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Posts Made By: Hugh Bartlett

September 25, 2009 02:07 PM Forum: Global Warming - REAL or NOT

decade temp trend flat

Posted By Hugh Bartlett
Check out this website for temperature and other trends tracked by satellite data by the University of Alabama at Huntsville (UAH):

http://www.drroyspencer.com

Everything has been trending down since 2002 on his graphs.

September 29, 2009 02:15 AM Forum: Beginning Astronomy?

Filters

Posted By Hugh Bartlett
What kind of aperture are we talking about?

October 7, 2009 03:11 PM Forum: Global Warming - REAL or NOT

Antarctic Ice Melt Lowest Levels in Satellite Era

Posted By Hugh Bartlett
Dean Rowe already covered this in another thread:

http://www.astromart.com/forums/viewpost.asp?forum_post_id=680536&poll_id=&news_id=&page=

October 14, 2009 03:43 PM Forum: Global Warming - REAL or NOT

What happened to global warming?

Posted By Hugh Bartlett
I found this interesting debate between scientists on either side of the issue. It's a bit lengthy, but a good read. Also take time to check out the comments at the end to see who was more persuasive.

http://fortcollinsteaparty.com/index.php/2009/10/10/dr-william-gray-and-dr-kevin-trenberth-debate-global-warming/

October 21, 2009 01:30 PM Forum: Equipment Talk

Lightweight AND wide field binos? Orion Scenix and?

Posted By Hugh Bartlett
There are some great deals right now from Orion and Meade on wide-angle 8x42 and 7x42 binoculars with 8° fields of view:

My first recommendation in this price range is the 8x42 Orion UltraViews, which have long been my favorite pair for planning starhops to telescopic objects. The sharp portion is only the central 50%, but that is less important for locating objects:

http://www.telescope.com/control/product/~category_id=sale_binoculars/~pcategory=clearance_center/~product_id=79350

If you like roof-prism binoculars, I also got a pair of the 7x42 Meade Montana's on clearance. The lower magnification, however, is noticeable, and mine came slightly out of collimation. They have many nice features (great eye relief, phase coatings, nice adjustable eye cups, etc.), but optically, came up a little shorter that my Orion's for astronomy. For example, I could only see 2 of Jupiters 3 moons visible at the time in these, compared with all 3 in the UltraViews. Your mileage may vary, but Orion has excellent customer service and exchange policies - Meade a little less so.

http://www.shopatron.com/products/productdetail/Meade+Montana+7x42+Binocular/part_number=B170001/1323.0.1.1.57212.0.0.0.0?

October 24, 2009 03:45 AM Forum: Global Warming - REAL or NOT

Saving the Polar Bears

Posted By Hugh Bartlett
http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Facts&ContentRecord_id=cb2faa9c-802a-23ad-4bcc-29bb94ceb993&IsPrint=true

October 24, 2009 04:53 PM Forum: Equipment Talk

Handheld Binos: 8x or 10x, 42mm or 50mm

Posted By Hugh Bartlett
My personal preference in binoculars for general purposes and astronomy is something close to 8x42's are optimal. I find that 10x50's are in-betweeners: too shaky to hand hold, and do not have a wide enough field of view to show an adequate area of the sky to relate objects to the surrounding bright stars.

I have gravitated toward a collection of 8x42-ish for the pure binocular experience of quickly grabbing something with which to step outside and scan the sky for my favorite targets for closer observation.

If I want a more magnified binocular view, I mount my 15x70's or my 20x80's. But more recently, they have been replaced by an Astroscan telescope which sets up in seconds and can be pointed just as fast as binoculars with a green laser pointer finder.

At best, the field of view in the 10x50's is 6.5°; whereas my 8x42's, 8x43's and 8.4x44's all have an 8.2° field of view. Doing the math, that is at least 60% more of the sky that you are seeing, and that much greater chance of a bright star being in the same field of view as the deep sky object you are trying to find.

Other's mileage may vary... but that's the way I see it.


October 26, 2009 08:46 PM Forum: Global Warming - REAL or NOT

20th century is different

Posted By Hugh Bartlett
And so we would now be cooling if it were not for CO2? I don't know that is the correct analysis of the last 50 years, but if it is, we should be pumping more CO2 into the atmosphere to avoid a mass extinction due to the cooling period we are entering.

October 27, 2009 02:12 PM Forum: Global Warming - REAL or NOT

More on stats

Posted By Hugh Bartlett
From Roger Pielke Sr. (reacting to AP article entitled "Statisticians reject global cooling"):

As discussed on my weblog and elsewhere (e.g. see and see), the upper ocean heat content trend, as evaluated by its heat anomalies, has been essentially flat since mid 2003 through at least June of this year. Since mid 2003, the heat storage rate, rather then being 0.6 W/m2 in the upper 750m that was found prior to that time (1993-2003), has been essentially zero.

Nonetheless, the article is correct that the climate system has not cooled even in the last 6 years. Moreover, on the long time period back to 1880, the consensus is that the climate system has warmed on the longest time period. Perhaps the current absence of warming is a shorter term natural feature of the climate system. However, to state that the “[t]he Earth is still warming” is in error. The warming has, at least temporarily halted.

The article (and apparently the NOAA study itself), therefore, suffers from a significant oversight since it does not comment on an update of the same upper ocean heat content data that Jim Hansen has used to assess global warming.


November 27, 2009 10:45 PM Forum: Beginning Astronomy?

Re: helical focusers

Posted By Hugh Bartlett
I think that was my wanted ad. KineOptics is the company. I have received the focuser, and it is really simple and quite well made. It is very light weight, and can have various mounting heights with different spacers. I even discovered that it can be mounted backwards (installed on the inside of a mounting plate) and works just as well. It is really an ingenious invention.

It does not come with a 2"-1.25" adapter, but that's a minor thing that can be picked up here for less than $20.

The other cost/installation factor is that it has no mounting plate, and you need to drill a 2 3/8" hole for it. A metal hole saw and arbor costs about $30

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