Ohio Star Party/Outreach

[Mike Q]

Anyone still trying to organize an Ohio Star Party? A friend of mine has a dark sky spot down by the Ohio River with a 36” telescope who would be interested in hosting.

I believe your friend contacted me a couple of weeks ago via email asking if i was interested. I answered him but have heard nothing since.

[RitcheyPark]

For anyone interested, we are organizing a small gathering on Saturday October 5th to see the new site and for some observing that evening if the sky is clear. Best way to contact me is to text at 740 541 4746 and we can go from there. This is a 40 acre site named after George Willis Ritchey who grew up nearby. The site is being willed to the John Glenn Astronomy Park when I'm gone. Our goal is to aquire a Planewave R-C scope at a later date in honor of George Ritchey. The site is located on a hilltop over looking the Ohio river at Long Bottom. Bortle 4 or better depending on the sky conditions.
The Bushman at Ritchey Park.

[Mike Q]

For anyone interested, we are organizing a small gathering on Saturday October 5th to see the new site and for some observing that evening if the sky is clear. Best way to contact me is to text at 740 541 4746 and we can go from there. This is a 40 acre site named after George Willis Ritchey who grew up nearby. The site is being willed to the John Glenn Astronomy Park when I'm gone. Our goal is to aquire a Planewave R-C scope at a later date in honor of George Ritchey. The site is located on a hilltop over looking the Ohio river at Long Bottom. Bortle 4 or better depending on the sky conditions.
The Bushman at Ritchey Park.

I am going to plug it into my calendar. You have my number text me the address of the site.

[Mike Q]

This event is shaping up nicely and supposedly we will have clear skies

[Mike Q]

I will be heading out shortly bound for Long Bottom Ohio and the 1st and hopefully annually held star party at Ritchey Park. The weather says we will have clear Bortle 3 skies. I will post pictures as I can but it may be a day or two since i will be in the land of very little signal.

[Bigzmey]

I will be heading out shortly bound for Long Bottom Ohio and the 1st and hopefully annually held star party at Ritchey Park. The weather says we will have clear Bortle 3 skies. I will post pictures as I can but it may be a day or two since i will be in the land of very little signal.

Have fun!

[Mike Q]

The scopes of the first star party at Ritchy Park

[Mike Q]

So it was a pretty clear night down on the Ohio River. We had 30 or so people show up. Ritchey Park provided all the scopes for people to use. We had a 5 or 6 inch Tak, the massive 36 F3.3 dob, a 14 inch SCT, the astro club from Ohio University in Athens brought a 5 inch Newt and my trusty 4 inch was at the end of the line. We ran into problems right off the bat....the go to on the 36 has issues and it was being directed manual by the astronomy professor from OU. Remind me NEVER to get a manual scope that big. The Meade was another issue. It didnt have a finder scope on it making a accurate alignment all but impossible. Too add insult to injury no one was particularly up to speed on that particular model. I managed to figure it out but with out a finder to dial it in proper...i unplugged it and shoved it back inside. Another issue....the Park has more telescopes then eyepieces. Fortunately yours truly brought enough to spread around a bit. Once we got things rolling we were able to find a couple dozen items over the next two hours to entertain those who showed up. Oddly enough I was so busy all night running around playing eyepiece guru that i never had time to look thru the big scope. As a note of interest i set my scope on the same object the Tak was on a couple of times and went back and for comparing the images. I am not going to tell you they were equal, but i definitely didnt think it was multiple thousands of dollars better then the little astro tech. So score 1 for the frac.

All things considered it was a decent night and a decent result for the first attempt

[Mike Q]

A interesting note about the big Tak refractor. Bushman was trying to go wide on M31. Not knowing any specifics about the scope i handed him my ES 30 82, a couple minutes later he brings it back and wants something even lower power, closer to 40mm, the only thing i had was a 38mm 70 degree, that 80 dollar eyepiece worked very well in it. I was kinda shocked in all honesty. I also have to give a nod to my little 4 inch astro tech. Going back and forth between the two comparing images, sure the Tak won, but to me there wasn't multiple thousands of dollars worth of difference between the two. Score 1 for the little scope.

[Bigzmey]

Sounds like a great outreach event Mike! And running around, operating scopes etc. instead of enjoying time at the EP sounds familiar.

[Mike Q]

Sounds like a great outreach event Mike! And running around, operating scopes etc. instead of enjoying time at the EP sounds familiar.

This was more of an family outreach deal then a star party. He is already talking about trying to do another one before the weather gets to bad. Yours truly has already been invited and reminded to bring eyepieces lol