Video Amateur Astronomer Bruce Berger Talks About Meteors and Telescopes (Video) 36
Video no longer available.
Bruce Berger is an IT
guy, but he's also an amateur astronomer who takes at least one aspect
of astronomy more seriously than most sky-watchers. Not
content with what he could buy when he first wanted a telescope of his
own, Berger set out to make one -- it turned out so well, he says
he'll never part with it, and he's made several others since, and
taught many other people to do the same. In this pursuit, he's also
been a long-time member of the Amateur
Telescope Makers of Boston, including a stint as the group's
president. (Berger's custom license plate reads "SCPMKR.") In the video
below, though, I caught up with him in Maine between evenings watching
this year's spectacular Perseid showers (and without any of his
home-built scopes to hand), to give some insight about what would-be
skywatchers should consider in looking at scopes. It's surprising just
how good today's telescopes are for the money, but it's easy to be
ripped off, too, or at least disappointed. (And besides avoiding
department store junk, building your own is still Bruce's strongest
advice.) Ed note: This Video is Part 1 of 2. Part 2 will run tomorrow.
2013 Leonids? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I figured they meant Perseid.
Re: (Score:3)
Perseid peeked a few days ago.
Re: (Score:2)
Good catch. Fixed. Thank you.
Re: (Score:1)
Brainfart; sorry. They're both such nice names!
Re: (Score:3)
Check out these (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
I've had two telescopes, not including binoculars and cheapo dime-store stuff. My first scope was 4 1/4" f10 Newtonian. Bulky to haul out with the steel mount, but a lot of fun. I was enthusiastic enough in my teens to haul it out when there was snow on the ground. Cold Winter nights had the clearest air in Northern Virginia, even if you didn't have the spectacle of the Summer Milky Way.
When I went to school I traded it in for the compact backpack scope that Edmund was selling at the time. This baby wa
Re: (Score:2)
If you were getting "discs" from stars I want that telescope. Please tell me where I can find it.
Re: (Score:2)
So... what does his license plate mean? (Score:4, Insightful)
He makes Special Containment Procedures to Secure, Contain and Protect makers?
Re: (Score:2)
Good on him, but I'd rather just buy one (Score:1)
I think I'll just buy a Meade scope with the autostar system. Sure it's more expensive, but it's a whole lot less work for someone like me who just wants to gaze occasionally. I've got a little Bausch and Laumb SCT that I bought at a pawn shop for about $200 when I was in college. Equatorial mount but a real PAIN to align. The modern scopes with GPS and auto-alignment are a breeze.
Thank you /. (Score:2)
How to buy a telescope? (Score:1)
I was really hoping he was going to talk about building your own telescope and grinding your own lens.
Re: (Score:1)
Other years, Berger told me, he's brought materials to camp to demo the lens grinding process, but this year brought only ready-made stuff -- only so much fits in the Prius at once ;) I hope I'll get a demo of the grinding / design process later on, though. In the meantime, there's a lot of good info at the ATMOB site linked in the summary.
Re: (Score:1)
Telescope size (Score:4, Informative)
Refractors have two main disadvantages, one, the larger the aperture, the thicker the lens has to be as well, making the lense heavy. IIRC it also requires longer and longer tubes to focus the light.
A reflector mirror on the other hand can be much shorter for the aperture size and the mirror can be lighter than a similarly sized lens, as it only needs to be a reflective film or coating on a lighter substrate, as long as it has minimal imperfections.
Really good and large mirrors are expensive though. Here is a place that will sell you good mirrors if you want to make your own. http://zambutomirrors.com/mirrors.html [zambutomirrors.com]
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
While with the SCs the problem is not that important as nearly all of them have the same aperture of f/10, with faster newtons people often are sold a large telescope because it is ea
Re: (Score:3)
While size matters, the way the telescope is used matters even more.
The last Astronomy party I attended featured a spectacular 28" Dobsonian scope built by a company called poetically "Size Does Matter". The Eastern Veil looked great through it. I then went back to my small 8" Schmidt-Cassegrain bolted a camera to the back, pointed it to the Eastern Veil and took a 2 hour photo that looks much better than anything I could see through the telescope 10 times the cost of mine.
My suggestion to anyone who wants
Re: (Score:1)
Yikes (Score:2)
Go to the visual atrocity that is the home page. Click on the section labeled "Library". Get a page of
2013 Jan Feb Mar
2012 Jan Feb Mar
links to
Go to the "Gallery" section and see a list of links in ASCIIbetical order of useless gallery names, (ex: "Bill Toomey's images") each individual one with thumbnails in a v
I still miss Gleaning for ATMs (Score:2)
Huge PV array behind him? (Score:1)
That barn in the background, is it covered with solar panels? LIke 200 of them? I'm getting ~20 panels on my house roof and it is expected to supply my annually-integrated electrical consumption!
Re: (Score:1)
Yes, that's a barn covered with solar panels. I meant to count 'em, but forgot -- don't think it's quite 200, but it's a whole lot.
I talked this morning with one of the camp's owners, and he said of the installation (which has taken a few years to complete) "I wish we had a bigger roof ..." It's supplying something over half of the camp's electricity needs, but not all. There are also solar heaters for water on some of the cabins, and generally they try to be efficient generally.
Get out to some dark skies (Score:1)