Fun time at Houge with the Mercury Transit

by Rich Neuschaefer

I was using my AP 155EDFS (155mm f/7) APO refractor with a Zeiss full aperture white light solar filter. At times the seeing was quite good. There was a big sunspot near one limb of the Sun and a couple of little ones near the other limb. You could ligher markings near near the sunspots (lighter than the rest of the solar disk.

There were more than a dozen telescopes and a number of visitors came by for a look. Several came back, bringing their friends and kids.

There were several H Alpha scopes showing really interesting views of the sun. Mike Koop also set up a long distance solar scope. He projected an image of the sun nearly the length of the grassy area next to the tennis courts (about the length of a tennis court), into a box with a white bottom. It gave a nice view Mercury against the solar diak. It was a fun way for parents and kids to watch the event as the same time.

Mike Koop suggest we see how much longer it would take Mercury to slip off the photosphere vs. the chromosphere. My white light filtered telescope saw Mercury have third contact and then forth contact several seconds before Mike had third and forth contact with his H-Alpha scope viewing the chromosphere.

It was a fine day for astronomy!

Posted on sf-bay-tac Nov 08, 2006 18:27:45 PT
Converted by report.pm 1.4 Dec 12, 2006 21:52:58 PT