17 replies to this topic

[Bigal1817]

I’ve been asked to help my daughter’s Girl Scouts troop learn about astronomy. I’ll show them the Sun spots this Thursday around 3:30 local time. I’d like to try to show them Venus too, but it’s so tough to find and, while the Sun is outside the view, I don’t like to sweep around too much because of the dangers of allowing it to enter the view. I located Venus with the Go-To Equatorial mount pretty easily while trying to replicate the movement in the alt-az. Alas, I was unsuccessful. I’m using a Herschel Wedge for the solar and mirror diagonal to find Venus.

Anyone have any tips or suggestions?

Edited by Bigal1817, 09 March 2025 - 09:21 PM.

[Sebastian_Sajaroff]

Does your mount have circles ?

[RMay]

If you’re trying to show them Venus at 3:30 in the afternoon, it will be nearly impossible, because it’s quite close to the sun and can really only be seen after sunset.

It’s low in the west right now, so you can take a look at it, and then make locating it a ‘homework’ assignment for them.

👍😉

Ron

[Bigal1817]

Does your mount have circles ?

.

It’s a DiscMount-4. I have encoders and a Nexus DSC but I’m not sure how to align with only the sun as a reference (the Moon will be down). I’m open to suggestions!!!

[Bigal1817]

If you’re trying to show them Venus at 3:30 in the afternoon, it will be nearly impossible, because it’s quite close to the sun and can really only be seen after sunset.

It’s low in the west right now, so you can take a look at it, and then make locating it a ‘homework’ assignment for them.

👍😉

Ron

For sure tough, but not impossible. I viewed it today in my goto and saw the beautiful crescent.

[Daveatvt01]

Try setting the scope in the shadow of a building to the SW, so the sun is just below the roofline. Make sure it is in the shade at any angle you might point it. Now the sun won’t fry anyone’s eyeballs. It will keep getting lower in this situation. Next estimate where Venus should be using the sun as a rough guide. You may have to take a few steps back and forth. Venus is about 16 degrees above and 3 degrees to the right of the sun from my location on that day. It should be similar for you. Sweep with a low power eyepiece to find it.
If you have a smartphone, it may have an app that measures angles too- you can lay it against the scope and help you find the correct elevation.
Make sure you are focused after switching to the star diagonal.
Have fun and be safe.

[RMay]

For sure tough, but not impossible. I viewed it today in my goto and saw the beautiful crescent.

Yep… caught it just before 10am this morning. I’ll be trying to keep it in my sights for as long as I can, with rain expected next week, as it reaches inferior conjunction on March 22…

 

Good luck with your efforts,

 

Ron

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[Bigal1817]

Try setting the scope in the shadow of a building to the SW, so the sun is just below the roofline. Make sure it is in the shade at any angle you might point it. Now the sun won’t fry anyone’s eyeballs. It will keep getting lower in this situation. Next estimate where Venus should be using the sun as a rough guide. You may have to take a few steps back and forth. Venus is about 16 degrees above and 3 degrees to the right of the sun from my location on that day. It should be similar for you. Sweep with a low power eyepiece to find it.
If you have a smartphone, it may have an app that measures angles too- you can lay it against the scope and help you find the correct elevation.
Make sure you are focused after switching to the star diagonal.
Have fun and be safe.

Hi Dave,
This is very helpful. Where did you find the information that Venus is 16 degrees above the sun? If I can locate this, I can guesstimate where to position the scope.

[DAVIDG]

 I observe Venus all the time during the day since it is best to view it when it is high in the sky and not super bright in the scope. First I use the measure function in Sky Safari to show the distance between Venus and the Sun. Next I use a my 7x50 binoculars that I keep focused at infinity. I know the field of view of the binoculars is 6 degrees. On many it is  written on them. So I know how many field of view I need to move from the Sun to be pointing at were Venus is in the sky. I place the Sun behind an object so I can't view in the binoculars like behind the roof or chimney of my house. I then starting were the Sun is behind the object move the binoculars the needed amount of field of views away from the Sun and in the direction of Venus. Almost always with a bit of swiping I will see Venus in the binoculars. From there I know were to look naked eye and usually again I can see it without the binoculars. From there  I can reference it's position to some other object like a tree branch so I can easily find it in the finder of one my scopes and observe it with the main telescope.

   Yesterday afternoon I easily found Venus around 4 pm since it was almost  20 degrees straight  above the Sun. Here is a not so great image I took with my cell phone held up to eyepiece yesterday. 

 

               - Dave 

 

[havasman]

I have seen guest observers and especially children do anything and everything wrong from knocking over a Dob to pulling eyepieces out of the focuser and ,worse, moving a fixtured pair of binoculars to look at the sun protected only by a pair of solar film glasses he had on his face. I was barely able to run over & jump in front of him before he boiled his eyeballs. The member supposedly in charge of that gear which he'd brought looked away for a moment. Please use EXTREME caution if you're going to let kids look through a wide angle finder pointed anywhere near the sun.

