Observers' Forum

Edited by John Isles (ILS), Michigan

This is the place where you can share observing experiences, make suggestions, ask for advice, and sound off on any topic likely to interest other observers. Material for inclusion in Observers' Forum should be sent to the editor:

John Isles, 11105 Tremont Lane, Plymouth, MI 48170
e-mail: jisles@voyager.net

In this Observers' Forum we are pleased to have interesting contributions from Jeremy Knowles, Mike Simonsen, Richard Huziak, Fraser Farrell, Michel Lerman and Chris Stephan.

On Hearing David Levy at the AAVSO Fall Meeting 2000

He told of starry skies above
and the joy in our hearts-can you call it love?
Was it love of the sky that brought us here?
Or, better, the love of truth so clear?
But without the stars and planets, too,
what would our space crews and poets do?
Astronomy has plenty of books,
soon obsolete, it seems, by the looks
of all the dust-enveloped tomes
you can see stacked up around our homes.
Computers, too, so soon replaced-
the pride and the power so interlaced.
We share our thoughts in discussion group;
when there's news, we'll not be out of the loop.
But the greatest joy is not far from home,
when our minds swirl our thoughts as the oceans foam.

Mike's Top Ten Variable Stars

[Actually Eleven. Rival lists will be welcomed by the editor!-ILS]

1. CY Lyr-(UGSS) My favorite field and star. Located in the midst of a small open cluster in Lyra, this is a favorite stop of mine. Even if the star is not in outburst I get to visit this neat little cluster in my nightly run. CY goes into outburst quite often, so chances of seeing it and making a positive estimate are always good.
2. RX And-(UGZ) Located almost due east of M31 in And, this one is an easy find. You can actually use M31 to hop from to get to this field. RX is a Z Cam type star. It has frequent outbursts sometimes, and other times it just hovers near minimum or gets stuck halfway down from maximum. It is usually visible in my 10" even near minimum (~14.3), so I can follow the antics of this unpredictable star through its whole cycle.
3. SS Cyg-(UGSS) The prototype of UGSS stars, this one is always visible from minimum to maximum in my scope. It has fairly frequent outbursts and seems to be quite restless at minimum, so you never know what to expect from this guy from night to night. The AAVSO frequently asks for monitoring of this system to alert teams of scientists who want to observe SS Cyg with satellite telescopes when it goes into outburst. This alone makes it interesting to keep track of.
4. V1062 Cyg-(UG?) There is debate in some circles whether this star even exists. I swear I have seen it in outburst once, but its identification is clouded by the fact that it lies in a field with many faint stars of nearly the same brightness as V1062 would be at maximum. Even though it is on the same chart as V1060 Cyg (which almost all the CV junkies watch), not many pay attention to this one. After convincing my Polish friend Maciej to start monitoring this star, he dubbed it "the Bloody Simonsen Star," owing to the difficulties described above in observing it. Getting named after me puts it at #4 on my list!
5. V1504 Cyg-(UGSU) This one is a UG SU UMa type, which means it has normal outbursts and "superoutbursts" that are brighter and last longer. I can rarely glimpse this star during a normal outburst, but when it gets brighter in a superoutburst I can see it and make positive estimates near the limit of my scope. The real reason it makes the list is that it is the first field in which I was able to see a legitimate 15th magnitude comparison star. On very clear nights when Cygnus is overhead, the 15.0 stars in this field are visible in the 10".
6. U Gem-(UG) This is the prototype of all U Gem dwarf novae and the first one discovered. This alone puts it on the list. But this is another star that I am able to follow well through its entire cycle. At minimum it hovers around 13.9-14.3 and it goes into outburst about twice a year. Making positive estimates at minimum is always a challenge. At maximum it is one of the brightest of the dwarf novae.
7. V651 Mon-(PN) This star is actually the central star of a planetary nebula in Monoceros. It hasn't shown much activity in a long time, but getting there is easy thanks to a group of stars that form an arrow-like asterism. When you arrive, you can spend some time eking out the details of the nebula as well as making a positive observation of the star. The nebula presents its own challenges in making observations of this one, so be careful.
8. KT Per-(UGZ) Another Z Cam-type star with unpredictable outbursts and standstills. It lies almost due west of M76, the Little Dumbbell in Perseus. FO Per and TZ Per are other favorites in this constellation.
9. R Leo-(Mira) This long-period variable was the first one I was able to locate and make an estimate of, so it holds a place in my heart and memory for that alone. I don't observe it regularly any more, but I see it in my finder often while hunting down X Leo, a cataclysmic variable in the same field.
10. QY Per-(UGSU) On a very cold December night, while trying out a new eyepiece I got for Christmas, I detected a rare outburst of this star. It is included in the BAAVSS Recurrent Objects Program, so I knew it was of interest to amateurs and professionals alike. Its type was not known until it was studied in some detail after my detection of its most recent outburst, so my observation proved to be of some immediate scientific value. Being mentioned in an IAU Circular was also an unexpected thrill.
11. R LMi-(Mira) This star was my "bad luck" star for a long time. It seemed like every time I tried to observe this LPV something bad would happen: the corrector plate would frost over, the eyepiece would cloud up, my pen would fall in the snow, my chart would blow away, or someone would drive up with headlights glaring. It lies at the end of a little string of stars that form a question-mark asterism, and it varies quite a bit in its minimum magnitude, so it is interesting to follow. I consider myself lucky to make an observation without the dome blowing off or something!

