Sunspot positions and sizes for 1825-1867 from the observations by Samuel Heinrich Schwabe
Samuel Heinrich Schwabe made 8486 drawings of the solar disk with sunspots in the period from November 5, 1825 to December 29, 1867. We have measured sunspot sizes and heliographic positions on digitized images of these drawings. A total of about 135,000 measurements of individual sunspots are available in a data base. Positions are accurate to about 5% of the solar radius or to about three degrees in heliographic coordinates in the solar disk center. Sizes were given in 12 classes as estimated visually with circular cursor shapes on the screen. Most of the drawings show a coordinate grid aligned with the celestial coordinate system. A subset of 1168 drawings have no indication of their orientation. We have used a Bayesian estimator to infer the orientations of the drawings as well as the average heliographic spot positions from a chain of drawings of several days, using the rotation profile of the present Sun. The data base also includes all information available from Schwabe on spotless days.
LOIRP Status Report 31 May 2013
Dennis Wingo: We are still on stand down until the tape drive head gets back from the shop. It was delivered to Videomagnetics today so hopefully it will be back here before the end of next week. While we wait, Austin Epps and Jacob Gold (who has joined us as one of our student interns this summer) are catching up on the back end processing of the images. Jacob has over 3,000 framelets to number right now!
The last two tapes that ran on 5-29 before the tae drive head tip broke are listed below.
G2-071, partial capture LOII-2095H (completes image)
G2-072, partial capture LOII-2093M, complete capture 2094H
LOIRP Status Report 29 May 2013
Dennis Wingo: Its dead Jim…. The new head we just got and have ran about 20 tapes has died. Somehow a tip was broken this morning when we put G2-073 on the machine. We are going to have to send it back to Videomagnetics for repair. We may be able to find one of our other heads with some life left to carry us over until we get this one back but I can’t count on it. We can now catch up on all of the captures we have done of late. We should have several hundred more images now! I will get some statistics from Austin after we have processed the tapes that we have done lately.
LOIRP Status Report 20 May 2013
Dennis Wingo: Got the new refurbished head working today! Going back and doing one Madrid tape and then instead of doing the 18 scotch tapes we are going to start with the Goldstone tapes which some of them overlap the Scotch tapes. This also preserves the head in case something happens with the Scotch tapes so that we get our LOII stuff done as we promised for our Rockethub donors…
Maintaining Our Old Tape Drives
Ken Zin works with an Ampex tape drive head for our FR-900 tape drive. This one had to be sent back to repair after the refurbishment. One of the head tips did not work.
How Life Magazine Revealed “Earthrise” in 1966
The following two pages from the 9 September 1966 issue of Life magazine are how many people first saw the famous “earthrise” photo taken by Lunar Orbiter 1 less than two weeks earlier. The editors of Life sought to place the image in a context such that people could see what was actually in the picture. LOIRP has done similar analyses here and here. Due to the enhanced resolution of our images we were able to pin down the exact time and orientation of Earth a bit more accurately than was possible in 1966.
Click on images to enlarge.
LOIRP analysis in 2008
Boeing Planetary Probe Concept Based on Lunar Orbiter Design
“This is an artist’s impression of how an unmanned would look as it neared Mars before going into a the planet. The Boeing Company has proposed building such a spacecraft, using technology developed during the successful Lunar Orbiter program. It would carry automatic equipment for taking, developing and sending back to Earth close-up photos of our neighboring planets. The spacecraft would operate in orbit for about a year and could be used on missions to Mars or Venus.” Larger image.
LOIRP Supporter Michael Wright Stops By McMoons
Dennis Wingo: “Michael Wright came by and picked up his image this past week and we took a picture of him with our FR-900 machine. We thank Michael for his support! He also brought by some pictures of paintings by LOIRP benefactor Don Davis, of the iconic L5 habitat images from Gerry O’Neil’s studies in the 70’s. Many of us are Gerry’s kids…”
LOIRP Supporter Certificates
Dennis Wingo: “Today has been organization and logistics day for shipping stuff. We have all of the prints and their certificates done for the $1000, $750, and $500 prizes. We are missing some addresses and even names! I will email those folks tonight. The images below are your certificates. The gold rimmed certificates are for the $5000, and $1000 prizes and the rest get the certificates with the green border. Stuff will start being mailed tomorrow we promise….”
High Resolution Lunar Orbiter V Mosaic of Crater Copernicus
This mosaic of the floor of crater Copernicus was created by combining the following 24 high resolution images taken by Lunar Orbiter V on 16 August 1967: 5148_H1, 5148_H2, 5148_H3, 5149_H1, 5149_H2, 5149_H3, 5150_H1, 5150_H2, 5150_H3, 5152_H1, 5152_H2, 5152_H3, 5153_H1, 5153_H2, 5153_H3, 5154_H1, 5154_H2, 5154_H3, 5155_H1, 5155_H2, 5155_H3, 5156_H1, 5156_H2, and 5156_H3.
One of the later Apollo missions was originally planned to land inside Copernicus crater. The last three Apollo missions were eventually canceled.
[Larger image] [Much larger image] [Very large image at NLSI] [ 10% size image exceptionally large]
[Full resolution, This image is 24 GIGABYTES. This is probably the largest image of planetary data ever put together into one mosaic. If it were blown up to full size at 300 DPI it would still be 37 feet wide by 18 feet tall.]
Lunar Orbiter Camera System Prior to Being Placed in Pressure Shell
Lunar Orbiter Model at Apollo 11 Press Center in Houston
A model of the Boeing-built Lunar Orbiter, which paved the way for the Apollo 11 mission with its close-up photos of the moon, looks down on a mockup of a lunar landscape at the press center in Houston. (Boeing photo). Larger Image.
