New Mount Operational

After about 2 weeks of setting up, configuring software and testing, the new Astro-Physics AP 1100GTO mount is now fully operational.  There are still some options that I have not yet turned on, but all the basic functions are now working. The EdgeHD11 main scope is now back in service!

The Pier stands 54" tall.  Loading and unloading the OTA is a chore, but manageable provided I keep a close look at the step-stool I use.  I just received a better step-stool from Lowes that should make this all a bit easier. You don't want to slip and fall carrying a $3500 optical tube that weighs in at about 35lbs.

The Astro-Physics GTOCP4 (with APCC software) is mounted on the south side of the pier. It controls the mount itself and all the specialty operations that the mount is capable of performing.  It can operate standalone with either Ethernet or WiFi, so apps like SkySafari can control the scope directly.

On the north side is the Computer and Power Distribution assembly which contains the mini-computer, dew heater controller and the power distribution panel.

The MinisForum GN34 mini-PC (right side) controls all the equipment (cameras, filter wheel, guide scope camera, the mount, remote focuser, etc.) and has all the astro-software needed for astrophotography (Stellarium: planetarium software used to select and command the scope to target a specific object; SGP Pro: the image capture suite which is the main application that controls all the equipment; and a host of other apps.) It has an Intel Celeron J3455 processor, Intel HD graphics 500, 6GB LPDDR3 memory, 64GB eMMC storage, IEEE 802.11ac Dual Band WiFi, Bluetooth and Gigabit Ethernet. Features three USB3.0 ports, SD card slot and both HDMI and VGA ports. This is connected to a gigabit switch in my barn via a 100' network cable. The GN34 comes with Windows 10 Pro and so I control it via a remote desktop connection from any of my computers or mobile devices.

All the 12v power for the system (except for the AP1100 which has a dedicated 12v PS) is distributed via a West Mountain Radio RIGrunner 4008 power distribution panel from Powerwerx. Power is obtained from two Pyramid 12v power supplies, one for the mount and one for all the other equipment.  The power cables on all my devices have been modified to use Powerpole connectors which go right to the RIGRunner. No more lost power due from the cheap car cigarette lighter plugs!

The Dew heaters are controlled by a Kendrick DigiFire 7 controller.

For expansion purposes (like when I run my QHY10 Camera) there is a 7-port powered USB hub mounted to the side of the power assembly.  The MicroTouch focuser controller sides along the hub.

Both the GTOCP4 unit and the Computer and Power Distribution assembly can be easily removed and brought inside to protect them while the mount itself remains outside covered in a Telegizmos 365 Series Cover.

On April 22 the first EdgeHD image was taken with the new setup.  This is an elliptical galaxy  in the constellation Coma Berenices. Taken with the ASI1600mm Pro, this LRGB image was just over 1.9 hours of total integration time.  To the left is NGC4394, a SBb barred spiral galaxy.

I expect to be taking lots of new images of dim, distant objects now that I have a mount up to the task. All I need now are clear skies :)

More Testing of the AP-1100GTO

Taking advantage of the nice day yesterday, I continued with testing the new mount.  I need to route new cables but the cables and power distribution box aren't going to arrive until Friday (today).

During the test I decided to put the planetary camera on the GT102 APO. Now the GT102 doesn't have a long enough focal length to take good images of the planets. For that I need the EdgeHD-11 SCT, which is my big scope and the reason for getting the new mount. But what the heck - I decided to image Venus since it is currently very bright and rather large in size. Should be easy to image even with the APO.

Now since the mount has not yet been aligned precisely to the north celestial pole, gotos would be off by as much as a degree or more. And, since it was daytime finding Venus took a bit of time. But find her I did and got the following image. Not great, but not all that bad either. By the way, Venus has very little surface detail so I didn't expect to see anything but the crescent moon-like image.

Venus 4/16/2020 4:16 PM
GT102 APO with ASI120mc Camera

Tomorrow (Saturday) the cables and power distribution box will be installed. Then, weather permitting, another test with the new cabling will proceed. I'm still waiting for the PoleMaster adapter to arrive which is needed to fully align the mount. Not sure why it's taking so long to get here. Need to check my vendor.