Millennium Star Atlas Errors and Omissions

When I first purchased my Millennium Star Atlas (MSA), first edition, I was absolutely overjoyed with the quality and detail in the Atlas. A friend, Dale Jeffrey, said his copy of the Atlas "added two inches to his telescope's aperture," and indeed I found the same. The accuracy of plotting and detail of extra-galactic objects made finding and identifying faint fuzzy things a whole lot easier.

However, deep-sky observing is not my only interest. When I began to use the Atlas for variable star location by my usual method of star-hopping, I became amazed at the number of brighter variable stars that were either plotted and not labeled with the variable's name, or not plotted at all.

When I contacted Roger Sinnott, MSA co-editor, of Sky & Telescope magazine, he explained that there were a few factors that resulted in these problems. For one, the Hipparcos satellite did not detect all the variables, since either the variation was not significant enough to be detected, or the variable was too dim during the mission to be detected. Another reason was that the median magnitude of variation was chosen for the star's dot size, and those stars for which the median magnitude was not brighter than ninth magnitude were rejected. This apparently deleted some brighter objects, such as R Cas, from the list. Sky & Telescope made an effort to plot many of the variables that were "missed," but obviously many were still overlooked.

Don't get me wrong. The MSA is still an absolutely wonderful atlas, and the errors and omissions seem, hopefully, to be minor in nature. Even so, some of the decisions made either consciously or unconsciously by the editors are not welcome in my mind. For example, why should a ninth-magnitude cutoff be chosen for variable stars when the Atlas has stars as faint as eleventh magnitude? I'd rather see a deeper cutoff to prevent spurious "nova discoveries" when a bright, unplotted variable star all of a sudden appears. Also, only galaxies and deep-sky objects with a limiting magnitude of 13.5 were plotted, which means that only part of the NGC catalogue is represented, whereas in smaller atlases, such as Uranometria 2000.0, the NGC catalogue is mostly present. However, all deep-sky objects to that limiting magnitude are plotted in MSA, so it has less catalogue bias. But my humble opinion is that in an atlas with such precision-and considering that deep-sky observers and equipment demand fainter objects-this Atlas could shine by plotting fainter objects.

My resulting errors list can be found on the web at http://prana.usask.ca/~sarty/astronomy.html#MSA, but those without internet access can write to me for a copy at 709 Sixth Avenue North, Saskatoon, SK, Canada S7K 2S8.

How my errors and omissions project got started deserves a few words. I began comparing AAVSO charts with the MSA to see if Hipparcos had identified any of the AAVSO-chart suspected variables as real variables that could be then added to my observing list. (Over the years, AAVSO observers have suspected variation on hundreds of comparison stars-see the AAVSO validation file for those stars-generally listed as something like "131 comp N".) After comparing more than 2000 variable star charts with the MSA, I found that virtually none of the suspected variables were detected by Hipparcos! This was a great surprise, but the by-product of the effort was the identification of hundreds of non-plotted variables in MSA and a large number of discrepancies on the AAVSO charts that need to be sorted out, and which have now been reported to Charles Scovil.

I also plotted all known variables onto the AAVSO charts as well, for a future observing project. The errors list represents that effort, along with some input from variable star observer Noel Peattie of California, who identified many other discrepancies after I posted the initial problem-star list on the AAVSO Discussion List in March 2000.

My hopes for this list are many, but I also feel I am opening a can of worms. I know I have only touched on the subject of non-labeled variables. There must be hundreds that are not plotted, as I have only reviewed the sky covered by the area of AAVSO charts, and only to my effective observing horizon of about -36 degrees (since I live in Saskatoon, Canada, at +52 degrees 03 minutes).

