- Utah-Astronomy - mailman.xmission.com

FOR SALE: Byers Stepper Motor Drive Control
by Chuck Hards 18 Jan '16

18 Jan '16

I'm selling a rare Byers Stepper Motor Drive Control. See my ad here: http://www.cloudynights.com/classifieds/item/70485-byers-stepper-motor-driv… This is perfect for either an observatory-mounted scope that uses stepper motors, or a large portable scope. Not for AC synchronous motors. Terrific unit for both the practical observer as well as Byers collector. I'd be willing to cut a deal for a local buyer. Will meet you halfway up to 100 miles. Thanks for looking!

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Morning Sky
by Chuck Hards 11 Jan '16

11 Jan '16

I noticed Antares low in the southeast this morning, for the first time this year! Can spring be far off? ;-)

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Comet C/2013 US10 Catalina
by Dave Gary 02 Jan '16

02 Jan '16

Took a quick photo of Comet C/2013 US10 Catalina. The bright star below the comet is Arcturus. The comet appears to be getting dimmer. It seemed noticeably dimmer visually. However, Moon is still fairly bright and Arcturus is quite bright. > https://www.flickr.com/photos/78046474@N06/23479438043/in/dateposted-public/ <https://www.flickr.com/photos/78046474@N06/23479438043/in/dateposted-public/> Dave

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The serendipitous discovery of a possible new solar system object with ALMA
by Dave Gary 18 Dec '15

18 Dec '15

Have you guys seen or heard anything about this? It’s pretty weird. On the right-hand side of the page under “Current browse context” if you hit “next” there’s another article related to this. > http://arxiv.org/abs/1512.02650?context=astro-ph.SR <http://arxiv.org/abs/1512.02650?context=astro-ph.SR> Dave

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The serendipitous discovery of a possible new solar system, object with ALMA
by John M. Craig 18 Dec '15

18 Dec '15

Pretty wild. It's hard to imagine that something as big and relatively close as that would have been missed by the IR satellite telescopes that have surveyed the sky. But given the options that the abstract offers for the possible distances (haven't had time to look at the whole paper), it's kind of hard to know what to think. Next thing to do would might be to have Arecibo bounce a radar signal off it. If the ALMA team's size estimate isn't wildly off, then that should be possible and that'd nail down the distance neatly. If there's no return signal, then it's got to be farther away than 25 AU, doesn't it? Given the proper motion they've identified, at least they won't likely lose track of it! It'll be interesting to see what follow-up observations are able to reveal. John

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Sky Safari 5 Pro on sale
by Joel Stucki 17 Dec '15

17 Dec '15

If you do not have a planetarium software for your phone yet, Sky Safari 5 Pro is on sale for 50% off at $19.99. This is for IPhone but there is a android version likely on sale also. Well worth every penny.

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Planetary Discovery
by Joan Carman 17 Dec '15

17 Dec '15

Looks legit http://centurylink.net/tv/3/player/vendor/CNN/player/cnn/asset/cnn-closest_…

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Southern Hemisphere Objects
by Brent Watson 13 Dec '15

13 Dec '15

Now that I have a telescope and am in the southern hemisphere, I am starting a "bucket list" of objects to observe here. So far, here is my list:NGC253NGC216947 TucanaeLMCSMCTarantula NebulaCoal SackAlpha CentauriOmega CentauriCentaurus AEta Carina I am soliciting additions to this list. Please think of the objects that sound interesting to you but you can't see from North America. Add to this list so that I can observe them for you. I am also interested in objects some of you may have seen while you were in the more southerly climes. Wayne Sumner, this means you - among others. BTW, my scope is a 10 inch f4.7 Sky Watcher collapsible dob. I'll cross post this to Facebook also, so don't get too upset if you see it twice. Thanks,Brent

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Orion Nebula 12 December 2015
by Dave Gary 13 Dec '15

13 Dec '15

Took this last night with a new little camera I purchased, the ZWO ASI120MC-S. It’s a little lunar/planetary camera. There weren’t any planets worth photographing at 21:00 last night, so I swung the 80mm scope over to something bright, the Orion Nebula. It was a little tricky to achieve any reasonable focus with the camera attached to such a small-aperture scope, but I figured it out, eventually. I’ll use the camera with one of my larger-aperture scopes next time. You can just barely make out the Trapezium in this photo. This was a 15-second exposure, no stacking, adjust-the-edit-sliders-in-iPhoto sort of affair. Hopefully, when I get the included software figured out, I’ll be able to get some good shots with this camera. Of course, I may be long dead before that happens. The photo after this one (in my photostream on Flickr) is the first-light photo I shot of Moon on 3 December. Dave > https://www.flickr.com/photos/78046474@N06/23638902191/in/dateposted-public/ <https://www.flickr.com/photos/78046474@N06/23638902191/in/dateposted-public/>

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Southern Hemisphere Objects
by baxman2＠q.com 12 Dec '15

12 Dec '15

Could we see some photos of these Southern Hemisphere viewed astronomical wonders.

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