Saturday, June 20, 2009

First Light!





As my wife described it, I was like a kid in a candy store. I had everything set out early and waited patiently (or maybe not so) for the sun to set. With each passing minute I scanned the sky for the first twinkling star. Up and down the hill I went while helping the wife cook on the grill.

—Finally there it was… Vega! Down the hill I ran and uncapped the scope. Turned on the view finder, centered the dot and presto, there was nothing there. Instantly I worried about my collimation, was it any good? Would this be a fruitless evening trying to achieve first light? In and out I turned the focuser and presto, there was a star. Very faint it was, and not Vega at all, but a sharp, well focused star.

—So up the hill I went to get the wife and tell her my collimation was successful! All I had to do now was adjust my view finder so I could start scanning the heavens. Sadly there were no planets to view or moon to use as a focus point. I had to hope that I could match the star in my view finder and the one in my eye piece. For the next two hours I struggled with it, and guess what? No success at all. I decided to focus on the Mizar/Alcor double star in Ursa Major. I could put the red dot right on it, but never find it in the scope.

—So ‘First Light’ was a mixture of highs and lows. punctuated by another upset buck white tail dear and my two labs that wouldn’t get out from underfoot. I did mix in some yummy burgers on the grill in the middle of it all. Not to mention I did see the HIP 91919A/91926C Binary system, which was really cool.

—All in all a successful evening I hope to do again next week. I hope you enjoyed my account and would love some feedback on how everyone is enjoying my blogs..

2 comments:

  1. Hi, really love the blog. We have produced a free podcast on NASA's latest mission and would love your feed back. Have a look and let us know what you think of the idea. If you click on my URL it will link you to it.

    Thanks,

    Kit.

    ReplyDelete
  2. In my comment before I realised that I left a wrong link. Click on my name on this post to get the correct one.

    ReplyDelete

 
Blog Directory
Top Blogs EatonWeb Blog Directory RSSMountain

Free Blog Counter
Poker Blog