I hope this list will be of use to variable star observers who may want to plot or label the missing stars before using the Atlas in the field. I also hope that other observers of all kinds will report their known errors to me so that this list can be updated and reflect all the errors in the MSA. I hope too that the MSA editors will consider these data and will improve and revise future editions of the MSA to better serve the needs of the observers who are the main users of this Atlas.

Keeping it in Perspective

SCENE: The darkened TV studio of a current-affairs show. The show's host "H" is spotlit as usual. The guest "G", however, is visible only as a silhouette and the guest's voice has been electronically altered.

H (to camera): And now for our next story we talk to an addict. But this isn't the usual my-life-was-ruined-by-drugs story; tonight's guest suffered a much rarer addiction-VARIABLE STAR OBSERVING. Fortunately tonight's guest "G" was lucky enough to break the habit, and joins us in the studio now.

H (to guest): Firstly, can you describe VARIABLE STAR OBSERVING for our audience?

G: It's a simple procedure. You compare the brightness of a VARIABLE STAR with other stars nearby-what we call the COMPARISON STARS-and then record your estimate of brightness, together with the date & time, to create an OBSERVATION. You can then report or publish OBSERVATIONS in several ways so that any astronomer can get at them later.

H: So it's something to do with astronomical research then?

G: Yes. In fact VARIABLE STAR OBSERVATION can reveal quite a lot of information about stars in general, not just the ones being observed.

H: This doesn't sound like a potentially harmful activity. . . .

G (interrupting): It wasn't-at first-but it's so easy to get trapped into a full-blown addiction.

H: So how did you get trapped?

G: For a long time I wasn't addicted at all. Well...ok...I would look at a few VARIABLE STARS occasionally, just to see if they were bright or dim that night. Most of them weren't even mentioned in the few books I had. But I was looking at lots of other things too! You know, the Moon, planets, interesting star patterns, comets, clusters and what not. But one fateful day I visited a library that contained dozens of astronomy magazines, and I started reading them. There were articles about VARIABLE STARS that said anyone could do valuable OBSERVATIONS of these things; and that organizations existed to promote and collect OBSERVATIONS. And I thought to myself "I could do this...."

H: And that was the beginning of the addiction?

G: Oh no, that came much later. I wrote to these organizations and was sent booklets on How To Observe and some charts of VARIABLE STARS. So then I started OBSERVING VARIABLE STARS rather than just looking at them occasionally. It was great in those days; I was observing a couple of dozen stars two or three times per month, getting OBSERVATIONS and reporting them, occasionally drawing dots on sheets of graph paper....

H: So when did the addiction come into it?

G: I guess that started after I got copies of every VARIABLE STAR chart ever published by these organizations. I had just wanted to expand my observing list a bit, but then I thought "what the hell, get them all, and then I can pick and choose."

H: How many charts was that?

G: A few thousand I think-it was quite a stack of paper-and some of the charts had more than one VARIABLE STAR on them too. It was while I was looking at it that I was seized by this sudden desire to regularly observe them all.

H: Why do you think you had this desire?

G: Well...I knew there were only a few hundred VARIABLE STAR OBSERVERS in the entire world. Some of them lived in cloudy places. Some had night jobs and other commitments. I guess some of them even watched TV a lot...maybe they're watching us now? Anyway, I was thinking that someone had to get out there and keep an eye on these stars in case they did something unexpected.

H: So it was this sense of duty that drove you to addiction?

G: Not completely. Sure, it was a significant factor; but what finally did it was the publication of the annual totals for every observer in our newsletter. There I was, having put in this gigantic mad effort to watch everything at once, and there were these people with 10,000 more observations than me for the year! It was humiliating, but then I suspected that (1) they were retired with lots of spare time and (2) a lot of their totals came from very frequently observing a certain type of star.

H: Why would they do that?

G: What? Retire? Oh, the other thing...well...in layman's terms...some VARIABLE STARS explode in a semi-regular sort of way, and do all sorts of interesting things as they fade again.

H: So these observers were using these stars to cheat and get their totals up?

G: No, no, you misunderstand. Doing frequent observations of these things is useful to pin down exactly when the action starts, and to define what happens afterwards. The astrophysicists love these stars and want us to watch them. But of course going out to watch the same hundred or so of these "dwarf novae" things every night is quicker than checking out absolutely everything like I was. Even though the other stars are interesting too, just the time taken to move the telescope from one to the next really adds up...

H: But there are telescopes with "go-to" controls, aren't there?

G: Of course, but they don't "zap" instantly from one star to another, and they cost money. For the same money I could get a bigger telescope that would see many more VARIABLE STARS; and let me follow most of them when they were faint too.

