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meteor spectroscopy
Lew asked a little about meteor spectroscopy. I've dabbled into the effort a
little. first of all, I'll say it takes a lot of luck and expense for little
return. but you need something to disperse the meteors light into a
spectrum. This is done with either a prism or an expensive diffraction
grating. An ordinary cheap diffraction grating that is sold at hobby supply
stores etc. won't work for meteor work. A big enough quality grating to
cover a lenswill cost several hundred dollars or more if you can find a place
that sells it. I made my spectrograph from the largest prism I can find in
the Edmunds Scientific catalog. It cost somewhere near $200. You have to
mount this prism at a proper angle in front of the camera's lens. I tried it
out first on stars. I noticed that on a 50mm lens, I couldn't make out the
emission lines. but with a 135mm lens I could see some lines. Anyhow, you
make a time exposure and hope for a very bright fireball. The prism absorbs
a lot of light. But if a fireball crosses the prisms proper alignment,
various emission lines will be spread across the film. While engaged with
trying to obtain meteor spectra, I was never blessed with a brite meteor at
the right time and setup/alignment. My hats off to those few successful
amateurs.
George