Posts Made By: Herbert Kraus

Inge Skauvik said:Do anybody know the magnitude of the brightest stars of NGC6229. My estimate is 15th magnitude, but I may be wrong.

The catalog of galactic globular clusters in "Star Clusters" by Archinal & Hynes includes a column that gives the visual magnitude of the brightest star in the cluster. For NGC 6229 that magnitude is given as 15.5. You were right on!

You also provoked me into making pie charts to show my observing preferences! As for many others, these preferences depend on whether I'm trying to star-gaze at my light-polluted suburban home or at one of the more-or-less dark sky sites accessible to me. Here are two charts illustrating the differences.

Gordon Gower said:I have been appointed to do public astronomy at two national parks in Utah for 7 weeks this summer. . . I will be carrying a vast amount of gear for my wife and I for 7 weeks away from home . . . I will have several standard atlases for reference, but I may have to prepare some short talks, and I will field many questions. NOW, I would like to take one or two books along for basic reference and and as resources for preparing talks. . . What would you recommend (remembering that space is at a premium)?

Gordon: I interpret your request as seeking some sort of encyclopedia on astronomical subjects, not any observing handbook or guide. If I've read you correctly, my suggestion would be this:
The quality encyclopedias are too bulky for your purposes (someone recently gave me a copy of "The Cambridge Atlas of Astronomy" which is really a good encyclopedia, but it weighs a ton; there is also a mammoth 4-volume "Encyclopedia of Astronomy and Astrophysics" which retailed for $650 in 2001 but was well-received.). And the ideal source for your presentations might be the magnificent essays on various astronomical subjects scattered through the 3 volumes of Burnham's Celestial Handbook, if a concise up-dated version of those essays existed. But I found reviews in Sky & Telescope of two recent books that may suit your purposes: "The Universal Book of Astronomy" by David Darling, published in 2004, got a pretty good review in the February 2006 edition of Sky & Telescope (page 89); and the 3rd edition of Patrick Moore's "Atlas of the Universe" published in 2005 got a fairly good review in the March 2006 edition of Sky & Telescope (page 85). If you don't have access to those issues of S&T, I could send you copies of the text of those reviews via the astromart private e-mail system if you like. Good luck. Herbert Kraus.

David: I can't answer your inquiry, but the OTA of your scope bears a close resemblance to a refractor advertised by "Swift Instruments, Inc." in the December 1980 issue of Sky & Telescope, right down to the 910 mm focal length (which seems unusual to me). I scanned the old ad and am attaching a copy of it. Good luck on your quest.

Enrique Barrio said:I googled my state state this afternoon, and except for a few camera stores with a beginner scope or two; there was nothing. Are there any real store anywhere that actually carry equipment that would be worth a visit.

Enrique: Your profile indicates you're in Hialeah, Florida. Check out the outfit that advertises in Sky & Telescope magazine (see page 81 of the August issue) that is in Sarasota with branches in Ft. Lauderdale and Pompano Beach. Maybe one of those locations would satisfy your objectives.

Curt: Thanks much for the information about the forthcoming apparitions of Mercury. Your data indicate that 30 minutes after sunset it will appear only about 3º above your horizon in Chicagoland, but well over 20º in southern latitudes. If you can readily calculate it, can you advise how far above our horizon it will be at that hour around September 25 at latitude 34º north (longitude 118º west)? I ask because our club has been asked to do a star party at a local school on September 25 (one day before full moon! ugh!) with some local bigwigs to be in attendance; and it would be helpful to know if we can show them anything beyond Jupiter.
If my request is too far beyond your call of duty, thanks anyway for your frequent and helpful forum posts. Herbert Kraus

Larry Seguin said:I was viewing the Moon tonight, and noticed some dark patches. They lie east of Copernicus, in Mare Insularum. Anybody know what these are?

Larry: Perhaps you were seeing the dark ashes that were excavated from beneath the lighter-hued surface lava by the impact that created Copernicus H, a small crater just southeast of Copernicus. This phenomenon is described by Charles Wood on page 60 of his book "The Modern Moon" and as item 74 of his "Lunar 100" features (see page 58 of the April 2006 issue of "Sky & Telescope").

Robert: My own 3.5-inch Questar is over 30 years old, and maybe my advice won't count for the more recent model you have. But for what it's worth, I would advise that you contact Questar (I have found them very user-friendly) and find out whether you should send them your scope for cleaning, and what what it would take to do that.
The following quotes are from the manual that came with my old telescope: "Never unscrew the barrel of the telescope or touch the primary mirror for any reason. . . . On ordinary lenses, or even on most precision optics, small sleeks may be polished out, thinning the lens within manufacturing tolerances. But superfine optics like Questar's have no such generous margin for error. Each Questar is an individual triumph of the optician's art, achieved by aspheric hand retouching of matched elements during a long series of performance tests. . .[etc., etc.]" Good luck with your new scope.

John Begg said:I'm looking for planning software that I can use to guide my scope mounted on a Skyview pro mount with the intelliscope push to add on. I would like to create an observation list, choose an object from the list, and use the software to guide me in moving the scope to the object. I'm looking for functions similar to the way the intelliscope controller guides me to an object.

I would suggest that you make a list of the objects you want to view from sources such as observing handbooks, Sue French's monthly article in Sky & Telescope, one of the Internet sites that lists object of interest by constellation, etc. etc. Then proceed as follows:
1. If the object is a galaxy, nebula or cluster in the NGC or IC or Messier catalogs, it's already in your database and you can punch it into your Intelliscope DSC to get to it.
2. If the object is a star or binary, it may also already be in the Intelliscope database. For prominent named stars, use the Intelliscope list of named stars to get to it; if it's not named, check the Intelliscope list (an appendix to the User's Manual) of stars that have a number in the Intelliscope catalog and use that catalog number to get to the object.
3. For any other object, note down its celestial coordinates from whatever source you're using, and make it one of the up to 99 user-selected objects you can enter into the Intelliscope database. Or else just use Intelliscope to slew to those coordinates (the User Manual also tells you how to do that).

Ken Landaiche said:Can anyone tell me what circuit was described? Send me a schematic?

Ken: The attached schematic may help you.