The Liverpool Astronomical Society

Alright King Comet?! just a thought, is there a magnification adjustment on one of the eyepieces? I have a pair and the right hand eyepice has a magnification adjustment on it. Set that to zero and if the images still dont marry up, your binos need collimating mate. I dont have a clue how you do it, but mine need collimating!

Welcome Oonagh! The tenacity of the aurora is dependent on the activity of the sun. At the moment we are in one of the lowest periods of activity (the sun has 11 year cycles). Apparently if conditions are just right and the sun has had a particularly violent outburst (or coronal mass ejection!),you can see the aurora from southern england.
I have seen the aurora once, on one of the flights you mentioned.They said there was an 80% chance of seeing it during the flight. We flew to Iceland airspace and the pilot did figure-of-eights so both sides of the plane could see. It looked like a bright green ribbon, quite thin on the horizon and if you followed it right round, you could tell that it was curving, following the curvature of the earth. It was like slow moving clouds in that it didn't dramatically flicker in front of your eyes, it just seemed to gradually change.
I am reliably informed that amateur astronomers from the far north of europe are not huge fans of the aurora because it interferes with their observing!

Ha, ha, ha brilliant!!! Nice one Brian!

Looked for the comet last night and saw a bright yellow star in perseus. Through binoculars it looked like a globular cluster does in a telescope. Is this the comet? I checked a star chart to make sure there are no globulars in perseus and there didnt appear to be any. Does anybody know why the comet has flared so violently?

Hi Mark,
What about a forecast from Metcheck for the observatory coordinates, or just Liverpool generally? I've noticed on their website, they say you can add Metcheck "stickies" to your own website for free.
I always check the LAS website and the astronomy section of Metcheck everyday after work to see if its gonna be worth lugging the scope out of the shed!

Alex

Hello everyone, sorry I havent been up to the observatory for a while - been on holiday!
Managed to sort a night out at the Centre for Observational Astronomy in the Algarve whilst on holiday. The centre is run by an English couple, Bev and Jan Ewan-Smith and has four domes and  B&B facilities. They have 8", 10", 12" and half-metre reflectors and CCDs and SLRs for imaging.
Despite the moon being at 98% of full, I still managed to view a number of Deep Sky objects. Bev helped me in the main dome with the half-metre reflector and I tell you something - this bloke can star hop! He asked me what I wanted to look at and he could find it in less than 90 seconds!
The sky from so far south was a little different from here in the UK, could see all of scorpius and sagittarius and they dont have many circumpolar constellations like we do. Even with the moon relatively high the light grasp of the telescope enabled me to see the lagoon nebula, the swan/omega nebula, the ring nebula, the dumbell nebula, the supernova remnant the veil nebula and another part called the eastern veil, the cats eye nebula, M13, M92, loads of open clusters, the ET cluster, M31 Andromeda, jupiter and antares - which looked awesome through such a big scope - the colour was so vivid it looked like a ruby. M51 the whirlpool galaxy was a bit disappointing as it was quite washed out by the moon. It was a shame because I would have liked to have tried imaging it. We looked at a few other things but I can't remember what they were. All in all a good nights observing even with the moon so bright! You get a free yearly observation listings book by Paul Money when you stay aswell. Comfy room, friendly and knowledgable hosts, nice fresh food, even arrived just as fresh cakes were coming out of the oven - result! They passed me a few of their newsletters, which I'll bring to the observatory on Wednesday, there's some brilliant Deep Sky photographs taken from COAA on them.
I would recommend COAA to any fellow astronomers!!

Its probably gonna continue into september aswell! Long range forecasts on the met office website predict a wetter summer than the average last ten years, slightly cooler aswell.

Oh well, at least its good for the gardens. Thing is, cos everythings shooting up so much, my horizon is gonna end up higher in the winter!

Alright James!
The main scope is a 16inch dobsonian, but theres a 12inch meade lx200 for imaging and a 30inch dobsonian which is the size of a bus, plus loads of people take their own scopes.
It was Brendan that showed me the planetary nebulae the other night.
I managed to find the M57 Ring Nebula last night, even though it was still twilight. Thats the first time I've seen a planetary nebula in my own scope! Checked out the Albireo binary system aswell.
Thanks Brendan for showing me what to look for and where to look!