New Mount setup progressing

On April 2, 2020 I finally decided to 'pull the trigger' and acquire a new, observatory grade mount to replace my ailing CGEM -- the Astro-Physics 1100GTO. Last Friday nine of the ten boxes arrived (the scope attachment hardware arrived on Monday. Took about a couple of days to get all the hardware checked out and the software loaded and tested.

When the Dovetail Plates arrived on Monday I attached the WO GT102 and tested it inside my barn.

Last night, the new mount (with the smaller GT102 OTA) went out under the stars for an initial test run.

So far this mount is proving to be all that was advertised.

Comet ATLAS is Breaking Up

Apparently, breaking up is not hard to do (sorry Neil), at least not when it comes to comets. With the hopes that Comet ATLAS would be the comet of the 20's, this recent news from the Virtual Telescope Project 2.0 makes that pretty unlikely.

After a number of observations of the inner coma of this comet, the team(s) at VTP observed at least three fragments, telling the comet really experienced a breakup event. Here is the telltale image.

What this all means for what may lie in the future is anyone's guess. Could the remaining larger piece still produce a naked-eye visual object with or without a tail? Maybe. But in the past such breakups have typically been dire news for any memorable visual event.

More updates to follow.

The Great Comet that Might Be

As reported in my previous blog entry, I have been imaging a new comet, C/2019 Y4 ATLAS for the last few evenings, and have been following the reports of rapid brightening (up to 600x brighter than original predictions) of the comet. This has produced a lot of fanfare with the expectation (hope) that in mid-May, ATLAS could rival Comet West which was a splendid morning comet back in 1976. It seems to be following the same orbit as the great comet of 1844.

Well folks, it looks like there is trouble in River City!  Recent observations have indicated that ATLAS may be breaking up, or fragmenting.

In a recent Astronomical Telegram, astronomers Quanzhi Ye (University of Maryland) and Qicheng Zhang (Caltech) report that photographs taken on April 2nd and April 5th of the comet revealed a marked change in the appearance of its core or pseudo-nucleus from starlike and compact to elongated and fuzzy. A second team of astronomers led by I. A. Steele (Liverpool John Moores University) confirmed the discovery. This change in appearance is "consistent with a sudden decline or cessation of dust production, as would be expected from a major disruption of the nucleus," wrote Zhang and Ye. (as reported by Astronomy Magazine).

See the article in Sky & Telescope for details.

I will, of course, be following the news about ATLAS, and imaging it once the weather clears here in Maryland. My image (from April 2nd) shows a well formed nucleus (similar to the image above/left).

Stay tuned ...

Been a long time ...

Wow, I can't believe I haven't posted anything here in a long while.  Well, not too surprised as I've been really busy at work, at home, at Church, etc. And the skies haven't been the best either.  However, here is a recap of what I've been doing since November.

First up, comet C/2017 T2 (PANSTARRS).  Been following this comet for a number of weeks. Here is a time-lapse video I took back in January:  Video

I'm taking a few more images this week as it continues its course to perihelion (closest to the sun) in early May. It is faint, and not expected to get much brighter. You'll need a telescope or good binoculars to see it. Not much of a tail either; just a small greenish fuzz ball.

In January I finally got around to processing my first mosaic. Subs were taken over the period 10/10/2019 to 11/02/2019. In fact, 480 of them. A mosaic in astrophotography is the process of taking groups of images and then stitching them together to create one final image. It is used when the object you are trying to image is too large to capture in the field of view of your telescope/camera. Generally, you have two options: buy a shorter focal length telescope or create a mosaic.

The object I imaged is IC 1396, the Elephant Trunk Nebula. I wanted to capture it in narrowband using the Hubble Palette. Since the SHO palette requires three sets of images (subs) taken with each NB filter, I needed to capture 40 subs x 3 filters x 4 panels, or 480 individual sub exposures, each one taking 5 minutes. This was a long involved session spanning quite a few evenings. Then the post-processing was a huge labor intensive effort. Not sure I will do this again, but here is the result of that effort.

IC 1396 - "Elephant Trunk Region" in SHO
WO GT102 APO with ASI 1600mm Pro
10 hrs total integration 

Next, the Jellyfish Nebula. This image, taken in late January, is a galactic supernova remnant (SNR) in the constellation Gemini, the remains of a star that exploded after using up all its nuclear fuel.

