SAGUARO ASTRONOMY CLUB DOUBLE STAR DATABASE VERSION 4.0 dated July 4, 2008 Steve Coe email: stevecoe at cloudynights dot com Many members of our astronomy club have always enjoyed the beauty of multiple stars and in an effort to provide a list of these objects, this project was begun. We are not foolish enough to believe that it is complete, but it should be a good starting point for many amateur double star observers with modest telescopes. The previous versions of the SAC double star database have been created by starting with a large professional set of data, usually the Washington Double Star (WDS) catalog. We found that approach to provide plenty of stars but we found that size just created an overwhelming observing list. So, this time we came at the problem from the other direction. Instead of creating a double star database from a huge file, we would put together the information from a wide variety of modest sources and created a larger file of multiple stars that have been discussed in the astronomical literature. In other words--someone at some point said that these stars are worth observing. There are three versions of the database in this release, in an effort to provide the users of the data the most useful format for their computer. The "fence" version is a text file that has a vertical bar, or fence, between each field. The "QCQ" version is a quote comma quote delimited (CSV) version so that the user can easier import it into a variety of spreadsheets or database managers. The third version is in the form or an Excel spreadsheet. A description of the fields and what data they contain follows: Database Format Summary: FIELD NAME TYPE WIDTH 1 Con Char 3 2 Name Char 15 3 RA Char 7 (HH MM.M) 4 Dec Char 6 (+DD MM) 5 Comp Char 5 6 Other Names Char 27 7 Mag1 Char 4 8 Mag2 Char 4 9 Sep Num 6 (9999.9) 10 PA Char 3 11 Notes Char 62 12 U2000 Char 3 13 Tirion Char 2 14 Bright Star Atlas Char 2 15 SAO Num 6 ------------------------------ ** Total ** 155 Details about each field follows: Field Number: 1 Name: CON Size: 3 (Char) Constellation in which the object is found in IAU format, given in the table below. Only upper case abbreviations are used for ease of programming using case-sensitive commands. ANDROMEDA AND LACERTA LAC ANTLIA ANT LEO LEO APUS APS LEO MINOR LMI AQUARIUS AQR LEPUS LEP AQUILA AQL LIBRA LIB ARA ARA LUPUS LUP ARIES ARI LYNX LYN AURIGA AUR LYRA LYR BOOTES BOO MENSA MEN CAELUM CAE MICROSCOPIUM MIC CAMELOPARDALIS CAM MONOCEROS MON CANCER CNC MUSCA MUS CANES VENATICI CVN NORMA NOR CANIS MAJOR CMA OCTANS OCT CANIS MINOR CMI OPHIUCHUS OPH CAPRICORNUS CAP ORION ORI CARINA CAR PAVO PAV CASSIOPEIA CAS PEGASUS PEG CENTAURUS CEN PERSEUS PER CEPHEUS CEP PHOENIX PHE CETUS CET PICTOR PIC CHAMAELEON CHA PISCES PSC CIRCINUS CIR PISCES AUSTRINUS PSA COLUMBA COL PUPPIS PUP COMA BERENICES COM PYXIS PYX CORONA AUSTRALIS CRA RETICULUM RET CORONA BOREALIS CRB SAGITTA SGE CORVUS CRV SAGITTARIUS SGR CRATER CRT SCORPIUS SCO CRUX CRU SCULPTOR SCL CYGNUS CYG SCUTUM SCT DELPHINUS DEL SERPENS SER DORADO DOR SEXTANS SEX DRACO DRA TAURUS TAU EQUULEUS EQU TELESCOPIUM TEL ERIDANUS ERI TRIANGULUM AUSTRALE TRA FORNAX FOR TRIANGULUM TRI GEMINI GEM TUCANA TUC GRUS GRU URSA MAJOR UMA HERCULES HER URSA MINOR UMI HOROLOGIUM HOR VELA VEL HYDRA HYA VIRGO VIR HYDRUS HYI VOLANS VOL INDUS IND VULPECULA VUL Field Number: 2 Name: NAME Size: 15 (Char) Name of the discoverer of this multiple system. A Aitken, R.G. HRG Hargrave, L. AC Clark, Alvan HU Hussey, W.L. AG AG catalog I Innes, R.T.A. ARG Argelander, F. J Jonckheere, R. B Bos, W.H. van den JC Jacob, W.S. BrsO Brisbane Obs. Kr Kruger, A BUP Burnham, S.W. pm L Lewis, T. COO Cordoba Obs. LAL Lalande, F. de COU Couteau, P. MLB Milburn, W. CPO Cape Observatory MLO Melbourne Obs. DON Donner, H.F. PZ Piazzi, G. ES Espin, T.E. R Russell, H.C. GLI Gilliss, J.M. RMK Rumker, C. GRB Groombridge, S. SEE See, T.J. H Herschel, W. SEI Scheiner, J. H N Herschel, W. Sh South & Herschel H V Herschel, W. SLR Sellors, R.P. H VI Herschel, W. STF Struve, F.G.W. HDO Harvard Obs. STT Struve, Otto HEI Heintz, W.D. WEI Weisse, M. h Herschel, J. WNC Winnecke, A. If the object was not listed in a preceding catalog, we used the star's Bayer or Flamsteed designation or the full name of the observer. Field Number: 3 Name: RA Size: 7 (Char) Epoch 2000 position in hours and minutes of Right Ascension. (The format is: HH MM.M) Field Number: 4 Name: DEC Size: 6 (Char) Epoch 2000 position in Declination degrees and minutes. (The format is: SDD MM) Field Number: 5 Name: COMP Size: 5 (Char) If this is a multiple system, which components of the triple (or more) are in this record. For instance, if this field has ABXD then this field of data applies to the star system D in relation to the brightest pair in this multiple star AB. Field Number: 6 Name: OTHER NAMES Size: 27 (Char) If there is another name for a star, its designation is included here. There may be several "A.K.A"s here. Field Number: 7 Name: MAG1 Size: 4 (Char) Magnitude of the primary star. Field Number: 8 Name: MAG2 Size: 4 (Char) Magnitude of the secondary star. Field Number: 9 Name: SEP Size: 6 (Numeric) Separation of the pair in arc seconds. Field Number: 10 Name: PA Size: 3 (Char) Position Angle of the pair in arc degrees clockwise from North. Field Number: 11 Name: NOTES Size: 62 (Char) To prevent errors in some database import programs, we did not use a double quote mark (") for arc seconds, two single quotes ('') were used. Several abbreviations were used in the Notes section: CoCo = Color Contrast, the star exhibits a difference in color between the primary and secondary. Colors = B = blue, BG = blue-green BW = blue-white Gn = green Gy = gray L = lilac O = orange P = purple R = red, T = topaz (pale yellow) V = violet W = white Y = yellow Magnitude Contrast = the stars appear very different in brightness. var = variable, the magnitude of the star changes with time. We are well aware of the "wildness" of some of the colors, some of which cannot be possible considering Planck's Radiation Law. However, they are historical and based on the possibility that the response of the eye is rather variable and the mind of the observer sometimes may get fanciful. Use your own judgement. If the binary pair is generally no more than half a magnitude different and the spectral class is close, the term "Almost Matched Pair" is used. If the magnitude difference is less than 0.2 of a magnitude and the spectral classes of the members is almost the same or actually the same, the term "Well Matched Pair" is used. There are problems with this method in that different sources might have different values for either or both magnitude and spectral class. So, here again, consider the terms general and use your own judgement. Field Number: 12 Name: U2000 Size: 3 (Char) The charts in the Uranometria 2000.0 that map the area of sky in which the star is located. It is not guaranteed that all multiple stars plotted on U2000 are contained in the database but we are trying. Field Number: 13 Name: TIRION Size: 2 (Char) The charts in the Tirion Sky Atlas 2000.0 that map the area of sky in which the star is located. This is included so that a less detailed view of the area will be available to star hoppers. Field Number: 14 Name: BRIGHT STAR ATLAS Size: 3 (Char) The charts in the Bright Star Atlas that map the area of sky in which the star is located. Of the three chart names included this is the smallest scale. Field Number: 15 Name: SAO Size: 6 (Char) The number for this star in the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory survey. There are several digital finder systems that use this number. CONTRIBUTORS Bill Anderson put a number of different data sources into the original Master Data File after getting numerous fields to have some uniformity, organizing the data so as to make subsequent work much easier and doing a lot of reorganization as the project continued. He also wrote the program for determining the Tirion, U2000 and Bright Star Atlas chart numbers. Steve Coe wrote the file you are reading and checked and entered data. He is also the one to do the internet work associated with questions and uploading the files. His particular expertise was finding the SAO numbers so that users of telescopes with computers that have that data installed can easily find these stars. One interesting touch was his adding in binaries in which one of the members was a carbon star. Look in the "NOTES" for those additions. A.J. Crayon and Al Steiweg did error corrections. Brian Skiff provided us with error checking data and gave us input on what to include for each entry. REVISION HISTORY Version 1.0 was the raw data from the output of a Quick Basic search routine that was written by Bill Anderson and Steve Coe and run against the Washington Double Star catalog as we received it. Version 1.1 was the output from Alan Gore's dBase III+ program to parse the star names from the NOTES. Version 1.2 contained the precessed values for position and added the chart numbers. Steve Stanford wrote the chart numbering program and Kent Hepburn interfaced it with the data from the WDS. Version 1.3 was a quick check to make certain that we had not lost any "famous" doubles while dealing with the above operations. Version 1.4 was the output of a comprehensive check that lasted several months trying to catch any errors, large or small, in the data or documentation. All the above versions were internal to the SAC and did not get a general release to the public. Versions 1.5 thru 1.8 were intermediate revisions done by Dan Ward to eliminate some data format inconsistencies. A few non-SAC members received copies of one or more of these versions. When Dan finished 1.9, the rest of the team went through it again to make one more check prior to release. Version 2.0 is hereby placed in the public domain. It is our first release of the double star database for general use. Version 2.1 is released to fix a problem that Quick Basic had with values of Declination near the equator. The algorithms in QB just don't understand negative zero!! A dec such as - 00 32 was forced to become positive. So we had to go through all the stars near the equator and check their declinations. Version 3.0 is a brand new attempt to create a useful double star database that contains a listing of multiple stars that are worth observing. Many sources of information about double stars were combined to provide as complete a set of data as could be found. Version 3.1 fixed three or four problems. It would not have been released so quickly, except several of the stars are famous and would have stood out. Version 3.3 added some doubles that were sent to me by email from several sources, a few of the stars are bright and have Flamsteed numbers, so I added them in and made a new release. Version 4.0 was an effort to make the data as clean as possible. The data was reviewed and a few errors were found in positions and seperations. Some NOTES were added to provide more information about each star. FINAL NOTES We realize that such an undertaking could not possibly be completed without some errors or typos creeping into the database. We would like you to get in contact with us if you find any problems. www.saguaroastro.org