Otto Struve 499 A-Bc

 
Carol Lakomiak
Star: Otto Struve 499 A-Bc
Date & Time: July 8-9 2003
Seeing: 6 [see
http://www.backyard-astro.com/Logs/logsreport.html
Transparency: 3/10 
Location of site: 45°N // Tomahawk
WI, USA
Site classification: Rural
Temperature: 65°F dropping to 50°F
Sky darkness:  4/10 (Thompson Scale)
Conditions: surprisingly minimal dew;
slight breeze from the North
Telescope: Meade 8" f/10 LX-10 (Snoopy )
Eyepieces: 32mm, 13.8mm, 9mm, 5mm
Magnification: 63x, 147x, 226x, 406x
Split with 63x, white in color..
 
 







 


 
Mike Sutherland
Star: Otto Struve 499 A-Bc
Date & Time: 11 July 2003, 11:13 PM PDT
Seeing: 6 <1-10 Seeing Scale (10 best)>. 
Transparency:  so-so
Location of site: Beaverton, OR, USA
45d 29' N, 122d 48' W
Site classification: Suburban
Temperature: Warm, mid-70's (F)
Sky darkness: 4 <Limiting magnitude> 
Moon:
Telescope: Takahashi FC-60
Eyepieces: 4mmTakahashi Hi-Ortho
Magnification: app. 125x
At 60mm the companion is just visible with direct vision but averted vision
makes it more obvious. Just white and faint white for the primary/secondary.

We had a clear Friday evening, so I could wait for the Queen to clear the tree's and not worry about work the next day. After my session I checked the website to see what others have said about these pairs. It's interesting what aperture will do! In one case (Otto Struve 254) I had the primary and secondary reversed from what others report! I guess my 60mm responded to the sharpest light more than the larger one. Seeing was so-so, but still fun to get out and see something.

Ambience: A low patch of lawn in my backyard amongst trees and bushes, (the only spot I can view Cassiopeia this time of year). Quite warm with a few mosquitoes. No dew but I was still warm from the heat of the day and took my time cooling off. I fogged up the EP if I got too close the first hour. There was a small pool party going on at a neighbors over the fences.
Couldn't make out the conversation (darn!) but the mood seemed light and positive, (whew, I hate domestic disputes). My cat joined me for a while but left when I refused to spend my evening rubbing her belly and would rather poke my eye in that little white tube.
 


 
Luis Argüelles
Star: Otto Struve 499 A-Bc
Date: 28, July, 2003 , 23:45 -> 2:45 local time
Location of Site: Sena de Luna, Spain
42.55N, 05.57W
Seeing: 6/7 <1-10 Seeing scale (10 best)>
Transparency: 6 -> 5 <1-10 scale (10 best)>
Other conditions: No Moon. 
Temperature:16ºC
Altitude: 1,200 mts (3,940 ft)
Site classification: Rural
Sky darkness: about 5.5
Telescope: Takahashi FS-102
Mount: Vixen GP + Skysensor 2000
Eyepieces: 9mm Nagler, 5mm and 3.8mm Eudiascopics
Diagonal: Zeiss prism diagonal
Magnifications: 91x, 164x, 215x
Using the 9mm, the primary appears as yellowish and I can’t give a color for the secondary. I have a very slight suspicion on a closer component, but I’m not even a 5% sure. The field is really rich, located in one of the dense zones of Cassiopeia.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 


 
Tim Leese
Star: Otto Struve 499 A-Bc
Date: 24-Aug-2003, 23:50 UT.
Location of Site: Northwich, Cheshire. UK
(53° 15' N -2º 33' W)
Seeing: 6 <1-10 Seeing scale (10 best)>
Transparency:  <1-10 scale (10 best)>
Other conditions: clear sky. 
Site classification: Suburban
Sky darkness: 4.3 ( UMi ) <Limiting magnitude>.
Telescope: 200mm f/6 Newtonian reflector.
Mount: Vixen GP
Eyepieces: 18mm Orthoscopic, 9mm Orthoscopic
Magnifications: X67, X133
18mm Or-------I wasn't completely certain that I had the correct star here. I found a yellow/orange star with a tiny mote of a companion requiring averted vision for most of the time. I glimpsed the companion at the approx listed PA using direct vision but found it 
useful to practice using averted vision on this star. A nice chain of stars drifted through the fov. 

9mm Or----------Unexpectedly, I found it very difficult to see the companion at all, even using averted vision. Not convinced that I have the right star. Must return to this one later.
 