H: I assume you went for the bigger telescope then?

G: Of course. I re-mortgaged the house and used the money for a 24-inch telescope; I was determined to beat these guys. The 4-inch I had been using could only see a few hundred VARIABLE STARS at best.

H: It sounds like your addiction began at that time. What happened next?

G: At first it was wonderful. I had a scope that could see everything! I was getting OBSERVATIONS at 16th magnitude dozens of times a night! Admittedly the kids were peeved when I made them store their bikes outside, so that the scope could fit in the garage. And the boss found me fast asleep at work one morning....

H: It started to affect your work and family then?
G: Well...yes...I guess it did.
H: So then what happened?
G: Actually I managed to conceal the truth for a long time. Luckily the local media were full of sensational stories about weird allergies and baffling chronic maladies. So I told everyone I was suffering from TOS but didn't explain that TOS meant Telescope Overuse Syndrome. Of course one of the "symptoms" was my inability to stay awake in the daytime. Eventually I persuaded the boss to get me onto a permanent invalid pension.

H: You lied about your condition?

G: I had to...if I had said I was doing over 500 OBSERVATIONS every clear night people would have thought I was nuts! And on cloudy nights I would read books and journals and magazines looking for the tiniest morsels of VARIABLE STAR-related content. The first thing I read in Sky & Telescope each month was the bit where they listed "Minima of Algol".

H: It sounds like you were obsessed.

G: Well I guess I knew I had a problem when I was observing stars in the Orion Nebula and started thinking "this would be so much easier if that $#@! nebula wasn't there to spoil the contrast." But it got worse after I bought a computer and got on the Internet. I discovered even more VARIABLE STAR information online. Not just the thousands of web sites and online journals, but there were newsgroups and mailing lists too. I subscribed to them all-I'm probably one of the few people alive who's read every single VSNET message ever written-but it still wasn't enough. At first I thought of subscribing under pseudonyms too, but then I had another idea.

H: Which was?

G: I would post variable star messages to all the Internet newsgroups and mailing lists I could reach; just to generate more content and discussion.

H: Did it work?

G: Only for a few days; until I started getting thousands of hate mails and my Internet provider was forced to shut down my account. It was really stressful until I got reconnected. Fortunately there was also a total lunar eclipse that week, which allowed me to do 200 extra OBSERVATIONS...which got my total for the year into the Top 5 Observers.

H: A proud moment for you?

G: Yes it was...but then I wanted to knock off those four observers ahead of me.

H: You wanted to do more observations than those four?

G: No, no, I wanted to send hitmen after them...they were stopping me from being Numero Uno! It was either that, or move to the Chilean Andes to get more clear nights. But I'd already blown all my money on the telescope and charts and other stuff.

H: So then what did you do?

G: I started driving around on cloudy nights after I'd read all the email, looking for flickering streetlights, emergency vehicles, burglar alarm lights...anything that varied. Trouble was, nobody would accept OBSERVATIONS of "police car lights at local shop at 5am" even though I had timed their periods to the nearest 0.01 second.

H: I guess this was the low point of your addiction?

G (sobs briefly): Yes...

H: How on earth did you break free?

G: Not by choice. Call it fate, serendipity, divine intervention; but it happened one morning when I was looking at the CD collection. The Pink Floyd "Pulse" album was facing me-you know, the one with the flashing red LED in the cover-and by reflex I began timing its period. I never knew the burglar was there until he hit me with the saucepan. I woke up in Intensive Care four days later.

H: You call that luck?

G: Well yes...you see there was a mistake during my hospital admission and my file got switched with someone who was in for a brain tumor removal. Apparently the surgical team were so tired from their endless 120-hour working weeks that they never noticed they were removing a healthy piece of brain from the wrong patient. For days afterwards I was staring at flashing lights and heart monitors in Intensive Care without even thinking of periodicities. The surgeon must have removed the bit of brain that caused the VARIABLE STAR addiction!

H: A peculiar sort of luck then...

G: It gets better. When I got home I discovered that the burglar had stolen the 24-inch telescope and the computer. All I had was the old 4-inch, the charts, and my old address book. That evening I observed only two VARIABLE STARS, but I was happy because I had observed two more VARIABLE STARS than 99.99999% of the world's population ever had. And the next night I observed only three more and I was still happy. My madness was over!

H: That is a remarkable turnaround...but do you blame these mysterious "organizations" you spoke of for your addiction?

G: Well they certainly made it easier to get addicted.

H: In what way?

G: Because they're generally helpful and insidiously encouraging to observers. They supply charts, detailed instructions, almost everything you need. Did you know that one of them has even infiltrated the American school system?

