all 0.30 seconds totalling 6 mins. Guiding was done using PHD and my Losmandy G11.

The darks and the subs where then stacked in Deep Sky Stacker with any additional processing done in CS2.

Make mine a Pyms part 2

My self a two other observers decided, yesterday, because the forecast was looking particularly good, we would head UP in to the hills for and hour or two observing.

We arrived shortly after 8pm to find the car park occupied with a mobile camper van, the owner asked politely what we were doing, and we explained that we were hoping to do some gazing and imaging assuming the skies cleared.

The skies were forecast to clear from 9pm, and it was looking hopeful after 21:30 when, large openings appeared all around the sky.

I suspected that the sky would be very transparent because of the amount of rain fall, during the past week. I wasn't disappointed. In the East where the sky was clear, the NELM was a good m+5.6 with the double cluster and messier 31 easy with the unaided eye.

I was able to take some fixed tripod, digital camera image's, using my Nikon D40. The image here shows the area surrounding Perseus and Cassiopeia.

This was really a test to see if my Nikon is suitable for imaging the night skies, and also to prove to myself that I don't need the expense of a Canon 1000D.

Looking at this image, I think my camera shows promise.It is a wide field taken with my 18-55 Nikon AF lens set to 18mm and fully open, f3.5 with an iso of 800 and 1600.

Later, when the camera battery died (I've since bought two new ones) I decided to use the 10" and Mk1 eyeball.

The skies at 22:30 where not fantastic, and I was only able to make one observation.

Using my 24mm Pany with a Baader UHC-S filter, I was fortunate to see the famous Crab Nebula or M1.

Through the eyepiece M1 appeared as a bright, but flattened patch of grey light, in a rich star field.  It has been said that M1 can been seen through 7x50 and 10x50 binoculars, and I have both, but I have never seen it.

The skies were getting worse towards midnight, so we decided to call it a night. It was a shame the weather couldn't have been more cooperative, but at least we did see something. And I was able to use my camera which was a bonus I suppose.

I just wish we could have a break from this persistent trough of low pressure. A cold front would be very welcome.

I'd like to thank Paul C and Ray S for there company last night. Better luck next time lads...

An Evening with the Milky Way

Here is another posting by, guest astronomer, Paul Cannon.

The evening of 10th of October was clear and I decided to venture up to Fernilee reservoir for an imaging session. My main target was Comet Hartley again, but it was so clear and the Milky Way was visible from horizon to horizon so, I decided to image it with the DSlR on a driven equatorial mount. These were 120 second images and no CLS filter was used or darks and flats taken, maybe next time. This means there is a degree of noise in these images, but I thought they were'nt bad for a site no more than ten miles from Stockport and Macclesfield. Comet Hartley as a fuzzy green spot can be located below the double cluster in Perseus. There are many deep sky delights within these images the longer you look  the more you see, take you time to browse.

 

Thank you Paul.