Topics

Weather

Cloud, haze and the odd clear hour. Oldest first, so it reads from the first try to the latest.

  1. Observing session

    First light: the Ring and the Dumbbell

    The telescope's first evening out, a knock against its own handset, and two planetary nebulae before midnight.

  2. Observing session

    The focuser focuses itself, and the Triangulum Galaxy through a gap in the cloud

    First night with the motor focuser doing the work, polar alignment from 8 degrees out to 0.3, a start on the North America Nebula, then haze, and the Triangulum Galaxy after midnight.

  3. Observing session

    Mapping the garden, and finding home

    The telescope measured my garden's skyline by itself before dark, the true home position turned out to be ten degrees from where I had been setting it, Tabby's star got its first night, and then the camera started misbehaving and a neighbour's bonfire finished the night.