Putman Mountain Observatory

Calibrating Observatory Equipment

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Many months of time and effort were spent calibrating and adjusting  the observatory equipment to make image acquisition and automation more efficient. The following components were calibrated: Dome positioning - to within a degree of azimuth Telescope pointing using Bisque T-Point Model - within 10 arc seconds of pointing accuracy Telescope periodic error correction - [...]

What is a Weather Server?

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The Weather Server is a computer system that manages the collection of real-time weather and astronomical information. Once the information is collected, it is processed into web pages for display on this web site or it is made available to the observatory computer for use in managing the operation of the telescope so it can respond to changes [...]

Determining Back Focus for RCOS Telescopes

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  The back focus specification from RCOS for the Telescope is 9.929 inches.  See diagram below. Therefore, the focal plane for the camera should be as close as possible to 9.929 inches from the telescope backplate.  The camera, extension tubes, filter wheel and adaptive optics unit comprise the "imaging stack."  The imaging stack must be configured with [...]