29.10.19 More solar & the observatory dome.

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Tuesday 33F-45F: Much colder but clear and sunny. Really struggling with poor seeing conditions today. 

I tried for several hours, with all three telescopes, to capture the disturbed area near the limb. The mottled mask is/was back! I was watching the temperature reading in SharpCap

Later in the afternoon I attempted to capture the 10 o'clock prom. [Image right] Not great but not truly awful!

I found my auto-guiding cable and downloaded PHD2. Sadly it will only lock onto stars. Not solar, nor lunar features, as far as I know.

PHD2 worked straight out of the box in finding the camera and loading the details without my searching.  It was also quite easy to understand. That may be the "Dummy" in the clever title. "Push Here Dummy!"

The chain drive to the friction wheel, dome drive is serving me well. It is much easier to adjust the dome while seated at the computer keyboard and monitor. Instead of finding my way across the dome without hitting my head on the telescopes.

This image of the dome was taken with my feet ten feet above the ground on a 14' tall stepladder. The sun was already setting behind the local trees. The reflection of the trees and clouds can be seen in the green, anti-reflection coating on the iStar 7" objective. The 6" f/8 H-alpha telescope is immediately below. While the silvery, solar foil filter is visible to the left on the 90mm Vixen f/11. I ought to make a new filter because the old one is years old. Luckily I found my stock of Baader filter material the other day.

The telescopes are peering over the base ring but the 7" just clears the inside of the dome when pointing higher. It used to brush the light bulbs, in slow motion, during some overhead slews. I found some more compact LED bulbs, moved them backwards and raised them slightly. The telescopes are considerably offset by the mounting but the dome also rotates. So one cannot be certain where a 7' long refractor will sweep at any particular time. It often pays to wait for some time before attempting a meridian flip. Otherwise they may brush too close to the bulky mounting and pier. Fortunately the mere touch of any of direction buttons on the handset will instantly stop a slew.

Click on any image for an enlargement.

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