Image of the Moon extracted from videos taken in October last year.
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Lunar Photo 13th Feb 2019
Around first quarter is a favourite phase of the moon, with the sun high enough in the lunar sky to show the rugged Montes Apenninus & Montes Caucasus emerging into the light in the northern half of the disk.
This image was taken on 13 February 2019 at 20:39 UT at the Piers Sellers Observatory with the 0.57m f/4.7 ‘Alan Young’ Newtonian and a ZWO ASI174MM camera at prime focus employing a 520nm filter. It is 500 frames stacked in AutoStakkert software.
In this view the crater Eudoxus proudly sits on sentry duty at the top end of Montes Caucasus.
The large basin of Mare Serenitatis (to the right) shows a distinct ray band, with the little crater Linne sitting there, exposed in the open!
Back on the other side of the range (left hand side), the secondary impactors in Cassini crater are clearly visible.
Between the ranges the central peaked crater Aristillus sits alongside the more massive Archimedes.
NGC 2244 (Caldwell 50) Image
Here is an image of NGC 2244 we captured recently at the Cadsas Observatory in Cranbrook. It’s an open cluster on the edge of the Rosette Nebula in constellation Monoceros.
This image is a stack of 9 captured images.
P Cygni (variable star) and Dumbell Nebula (M27)
Captured with the Alan Young telescope on 5th and 10th Oct 2018 respectively with an exposure of 20 secs.
p-cygni Image – A most distant naked eye star
Captured last Friday with the Alan Young telescope at the CADSAS observatory.
p-cygni is a variable blue super giant, with a visual magnitude of between 4.5 and 5. At a distance of about 6000ly, it is one of the most distant stars visible with the naked eye.
Resilvering The AYT Mirror – Before and After Images
There is some image improvement from the recent resilvering of the 22.5 inch primary mirror of the Alan Young telescope. But still more work to do on the collimation. Examples here …
BEFORE
V452 Image – March 2017
AFTER
V452 Cas Image – Dec 2017 (5 stacked 10s frames)
Primary and Secondary Mirrors Resilvered
I am pleased to report that the Alan Young Telescope at Cranbrook School, is now again in working condition.
Both mirrors of this large reflecting telescope, primary and secondary mirrors, have been re-silvered by Orion Optics.
Here is a photo by Graham Caller,
Mirrors Re-Installed In The Alan Young Telescope
Photo taken just after the mirrors were reinstalled after their recoat by Orion Optics.
Bubble Nebula NGC7635
Another fantastic astro image by CADSAS member Graham Caller. this is NGC7635, the Bubble nebula in Cassiopeia.
He gathered data for this Oct 2016 to Jan 2017. It’s a compilation of 35 single frames with exposure times of 5 minutes for Ha and 10 minutes for SII and OIII – total of 2 hr 55 mins of data capture.
OSH (OIII SII Ha) narrow band filters were used. He has colour mapped them to the RGB channels to give this false colour representation, in order to show a better contrast between the different channels.
OIII (oxygen) – red
SII (sulphur) – green
Ha (hydrogen) – blue
Resilvering The BIG Mirror
This morning, Rod and Ted of the CADSAS committee dismantled parts of the Alan Young telescope to remove the big 22.5″ primary mirror and the smaller secondary mirror.
The mirrors will be sent to Orion Optics very soon.
Orion will re-coat both mirrors. We are hopeful their service will greatly improve the mirrors’ reflectance of light and therefore our imaging results.
Although often still referred to as “silvering”, the Orion recoating does not use silver. The modern and widely accepted Hilux coating, uses aluminium in the mirror coating process.
Come and visit in the Autumn when it’s dark again and see the results.
M13 Globular Cluster Image
An image of the M13 Globular Cluster. Taken 03 April 2017 at 22:23 BST : 15 frames of 10 secs at the Brickfield Observatory, with an 80mm Refractor with ASI 178MC Cooled camera stacked in Deep Sky Stacker.
