TAG Gemini
General / Maintenance / Optics / Techniques
Rainy weekend, perfect for maintenance
I had a bunch of maintenance piling up in the obvservatory, so I decided to do some of it since it’s raining all weekend. I spent a little time getting the mount […]
General / Maintenance / Techniques
Gemini Model Parameters
Well, I think I finally nailed the polar alignment. A: 1 E: -1 Here are the rest of the modeling parameters: dH 26′ dD -2′ NE 33′ (Axis non-perpendicularity at the equator) […]
Deep Sky / Gear / General / Long Exposure Photography / Observing Reports
NGC2244, The Rosette Nebula in Monoceros
With the newly-tuned mount, I decided to try Pumpkin on some more unguided imaging. After the “baseline” from the previous night, I now wanted to see what this MFWB could really do. […]
Deep Sky / Gear / General / Long Exposure Photography / Maintenance / Observing Reports
Pumpkin by her lonesome
I mounted up Pumpkin by herself tonight. The mount’s been having a problem with guiding, very rough behavior in RA. I’m going to be tuning the mount up tomorrow, but the sky […]
ATM / Electronics / Focuser / Gear / General / Maintenance / Observing Reports / Optics / Techniques / Technology
Murphy was an optimist.
Clear Sky Clock said it would be cloudy all night, so of course it stayed 90% clear until about midnight, when it socked in. But I’m getting ahead of myself… I decided […]
The way forward – mount tuning
Given my strange “bell-curve” style tracking errors that I was getting last spring/summer, I am unconvinced that my mount is the source of the problem. I need to find and kill the […]
Astro knowledge / General / Maintenance / Optics / Technology
G-11 – Guiding Oscillation
I stacked the 16 frames shot last night into a single GIF animation. There is a very strange “retrograde motion” thing going on during the course of an evening. I don’t know […]
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
Veronica not showing her full potential — NGC 6888
I’m having a tracking problem with the mount. This is all eerily familiar. Things run fine for a couple of hours and then the wheels fall off. This results in only being […]
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
Working my way through a "zoomed" set of the images from last month — Sh2-101
Saturday was cloudy, but Sunday night was clear, so I set up the scopes for another night of photography. I decided to shoot Sh2-101, The Tulip Nebula. I am still working on […]
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
Familiar landscape — NGC 6888 and Sadr
I was running out of ideas of things to shoot; I’m getting pretty worn out from several nights in a row of being up late shooting, and I’m starting to make bad […]
RECENT UPDATE
Polar Alignment Calculations
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 […]
Gear / Observatory / Telescope
Special Guest Star takes the mount at Hilltop O
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 […]
General / Maintenance / Observatory
Dome shutter is motorized again!
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 […]
Trixie 2017 – tube mods
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 […]
MOST COMMENTED
Observatory
Observatory 2.0 – Time has come today!
General / Maintenance
First Light, a deeper look
Mount / Observatory / Telescope
Observatory 2.0 – Result!
Observatory
Observatory 2.0 – The Pier goes in
Gear / General / Maintenance
Martin Farmer Wormblock installation notes
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
NGC2244, The Rosette Nebula
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
Another beautiful night.