Space Forum / Amateur Astronomy / December 2004

Dec.30/31, 2004 - 2345 UT. 12cm, f/8.3, 100cm fl refractor
at 40x and 67x. Observed from balcony in Halifax, Nova Scotia,
Canada.
Yep, there was light pollution! Seeing was good say 4/5. Sky

I need a medium-load tracking mount, but pockets not deep enough just
yet for a Titan or Paramount.  Orion's Atlas mount looks OK but the dec
weight shaft looks small.  The Vixen Polaris looks OK.  Both are in my
current price range.  Opinions?

saa
I've setup a website with the aim of raising £100 for the victims of the  
tsunami in SE Asia.
Please try to help in any way you can.

Well the questions in the title, is this a good idea? Can the DSI do
everything a LPI can do and more or should I keep my LPI and save up
some more?  I can probably get ~50% of the cost of a DSI from selling
my LPI on Ebay, if the DSI effectively makes the LPI redundant this

I've updated my website with some pictures of sunsets
http://images.ciel.free.fr/Eversion/Sunset.html#set2 and a page about
the way I build a lunar mosaïc.
If some of you are interested, it's here

In the south of France on Dec. 29th, in the middle of the night, Simian Etienne
took this picture of the pitch-dark ISS passing in front of the moon. The
station's wing-like solar arrays are clearly visible, as are its thermal
radiators and a docked Soyuz capsule.

Comet Machholz seen and recorded in SE an hour before moonrise with
image posted at
http://home.freeuk.com/m.gavin/digsky.htm
Gone hazy now under moonlight :-(

Be brief and to the point.

The following is the official position of the Italian Amateur Astronomers
Associations with respect to the IDA's Model Lighting Ordinance, which we
consider NOT useful as it is written and even dangerous for existing laws
and enforcements on light pollution.

I am looking for a reprint of:
R. A. Schmidt, "Constructing a 10" Kutter Schiefspiegler", Telescope
Making #4, pp. 8-13, Summer 1979.
It does not appear to be in the Best of Telescope Making volumes

When viewing star spectra?
Or is a sub-diameter reflection grating
just as good?
-Rich

I'm missing something fundamental here, and I'm hoping one of you can please
help me to figure this one out.
I have an Antares 8x50 RACI finderscope, which does the job just fine,
except that on really dark nights I can't see the crosshairs too well.  Of

Long story short, my 2 yr. old nephew got ahold of one of my bino caps
and munched it like an Oreo cookie.
After my astonishment at hearing a new cap would cost $4.95 plus $10.00
shipping, the apologetic rep at Orion (hands tied and just doing her job)

Looks like close we can expext one nice close encounter in 2029:
http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/risk/2004mn4.html
Will it be visible in small telescopes?
Ante

The Indo earthquake was caused by a subduction event NOT a landslide.
An area 1000km's long and 40 wide slide over one another triggering the
earthquake. The fact that so many aftershocks occured and will continue
to occur shows this.