This image is a modified HOO palette: 30% Sii / 70% Ha in the Red, 100% Oiii in the Green and Blue channels. RGB stars were added.

IC 443 - The Jellyfish Nebula in HOO
WO GT102 and ASi 1600mm Pro
10 hrs total integration

Next up is the Helix Nebula.  This was actually taken back September and October, but the post processing was a little tricky and I only got it done recently.

NGC 7293, or the Helix, is an example of a planetary nebula, formed by an intermediate to low-mass star, which sheds its outer layers near the end of its evolution. Gases from the star in the surrounding space appear, from our vantage point, as if we are looking down a helix structure. The remnant central stellar core, known as the central star (CS) of the planetary nebula, is destined to become a white dwarf star. The observed glow of the central star is so energetic that it causes the previously expelled gases to brightly fluoresce. (wiki). This image was taken using the HOO palette (where the Ha filter is assigned to the red color, and the Oiii filter to both the green and blue colors. No Sii data was taken.

NGC 7293, The Helix Nebula in HOO
WO GT102 and ASI 1600mm Pro
Integration: 4.1 hours

On January 29, 2020, comet C/2017 T2 PANSTARRS photo-bombed the Double Cluster in Perseus.
Although I wanted to get the comet when it was closest to the cluster, I had to wait a couple of nights for the weather to clear. Here it is leaving the area, very close to 8 Per.

Finally, here is a grouping of galaxies known as the Leo Triplet. The Leo Triplet (also known as the M66 Group) is a small group of galaxies about 35 million light-years away in the constellation Leo. This galaxy group consists of the spiral galaxies M65, M66, and NGC 3628. 

Leo Triplet
LRGB Image (1 hr in each RGB and 2.3 hrs in Luminance)
WO GT102 with ASI 1600mm Pro

M66 is at top left; M65 bottom left.  NGC 3628 is to the right.

Well, that's it for now.

With the COVID 19 virus on everyone's mind I thought posting this selection of images would give you something else to think about.  I'm currently at home, so I have plenty of time to image the sky. In fact, as I write this, my telescope is imaging comet C/2017 T2 once more, and then it will move on to another comet, C/2019 Y4 ATLAS.  More about this comet, which could become visible to the naked eye later this year, in the next installment.

So, what's up with Betelgeuse?

Betelgeuse and Antares are the two nearest red supergiant stars that are characterized as core-collapse Type-II supernova (SN II) progenitors. Recent photometry shows that Betelgeuse has been declining in brightness since October 2019, and has now reached a modern all-time low of +1.12 mag on December 7, 2019. Betelgeuse is a complicated variable star whose period of ~420 +/-15 days is marginal at best, and this period varies a lot throughout the years. Betelgeuse also has a longer-term (5 - 6 years) and shorter term (100 - 180 days) period of variability with smaller brightness changes. This latest observation has Betelgeuse shining the faintest in the 25+ years of continuous monitoring by astronomers and 50 years of photoelectric V-band spectroscopic observations.

Amateur astronomers around the world have been commenting on the very obvious dimming of one of the key components of the Orion constellation. Many are waiting for Betelgeuse to finally 'go off' which would produce the most fantastic event in modern time astronomy. Indeed, scientists have predicted that Betelgeuse is ripe to go supernova soon, but soon is a relative term, and ranges from 100,000 years and up. No one knows for sure and recent activity may indicate a readiness of the star to enter the pre-supernova phase. Betelgeuse has dipped deeper in brightness before in the 1940's and 50's (long term brightness curve).

Will we see Betelgeuse 'pop' in our lifetime? Probably not, but if it did, you'd certainly know it. No, it would not end life on Earth. No, it won't become a second sun. Betelgeuse is about 450 light years from us and so would appear as a very, very bright star if it exploded. A supernova would need to be less than 50 light years to really affect life on earth. however, when this does happen, Betelgeuse will brighten enormously for a few weeks or months, perhaps as bright as the full moon and visible in broad daylight. And then, Orion will look very different than it does today!