 

I would never do it. Failure consequences are too high.

[Bigal1817]

I observe Venus all the time during the day since it is best to view it when it is high in the sky and not super bright in the scope. First I use the measure function in Sky Safari to show the distance between Venus and the Sun. Next I use a my 7x50 binoculars that I keep focused at infinity. I know the field of view of the binoculars is 6 degrees. On many it is written on them. So I know how many field of view I need to move from the Sun to be pointing at were Venus is in the sky. I place the Sun behind an object so I can't view in the binoculars like behind the roof or chimney of my house. I then starting were the Sun is behind the object move the binoculars the needed amount of field of views away from the Sun and in the direction of Venus. Almost always with a bit of swiping I will see Venus in the binoculars. From there I know were to look naked eye and usually again I can see it without the binoculars. From there I can reference it's position to some other object like a tree branch so I can easily find it in the finder of one my scopes and observe it with the main telescope.
Yesterday afternoon I easily found Venus around 4 pm since it was almost 20 degrees straight above the Sun. Here is a not so great image I took with my cell phone held up to eyepiece yesterday.

- Dave

venus 3925.jpg

That’s a pretty good plan. I have binoculars but may or may not bring/use them depending on the specific location. We’ll be on the sidewalk in front of a strip mall so blocking out the sun with the building may or may not be an option.

[Bigal1817]

I have seen guest observers and especially children do anything and everything wrong from knocking over a Dob to pulling eyepieces out of the focuser and ,worse, moving a fixtured pair of binoculars to look at the sun protected only by a pair of solar film glasses he had on his face. I was barely able to run over & jump in front of him before he boiled his eyeballs. The member supposedly in charge of that gear which he'd brought looked away for a moment. Please use EXTREME caution if you're going to let kids look through a wide angle finder pointed anywhere near the sun.

I would never do it. Failure consequences are too high.

Safety is PARAMOUNT! My general plan is, after viewing the sun, to move the scope up in the sky, swap in the diagonal for the Herschel wedge, and sweep in one direction only - AWAY FROM THE SUN!

If I get lucky and find Venus, we all view safely. If not, too bad and I will NOT be determined to sweep a 2nd time. I’ll be using a small refractor on my discmount with the disc-tension set high. There won’t be any accidental movements of the scope like with a DOB.

Edited by Bigal1817, 10 March 2025 - 02:10 PM.

[Bigal1817]

Clouds rolled in to try to spoil the party. They were thin enough the Girl Scouts saw the sunspots but thick enough I didn’t bother to try to find Venus, so the Herschel Wedge stayed in the whole time and viewing was 100% safe.

[RMay]

Clouds have actually been quite helpful in cutting down the glare. Here’s a pic from last night.

Ron

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[Bigal1817]

That’s a beauty! An interesting that the clouds help the cause.

[RMay]

That’s a beauty! An interesting that the clouds help the cause.

Thank you!

Ron

[CHnuschti]

I located Venus with the Go-To Equatorial mount pretty easily while trying to replicate the movement in the alt-az.

The use of a cheap inclinometer is very helpful. Inclinometers work "absolute" concerning the tilt. Once calibrated on the horizontal, you just have to put them aligned on the telescope tube. The precision is quite high, some 0.2° I would guess.
 

With a low magnification eyepiece with say 1° FOV, find the right focus on clouds, an airplane of far away mountains.
Then locate approximately the azimut direction, set you altitude tilt according to skysafari or others apps giving the alt/az coordinates, and slowly sweep horizontally until you find it. Did work many times here for finding more difficult candidates like Mercury.

 

Venus should be no challenge also during the day, as long some clarity is given, might be well to locate in a simple finder. To avoid the sun, well, go behind a building wall or something like that.

 

regards

Edited by CHnuschti, 14 March 2025 - 06:52 PM.

[ButterFly]

.

It’s a DiscMount-4. I have encoders and a Nexus DSC but I’m not sure how to align with only the sun as a reference (the Moon will be down). I’m open to suggestions!!!

With your solar filter in place, use the sun as the first alignment reference.  It will give you directions to venus from there, and get you rather close.  Level your mount as best as you can, and make sure your time and location are correct (wait for a good gps fix).

 

If you start your nexus while pointed due north, and level to the horizon (or straight up and north, if "up" is your alt ref position), you can get hints on how to get to the sun as well, before you even align anything.  Unless and until you are sure that the sun is several degrees away, keep your solar filter on.  This method can help when it's only Jupiter and venus up, for example, with the sun very low on the horizon, or when you don't really know star names very well.