Hi Gary, I don't have a lens for it so I don't know how faint it will go "unaided". When I use it with a C-5 I can get down to about mag 10 or so. With luck I'll be borrowing a lens from Kurt shortly and then I'll be able to see how faint the camera will go without a scope. I'll post the results here. patrick On 15 Dec 2009, at 10:38, gwclark@gwclark.com wrote:
Patrick,
In your experience what it the limiting magnitude of the PC164C?
Also, I've been playing with a webcam using a 200 degree door viewer as a fish eye lens. Just a thought.
Thanks,
GW -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] Cheap meteor camera? From: Patrick Wiggins <paw@wirelessbeehive.com> Date: Mon, December 14, 2009 11:15 pm To: Utah Astronomy <utah-astronomy@mailman.xmission.com>
I took advantage of this evening's clear skies to try out the Super Circuits PC88WR (90 degree FOV / 0.003 lux).
Compact and easy to mount using the supplied mounting hardware. Easy to hook up and operate.
I first pointed it at Polaris which barely registered.
Then over to Orion. All of the 7 brightest stars registered but of those the faintest (the belt stars) just barely registered.
So it looks like mag 2 is about as faint as it will go.
I might have thought about keeping it anyway but there was also a very bright hot pixel at lower center. So it's going back with a suggestion the offer a similar camera but with the "guts" of the PC164C which is rated at 0.001 lux.
I have a PC164C but no lens. However a friend has a lens he thinks will fit so I'll be trying that next.
patrick