Breaking a long astronomy hiatus
As much as I still want to call myself an amateur astronomer, it requires you to DO something astronomy-related occasionally. Like looking through my scope, perhaps.
Just as the pandemic started, we were about to host a RASC Ottawa telescope workshop where people could come and see the different scopes, how they were set up, etc. When we cancelled, many people accused us of hysteria and that the virus wasn’t a threat. I wish I had saved those emails. 🙂
Since then? Almost nada. While lots of people around the world turned to sourdough bread, many also turned to astronomy. Purchase orders went out, production waiting lines got longer and longer, and prices went up, but many tried it out. Not me. Oh, I bought two new telescopes at the Black Friday event that year, and they were good deals. I bought a refractor and a reflector, with mostly the intent to try them out, write some “step-by-step” guides on how to use them, and perhaps either donate to the cottage or sell off. I planned some writing, looked at some stuff online.
But since March 2020, the only active thing I have done is to go to one of the first Star Parties in Carp, but even then, only to wander around to talk to people. I didn’t even look through anyone’s scope, I don’t think. I was there about 30 minutes and bailed.
If you haven’t done astronomy for four years…
This past month, while on vacation, the three of us (Andrea, Jacob and myself) went to see the Astronomy exhibit that my friend Stephan put on in Gatineau this summer for Astropontiac (I also run the website for them at HTTP://www.astropontiac.ca). It was fun, we did the Planetarium thing, and took some fake pictures on Mars. Oh, I forgot…we DID go to the Planetarium in Boston last year too.
But I still hadn’t done any actual observing. The most recent star party was on my list, but it was rained out.
Then, dun dun dun…we decided to go to the cottage. Dark skies. Quiet nights. Could I take all my gear?
Well, yes, I COULD take the gear. The bigger questions were if I could actually come up with a proper tracking list to make sure I didn’t forget anything AND fit it all into the car. I had one previously, but it was lost in the bowels of my computer. So I made a new one, asked for input from fellow RASC members in Ottawa. It looks daunting, I know.
- Main Telescope Gear
- Optical Tube Assembly
- Dust cover
- Dew shield
- Scope covers, tarps
- Tripod
- Tripod spreader
- Anti-vibration pads
- Light sticks for around legs
- Mount
- Telrad
- Power pack
- Power cable
- Charging cable
- Eyepieces
- Barlow
- Focal reducer
- 1.25″/2″ adapter
- Main Accessories
- Solar filter
- Filters – Colour
- Filters – Other
- Filter wheel
- Red light
- Flashlight
- Log book
- Digital recorder
- GPS location
- Sky forecast
- Key targets
- Chair
- Table
- Foot stool
- Bug spray
- Thermacell
- Thermacell refills
- Planisphere
- Sky atlas
- Extra batteries – scope
- Extra batteries – flashlights
- Extra batteries – TelRad
- Dew control, hair dryer
- Compressed air
- Clothing and snacks
- Warm shoes
- Gloves
- Hat
- Hoodie, sweater, torso warmer
- Pants
- Socks
- Hand warmers
- Water / pop
- Chocolate
- Extra accessories
- Tool kit (small, large)
- Smartphone mount
- Bluetooth remote
- Magnifying glass
- Binoculars
- Level
- Wifi dongle
- Laser pen
- Smartphone
- Tablet
- Notebook
- Laptop
Even if I just take the required stuff in black, leaving the red stuff for public / winter / imaging outings, that’s still a bunch of gear. I confess that my current storage setup was not ideal either…some of it was in the basement, some of it was in the garage. It’s a moment, gathering everything. Pre-charging stuff. Even for basic viewing.
Some of it isn’t needed, as my smartphone will give me an atlas, GPS location, etc. on the fly. And I don’t REALLY need my log book. I didn’t take my chair or tables, either, too bulky along with actual stuff like suitcases for the trip for the other family members. 🙂
I ended up with a bag for the tube, my tripod and mount together, a small filter box, a larger eyepiece box, a bag for assorted pieces like my TelRad (terrible setup, need to revisit that), plus my solar filter in a cardboard box. Then add in 2 suitcases, a duffel bag, two backpacks, a bag of shoes and towels, boots, a cooler, two pillows, my CPAP machine…yeah, it’s another moment to load the car.
I was ready
Motivating myself for a viewing was a bit of a jump. There aren’t many planets right now in my normal viewing of 10:00 p.m. to midnight, as the cottage only has a good Western view. Things to the East are blocked by trees. If something is DUE SOUTH, it just starts peeking out behind the trees on the shoreline. So I would get the moon and Saturn after about 12:30 at night. Other than that, I’d need to go hunting.
