Congratulations Patrick! Your offer to help others into the science & discovery in astronomy tremendous. For those of you that are thinking of doing a bit of science with your telescope there is a whole new world out there that brings great rewards. Cindy & I have been doing science with our telescopes for over 8 years and during that time she has discovered four planets around other stars, and has published in refereed journals 7 papers. She didn't write these papers but was co-author, along with other amateurs and professionals, on all of them because her discovery data was used in the detection. I follow cataclysmic variable stars with another group and have published 6 papers in refereed journals. The publication part is partial reward for doing the work however, the great payoff is when analyzing your data in the morning, you realize that you have discovered something that no one else has seen. It sends chills up your spine. Patrick, you know that feeling. There are many avenues that can be pursued with amateur equipment: Measuring the timing variations of eclipsing binary stars Measuring the rotation period of cataclysmic variable stars systems Measuring the rotation and even discovering the shape of asteroids Discovering new asteroids Super nova discovery Discovery and measurement of variable stars Discovery of exoplanets The list goes on and on. It is hard and precise work but the rewards great. I would encourage any that have the desire to get involved. There are many organizations out there that will help you: AAVSO http://www.aavso.org/ IAU Minor Planet Center http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/iau/mpc.html The Center for Backyard Astrophysics http://cbastro.org/ The Minor Planet Observer http://www.minorplanetobserver.com/ The society for Astronomical Sciences http://www.socastrosci.org/ If you would like to add to your enjoyment of astronomy and want to try your hand at science, I would be happy to help you get started. E-mail me privately and I'll give you a hand. Jerry Foote ScopeCraft, Inc. 4175 E. Red Cliffs Dr. Kanab, UT 84741 435-899-1255 jfoote@scopecraft.com