A Historic Event on Jupter

A fairly rare event happened tonight, so I didn't want to miss it. (Click on the banner to see the details.) The banner above is a set of photos I took tonight through my big telescope. The event is called a transit. Three of the moons of Jupiter, Callisto, Europa, and Lo passed in front of the viewable face of the planet. These three cast shadows that were visible through a telescope. The shadow transit happened within about a half hour, so there was no time to doddle around. On top of that, the temperature dipped down to freezing right at the pivotal point. All in all it made for a really exciting night.

I started out getting set up around 4pm or so. I tried a new process this time. (Click the image to see the steps.) I used the lifting cart to bring the telescope up to the tripod height. The telescope is about 200 pounds, so lifting is a real pain. This allowed me to roll it out and get it up to the right height without it tearing the ligaments that hold my spine together. I took a break to go eat with the family around 6pm. We got back around 9pm. I had downloaded a schedule of the nights festivities so I could make sure to catch all the fun.

Unfortunately I still didn't get a good alignment. I'm having trouble getting it into the polar home, and beyond. Any suggestions from you pros out there would be great. I have the general idea, but I have yet to get a good alignment. After about an hour of messing with that, I finally got it close enough.

I started setting up the imager. It went off without much trouble. Once I got the computer in place it clicked to life. I will say, this is no point and shoot situation. It's a constant balance between keeping the object in the field of view, pulling accurate focus, and setting camera functions. It's wild fun... if you like that kind of thing.

So after cutting it close with my setup time, the shadows began to fall. I used a 26mm first to sight it in, then I transferred back to the imager. With a few tweaks it was ready to go. This type of shadow transit will not happen again for about 17 years. So it was nice to be able to catch it. It was one of the more gratifying experiences I've had with the scope so far. The images are my first to take with any telescope so I'm pleased with the outcome. I have a lot to learn, but it was a good night.

It's hard to do this kind of thing and not think about how uncanny life is. The universe is a an unlikely place for life to exist. Here I am having to look across millions of miles of space just to see another chunk of something semi-solid. There are so many variables involved in the sustaining of life. It's just beyond belief that we could have randomly appeared here. Looking at things like what I did tonight, leads me to that familiar notion that, there must be a creator. There just must be.

Tweeking the Telescope.

You may notice in the picture a plastic segmented case sitting on the telescope platform. I finally got all my eyepieces and most used gear organized into a little case. It's so much more convenient, especially in the dark. It holds almost everything... Not quite. There's always a few pieces floating around that have no home, so I guess I need to find a place for those.

I spent a couple of hours today "fiddling." That's what I tell my wife when I'm going out to work with the telescope. "I'm going to fiddle." I say that becuase only a small portion of my time goes to actually looking through the telescope. Most of it is still set up. This is partially because I'm still getting everything set up. I've learned something though.

I'm realizing that astronomy is as much a tinkering hobby as anything else. I had to make a tool in the shop today to do what I needed. I wanted to take out a ring in the T-adapter (camera mount tube). I didn't have a screwdriver small enough. So I cranked up the grinder and flattened out the end of an Allen wrench to fit the slot. It was an easy fix, but it made me think of all the explorers and ancient astronomers who have gone before. I imagine what it must have been like to have to build every piece from scratch. 

The telescope I have (Meade LX200 12") had a focal reducer on it (Celestron f6.3), which meant that the image was "zoomed" out. It made it where the images were farther away. I had tried a couple of times to remove it, but it wouldn't budge. I pulled out all the stops, and put the piece in the vice in the shop. I then used a screw driver to twist the nose piece off. Finally got it, with a shout of joy. Now the telescope has a much tighter view. 

The reason why I wanted to take the focal reducer off, was because I got a package in the mail today. I got a planetary imager from orion. It's a camera specifically designed for planetary, and moon imaging. The idea is that it can take hundreds of photos in a quick burst. The software then analyzes the images and stacks them. This makes it possible to get more detail than with a single image. It reduces the effects of the huge column of air wavy air that the atmosphere provides. I tested it out today with it's accompanying software. It was during the day so all I could do was point it at a telephone pole about a quarter mile away. 


Here is an image that I compiled from 100 shots. Note: I didn't calculate any dark frames on this one so it has pretty heavy noise lines. I'm really eager to get some shots of Jupiter, Saturn and the moon. Maybe even Mars. I know the image isn't much to look at, but it represents about two days of preparations. The telescope is finally ready to get some decent shots of the our solar system.

