Mastodawn

Felix Herder Mar 3

LOL true Mastodon verification:

YOU MUST VERIFY YOURSELF ON MASTODON BY:

- Posting a picture of a cat in your lap
- Random photos of flowers
- Wax poetic about your favorite episode of Star Trek TNG (or your hate of the series)
- Random, undecipherable technical blabbering about ham radio electronics
- Mention something about your favorite Linux command line
- Say hello to your many LGBTQ followers/friends here, just because you're glad they're here
- Toot a picture of some mushroom you ran into while walking in the forst
- Something something astronomy
- Random gadget/device/bicycle post
- Post a random picture of a tree or window
- Photo of your sewing/mending project!
- Hand drawn art post

Femme Malheureuse Mar 3

@ai6yr Oh mah gawd I am slacking off. I haven't done any of these recently.

I must remedy this or lose my Mastodon credentials.

@femme_mal @ai6yr same here... Dang...

Darth Hideout 🏳️‍🌈Mar 3

@ai6yr Should be a merit badge.

@ai6yr You forgot ham radio and sewing machines

𝕕𝔼cⒶ𝕪 Mar 3

@W6KME @ai6yr i am suddenly inspired to get a Singer 319W2 up on 40M QRP doing Hellschreiber.

@decay @ai6yr I approve of this.

@decay @ai6yr I have a Singer 211 made in Germany that is perfectly suited for Hellschreiber. And I could probably load the table and motor on 6 meters...

@decay @ai6yr The 211 is surplus to my needs; could be looking for a home...

AI6YR Ben Mar 3

@W6KME @decay Wow, is that an industrial monster?

@ai6yr @decay Yep. It's a beast. 1/2 hp motor and table included. 211G165 specifically, triple-feed walking foot.

The problem is I also have a Consew 226R-1, and you can't exactly stick a spare industrial machine under the bed.

@W6KME @ai6yr @decay
I think that’s a spark-gap rig.

AI6YR Ben Mar 3

@NM8A @W6KME @decay I mean, both of those machines have so much metal, I suspect they'll load up on 80m.

𝕕𝔼cⒶ𝕪 Mar 3

@NM8A @W6KME @ai6yr anything is a spark gap rig if you try hard enough.

@decay @W6KME @ai6yr This bit in the manual of my (née grandmother’s) 221-1 has always amused me.

@NM8A @decay @ai6yr Maybe one day I'll have a featherweight...but I only tend to acquire broken stuff and fix it, and Featherweights have become too precious to be found on the curb.

AI6YR Ben Mar 3

@W6KME @NM8A @decay There was one at an estate sale this weekend in Camarillo, but I did not have motivation to go see if it was overpriced or not, lol. And it wasn't broken (like you... if it's perfectly working it has significantly less interest to me).

@ai6yr @NM8A @decay And it's not just the joy of repair...if it's not broken, it'l likely going to be priced to the market. For Featherweights, that can be $500 for a nice one. As nice as they are, you can buy a lot of far more capable machines for $500.

@decay @NM8A @ai6yr I am forever going to think of this machine as a spark gap sewing machine.

Paul_IPv6 Mar 3

i think any hardware/toys you can geek about count. i follow folks talking about musical instruments, fiber crafts, jewelry, woodworking, calligraphy/fountain pens. you just have to be well beyond sanely interested in whatever it is and overly willing to share technical details. ;)

Dianora (Diane Bruce)Mar 3

@paul_ipv6 @W6KME @ai6yr hides fountain pen *whistles innocently*

Paul_IPv6 Mar 3

@Dianora @W6KME @ai6yr

i can stop buying fountain pens any time i want.

i only buy fountain pens at parties.

@paul_ipv6 @Dianora @W6KME @[email protected] Discovered the Chinese vanishing point clones recently. They are so nice

David Nash Mar 3

@paul_ipv6 @W6KME @ai6yr Hardware/toy geekery pairs nicely with "Something something astronomy".

