General / Observing Reports

Sirius and Rigel, high in the south

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… were the only two stars I could see tonight. It’s been a blustery day punctuated with strong showers, and the wind has opened just a tiny seam in the cloud cover, […]

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Maintenance / Observatory

Aww, you missed me.

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I was downtown, having a fancy date with my wife, when we got a text from W_, who was watching the house for the evening. It had been quite windy all day, […]

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Techniques

Polar Alignment Calculations

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Here’s a page that derives Polar Alignment Calculations. (update 5/2020: the original site is gone, so I found the text on Wayback and am inserting it below. This is by the original […]

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Gear / Observatory / Telescope

Special Guest Star takes the mount at Hilltop O

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The Astro Jedi needed somewhere to store his light sab—- I mean, bucket, and I was only too happy to accommodate him. I have decided that I need to come to a […]

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General / Maintenance / Observatory

Dome shutter is motorized again!

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I finally decided to bite the bullet and fix the shutter motor. Things went sideways last winter, and I’ve been opening the shutter manually (and tying it shut with rope, so we […]

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ATM

Trixie 2017 – tube mods

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I finally got around to cutting the MTA-UTA tubes to length; the only eyepiece that would come to focus with the focuser spacer in place is the Televue 55mm Plossl. If I […]

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