Hi,


<p>Here is a quick set of photos and a deep image to report briefly on the status of our equipment at 
the Blue Mountain Vista Observatory.

</p>
<p>Dual scope 
<a href="http://www.physics.drexel.edu/~steinberg/astro/BMVO/overview%20of%20two%20scopes%20on%20Tandem%20bar-%20IMG_1644.JPG">overview
</a>- </p>
<p>The large scope is a 320mm f/8 
<a href="http://starizona.com/acb/Hyperion-125-f8-Astrograph-P2960C132.aspx">Hyperion</a>, a corrected Cassegrain using Harmer-Wynne optics.</p>
<p>The main camera is an Alta U16M with KAF16803 16 Mpixel chip (37mm square).

</p>
<p>The smaller scope is a 106mm f/5 Takahashi FSQ106N with Orion SSPro camera, currently used mostly for guiding.

</p>
<p>
<a href="http://www.physics.drexel.edu/~steinberg/astro/BMVO/rear%20view%20of%20the%20tandem%20bar%20setup-%20%20IMG_1641.JPG">Rear view</a> of the 
dual scope setup - </p>
<p>148 minutes on the 
<a href="http://www.physics.drexel.edu/~steinberg/astro/BMVO/NGC6047-80+68min.jpg">Hercules Galaxy Cluster</a>&nbsp; 
Abell 2151- </p>
<p>This image (one hour obtained on each of June 18 and 20, 2010) is a fairly deep view (~mag 21+) of the Hercules Galaxy Cluster (Abell 2151), containing many interesting objects some of which I will comment on in a separate note.

</p>
<p>The FOV is about 50x50 arc minutes. North is up. With 2x2 binning in use, the plate scale is 1.46 arc-sec/pixel. Be sure to expand the image on your monitor to see many details of interacting galaxies, etc. Especially note IC1182 (about an inch NE of the center of the image), with its dual jets. The eastward jet is linear, while the fainter NW jet/plume resembles a backward question mark. 
For comparison, here is a <a href="http://www.eso.org/public/news/eso9834/">view</a> of this object with 
a one-hour exposure on the 8.2 meter VLT-UT1 telescope in the northern Chilean 
Andes.</p>
<p>Regards,
</p>
<p>Dick </p>