Current bit of precision-ground glass in a tube: 12.5"/320mm f/5 Dobsonian reflector on a cart for easy transport. It breaks down into smaller components so it's possible to take it on a road trip to darker skies.

Paul_IPv6 Mar 3

@dpnash @W6KME @ai6yr

so much light pollution in so many places. must be amazing to have a large lens and be far enough off the grid to get clarity/contrast.

David Nash Mar 3

@paul_ipv6 @W6KME @ai6yr My home is close to downtown Portland, but I can get to decently dark skies with a 45-minute drive and from there, it's a lot of fun. I need to remember to do that more often.

AI6YR Ben Mar 3

@dpnash @paul_ipv6 @W6KME Oooh, did you build that yourself?!?!

David Nash Mar 3

@ai6yr @paul_ipv6 @W6KME

Regrettably, no. I’m not that dexterous. I bought it a while back from someone who was a woodworker first, astronomer second. He put a good mirror into some seriously gorgeous wood work. This scope was also slightly cheaper than the comparable commercial options at the time (right around the start of the 2000s).

Iris Young (he/they/she) (PhD)Mar 3

@dpnash @ai6yr @paul_ipv6 @W6KME half a point for knowing sbdy who can build a telescope from scratch, and half a point for the photo and technical details. I say you qualify.

Jacob Something Mar 3

@dpnash @paul_ipv6 @W6KME @ai6yr Wow, you made that? Do you also have a photo in disassembled state? I've been wondering, when there's light pollution anyway, does a bigger lens help?

David Nash Mar 3

@jkanev @paul_ipv6 @W6KME @ai6yr

I didn’t make it myself. I bought it from someone who was a woodworker who’d also gotten into amateur telescope making. No good photos of it though in the disassembled state, unfortunately.

If there is a lot of light pollution, the larger mirror does help: it won’t fish really diffuse faint objects like galaxies out of the murk, but it does make it easier to see fainter stars and clusters of stars. Larger optics also translate into higher optical resolution, so you can see finer details in bright objects like the moon and planets.

Jacob Something Mar 3

@dpnash @paul_ipv6 @W6KME @ai6yr
Some weeks ago, on a clear night, I tried to see the pinwheel galaxy. Took me a while to find the exact spot, but what I saw was exactly dark blue on a dark blue background. I could make out nothing. Not even a faint difference. That was with a six-inch reflector, near a big city. You've probably seen it?

@jkanev @dpnash @paul_ipv6 @ai6yr FWIW, I have never seen the Pinwheel using my eyeballs, just cameras, even from some pretty dark sites. I have a 10" Newt, nothing compared to most Dobs but still a pretty big bucket.

David Nash Mar 3

@jkanev @paul_ipv6 @W6KME @ai6yr

I have, from a very dark sky with a 10” scope some years back. With a 6” it should be possible to see all the Messier catalog galaxies, but you’ll need a dark sky to have a reasonable chance at it.

Galaxies are, without a doubt, *the* toughest things to see with significant light pollution. You can snag fairly faint stars by cranking up the magnification a bit, and many nebulas can be made more visible with narrowband color filters, but galaxies are only visible when the sky background light level is low enough.

AI6YR Ben Mar 3

@dpnash @jkanev @paul_ipv6 @W6KME One year, I accidentally ended up at Death Valley during the "Dark Sky" festival, where there were a whole array of massive telescopes set up and I got to see so many things!!!