 


 
Steve Bodin 
Star: Otto Struve 499 A-Bc
Date & Time: 4 Sep 2003, 11:45 pm local
8pm to 11:30 pm local
Seeing: 5-6  <1-10 Seeing Scale (10 best)>. 
Transparency: Fair
Location of site: Silverdale WA, USA
47N 123W
Site classification: suburb-rural
Conditions: warm 60F, no wind
Sky darkness: 5.6 <Limiting magnitude> 
Telescope: Celestron C8
Eyepieces: Video camera DX8263SL
Magnification: 3x barlow app 1000x
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 

Star: Otto Struve 499 A-Bc
Date & Time: 12 Sept 2003 11:30pm to 2 am
Seeing:   <1-10 Seeing Scale (10 best)>. 
Transparency: Fair
Location of site: Silverdale WA, USA
47N 123W
Site classification: suburb-rural
Conditions: temp 45-50F, damp
Sky darkness: 4.0 due  moon <Limiting magnitude> 
Telescope: Celestron C8
Eyepieces: Video camera DX8263SL at prime focus and 3x
Magnification: app. 333x and 1000x
 

Stt499 was found after resetting the setting circles on beta Cass and 
the proceeding to the correct field. Just cleared my house and about 
as far as north that I can point the C8 with the Video camera 
attached. Took three separate images at different integration 
settings. The wide BC pair was seen easily at x4 integration and 
measured near the WDS value. Seeing caused the primary to jump around 
a bit and a closer component could be only guessed. Post op 
measurement do show something joined to the primary, but it is faint 
maybe 8.5 to 9th mag. Measurements as follows: A-BC 9.57 at 076.1 deg 
PA. The new suspected component, lets call it "a": Aa 1.36 sec at 
015.5 deg PA, with sigma of 0.20 sec and 4 deg.

Needs further looks with a bigger scope , anyone got a 12 inch to put 
on this one?

As a supplement to post on STT499 from 4 Sep 2003, I can add that the 
subject faint close companion seem less certain upon viewing last 
night. The image could be just that double image seeing that is 
common with less than perfect seeing. Seeing double is a common 
problem for this group, but the doubled image due to atmospheric 
refraction is a known fact to serious observers. 

So I give it a 20 percent chance of really being there, need a bigger 
scope. Can't put the Bigdog on it until later in the year since 
alt/az does not work to well near the zenith.

Just posted in Images by Members/Steve Bodin folder a classic double 
image of a single star, or maybe single star. This was an automatic 
stack of 100 video frames of STT499 video from 5 Sep 03 and this 
result came out of the process.  One must be careful of this kind 
of 'double star'!! 

Seeing seemed 6-7/10 but the seeing was very 'slow'. You know, the 
kind of seeing that slowly drifts from good to bad and back again. 
Probably, the convection cells above my scope high in the atmosphere 
were near the 8 inch size of the scope. Just a conjecture.
 
 
 
 
 
 

One more look at the possible extra star in STT 499, but not spotted. A-BC seemed quite easy and measured 7.57 sec at 076.8 deg PA. But nothing noted close to the primary, must have been an illusion the other night, or maybe a variable star. Well I have lowered my probability of an extra companion to 10%.


 
Morgan Spangle
Star: Otto Struve 499 A-Bc
Date: 9/5/03  2003.679
Location of Site: Larchmont, NY, USA
(40.55.26N, -73.44.43)
Seeing:  7 <1-10 Seeing scale (10 best)>
Transparency: 5 <1-10 scale (10 best)>
Other conditions
Temperature:
Altitude
Site classification
Sky darkness
Telescope: TEC 203mm Mak-Cass, f/20 
Eyepieces: ---
Magnifications: 567X
PA: 76.6
Sep: 9.56"
I had clear skies until I started hunting for the "third" element of this one, but of 
course some high thin clouds immediately swept in, making any conclusions 
about the mystery guest difficult to obtain. I couldn't see any evidence of a 
bulge, and certainly not any resolved split. A nice and easy, fairly wide pair.
For the measures, I used a Retel micrometer, with a 12mm eyepiece and a 
Astro-Physics 1.7x Barcon barlow to achieve my magnification value. I'm still 
working mainly on "calibration stars", to get a really good value for the 
micrometer, and on my technique for measuringf position angle. But I'm 
getting close to moving on to more challenging doubles (as you can see, 
these measures were consistent with the catalogue values of PA 77 and Sep 
9.6"), and hope to enter more into this group's discussions soon. Meantime, I'll 
continue to enjoy the fine writing here!
 
 
Bob Hogeveen
Galaxies: Otto Struve 499 A-Bc
Date & Time: September 13 and 14, 2003, 22h LT 
Sky darkness: 4 <Limiting magnitude>
Transparency: 8 <1 worst - 10 best>
Seeing: 6 <1-10 Seeing Scale (10 best)>
Location of site: Annen, The Netherlands
53ºN, 6ºE
Site classification: Village backyard
Moon: Just rising in the East 
Temperature: 15º C 
Telescope: Celestron C11
Eyepieces: 10mm Plossl, 5mm LV 
Magnification: 280x, 560x
 
Two reasonably clear nights in a weekend gave me a good oppertunity to see if anything evidence of the mystery-component of this pair could be obtained.

The result of the first observation was that nothing more than an ordinary A-B pair could be seen. The central star-image of A was reasonably sharp and steady, even with 560x. Around it irregular and shaky portions of diffraction patterns were seen, on some moments taking shape as close virtual companion. But these images had short lives an appeared on different positions. Conclusion after watching this vivid image for a while can only be that no real companion could be detected.
   
I hoped for better seeing the second evening, but if so, it was only very slightly better. The result of the second observation was the same: No companion detected.

 


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