Hello James,
I am pretty new to the forum aswell. I got the bottle up to go to the Society observatory last week and I went for the second time last night. Weather was awful the first time, but I ended up staying til after 1am last night looking at planetary nebulae. It was the first time I've ever seen them with my own eyes!
The monthly magazines that come out all have pretty good monthly star maps and things to look out for during the month.
A 6" reflector is a pretty powerful scope, especially for a first scope. You should be able to cover most areas with that (lunar, planetary, stellar, deep sky).
Welcome to the forum mate!
Al

Made my first trip to meet everyone on wednesday night, up at the observatory. Was a little nervous when I was outside, it's a proper observatory with a dome and everything! it looks a bit daunting from outside, but its really nice inside.

Once inside everyone introduced themselves and we had tea and biscuits before I got the grand tour of the library and offices and the observatory dome itself. Everyone was brilliant, very knowledgeable and really friendly. There was no awkward silences or anything, just constant chat and there was always 2 or 3 conversations going on at any time. I was well impressed with the sheer power of the equipment, especially the 16inch and 30 inch dobs and the Meade scope.

There was over a dozen people who turned up, even though the all the weather consisted of was relentless rain and complete cloud cover.

Im just writing this post to encourage anyone thinking of coming along to turn up, I was made up I did! See you all next Wednesday, fingers crossed for better weather!

Just saw the ISS pass over, bang on time! Wow that thing moves fast! Considering its altitude, I wasnt  expecting it to move that fast. Very bright aswell. Managed to get it in binoculars, but couldnt discern any shape. Just an orangey yellow colour. How on earth did you manage to track it with a Dobsonian??!!!

After reading David's message for John, I tried looking for the ISS last night, didnt see it, but I think I was a bit late looking. Stumbled across jupiter though! Didnt think it was that easily visible as it was meant to be low on the southern horizon. It wasnt that low! I think it was at opposition a couple of days ago, so its still pretty close and very bright!

Seeing wasn't very good as it was reasonably low down so atmospheric turbulence made it look very "wavy!" It was also right behind a new high pressure sodium streetlight and I think this washed it out a fair bit. Could see the red belts and the yellow globe and four of the moons. So sure I saw the great red spot in a very brief instant of good seeing. The time was around 00:00 to 00:10. Does anybody know if it transited jupiter at this time or was it just "wishful seeing"!!!!!! Gonna have a look for M13 over this weekend, weather permitting!

Should be making my first visit to the observatory on Wed, I haven't been able to make it for the last couple of weeks.

Congratulations David on your wedding anniversary!

Hello everybody! Im new to this forum, in fact it's the only forum I've ever posted a message on!

I have a profound interest in astronomy and what was a hobby as a young child has returned with a vengeance over the last few months! I got a 10 inch dob in march and started re-learning the sky.

I've been well impressed at some of the things I have seen from my light polluted back garden in Wirral. Ive watched the moons orbit around the rings of saturn, watched the phases of venus, even caught mercury recently! I couldn't believe the detail on the moon the first time I used the dob on it, I felt like I was there. Ive found elliptical galaxies in virgo, the huge orion nebula, some clusters in cassiopeia. After three nights of trying I even found the whirlpool galaxy, but was dissapointed because through the layers of light pollution, it just looked like two grey clouds.

I even managed to get on one of those night flights to see the aurora last february and sure enough I saw a beautiful green aurora, arcing round the sky. I wish we could see them from Merseyside!

Every time I look up, I can hardly believe the beauty and variation of everything up there. It's so humbling to think that even when you're sitting down to you're dinner at half one on a monday afternoon , saturn is still grinding round above you're head and in turn it's moons are grinding on their mechanical orbits around saturn, which in turn is orbiting the sun, which is orbiting round the milky way, which is orbiting other galaxies in the local cluster. Every time I look through the eyepiece it's almost a religious experience and you do sort of feel you're place in the cosmos, because you're part of it, standing there watching the universe dance in front of your eyes!

Anyway, basically I would very much like to join the Society and to meet up with other people who share the same interest. I read in this months Sky At Night that there is an observing evening at your observatory in Pex Hill and I wondered if I could come along and join in?! Ive read some other posts and think I understand how the joining procedure works. Do I just turn up a couple of times and apply after that? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks for your time everybody and hello!