Polar Orbital Weather Satellite Pictures And Astronomy
Homepage
by Lewis E. Duffing
This web
page first came on-line in 1994, The web page was last updated on 6/18/2007
First, if
you want to learn more about me, click on the link below!
How can you
receive Polar Orbital Satellite pictures like the one shown above??
Well Read On
and Find Out...
The
following links and data will put you in touch with the world of real time
reception of polar orbital weather satellite pictures. This is a fascinating
hobby where you could, if you live on the eastern side of the USA, be the first
to see a picture of an Atlantic Ocean hurricane, even before the USA National
Hurricane Center brings it to the publics attention. However, no matter where
you live in the world, this hobby can be used to obtain satellite weather
pictures twice a day. This is the reason I thought a common page of information
on the world wide web would be
useful. This data can still be used today to receive weather satellite pictures
View
more satellite pictures which I have received
If you have
any questions or comments send mail to:
Lewis E.
Duffing,
Curator of Polar Orbital Weather Satellite Pictures And Astronomy Homepage
MY REMOTE
ASTRONOMY OBSERVATORY
My remote observatory consists of a Technical Innovations RoboDome, http://www.homedome.com mounted on the top
of my addition at the back of my garage by my builder. The dome has so far
performed very well, and I am satisfied with its remote performance. here are
several pictures of my observatory: You can click on each picture to see a
bigger view just use your broser back button to get back here
The dome houses a computer controlled classic Meade LX200 8-inch f10 telescope,
http://www.meade.com which fits perfectly in
the dome. The opening in the top of the dome follows the rotation of the
telescope automatically and I use Software Bisque’s THE SKY program http://www.bisque.com on a refurbished Gateway
http://www.gateway.com computer to point
at the object I wish to observe. I do not observe by eye from inside the dome
it is too small for a person, everything is done by CCD cameras and computer
software.
The LX200 is placed on the standard Meade
Wedge for polar alignment and tracking. The wedge in turn is mounted on a
1” thick aluminum plate which is drilled for four ¾ inch threaded
rods on its edge which extends four feet down to an identical 1” thick
aluminum plate supported on a wooden beam between the walls of my addition.
The wooden beam is a standard prefabricated beam which the builder cut
and installed seven feet above the floor using the two-by-fours of the
additions walls. The beam can support a mans weight and appears to
prevent any vibration from reaching the scope. The wedge can be adjusted for
leveling by moving the plates up and down with ¾ inch nuts and lock
washers. The top plate has a sheet of non-stick aluminum foil glued to its top
to allow more easy adjustment of the wedge azimuth. I used the Drift method
with my CCD camera to refine my polar alignment.Here is a picture of the wooden
beam and the aluminum plates and 3/4 inch threaded rods, and another picture
with the LX200 mounted on the plates
The main LX200 scope is being used with a 0.5 focal reducer so it becomes an f5 8-inch scope. The scope also has a Meade electric focuser installed. The main imager is a SAC 9, a very sensitive B&W CCD camera mounted on an Orion Dielectric Mirror Diagonal since the SAC 9 is too long to allow the LX200 to point to the pole star. The program to control the SAC 9 is AstroVideo a program developed by COAA http://www.coaa.co.uk for using a web camera to take astronomy pictures . The SAC 9 is a very unique camera to quote a SAC-Imaging http://www.sac-imaging.com webpage advertisement, “The new SAC9 is like no other camera on the Market! It combines the uniqueness of the SAC/Mitron with its 2 second live video and a 1/2 “ Sony EX-View HAD CCD chip which makes focusing a snap.” On a good seeing night I can set the SAC 9 up and stream a pseudo-video updated almost in real time over USB 1.1of a deep space object like M51 The Whirlpool Galaxy at magnitude 8.1 and be able to focus and align on it before switching to long exposure mode for my picture. The field of view of this combination is 22 x 16 arc minutes. I wish the SAC 9 was still being made I would have purchased another. Here is some more info on the SAC 9 sac 9.html. Here is an example of how sensitive this camera is this picture is a live capture shot from the SAC 9 while on my 135 mm f5 camera lens, you can easily make out M42 the Orion Nebula
The piggyback finder telescope on the LX200 is a 300 mm to 85 mm f5 Pentax-K mount zoom lens mounted on the DSI-2 camera using a Mogg DSI to Pentax K adapter http://www.moggadapters.com. Mogg is a firm which makes special adapters to install 35 mm camera lenses on a CCD astronomy camera which normally use a “T” mount thread. The field of view at 300 mm zoom is 55 x 74 arc-minutes and at 85 mm zoom it is 195 x 261 arc-minutes. It works quite well as my main finder scope. Click DSI-2.html for more info on the Meade DSI-2. I use Nebulosity a program by Stark Labs http://www.stark-labs.com or the Auto-Star Suite supplied by Meade with the DSI-2 to control the camera. By using this combination I will be able to shoot many of the colored nebula which cover wide sections of the sky. Here is a picture of that combination:
I do have an Orion StarBlast 4.5 inch f4 imaging
newt reflector which I will piggyback latter and couple it to the Meade DSI-2 one-shot Color CCD camera. I modified the Orion StarBlast telescope rack and pinion focusing
mechanism to accept the Orion AccuFocus electronic focuser so I can focus the
telescope remotely. The reason that I have not done this yet is I need to do more work on balancing the LX200 before I proceed. The DSI-2
Orion StarBlast combination would provide a 36 x 49 arc-minutes field of view.
