From: "Tim" <tjp314@pacbell.net>

Date: January 10, 2007 11:48:05 AM MST

To: Astro_IIDC@yahoogroups.com

Subject: Re: New Luna Images

Milton:

I like the results you're getting with the color flea2!  (especially

since I now have one).

I noticed your remark about ice crystals on the corrector.  I have

this  problem with my C-8 as well, for which I don't have a dew

remover (like I do for the 9.25", but that's not currently mobile).

When I was in Utah in October, I had 5 nights at about 20° F.  The

first night was the most humid (high desert at around 5000ft, usually

dry), and I was trying long exposures with various cameras.  I slept

during the exposures, and when I went out to put the equipment away,

the corrector on the C-8 and the objectives on the Jaegers 6" and

Megrez 80 were completely opaque there was so much ice on them.  I put

them in the spare bedroom in the house without the covers on, so they

could defrost and dry.

At home, when I'm using the C-8 in humid conditions, I actually use a

heat gun to remove the dew, being very careful to keep it moving and

hold it a foot or more away from the corrector.

-Tim.

--- In Astro_IIDC@yahoogroups.com, "Milton Aupperle" <milton@...> wrote:

Hi Folks;

Despite some issues with my HEQ5 mount (it really doesn not like -20°

Centigrade weather), I still managed to get a little bit of imaging in

over X-Mas.

Here is the 15 day old moon and a detailed strip along the western limb.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Astro_IIDC/files/Lunar/20070104_MJA_Luna.jpg

It's scaled down by 50% from the original and was shot using a color

Flea2 1032x776 camera with a Focal Reducer on the C8 (1000 mm focal

length). Seeing was about 5 to 6 / 10 turbulence, but I had 50 to 70

km surface winds blowing the mount around. It's a composite of 14

movies for the full disk and the details strip is another 9 movies.

Exposure times were 3 ms per frames, so you can pretty well freeze out

any turbulence.

And here are the normal and enhanced color images of the 7 day old

moon at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Astro_IIDC/files/Lunar/20061227_MJA_Luna.jpg

I also managed to capture the Valentine Dome then too.

TTYL..

Milton Aupperle