Activity

Jim, I’ve been just using the collimation cap that came with my scope, it appears to my untrained eye that it’s pretty darn close. It would be nice to check it with a laser. Im in Red Wing , but would be willing to travel to get some training on the use of the laser. Is that something you would be interested in helping me with.

Colin

wow, just got back in town and see we lost Dean Johnson! very sad news indeed. missed the meeting but if
anyone brought up doing a StarBQ in his honor i’m in.
jim

the Orion Lasermate deluxe works well or the Howie Glatter if you want to spend the big bucks. i have both if you just need to borrow them? jim

Saturday night Aug 4th at the RAC outreach event we observed a ‘carbon star’ in Aquila. Below is the map Josef has provided on our home page along with a photo taken Sunday Aug 5th from my backyard of carbon star V Aquilae. The cropped photo aligns with the stars V Aquilae and 40 on the map and was taken with the Orion Mini 6.3 color camera and…[Read more]

Dark skies tonight 8-31 but seeing conditions only fair. Imaged Saturn and Jupiter the latter showing Io’s shadow (arrow in pic below). Camera Orion 6.3 M pixel and scope Meade 10 in. SCT

Ha ha!  Thanks Jim … go and get it!

nice pics Bob! makes me want to buy a c8 like i’ve been thinking of 😉

In the image above the SUN was taken with the Orion 4.5 in. Starblast with a sun filter and Jupiter was imaged by an ASI 183MC camera and my 10 inch Meade SCT.

It is too bad we are at the mercy of the weather! Yesterday (the 26th) the sun was out and in the early morning so was Jupiter. The sun remains active and Jupiter is starting to dominate the night skies.

The event is still a “go”. I’ll be at Mystery Cave from 3-6. (I have an indoor presentation ready if cloudy).

The evening event is on from 8-10:30 in the Forestville parking lot just before you get to the historic bridge. I’ll be over there around 7pm. Be sure to stop at the park office on the way in and say you’re a volunteer and they will give…[Read more]

See details of the Forestville Dark Sky Festival in the outreach folder on the forum. Looks like they plan on holding as many events as possible with or without clear skies. Saturday evening’s forecast for the deep sky viewing is looking better. The solar viewing forecast from 3-6 pm at the Mystery Cave site is still questionable.

sorry, thought the saturday you were referring to was this saturday the 20th!

i could do saturday if weather permits.

Eagle Bluff is available for us Friday & Saturday August 26th and 27th, per Dean who wants to get out there!

Very nice pic of the comet but it looks like that poor thing didn’t have a chance because you don’t see it exit on the other side of the sun.  If you watch closely you can see it accellerate as it approaches the sun.

A still image from today’s (Aug 6th) SOHO C3 camera showing a probable CME (red arrow) as well as a small comet (yellow arrow).  See these events in the gif animation of C3 images above as well.