clear sky chart

Job 9:9

Job 9:9-10
9 He is the Maker of the Bear and Orion,
the Pleiades and the constellations of the south.
10 He performs wonders that cannot be fathomed,
miracles that cannot be counted.
NIV

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Saturn, But It's Hazy Again

Went out and imaged Saturn.  It was cold and hazy again.  It didnt look quite right in the eyepiece either, but I thought I'd give it a try.  I shot 4 avi's with different settings.  Seeing was horrible and the haze didnt help, but I ended up with one image that was halfway decent enough to post:
At least this one showed SOME detail.  The Cassini Division is sorta there.  I notice the northern portion is almost totally dark in this image, whereas in the past, I was seeing a white band, which I assume is the NED.  I'm not seeing it in this image.

The rest of the images that I was able to get varied from no detail whatsoever to barely showing the northern band.  Some were so bad that there was little contrast between the planet and the rings.

<Added 7:34AM 3/29> ' When I brought the telescope inside after writing this post, on the porch, i looked at the objective and saw a nice layer of frost on the glass.  Maybe it wasnt so much as haze as it was condensation.  This has been a problem before, and now I need to figure out how to prevent it.  I'm thinking a couple of low value resistors hooked to the battery that drives the clock drive to provide a small amount of heat that will hopefully prevent condensation.'

Eventually, we'll get decent seeing again.  If this keeps up, I'm going to think its my equipment!

This was taken on the 70mm refractor, by the way, and I know I've done FAR better in the past with it.

Also, I purchased some filters to try with the 127mm, but will be needing reasonable conditions to do any good.

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