Continuous work

Last night a small intervention was needed at UFO. I was already planning to spend a few hour collimating my C8, but last thursday the roof developed an erratic behavior that needed attention, so, with the help of João Gregório that I had already recruited to assist me for the collimation job, I left for the observatory around 18h45, with the sun still high on the sky and a very “cosy” temperature of 35ºC (sometimes more).

We arrived an hour later and immediately checked the roof. It turned out that a wire connecting the closure switch was damaged, and was probably giving the controller incorrect reading about the closing status of the roof. I also checked the motor support and tightened some screws and adjusted other small parts of the system, and about 45 minutes later the roof was apparently working. By this time we left for dinner, and the roof remained open.

Fast forward to around 21h45 and we returned, and after some initial debugging of a problem with the server and the ippower we use to control computers, a quick check to the satellite image showed us that the sky would cover in a few hours, so, in spite of the 32ºC we had at 22h00, we decided to install the set of Bob’s Knobs that I had bought more than a year ago and collimate the C8. The procedure was easy, and after some time my little SCT was very closed to perfect collimation. However, while working on the scope, we found out some strands of a spider web between the primary and secondary of the C8. Turned out it was more than a “few strands” (I took a picture with my phone, but it sucks) but  I decided to live with it.

After all this, I adjusted the focus position of the primary mirror (I focus with a secondary crayford focuser) and tried to do some vcurves, but by midnight the clouds rolled in and we had to close and return home.

During all this, both Fernando and Paulo joined via skype, and pointed their telescopes, and we all had a good time. It was a nice, productive, evening.