When I mount the Orion StarBlast combination above I will add a second piggyback scope on the Lx200, it will be the 300 mm to 85 mm f5 Pentax-K mount zoom lens monuted on a SAC 4-2 camera using another Mogg adapter designed for a SAC 8. Click SAC 4-2.html for more info on the SAC 4-2 camera. The field of view will be at 300 mm zoom 60 x 76 arc-minutes and at 85 mm zoom 215 x 269 arc-minutes. I will use Catch-42 another program from Stark Labs to control the SAC 4-2 camera. I can also use AstroVideo to control the SAC 4-2 camera.
Here is a picture of this combination on a photo tripod being setup.
Problems and Solutions With My Observatory
The reason I purchased the dome was forced upon me two years ago, at that time
I was setting my scope up in my driveway and using the cameras and the LX200
through a laptop. I found out first hand what happens when the sky is clear
during the winter time. With my medical problems at that time, I am hard
pressed to describe how cold it gets.
I knew I could control the scope remotely if I could extend the RS232 port and
the USB lines out to the driveway. I looked on the Internet and purchased some
reasonably priced USB 1.1 over CAT5 cable extenders to operate the LX200 and
the cameras remotely. This combination allowed me to setup the LX200 in my
driveway up to 150 feet away, and then operate the scope and my SAC 9 from my
computer in the house. The first time I tried that combination I found that I
still spent quite a bit of time just setting up the scope, and if I encountered
a problem, I had to go outside again. In the meantime I also found out that
after dark, during the summer around here, the mosquitoes arrive in such large
numbers that I was getting them in my mouth with each breath. Well I decided
that was no longer a good idea either.
I found a plastic dome on the internet about 1 inch thick 42 inches in diameter
and purchased it. My builder installed that and my telescope wooden mounting
beam at that time. I mounted my scope using the aluminum plates described above
but only needed one foot to raise the LX200 into the dome center. This looked
promising but two things happened, I found my scope over the years had lost
collimination and would not focus on a star. I purchased some adjustment knobs
and believe I have that problem licked. I also found that the dome during the
summer got so hot that I had to cover the scope with a reflective sheet to
protect the electronics. This was almost as bad as other problems I had in the
driveway.
That’s when I looked into a dome. I knew I could not install a large dome
so the RoboDome became my only alternative. I researched the RoboDome and asked
several people who owned one how they liked them. I was able to actually see a
RoboDome locally a short drive away. I purchased the dome last year and my builder
removed the plastic dome and installed the RoboDome last fall in 2006.
The RoboDome came as a freight shipment because of its size. The dome is made
of fiberglass and I was able to move it around easily. I wired it up with no
major problems and it worked the first time after the dome was installed.
I have had no problems with the RoboDome to date. here is a picture of the dome
after it arrived awaiting installation.
The scope in my original configuration was
set up using the original Meade diagonal which was poorly made, the threaded
portion came loose, and I almost lost the SAC 9. I purchased the Orion diagonal
which is better made and reflects light better.