H: Really? Which one?

G: A group that calls themselves the AAVSO and promotes something called HOA.

H: Sounds like the evil plot for a James Bond movie. Can you tell us more?

G: It's a plan to encourage astronomy and science education in American schools by promoting VARIABLE STAR OBSERVING...

H (interrupting): You're saying they're trying to lead kids down the same path to madness you described a moment ago?

G: I hope not. But I think the real danger is that they will encourage intelligent thought and a spirit of scientific inquiry in American kids. Kids will stop believing that the Moon landings were faked in Hollywood, that UFOs abduct thousands every year, that horoscopes are useful guides for planning your life...this HOA thing threatens to create a social timebomb of intelligent teenagers.

H: But what can we do to avert this menace?

G: Well...I was thinking that if we can detonate all the nuclear warheads we have, we'll create the "nuclear winter" climate with years of unbroken cloud everywhere. That will stop all the kids from observing VARIABLE STARS...and if we launch the nukes to the right places they will preserve my standing in the Top 5 Observers of all time by vaporizing all the other observers!!

H: Perhaps that surgeon missed a bit after all...I think we'll end it there.

Bob Clyde, A Dear Friend

I just received the sad news that my dear friend from Streetsboro, Ohio, Bob Clyde, passed away last night. Bob was a member of the Mahoning Valley Astronomical Society in Newton Falls, Ohio. He would have been 90 years old in a few weeks. (Sadly enough, the MVAS lost another of its special members in the past few weeks, Bernie Cortez. Bernie was one of the catalysts in building the Mahoning Valley Observatory in the early 1960s.)

Bob was one of the most active lunar occultation observers in the 1960s and 1970s. I went on several graze expeditions with him. In fact, he is the one who taught me how to do occultation and graze timings. The most memorable graze we did was the February 1981 graze of Aldebaran from Streetsboro in two feet of snow at about four in the afternoon. Bob was an active member of IOTA.

I taught Bob how to make variable star estimates and he was an AAVSO observer for several years[1976-1984]. In fact, he and I went to the Spring 1977, Fall 1980, and Spring (either 1981 or '82) AAVSO meetings together. I'll never forget the time we pulled over to sleep in Washington D.C. and woke up finding we were in a cemetery!

I would often go to Bob's home to observe with him. He had a 6" reflector and a 12" reflector. He built an observatory about 20' off the ground that he named El Nav Observatory. We also used to call it the "Moon House." Bob also had a 6" refractor with Jaeger optics that he gave to me in 1986, and I use it to this day. Now it is even more special to me!

His garage and spare bedroom were his workshops. Bob had a knack for ATMing. He was a great mirror and lens maker. He started making telescopes back in the 1930s. Bob helped me make my 14" reflector in 1976 and several 6" reflectors. I also have a few other astro items of his, which are extra special now.

Bob grew up in New York City and the Philadelphia area. He came to Ohio and moved to Elyria. He knew former AAVSO Presidents George Diedrich and Art Stokes. In the 1960s he moved to Streetsboro and became involved in the MVAS. Bob was employed as an optician at Harshaw Chemical in Solon when I first met him. He retired from there in the mid-1970s.

Just a few years ago Bob received the honor of being awarded by the Ohio Turnpike Astronomers Association for his dedication to amateur astronomy in Ohio. It couldn't have gone to a better man!

I've been in Florida since 1984 and have really missed my times with Bob. We were so close that we kept up the relationship by phone and mail. While on vacation in Ohio just three weeks ago, my son Andrew and I stopped to visit Bob in the nursing home. I had tears in my eyes when we left, for I knew my friend would not be around much longer.

Bob was a dedicated Christian and very involved at St. Thomas Lutheran Church in Streetsboro. I'm going to miss my dear friend, but I know I will see him in Glory!

Calling All Solar Observers

According to the latest Solar Bulletin, we are 67 observers in the Solar Division of AAVSO. But I have not seen one message from any of us in the AAVSO discussion list. Are we too shy, have we nothing to share, no question to ask? Personally I would appreciate chatting with other observers as I feel rather lonely in Ontario, Canada. There are not many solar observers around!

Meanwhile I have a question: What is the best H-alpha filter for a Meade 4" APO refractor: Daystar, Coronado, or what? Any idea?

I’m including two of my pictures of the Sun. They were taken at the focus of my Meade 102 APO refractor with an Olympus OM1 camera equipped with a 2x multiplier and a green filter. Kodak films: color Max 400 for the September one, black and white Professional T400CN for the November one, both at 1/250s.

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