[category
astronomy-report]
Name: Rob Hunt
Crew: 291
Date: 31/01/2024
MUSK OBSERVATORY (MO)
Solar Features Observed: Sun spots observed, imaged for processing later
Problems Encountered:
09:30
excellent blue-sky day, no wind, no clouds, temp. ~14o C, RH ~35%,
bashed top of head entering door – again. This time it drew a small amount of blood that stopped very quickly. Since I’m Crew Medical Assist, and Crew MO was not available, I returned to the HAB, disinfected it and applied a dressing. Incident recorded to MO,
I suggest write sign on inside and outside of door saying “Mind your head”,
shutter, and azimuth dome motors worked well,
at first the ‘scope Hand Control didn’t follow normal menu presentation so I power cycled at the pier and then ‘scope slewed to target.
10:05
subsequently, the first power-up resulted in the ‘scope perfectly with the Sun centered in field of view,
as yesterday, live view is fuzzy and I can’t achieve granular surface of chromosphere,
as for all of these observing sessions, a large, fuzzy ‘plume’ is seen on one side of the target in the eyepiece.
11:10
granular view of chromosphere still not being achieved despite tweaking tuners as Observatory Manager suggested,
while tweaking settings the ‘plume’ was seen in a number of the SharpCap captures,
something’s not right,
primary lens/filter was photographed to include in condition report of scratch and smudge noticed on 22nd Jan but not reported until now,
11:40
ran first capture at 50/2.16/80 (Gain/Exp/Histo),
ran several more captures at various settings.
14:00
‘scope reached limit of tracking ability so I stopped, packed up and returned to HAB,
data processing will be done at a later time.