The Dome is Open
I am sitting at my observatory on a perfectly clear night. The Julian Day is 2453829. I’m currently pointing at M67, getting some data in V, Rc and Ic filters. This is a field often used for photometric calibration (which is what I’m using it for!). M67 transits in a few minutes, so I’ll get data on hour of either side of the zenith and that should be plenty.
After that I am getting a few data points in V on a couple of blazars, MRK 421 and W Com. I had been doing time-series on these but I generally haven’t had enough time to demonstrably show variability in that amount of time. Instead I am just getting a dozen or so frames and averaging them to get one high-quality data point per night.
After that I am doing a long time-series run on GSC 3047-176, which is a double-mode RR Lyrae star that I have looked at quite extensively. I’m interested in mapping out as much of the rather bizarre light curve as I can.
Then, time permitting, I’ll grab some data on SS433, which is not a system I am familiar with and is the subject of an AAVSO Special Notice.
Should be a fun night! So far so good...
Monday, April 3, 2006