Heat and Circuit Boards

Where in California, Jerry?  I live in Santa Rosa and while it can be hot during the day (and it will be 95+ this weekend), it cools down very quickly at night.  Yesterday for instance it was nearly 90 in the afternoon but by 8pm I was quite cool outside and by 10pm I was cold and needed a thick jacket.  (It's going to be 126 in Death Valley this weekend so hopefully you won't be there!)

Are you concerned about leaving the rig setup outside during the day?  I am not familiar with the ASIAIR but I am an electrical engineer and I know that there is a big difference between the temperature at which you store electronic equipment and the temperature at which you operate it.  You can usually safely store (not powered on)  electronics at extreme high and low temperatures with no damage.  For operation, however, the temperature range is much narrower.

I just looked up the specs of the ASIAIR Plus and it says that the operating temp is 0-40 degrees centigrade (32-104 Fahrenheit)..  So as long as you aren't operating it above 104F you should be fine.

Neil

Where in California, Jerry?  I live in Santa Rosa and while it can be hot during the day (and it will be 95+ this weekend), it cools down very quickly at night.  Yesterday for instance it was nearly 90 in the afternoon but by 8pm I was quite cool outside and by 10pm I was cold and needed a thick jacket.  (It's going to be 126 in Death Valley this weekend so hopefully you won't be there!)

Are you concerned about leaving the rig setup outside during the day?  I am not familiar with the ASIAIR but I am an electrical engineer and I know that there is a big difference between the temperature at which you store electronic equipment and the temperature at which you operate it.  You can usually safely store (not powered on)  electronics at extreme high and low temperatures with no damage.  For operation, however, the temperature range is much narrower.

I just looked up the specs of the ASIAIR Plus and it says that the operating temp is 0-40 degrees centigrade (32-104 Fahrenheit)..  So as long as you aren't operating it above 104F you should be fine.

Neil

Hi Neil,

I live in San Francisco (can't image here, relentless fog for 3 months has made that impossible) and the place I am supposed to go to is in Mendocino, about 30 miles inland from the coast.  It's ideal for astrophotography with a wide open field, Bortle 1/2, low lying hills gives good access to horizons but keeps skyglow out, and a great, cool house to relax in during the day.

But with such heat, I am wondering whether I'd even enjoy myself.  I also wonder about cool-down time for the 130mm refractor I'd have set up in the field.  The hottest time of day will be around 4pm and I want to start imaging around 10:30 or so.  

Thanks for the info about electronics.  I would keep everything covered during the day with a thick Telegizmos 365 cover and then put a blue tarp over that. Everything would be turned off and I'd disconnect the power supply. 
Jerry

Jerry Gerber:
I can also remove the camera and bring it inside during the day.  That would mitigate an cooling problems because at night around imaging time the temperature will be around 75F and lower...

I take it you don't want to unmount the scope and bring everything inside during the day?

Sounds good, Jerry.  Let us know how it goes!  I have thought about going up the coast myself sometime to get into Class 2 skies.  Where I live it is Class 4/5 so not awful but not as good as where you are going.  Do you have some specific targets already?

Neil

Hi Nick & Neil,

Yeah, I'll choose 2 DSOs to image out of 3:   The Elephant Trunk Nebula, M13 and SH2-155.  I'm bringing only one telescope because of the heat (less to carry), an Askar 130mm refractor.  I have an Edge8 and an Esprit 100ED, haven't even gotten any images with the Edge yet, I'm working up to it.

By the way, since you're both in the Bay Area, I rented the same place next month from August 15-18.  It's Bortle 2, probably closer to Bortle 1, and I am setting up in a large field with excellent horizon access and we can drive right up to where we set up.  It's next to a house that has Wi-Fi, 2 bedrooms (sleeps 4-5) 2 bathrooms, full kitchen and large flat screen TV. Also air conditioning.  Large living room, it's really nice, I was there last month with my wife and she even liked it.  It's in a beautiful part of California.  

Tomorrow I am meeting Kevin McLoughlin there, he's also an imager on Astrobin.  I'm hoping to go up next month again with 2-3 people, so if either of you are interested, send me a PM.

Jerry

Jerry

Wow that's very kind and gracious and brave of you to invite a complete stranger to stay and star watch with you!  I looked at your profile and website and I think I would enjoy talking with you.

However I literally am only 6 days into this hobby and I have only captured three images.  The first was so bad that I didn't even post it to Astrobin.  I don't want to be the new guy that spends all of the time asking stupid questions!  But if you're willing to take the risk it would be fun for me.  Right now I have a conflict over those days but I'll see if anything changes and let you know.

Good luck this weekend!
Neil

The first thing I did when I decided I wanted to learn astrophotography is I got a book called The Deep sky Imaging Primer by Charles Bracken.  It contains a wealth of information that has proved to be very useful.  I highly recommend it.  Make sure you get the latest edition.

Hi,

We are currently going through a heatwave that looks a lot like what you are describing.

I've just had to admit defeat and pack my cooled omegon 533 because neither it nor the laptop (I suspect) could deal with the ambient temperature of 39-40 degrees Celsius(*). Way too many gremlins in the images. TEC didn't have much of an issue bringing the sensor down to 0 degrees, but the rest of the electronics clearly were a different story…

Thing with heatwaves is temperature at night varies greatly with the underlying material and with how long it was exposed to the sun during the day. Air temperature above dirt or grass is more like 35 right now and will probably go down to 30-32 which is okay for operating the gear (although far from ideal). But in the paved spot that I place the rig the stones are radiating like an oven, hence the 40 degrees…


Cheers,
Dimitris