Another problem developed when I purchased the SAC 4-2 one-shot color camera,
it will not function on USB 1.1 it requires USB 2 which is a higher speed USB
port. The Cat5 USB cable extenders only work at USB 1.1 the extenders can run
the Telescope and the SAC 9 but not the SAC 4-2. There are USB 2 Cat5 cable
extenders but they are very expensive. I purchased an inexpensive laptop to run
just the SAC 4-2 but found that I could run it remotely over my home network
but the picture was never clear on my indoor computer monitor. I could just see
what I wanted to take a picture of but could not focus properly because of
resolution differences between the laptop and my main computer monitor.
I investigated on the web and found you can
use Cat5 cable to extend the keyboard video and mouse so-called KVM over Cat5.
I purchased the extenders and a refurbished Gateway computer and placed it in
the garage addition. The Gateway runs the Telescope, the Dome and all the
cameras at the same time and I can use the same monitor for all my computers
using a KVM switch.
I originally tried to use the SAC 4-2 as a finder scope, which I coupled with a
shortened Orion Universal Camera Adapter to an old “T” mount 135 mm
f5 lens from my 35 mm camera days. The reason I needed to have the adapter
modified is the fact that all the CCD astronomy cameras I have used so-far use
the old 35 mm camera “T” mount threads but are not set at the
proper distance from the CCD chip to use a standard “T” mount lens
directly. You need to move the lens mount away from the CCD chip to focus
at Infinity. With this combination I could see stars but not recognize
what I was looking at. I read somewhere that looking through a astronomy CCD
camera was like "searching for a needle in a haystack looking through a
straw". Boy is that a true statement, the camera is more sensitive
than your eye and sees more stars in a smaller area than you can. It does not
help when you have some astigitism to boot.
The 135 mm was also mounted on the LX200 finder scope rail and I could not line
it up with the LX200 scope running in f10 mode. I pulled the SAC 4-2 off and
replaced it with the SAC 9 camera still using the modified Orion Universal
Camera Adapter and found that combination acceptable. I was able, the
first night, to find the Orion Nebula M42 and track it using this 135 mm
scope. I could not find M42 in the main scope using the SAC 4-2 even though
I could see it on the135 mm lens. I thought at the time that my problem was
because the SAC 4-2 was not sensitive enough.
I was reading Sky and Telescope magazine and saw a glowing review of the then
new Meade DSI-2 single shot color CCD camera. It sounded like a solution to my
problem with the SAC 4-12 and I was able to order one from a dealer out west. I
had problems with camera when it arrived and had to send it back to Meade where
I had more problems but finally I got a working camera in late winter.
I placed it on the LX200 and used it several times some results are shown below. When warm weather came I became terribly dissatisfied
with the DSI-2 camera which is un-cooled and produces many hot spots and also
does not appear to very sensitive requiring many minutes of exposure to even
focus or find an object. The main thing I was able to accomplish with the Meade
DSI-2 and the Nebulosity program was to drift align my scope to an acceptable
degree. That’s when I moved the SAC 9 to the main scope and
moved the Meade DSI-2 to its current location.
I purchased the Rails and mounting rings to mount my two piggyback telescopes
from Scope Stuff http://www.scopestuff.com.
More pictures of
the RoboDome both before and after assembly can be found here
I installed some addition devices to c heck weather while uning my dome clouddetector.html
Some Astronomy Pictures
The following pictures of the Moon were made with the SAC 9 on the LX200 at f5 recently. The pictures are actually 50 millisecond captures of the cresent Moon.
Here are some pictures from my Meade DSI-2 mounted on the LX200 at f5.
The first picture of M42 the Orion Nebula was processed with AIP4WIN2 a program supplied in the book "The Handbook of Astronomical Image Processing"2 edition, by Richard Berry and James Burnell after being combined from the summed captured RGBL Fits images by the AutoStar image processing suite. The second image is of M3 a globular cluster it is summed but not processed, the larger picture looks very much like what I have seen in my eyepiece of M3. The third picture is of M51 the Whirlpool Galaxy also summed but not processed.
The following picture of Saturn was taken in 2006 using a SAC 4-2 and the AstroVideo program for capture and processing, I do not remember how many frames were used for this picture.The SAC 4-2 was barlowed at 2X on the LX200 giving a focal length of 4000 mm and a f20 scope. The picture was cropped to the current size.
Here are four 1996 pictures of COMET HYAKUTAKE C/1996 B2
taken with ASA 400 Film in a 35 mm camera, a 50 mm standard lens and a cable
release on my standard tripod. Click on the picture for a larger view. Use your
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