wpo-amateur spectroscopy

mgavin at ntlworld dot com

2008 April 7

Spectroscopy - general
Papers published papers
Atmospheric phenomena
Equipment designs & reviews

Observations
Cool stars
Hot stars
Explosive events -novae
Extra-galactic

I have a long-standing interest in spectroscopy and it thus dominates my website. Most of the equipment, other than prisms and gratings, has been home-made and building the various devices was great fun. It is very rewarding to capture spectrograms of stars and planets showing the gases and various elements in their atmospheres.

Spectroscopy has been revolutionized by ultra-sensitive CCDs
amateur work can rival professional spectrograms of yesteryear.
Judge the amateur spectroscopist in France, Germany, USA and UK.
identify a supernova's spectral type
measuring a quasar's cosmological redshift
If you are new to spectroscopy my beginner's page may help.

An early Vega spectrogram below taken on Kodak 2475 [my favourite spectro film in pre CCDs days] via OG prism. Print 'snapped' with Kodak DC40 camera and image reworked via Paintshop Pro. Film has better penetration than CCDs into UV [recording the hydrogen Balmer series to ~370nm] but only just beyond Ha at 656.3nm in red. The Balmer 'head' converges [H# = infinity] at 364.56nm in UV.

Partial colour spectrum of variable star XY Lyrae [north of Vega] via MX5c one-shot colour CCD and WPO spectrograph.coupled to 0.3m Meade LX200

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