This is a brief look at what is happening at the observatory, where is the telescope pointing, what image is being acquired by the CCD camera and what is being done by these images, as a simple log file. This will also include all the troubles i face and how i am trying to get rid of them. I will also try to edit it as the night progresses so you might want to view it more than once.
Installed some ferrite rings on a few wires.. hopefully this will help some wierd behavior i am seeing in USB connections.
Captured some good data of an asteriod. Learning more and more on Astrometry.
Photoshop CS was not compatible on my 4K display.. finally installed Photoshop CC.
I have changed the position of the Weather Station and now it is standing 15 feet high. This will help to get better wind speed data and the temperature measurements.
Losmandy Titan mount without a doubt an outstanding mount! After using it for almost 15 years, i still am impressed by the quality of its performance. Carring C14 and a load of 5 instruments on its back, it still gives me superb performance.. very very happy with this machine and it is half the cost of Paramount!!
Over the years, i have been using it with first serial connection, then USB and tonight i connected it with the ethernet cable.. configured the network settings and there you go.. all the controls with so many options are now on the web browser!
Fiest thing i did is to update main board firmware and hand control firmare. It took some time to figure out things but finally got it done.
There are many new changes in the update but one of the feature which i am most excited about is a change in the pointing algorithm. A few goto tests did show clear improvement. I will however thoroughly test it in a couple of days to come.
I also changed the park position of the scopw tonight.
A night well spent at the observatory.
Moon is high up in the sky so no data acquisition possible these days.
Took dark frames of 900 seconds.
Tried taking flat frames with the light panel but no success. It seems three acrylic sheets are not enough to dim down the light for this purpose.
Took some dark frames.
Cleaned telescope room
I was late reaching the observatory.. Tried some more data on M82 galaxy.. could only get 10 minutes before the telescope limits were reached.
The black eye galaxy was in a good spot. Focused the scope on a star near the galaxy.. guide star was found and got a first image of 5 minutes.. it was a good sight! Then something happened to the guiding.. recalibrated the guide star and all but still the autoguiding was not good.
I thought is having some more data on M87 Jet but i already have a good SNR there so was not so appealing to me.
I found a good bright star for autoguiding for M3 globular cluster. After the exposure check, i could guide at 4Hz! Baged 40 minutes data of this cluster and called the night off.
Changing season also requires some changes in the observatory equipments' settings. Onw of these changes is the mechanical difference of focusing point in the TCF focuser.
I try to delay it as long as i can, because it required some more changes in the telescope and the mount.
Last night, the focuser got focused (and poorly) at around step 100 in TCF Focuser. I knew i wont be able to focus the next day.
So this evening, i performed these steps:
1. I opened the locks of the mirror cell of C14.
2. Set the TCF Focuser at 4000 step.
3. Put the Bahtinov Mask on C14.
4. Slewed the mount to Dubhe, a bright star in Ursa Major.
5. Changed the focus knob of C14 until the three lines were in the desired position My CCD was still attached and was taking 1 second continuous images which was being shown on my computer in the human room.. i was watching and controlling the software on the iphone though).
6. Took off the Mask from the front of the telescope.
7. Locked the Mirror Cell.
8. Collimated the Secondary Mirror using Bob's Knobs.
9. Adjusted the pointing model, which changed a little.
Went to the Human Room and refocused the star from The Sky X Pro software. It got a perfect focus at 4231 step. TCF Focuser has 15.2 mm of tube travel with zero backlash. It covers this distance kn 7000 steps.. talk aboit precision focusing!!
I wanted to image M81, but a lot of time was lost and the observatory wall was in the view. Still i got a few minutes on M81.
Next i moved on to M87.. this is my second attempt on imaging the jet of this galaxy. Focused the system again near the galaxy, found a guide star, rotated the imaging train, calibrated the mount and the adaptive optics, initiated autoguiding at 3Hz, started taking 5 minutes exposures.
Thin clouds were in the sky for a while but the guide star did not vanish so i kept going.
Got 3 hours of exposure in the end! Will process these frames in a couple of days.
Reached early evening to the observatory.. Summers have started to show up with the change in the CCD camera cooling system. Inwas imaging at -30C, now swtiched to -20C. I have already got dark library for -20C so no extra work for me!
Tood some images of M82, the cigar galaxy tonight, until it changed the meridian. Also my observatory wall started obstructing the telescope view.
Adaptive Optics' Autoguiding was working at 3 Hz.. 3 corrections being applied in 1 second!! Though it was slightly windy at the time, but 3 Hz kept the galaxy dead center at all times!
Inital processing seems promising!
I am not happy with my current flat field images.. i have tried various changes but still the background is not what i would like it to be.
Will be attempting a new method next week.. peeparing stuff for that.
Spent the whole night in takig new flats. Using an image rotator is a blessing indeed when it comes to finding a guide star BUT its a curse when using flat frames!
Also made three animation of a couple of comets captured this last week.
100 new drak frames of 120 seconds are also new tonight.
18:45
After a long time, i came to the observatory. Weather is clear though not very transparent.
21:00
For some unknown reason, everything is reset in the Gemini Control.. Everything! The Gemini GPS reciever is working incorrectly.. it correctly identifies the geographical coordinates but the timezone is completely wrong. I woud have to look more into it. For now, i am doing manual entires.
Telescope says the mount is tracking but it is not. Have restarted the Gemini Control a few times.. no solution yet.
22:00
'Cold Start' is the final solution for almost every problem Gemini faces. Pointing it at North and restarting the mount as 'Cold Start'
Pointing and Tracking is still bad. Also the SkyX Pro is not correctly controlling the mount.
22:30
Slewed to a star, Caster and synched the mount with it. All is fine now.
23:00
I do not usually image DSOs.. but for fun, aqcuiring luminance data of a spiral galaxy right now.
03:00
Clouds came after some time and i could get only 80 minutes of luminance data.
04:00
Observatory is closed.
18:00
An overcast.. observatory was closed.
19:00
Observatory was closed.. Roshaan and i had a good conversation on Astronomy, life and everything in between.
20:00
Cloudy and humid weather is keeping the observatory room closed. It will continue for a few more days.
I am trying the USB coonection from the observatory to the meeting room. Cat5/6 cable connection is not working. Have checked two different cables and connectors. This is a problem that needa to be resolved ASAP.
19:00
Came to the observatory.. Roshaan Bukhari (Secretary LAST) joined me.
We talked about LAST plans for LSM, Astronomy, Astrometry, near future workshops and more.
I tried some new cables to connect and work for me but that did not work out.
Sky was clear for some time but due to high humidity level, the telescope room was closed.
Observatory was closed.
21:00
Two first time visitors came to the observatory tonight. Showed them around. We talked about Astronomy reseacrch, Education and Telescopes. It was all great!
Clouds and rain everywhere.. no work on the telescope.
Did some repair work on CCTV cameras.
17:16
Clouds everywhere.. it is expected to drizzle all night.
19:00
Sky is all cloudy. Observatory was closed.