(Off topic, we had set up a "Star Wars" themed outing there to get some scouts enthusiastic about going to Death Valley, and it was ENTIRELY SERENDIPITY that it was the same weekend as the festival.. We also walked into the Visitor's Center very quickly and the only reason we knew about the festival, was an off-duty NPS ranger from our local park recognized me and told me to take all the scouts to the airport in the evening. IT WAS AWESOME)

@ai6yr @dpnash @jkanev @paul_ipv6 @W6KME

Congratulations! You just verified your Mastodon profile! ✅

AI6YR Ben Mar 3

@nellie_m @dpnash @jkanev @paul_ipv6 @W6KME lol

glasspshr Mar 3

@ai6yr @nellie_m @dpnash @jkanev @paul_ipv6 @W6KME

Star parties at dark sky sites are fabby

glasspshr Mar 3

@ai6yr @nellie_m @dpnash @jkanev @paul_ipv6 @W6KME

Also, the Crab Nebula is tough to see from suburban skies

David Nash Mar 4

@jkanev @paul_ipv6 @W6KME @ai6yr

For context, Mr. Messier observed many of the 110 objects in the Messier catalog with a 4”/100 mm refractor. This is a reasonable starting point for seeing them distinctly under a completely dark sky, which he (and pretty much everyone else in the 18th century) had. Keep in mind that in many cases, what he saw was “faint fuzzy blob that looks kind of like a comet”. Seeing details in galaxies (in particular) requires a larger scope along with genuinely dark skies.

@dpnash @jkanev @paul_ipv6 @ai6yr My failure to see it could have many factors-my own eyesight, the quality of my instrument, the darkness of my dark sky. As well, as you say, galaxies simply don't look like pretty spirals in naked eye views.

AI6YR Ben Mar 4

@W6KME @dpnash @jkanev @paul_ipv6 The telescopes I got to see galaxies through in Death Valley were all big (dunno how big) but it was amazing....

Jacob Something Mar 4

@dpnash @paul_ipv6 @W6KME @ai6yr
Mmh, my thoughts went along those lines a bit too. If he could see them, why can't I, my telescope's better than his. I've red records of people who observed stars in broad daylight using telescopes, so I thought maybe a bigger lens might help? The pinwheel has magnitude 7.8 which doesn't sound too bad. But like I said, there was nothing, not even a slight hint of anything. Uniform blueness. That's why I was curious whether you'd seen it with your very nice setup. A dark sky, unfortunately, isn't an option for my any time soon.

@paul_ipv6 @W6KME @ai6yr No mechanical pencils?

Paul_IPv6 Mar 3

@nickapos @W6KME @ai6yr

shhh… don’t give away everything at once… :)

J.D. MacLeod 🇨🇦Mar 3

@ai6yr I have failed utterly

AI6YR Ben Mar 3

glasspshr Mar 3

@ai6yr I choose cats and astronomy

John Maxwell Mar 3

unlofl [Promoted Toot]Mar 3

@ai6yr
- Find an existing lewd running joke and take it to a new low
- Gently push back on some reactionary nonsense, and get a warm fuzzy feeling seeing the whole thread becomes clowning on that guy
- Declare the internet is getting too ridiculous and that you're logging off for a while at least 3 days in a row

Nikkileah 🎮🚄🏳️‍⚧️🇬🇧Mar 3

@ai6yr I think I've ticked most of those boxes along the way

you're all idiots Mar 3

@ai6yr correct.

AI6YR Ben Mar 3

@idiot LOL that's water cooled?

you're all idiots Mar 3

@ai6yr the electromagnetics it was driving were.

Matt Blaze Mar 3

@ai6yr @idiot I love the geared dials for voltage and current, but the “do not forget” light really seals the deal for me.

Stephen Foskett Mar 3

@mattblaze @ai6yr @idiot those Dymo 1570 labels!!

AI6YR Ben Mar 3

@sfoskett @mattblaze @idiot hey! I like those labels!

@ai6yr @sfoskett @mattblaze @idiot @wendinoakland Obligatory: “if you used one of these, time for your colonoscopy”

Wendroid 🇺🇦Mar 3

@DanMorgan @ai6yr @sfoskett @mattblaze @idiot Define “use”?

AI6YR Ben Mar 3

@wendinoakland @DanMorgan @sfoskett @mattblaze @idiot LOL sitting on my desk from the recent routine doctor's visit... "... order for colonoscopy screening..." (really)