Articles
The Presidential Address 1996: Amateur observatories (pp. 177-185) ... Maurice Gavin
The comets of 1991 ... J. D. Shanklin
This report is the second in the annual series which gives for each comet: the discovery details, orbital data and general information, magnitude parameters and BAA Comet Section observations. It continues the series which last appeared in the Journal in 1950, with irregular notes appearing until the early 1960s. Observational reports were published in the Comet Section newsletter Isti Mirant Stella from 1973 to 1987 and a couple of papers were published in the Journal in the early 1980s. Further details of the analysis techniques used in this report are given in an earlier paper. Ephemerides for the comets predicted to return during the year can be found in the International Comet Quarterly Handbook. (pp. 186-199)
Faint-image detectivity: CCD versus film ... R. J. Neville
Experiments are presented which extend the results of a previous investigation of photographic emulsion detective efficiency to include a modern example of a charge-coupled device (CCD) imaging system. A modified, variable-contrast test object was developed in order to demonstrate fully the marked superiority of the electronic system in detecting faint stars against foreground night sky light pollution. (pp. 199-203)
A comparison of images from Lunar Orbiter IV and Clementine ... Ivor Clarke
With a new data set now available from the recent Clementine lunar mission of 1994 February to April, is it possible that the older Lunar Orbiter photographs are now no longer useful and are an out of date resource? (pp. 204-210)
Only the first four asteroids ... David W. Hughes
One of the reasons why nobody seriously bothered to look for asteroids in the second and third decade of the nineteenth century was the biblical suspicion that a large planet, when disrupted, would break up into only four pieces; and these four pieces had already been discovered. (pp. 211-213)
(Copies of any of these articles may be requested from the BAA office.)