I'm really excited to get out there, Once the rain stops, and share God's amazing creation work through images. Soon hopefully.

timelapse.

This is a simple little long exposure timelapse video I created the other night. It was just a test. In it you can see some of the challenges that we face in our backyard. We have an orange street light, and two blasting columns of light over head from a nearby billboard. the image quality is really poor online. When I do one that's worth looking at I'll upload it in high rez.

First Test Drive of the BIG TELESCOPE

 Click the pictures to see a closer look at the setup.
Telescope: Meade LX200 12"

Finally took the telescope for a test drive. I've been tweaking on it for a few weeks. I'm working on making a trailer mount for hassle free set up on location. I decided that since we were going to have a clear, reasonably warm weekend, I'd go ahead and set it up in the yard, even though it's not finished. So Friday, I set it up in preparation for the following weekend. 

Saturday afternoon I went out to fiddle with the telescope at about 2pm. I intended to figure out the t-adapter so that I could be prepared to take some astrophotos once it got dark. I spent all afternoon taking things apart and putting them back together. I finally found a solution that would allow the camera to attach but there was very little focus option. It was not great but I still had fun messing around with it.

As it started to get dark I made a fire in the fire pit, because it was going to get cold. 

Once Evening Came I thought I would be able to use the live view from the camera to see through the telescope. That, however didn't work. I turned the ISO all the way up, but there was no view to be had. This was disappointing but I had an inclination that this would be the case. Most images seem to be focused on long exposure so I had kind of guessed that this would be the case. Without live view it was incredibly hard to get the telescope aligned. So I took the camera body back off and put they eye piece back on. Because I was missing some key pieces for the T-adapter, I had to screw mount the camera on to the telescope. This took some time.

 I decided to take the camera back off and just do some observation. After another 15 minutes or so I had the eyepieces back in place. I did a really sloppy alignment. I still need to figure out how to get polar aligned. I have the wedge set for a different latitude, so I need to work on that. I wound up doing a single star alignment with Betelgeuse. It was good enough to do some basic observation.

Kristah came out and sat by the campfire I had made in the fire pit with Eily (our daughter) for a while. She went it after about an hour.

I watched Betelgeuse for a while, tried to see a nebula in Orion's expanding waste line, and then just wandered with the scope. I tried to get a view of Jupiter, but two conflicting star charts. My laptop chart said Jupiter over head, but my phone chart said it was about 25 degrees above the East Horizon. After fiddling a while with no luck I was ready to shut down.

I told my wife that I was about done, and I'd be in in a minute. Right as I was about to start packing up it occurred to me that the telescope had a guided tour function. I had not tried it because my alignment had been so rushed. However, I thought I'd give it a shot. So I clicked on "tonight's best" It took me immediately to Jupiter... or at least where it thought Jupiter was. It was pointing directly at a tree on the Eastern Horizon. I glanced in the direction that it pointed and saw a really bright dot that was hidden behind a wad of tree branches. I figured, "I have a 12" reflector, I should be able to see something" So I swung it around to correct for the poor alignment and gasped.

I'm not just being poetic here. I really gasped, then stepped back from the telescope and jumped up and down. I pumped my fist in the air, then went back to the eyepiece. A nice crisp view of Jupiter and four moons was shinning back at me. I could see the two main stripes of Jupiter that line up with it's moon's orbits. I was thrilled. It felt like a payoff that had been a long time coming. My first planet sighting had happened and I was really excited. I tried some different eye pieces to get a better view.

I know it wasn't exactly a scientific breakthrough but it was really exciting. So much of this discipline is tinkering with tubes, and glass, and gadgets. It's almost like, once you finally get everything working you're transported beyond. It was a great payoff.

On top of this, I was listening to a podcast about the evidence for God in the universe. A famous Astronomer / astrophysicist was talking about our best evidence that God exists. One of his main points, is called fine-tuning. He explained that the more we have studied the skys, the more we have come to realize that it is so insanely fine tuned that there must be a designer. I'm not going to go into the details here, but I felt at least a piece of that as I watched Jupiter.

I imagined what it would be like, to be the first to point a telescope at it and realize that it's not like all the other little shiny dots. It was a magical kind of moment. I'm convinced that the heavens declare the glory of God.