Re: Jan 03 Events
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Update on results for tonight:
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Had a miss with 2000 XC13 with the home observatory--which was expected given it was a 20% shot for me.? The drama on this one involved extremely bad images at set-up an hour beforehand.? So bad I thought the C14's corrector had broken (yep, got up on the step ladder with the flashlight to check).? After about a half hour of head scratching, I found the problem was condensed water all over the inside of my focal reducer (a 0.33x Meade).? I've left it out on my telescope year-round for years, and never had this happen before to my knowledge.? I do run two 10-watt dew heaters on the front/rear of the telescope 24/7/365--I guess I'll add a third at the focal reducer & camera.??
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Had a miss from my unattended home observatory with 1996 UQ3--again expected since it was a 15% shot.? The drama on this one was realizing I didn't leave enough time to set-up dome tracking remotely--I just left the slot homed (since you can only get in/out of the dome when it is home)--losing about 2/3 of the light at event time (C14 with a 10.5 mag target--not really a problem).? Just need to leave more time to get the fussy Remote Desktop connection to the observatory going.
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Got a positive on 1996 UQ3 using the C5 + Astrid from Hills Creek State Park--expected as that location was a 98% shot.? What was unexpected here was the duration--1.15 seconds, the predicted maximum duration was only 0.5.? The Astrid system worked flawlessly--I didn't, as I missed a turn for the park (where I've likely been 10 times in the past year).? The Astrid really takes the stress out of doing a prepoint.? I think it took me less than 15 minutes from parking the truck to having the pointing complete.? Even with the missed turn, I ended up with 15 minutes to spare.
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It is completely cloudy here now as predicted, and the satellite images indicate there isn't any hope for Eltigen in 30 minutes.? I'll cancel that station now...
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A good night none-the-less.? For high probability events, I'll be doing a lot more letting the observatory go on autopilot while I drive the Astrid system somewhere else in the path.
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Steve C
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Steve C