Plettstone 10-8-08 PART II

Greg LaFlamme

The list is quite so I'll take this time to add some stuff to my previous OR for those who could give a toot;-)

In my haste, rushing through my OR with speed and highlight verbiage I forgot to mention what a nice time I had visiting with Michelle and Paul. Friday night went the sky was cloudy, Michelle, Me, Scott and Carter had a good ole fashioned pow-wow. That's always fun to do and reminds me of sitting around the campfire when I was a young'n. Saturday night under much better sky conditions, Michelle and I had a small refractor shoot-out using Saturn as the prize. Her Stellarview 80mm triplet against my William Optics 90mm semi apo. We cranked them up to an unreasonable 200x and compared our views aloud. After tuning the focuser a bit, I was just about to say "looks the the seeing isn't supporting this magnification, Saturn is mushy" When she said "Saturn looks great tonight, this scope take magnification really well".. We switched scopes and I saw a perfect little Saturn in her Stellarview, bands and all! WO lost that one.. I'ma whooped. That's an excellent refractor you have there Michelle, a keeper. Saturday I met Rick Ellis (thanks for the name reminder Carter, great OR by the way, got me all inspired) Rick had purchased a 12.5" Plettstone from Astromart and it's a beauty. The previous owner had the three parallel tubes powder coated texture black. Came out well too, neat look. I had seen it on AM a couple years ago and even "borrowed" pictures just for keepsakes. It must be a neat feeling to have built these scopes, send them out then five years later it returns to the very spot it was created, looking brand new at the hands of someone who really enjoys it. Rick had a nice time hitting the big Messier's and we all gave him some objects to locate with his new instrument.

Mark Wagner and Richard Navarette had arrived earlier and set up there 18" Obsessions, computer guidance modules set up in the open back of their SUV's. Its looks like a great way to work your maps using the open back door of an SUV as an office! Looks organized. We all hung out, waiting for night fall waxing astronomy. I had asked Richard and Mark that if they came across anything neat looking to please pass on the designation to me. Right away a couple objects came my way and Later in the night a few more. All were real treats too. NGC 2820 and two edge on galaxies appear, 2814 on the right. Just as your enjoying the pair, a third little edge on, IC2458 appears! IC2458 is off the South Western tip of 2820 and it didn't appear right away. Once Mark said to look for it, it became visible directly. My Little Kestrel meter showed that the temperature throughout the night ranged between 44 degrees to 49 and provided the humidity that Carter had mentioned in his OR. The camping equipment worked very well and I love my little Sierra Sirius tent. You can set the thing up in 5 minutes no sweat. Unroll the Thermarest pad, toss in the mummy bag and done deal. I want to try some trips to the Sierra foot hills, the top of Yosemite, Grand Canyon and other dark remote sites, the skys make the extra effort way worth it.

Such a great time!

GML