DeepskyWim

On May 4, 2023, I ordered the Howie Glatter Cable Sling.  The Howie Glatter sling is a new support for the primary mirror of my 18" Obsession.  It has a few advantages over the standard Kevlar sling: Stability and Consistency: The main advantage of the Howie Glatter Cable Sling is that it provides stable support for the primary mirror, because the cable sling doesn’t stretch or slip off the mirror. Equal Mass Distribution: The cable sling has equal mass on both sides of the cable, which helps to reduce astigmatism. By maintaining balance, the cable sling minimizes any distortions caused by uneven weight distribution. Edge Support: The Howie Glatter Cable Sling restrains the mirror to its lowest equilibrium position, eliminating sideways miscollimation. The Howie Glatter sling ensures better collimation and overall performance. The edge support ensures that the mirror remains properly aligned during an observation session. The Howie Glatter sling arrived on September 25, 2023.  It

The interior of my Obsession's mirror box is not entirely black.  I am unsure whether it has always been this way or whether the black paint has faded over time.  I still had a lot of black adhesive felt lying around from a previous project.  I applied this adhesive felt to the mirror box of the Obsession telescope, making it considerably darker than before.  This will undoubtedly improve the contrast of the faint objects I intend to observe.  Part of the mirror box with adhesive felt, a part is still with the original paint. Adhesive felt installed in the mirror box. The original paint in the mirror box.

The secondary mirror of my Obsession telescope really needed a new coating.  When looking at it, I could see the back of the mirror through the coating.  I sent the mirror on August 11 to MCM Optique  in France to be recoated.  However, my secondary mirror had a strange di-electrical original coating (with probably 40 - 50 layers of ZrO 2 - SiO 2 ).  This made it impossible to remove the original coating from the mirror.   Alain from MCM Optique measured the reflectivity of the mirror at different wavelengths, which made it clear that certainly at the blue parts of the spectrum, the reflectivity had become very low.  Also in the green (around 500nm) and in the red, the secondary mirror was below what is needed to observe.   The reflectivity of the secondary mirror Alain proposed to cover the existing mirror with a new layer of aluminum, without removing the old coating.  This is not the best solution, but the quality of the newly coated mirror seemed to be very good.   The mirror was s

During the weekend of September 9 and 10, it was possible to visit the radio telescopes in Humain (Belgium).  It was the first time since the site was opened in 1953 that a visit was possible.  The station is used by the  Royal Observatory of Belgium .  A solar interferometer of 48 radio telescopes was build in the 1960s.  The telescopes are not used anymore since 2001.  All telescopes are have a diameter of 4 meter and are located at a height of 293 above sea level.   A few larger telescopes are still in use at the site.  Enjoy the pictures!

On August 30, 2023 we installed an ASA AZ800 telescope in the observatory at work, at the  Institute of Astronomy  of KU Leuven .  The telescope will be one of the telescopes of the MARVEL project, an array of four telescope we will install on the Roque de los Muchachos in La Palma,  It was a very rainy day, but we managed to put the telescope in the observatory.  Enjoy some of the pictures! The upper part of the telescope in the corridor. The lower part of the telescope ready for lifting up. The lower part of the telescope going up. The lower part of the telescope entering the dome. The upper part of the telescope entering the dome. The installed telescope.

August 9: Testing the eFinder August 9 was (finally) a clear night in Belgium.  During our holidays to Italy,  I did not take my telescope, because there is a lot of light pollution at the locations we visited.   I started observing at 23:30 and finished around 1:30.  The temperature dropped from 12.7°C  to 10.7°C, while the humidity increased from 85% to 92%.  The night was quite humid, but the dew control was working without problems.  The SQM was 20.28, which is a decent value for our garden. Since September last year, I am building a eFinder (see AstroKeith's pages , GitHub ).  I am preparing a separate blog post on the eFinder later this year (or the beginning of next year), but I need to do some extra tests firsts.  This observing session was used to do a lot of tests with the eFinder.   The eFinder is a small RaspBerry Pi computer, with an ZWO ASI camera attached to it. A small handpad is used as user interface (a VNC connection to the RaspBerry Pi is also possible).  The