I spent a fair amount of time before leaving to get myself properly set up. I used a few websites with a series of targets. Yes to planets, even ones that would be up later if I could stay up or come back out after an hour or two of sleep. Two potential comets although I expected to have trouble seeing them. And then a long list of globular clusters and faint galaxies. I ended up with 79 targets in all, weeding out many that would be gone below the horizon or were too close to the horizon to see in the usual soup.
I had my Clear Sky Charts bookmarked and a couple of forecasting apps on my phone. I took all my gear listed above in black. Ready, set, go!
Oh, wait. Nature didn’t cooperate. I was at the cottage Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights with nothing but rain and clouds. Monday night, it was supposed to be clear by early forecasts, but by that night, it was cold and almost totally socked in until after midnight at which time it was about 50% of the sky that was semi-clear. I could see stars at least, albeit with haze.
Tuesday night was the last chance, and while it was a bit better by 11:00, semi-clear in some areas of the sky, it was still hit or miss. And it was really cold. Not November cold, but colder than it should be in August. With nothing exciting to see, and the need to lug everything down to the shoreline, I passed. It just wasn’t good enough seeing. Even if everything was already down by the shoreline, I don’t know that I would have wasted my time setting up to view. It just wasn’t that great. And the sky charts and forecast apps seemed to have NO idea what was going on. Clear, no rain? Umm, what’s that water coming down out there then? The cool nights should have been good, but there was still too much haze.
Redemption
We were set to come back to Ottawa on Wednesday, we just hadn’t chosen an exact time yet. We ended up deciding “after lunch”, so at about 11:30 a.m., I decided to “consider” some solar observing. Really just to do SOMETHING with all the gear I brought with me. I was really frustrated there were no clear nights.
Andrea and Jacob helped me lug it all down to the shoreline and back, which was awesome. I was trying to keep my expectations low, in part because solar astronomy with my scope is not exactly straightforward. My scope works REALLY well with a TelRad to zoom in on targets to align at night; you can’t do that with solar. I have to first put the solar filter on so a) I don’t blind myself and b) I don’t set the scope on fire with all the intense light being collected. Great. Done. But it has its own little pinhole finder on it that doesn’t work great…you aim the scope somewhere near the sun, the light from the pinhole shows up on a thin membrane with a circle on it, and in theory, if it is aligned, then the pinhole is in the centre of the circle, or vica versa. I’ve used it before, so I knew it wouldn’t be that simple.
I often find that the true “alignment” is with the pinhole somewhere near the bottom of the circle. And then with my lowest power eyepiece in, and the biggest swath of sky in the field of view, I start a slow and steady grid search from that approximate location. Up, up, up, up, up, right, down, down, down, down, down, right, up, up, up, up, etc. Eventually the brightness of the sun shows up, and I can focus it SOMEWHERE near the maximum range of the scope in that direction. It takes a while to get it all set up and going, and I’ve never had it properly aligned enough to track on its own, so I have to keep manually adjusting the view.
It took me about 25 minutes or so for complete setup and to get the sun in the field of view and focused. Yay, sunspots! Success! I looked, Andrea looked, and then Jacob looked. Except he ended up bumping the scope and moving the image out of the field of view, just as others arrived to look, and then I had to spend another 7-8 minutes getting it in the pinhole spot again. It should have been way faster, but I just don’t do solar often enough to do it quickly.
Eventually, I got it back to where it was supposed to be and a bunch of other people looked too. I got out one of my more powerful EPs, 14mm instead of the 36mm, and gave it a go. Great views of the sunspots, and clear delineation of the shading in colour across the spots. My scope makes it a white colour, and it was clearly shades of grey across the spot.
I gave it a go to see if I could pull up Venus, Mercury, or Jupiter, but saw nothing. For V&M, I had to keep the solar filter on, too close to the sun, but the alignment theoretically was working. I’ve never done a solar system align before, so not really sure I was doing it right. But it said it was right. For Jupiter, I removed the solar filter but still couldn’t see it. Then again, I’ve never seen a planet during the day before, so I wasn’t surprised or disappointed. I would have been ecstatic to see it if I could, but it was really just giving it a try for fun. That would require a lot more time and patience in the future to get it dialed in. Or a different scope setup!
So…where does that leave me?
I’m declaring victory and calling it a win. I didn’t get to do any night-time stuff, but I did see a good selection of sunspots, as did Jacob and Andrea, and 5-6 other people at the cottage. Everything got repacked, brought home, and put back in the garage. As I said, I do still need to find a better setup and storage system for what I have in there for the small items, but it’s a start at least.
Jacob is also working on ideas for a potential observatory design (tied to a school project) for me.
Look out astronomy-lovers. I’m re-engaging! I didn’t bother with my smartphone so no pics, but it’s on the list.