Nope! Jupiter's Red Spot is not disappearing

No, Jupiter’s Great Red Spot is not disintegrating, physicist claims

Earlier this year, several amateur astronomers spotted an unusual anomaly on the planet Jupiter: bits of the gas giant's famed Great Red Spot appeared to be flaking off, raising fears that the planet's most identifiable feature might be showing signs of disappearing. But Philip Marcus, a physicist at the University of California, Berkeley, begs to differ. He argues that reports of the red spot's death have been greatly exaggerated.

A dramatic view of Jupiter's Great Red Spot and its surroundings, courtesy of Voyager 1 on Feb. 25, 1979, when the spacecraft was 5.7 million miles (9.2 million kilometers) from Jupiter.
NASA/JPL/Public Domain

According to Prof. Marcus, however, his computer models demonstrate that the flaking is not a death knell for the Great Red Spot at all. Rather, it's a very natural weather phenomenon arising from the complex fluid dynamics of Jupiter's atmosphere.

Read about it at arstechnica.com

NGC 7635 - Bubble nebula

The Bubble Nebula in SHO

NGC 7635 (The Bubble Nebula)
GT102 f/5.5 APO with ASI1600mm Pro Camera
7.5 hrs total integration time

NGC 7635, also known as the Bubble Nebula, Sharpless 162, or Caldwell 11, is an H II region emission nebula in the constellation Cassiopeia. It lies close to the direction of the open cluster Messier 52. The "bubble" is created by the stellar wind from a massive hot, 8.7 magnitude young central star, SAO 20575. (Wikipedia)

The Bubble Nebula is 7 light-years across and lies at a distance of 7,100 light-years from Earth. The star forming this nebula is about 45 times more massive than our sun. Gas on the star gets so hot that it escapes away into space as a "stellar wind" moving at an incredible 4 million miles per hour. This outflow sweeps up the cold, interstellar gas in front of it, forming the outer edge of the bubble. (Hubblesite)

Taken with my 102mm APO refractor and ASI1600mm camera, this is a narrowband image processed in the Hubble palette (SHO). Additional details on the image capture can be found at Bubble Nebula

Transit of Mercury, November 11, 2019

Well the day has finally arrived - the day of Mercury's transit across the sun.

Weather forecast was for 100% high cloud on Monday, the last transit of Mercury until 2032.  Yikes, usually a forecast like that is bad news - no chance at astrophotography. But when you are imaging a small black dot crossing the face of the sun, high clouds, if thin, are not a real problem. So the gear went out and I was able to capture most of the event.

First contact was around 7:40 am but due to the topography of my property the sun was not visible at that time. It wasn't until 8:26 am before the sun climbed sufficiently to peek out behind my garage/workshop and the southeastern tree line. I had some initial problems with getting the software up and running. Actually, it is a long story - I didn't decide to use my Canon 50D as the primary still camera until that morning and it turned out that the licenses to both my software applications that I use when imaging through the 50D had expired. The last time I used them was during the total solar eclipse of 2017. By the time I downloaded the new versions and paid for the upgrades it was almost 9:00.

But I finally did get everything up and running, although for some reason (still unknown) the mount was not able to keep the sun centered in the sensor of the camera and so I had to re-adjust every 20 minutes or so which made post-processing a nightmare.

Here is a single sub from the Canon. The sunspot-bare sun makes it easy to find the planet - the small black dot just left of center.

Transit of Mercury - November 11, 2019  9:12 a.m.
GT102 f/5.5 Canon 50D 1/1000 sec ISO 200

The whole session has been captured on a YouTube video on my channel which you can view via this link: Transit

A Japanese spacecraft is coming back to Earth with samples from a nearby asteroid

As reported in CNN Space+Science ...

For a little over a year, a tiny unmanned Japanese spacecraft has been sampling the surface of the near-Earth asteroid Ryugu, capturing images, blasting a little crater in it, and firing a "bullet" into its exterior to dislodge particles.

Now, after traveling about 180 million miles, Hayabusa2 has begun its yearlong journey back to Earth with valuable data and soil samples in tow.

The Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency hopes to use the materials to explore the origins of the planets and the source of Earth's oceans.

More details on this exciting effort can be found at CNN