Due to the great commitment and the high scientific yield of the work at the Hans Haffner Observatory, the company Baader Planetarium GmbH offered to help with the technical development of the observatory. From the Baader company the Hans-Haffner-Observatory has obtained not only the main telescope and the previous mount, but also numerous other technical equipment. With the support of the Chair of Astronomy, the previous GM 4000 QCI was lifted out of the observatory dome with the help of a crane on October 10, 2018 and replaced by the new, GM 4000 HPS II.
Already the first test images with the new mount showed the extraordinary high quality of the new system with additionally simplified handling. In the meantime, after many more measurement nights of the AGN group and exposures for astrophotos, working without the new mount at the Hans Haffner Observatory is hardly imaginable.
By means of alignment by the program ModelCreator the guiding-free tracking time could be increased from two minutes with the QCI to ten minutes with the HPS II. If the telescope is not too flat, even exposure times of 20 minutes without guiding are possible. The measurement nights of the AGN group are now much more efficient. Usually, between 10 and 15 AGN are measured at the observatory in one night, and guiding had to be done each time. Thanks to the new HPS II, the not inconsiderable time required for this can now be used for additional objects.
In addition to high-precision tracking, the HPS II also impresses with its extremely accurate pointing. Due to the exact, guding-free tracking and the precise pointing as well as the easy handling of the mount, students of the 9th grade can now already perform measurements independently and without the help of a teacher.
We thank the company Baader Planetarium, without whose generous support this technical upgrade would not have been possible!
(translated Team Baader Planetarium)
