29 october 2020

Writing this up a couple days afterward, since it's been a busy last few days.  Our family decided to adopt a tortoise, named Connie (aka Avocado), from a sanctuary near Reading, CA.  I spent Friday building an inside enclosure table for her, and we drove up yesterday to pick her up.  Today we finished the enclosure with the correct lights and so forth.  She seems to be adjusting well and everyone's excited.

As I recall below seeing was pretty good, 7/10, with short stretches of better.  I observed a number of challenging pairs, then spent an hour so so first on Mars and then the Moon.  Utterly fantastic views of the moon, which was one day from full.  To my surprise, because of the high light angle, I was able to see several Plato craterlets: A, B, C, D, g, and even f, which was a first for me.  I did not see e but the bright ray which runs from the slumped wall through it was very plain.  I saw the central rille in Schroter's Valley.  And incredible views of Pythagoras, especially the central peaks which were clear and so distinct.  There was so much detail everywhere it was difficult.  At 205x & 333x with a light red filter.

MLR 21 AB: 508; 533x: Very fine split of faint B, tough, ~2"
23H 30M 55.18S +62° 19' 17.6" P.A. 195 SEP 2.2 MAG 9.20,10.40 SP F8

ES 109 AB: 508; 205x: B is faint but well split, ~3 delta mag, slightly ruddy color compared to bright white A
23H 31M 55.53S +54° 01' 10.0" P.A. 51 SEP 6.1 MAG 8.86,12.24 SP G5 DIST. 61.69 PC (201.23 L.Y.)

AG 293 AB: 508; 205x: Neat near equal white pair, well separated.
23H 32M 41.84S +57° 30' 51.3" P.A. 21 SEP 3.6 MAG 10.21,10.68 SP G5

A 1490 AB: 508; 533x: Excellent pair, B is very faint, a point just within A's diffraction ring, hazy most of the time but sharpens with seeing.  Nice. 

23H 33M 28.10S +52° 10' 15.9" P.A. 193 SEP 0.7 MAG 8.60,12.60 SP A0

STI 3005 AB: 508;205x: Faint pair, but easily spotted, slight magnitude difference,  wide
23H 35M 34.63S +54° 35' 41.6" P.A. 328 SEP 5.5 MAG 10.80,11.50

TDT 4119 AB: 508; 533x: With seeing two stars resolve, the brighter one is one more blue than white, well separated B though <1", significant magnitude difference, not quite 1 delta.
23H 36M 20.33S +53° 00' 30.9" P.A. 154 SEP 0.9 MAG 10.22,10.42 SP A0

COU 2673 AB: 508; 667x:  Hairline split at very best moments with 667x, equal.  Snowman at other magnifications.   
23H 36M 28.59S +51° 36' 00.1" P.A. 107 SEP 0.4 MAG 10.10,10.40 SP A0

HLD 58 AB: 508; 205x: Quite easy pair with a large delta mag, ~3" separation

23H 36M 37.28S +53° 57' 11.0" P.A. 356 SEP 3.7 MAG 8.68,11.59 SP A2 DIST. 306.75 PC (1000.62 L.Y.)

A 642 AB 508; 533x:  Very difficult.  Bluish-green A has to be a perfect disk and hold for several seconds, and B is a very minute point at the diffraction ring.  Without the seeing B is just a haze.  Physical.
23H 37M 53.77S +58° 05' 43.4" P.A. 27 SEP 0.8 MAG 8.86,10.16 SP F0 DIST. 371.75 PC (1212.65 L.Y.)

MLR 366 AB: 508; 667x:  With seeing, extremely faint B appears <1" from not a very bright A.  B denses up with seeing, it coalesces more than sharpens.
23H 40M 04.79S +60° 15' 06.0" P.A. 336 SEP 0.8 MAG 10.26,10.78 SP G0

MLR 653 AB: 508; 677x: Split very fine, more than hairline, significant delta mag.  Seeing allows two white points. Nice. 

01H 08M 32.19S +55° 54' 06.4" P.A. 232 SEP 0.5 MAG 10.36,10.49

BU 868 AB: 508; 205x: AB is easy at 205x, wide light orange A and blue B.   Burnham discovered with the 18.5-inch at Washburn and did not notice anything amiss with the A star during subsequent measures with the Lick 36-inch.  EGG 1 Aa-Ab is 0.048", O.J. Eggen discovered Aa-Ab in 1984 with the Kitt Peak 4m telescope.
01H 10M 00.67S +52° 01' 59.8" P.A. 233 SEP 9.2 MAG 8.00,10.49 SP F5 DIST. 236.41 PC (771.17 L.Y.)

STT 23 AB: 508; 205x: Pair of clean white stars, widely separated, near equal.  Physical.

01H 10M 07.56S +51° 44' 48.2" P.A. 191 SEP 14.5 MAG 8.14,8.59 SP F8 DIST. 79.24 PC (258.48 L.Y.)

MLR 627 AB: 508; 667x: Very brief notched elongation of nearly equal white stars, but very brief.<0.3", which was given in SkyTools, given the difficulty.  [Current precise separation is 0.18".]
01H 10M 15.63S +57° 10' 03.6" P.A. 173 SEP 0.2 MAG 10.20,10.40 SP A0

BU 235 Aa-Ab: 508; 333x: Amazing system with five faint pairings, but the main attraction is Aa-Ab, near equal bright A, hairline at 205x and and a nice clean split at 333x, light yellow stars, slight magnitude difference.  Seeing giving me nice round disks. Terrific.  Physical pair with a 278 year period.  Amazingly, Burnham discovered this with his 6-inch.  
01H 10M 34.31S +51° 00' 47.8" P.A. 140.5 SEP 0.8 MAG 7.54,7.82 SP F5V DIST. 104.6 PC (341.21 L.Y.)

STT 38 BC: 508; 1067x: I spent a good long while on this one, and tried hard to nail down the position angle.  At 1067x, both with and without an apodising mask, but both times with a #80A light blue filter, which did seem to calm the diffraction a little, I had a clear view of the elongation with a strong sense of the weaker end being to the East or to the ESE.  I used the "disable tracking" command in SkyTools to find West.  I also tried a 78% central obstruction mask, and while the diffraction became a grid, and the disks much smaller, I could clearly see the same elongation and weaker end, though at a much smaller scale.  To my delight the current orbital solution puts the PA at 120.6-degrees, 0.179" separation, so I think I have detected it.  I can't wait until 2033 when this becomes an easy pair!