Cloudy skies returned on Saturday, 7 January 2017, and continued until Wednesday, 11 January. I missed the eclipse of the binary eclipsing varible star RW Tauri on Saturday due to the clouds. My next opportunity will be Wednesday, 18 January.

Open: Wednesday, 11 January 2017, 1837 MST Temperature: 59°F

Session: 1058 Conditions: Mostly clear

Equipment Used:
12" f/8 LX600 w/StarLock
Wired AutoStar II handset
2" 24mm UWA eyepiece
2" 9mm 100° eyepiece
2" 50mm eyepiece
2" 2X PowerMate

Camera:
iPhone 6s Plus

Unlike what had been forecast, the sky mostly cleared after sunset so I went to the observatory to check out Venus and the nearly Full Moon.

1841 MST: LX600 ON, StarLock OFF, High Precision OFF.

1844 MST: viewed Venus, 102X and 542X. Good view of the half-illuminated planet. Maximum eastern elongation would be the next day so the planet was almost exactly 50% lit.

Mounted the iPhone 6s Plus on the 2" 9mm eyepiece using the Levenhuk Smartphone Adapter. Did afocal slo-mo (240 fps) video recordings at 542X. This is a stack of 2485 video frames (10 seconds):

1902 MST: removed the iPhone and switched back to the 2" 24mm UWA eyepiece (102X). Viewed the Moon, 9.5 hours before precisely Full. A very slight terminator was visible. Could not get the entire lunar disk in the iPhone camera field-of-view using the 24mm eyepiece, but could with the 2" 50mm eyepiece (49X). Took this handheld iPhone image of the Moon (saturation increased to bring out the colors on the Moon):

1916 MST: last look at the Moon, 102X.

1917 MST: LX600 OFF.

Close: Wednesday, 11 January 2017, 1926 MST Temperature: 53°F

Session Length: 0h 49m Conditions: Mostly clear

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I have decided to update my Messier Catalog Astrophotography album with photos using the 12" LX600 and D7200 DSLR. I have already posted some photos taken in 2016.

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