On a very hot July 20, we visited Campo Imperatore, a vast high plateau located in the Abruzzo region of Italy. It is part of the Gran Sasso massif, the highest mountain range in the Apennines.  The scenery is stunning, and when we parked our car to go for a hike, we saw the Osservatorio astronomico di Campo Imperatore.  The observatory is located about an hour and a half drive from the town of Castiglione Messer Raimondo, were we stayed for a few days.  The road to the observatory is full of  and mountainous, but the views are stunning. The plateau is about 20 kilometers long and 7 kilometers wide. It is surrounded by high mountain peaks, including the Corno Grande, the highest mountain in the Apennines.  The Osservatorio astronomico di Campo Imperatore (Astronomical Observatory of Campo Imperatore) is one of the most important astronomical observatories in Italy. It is located in the Abruzzo region, at an altitude of 2,150 meters above sea level. The observatory is known for its exce

We spent a day in Firenze on July 2, 2023, during our summer vacation. The city is beautiful, but it is very crowded and it can be very hot. Besides its stunning architecture, the Galileo Museum is also worth a visit. As astronomers, both professional and amateur, we couldn't miss the opportunity to learn more about Galileo Galilei and his instruments. The sundial outside the Galileo Museum in Firenze is a monumental sundial that was built in 2007.  On the side facing the Arno river, a lizard indicates the noon and the month of the year.  The shadow the sundial casts on the street also shows the noon and the month. The sundial outside of the Galileo Museum, showing true noon and the month The Galileo Museum in Firenze is a museum dedicated to the life and work of Galileo Galilei, one of the most important scientists in history. The museum is housed in the Palazzo Castellani, an 11th-century building located in the heart of Firenze.  In the different rooms of the museum, different i

 Today, we had a nice 22 degree halo display at home.

While at work today, we witnessed a magnificent halo in the sky, accompanied by two brilliantly shining sundogs. We stepped outside to bask in the beauty of the spectacle on the roof of our building.  The halo and the two bright sundogs Moreover, we were fortunate to witness a stunning circumzenithal arc for the very first time.  The bright circumzenithal arc On our way back home, we were also able to catch a glimpse of an upper tangent arc.  As we were at work, we took the pictures using our smartphones and a Canon Powershot SX740 HS. Enjoying the halo

On March 1, 2023, there was a nice conjunction of Venus and Jupiter.  The view of the two brightest planets so close to each other (around 40') could not be missed.  In Belgium, we were blessed with cloudless weather already a few days before the conjunction.  A lot of people could see the two planets coming closer each day.  Enjoy some of the pictures of the event! Venus, Jupiter and the 4 Galilean moons on March 2, 2023 Venus and Jupiter on March 2, 2023 Venus and Jupiter during the conjunction on March 1, 2023 Venus and Jupiter on February 28, 2023

I was on La Palma from January 15 to January 21 for a technical mission at the Mercator telescope.  The weather was not very good, but I managed to get out the Orion Skyquest XT12i IntelliScope  we have in the Mercator building on the first evening I was there.   I forgot already that the sky is so unbelievably good from the Roque de los Muchachos.  There was quite some wind, but I could hide behind the car, so the wind did not disturb me that much.  The telescope has a right angle finder and a telrad, but the batteries of the telrad were empty, so I could not use the telrad.  Pointing the telescope with only a right angle finder is very difficult, so it was not easy to find the objects I was looking for.  It was quite cold, with a temperature of 2.3° when I started observing around 19h40 and a temperature of 3.7° when I stopped around 22h15.  The humidity fell from 57.5% to 33.2% and the wind speed was around 6 m/s.  I did not observe for a very long time, because I had to wake up ve

On October 25, we could enjoy a small solar eclipse from Belgium.  At the maximum, 19.5% of the Sun was obscured.  The weather was not perfect, but most of the clouds only appeared after the maximum.   The eclipse around maximum As the Sun was not high enough in the sky yet to be seen from our backyard, we set up everything in front of our house.  We invited some of the neighbours to have a look through our eclipse glasses.   In full action I used  Solar Eclipse Maestro  to automate taking the pictures to make a timelapse.  Sadly, Solar Eclipse Maestro does not work anymore with newer versions of macOS, so I had to install an old version of macOS in a virtual machine.  I used my  Canon EOS 80D  with the  Canon EF70-300mm f/4-5.6L IS USM .  I fear that I did not focus good enough, so that is something I have to take into account during the next solar eclipse!  Anyway, the pictures are still good enough to make a timelapse.   I also tried the  Skywatcher AZ-GTi  mount for the first time