Observations 05 Jan 2006:
----------------------------
Cosatrak 1 (Computerised satellite Tracking System).
MINTRON low light level CCD surveillance camera (0.005 lux typical
in non integration mode) and 0.00005 lux in STARLIGHT mode with 128
frame integration.
Used with 140mm focal length f/1.9 lens,integrating for 126 frames
which is equivalent to an exposure of 2.58 seconds per image.
Site 0433 : Longitude 18.51294 deg East, Latitude 33.94058 deg S,
Elevation 10 metres - situated in Pinelands (Cape Town), South Africa
For CLASSFD.TLE:
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90044 05 859A 0433 G 20060105185734400 56 15 0516591+093938 39
90044 05 859A 0433 G 20060105185853600 56 15 0532253+054117 39
90044 05 859A 0433 G 20060105190151400 56 15 0616122-044800 39
90013 03 564A 0433 G 20060105191130800 56 15 0520467+124236 39 +075 05
25724 99 023A 0433 G 20060105202114600 56 15 0347075+234054 39 +040 05
14729 84 012D 0433 G 20060105204217500 56 15 0540296-045303 39 +065 05
90035 05 625A 0433 G 20060105204350300 56 15 0805296+051904 39 +110 05
90045 05 862B 0433 G 20060105205906200 56 15 0148193+034908 39 +105 05
90045 05 862B 0433 G 20060105210549100 56 15 0157564+033040 39 +100 05
90045 05 862B 0433 G 20060105213532400 56 15 0241155+023111 39 +100 05
27938 03 041B 0433 G 20060105211016000 56 15 0909046+000029 39 +095 05
Strays:
--------
Delta 2 R/B
21048 91 001B 0433 G 20060105185031700 56 15 0438103+162039 39 +075 05
Users
27515 02 042A 0433 G 20060105185340700 56 15 0444403+175426 39 +035 05
Intelsat 904
27380 02 007A 0433 G 20060105204350300 56 15 0805529+051750 39 +110 05
Cosmos 654
07297 74 032A 0433 G 20060105205518300 56 15 0144232+032019 39 +050 05
Cosmos 1992
19769 89 005A 0433 G 20060105205604400 56 15 0138314+034328 39 +080 05
Atlas 3B Centaur range 8000 kms
28118 03 057B 0433 G 20060105211019400 56 15 0908317-004016 39 +075 05
Ariane 42P range 12845 kms
22670 92 072C 0433 G 20060105220433200 56 15 0553053+064006 39 +080 05
Notes:
------
(1) Main purpose of the tracking session was to test out a new lens.
Using a focal reducer I changed a 400mm f/5.5 telephoto lens to a
focal length of about 140 mm and operating at about f/1.9.
Unfortunately the main lens turns out to be of poor optical quality
when operating in the infra-red ( the CCD camera has peak performance
in the infra-red). Theoretically I should have got about 0.5 to 0.7
magnitudes gain on my usual 145mm lens but instead of getting around
mag +12.5 I only got about mag +10.1. In addition bright stars looked
like fireworks displays and the background was rather "washed out"
Only by reducing the f/stop to about f/5.6 (f/16 on the original
lens f/stop scale) was I able to remove this "fireworks display"
and managed to get down to magnitude +10.7- still less than my usual
camera and in addition the background appeared to be full of bright
pixels (dead pixels) which I have been unable to remove by applying
a dark frame.
My next try with this lens will be to use a teleconverter lens to
decrease the focal length. If the image quality is still poor ( as
I expect it will be) this particular lens will be discarded as being
unsuitable.
(2) Satellite 02042A (#27515) produced a very bright flash - so bright
it completely saturated the CCD camera and flooded the field of
view - it was helped by the "fireworks" that appeared around stars
brighter than magnitude +3.
(3) There may be a few more satellites to report as I have not yet gone
through the entire DVD recording but I dont think there is anything
of real interest.
Cheers
Greg
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