[vsnet-alert 4425] V803 Cen in bright eruption

[Joe Patterson <jop@astro.columbia.edu>]

                             V803 CENTAURI

      The recent report of V803 Cen in bright eruption by Andrew Pearce
and Rod Stubbings was wonderful news to us.  This fascinating helium star 
has been a high-priority target for the CBA for ~10 years, but some of 
its properties make it very hard to study:

(1) Most "outbursts" are very small, just 1.1-1.5 mag - thus not so easy
    to identify unambiguously.
(2) The cycle time for these outbursts is 21-24 hrs, a *very* inconvenient 
    timescale unless observers span a wide range of terrestrial longitude.
(3) The superoutbursts, while substantially brighter, last only a few days,
    much less than typical for SU UMa-type dwarf novae.
    
     Thus in our recent study (in press May 2000 PASP, available at www.
astro.bio2.edu/cba/publications/v803cen.html) we were forced to splice
information from many outbursts, with some nervousness since we never had
the opportunity to "do it right" - follow a single superoutburst from 
maximum light all the way to quiescence, with long time-series photometry.
So we earnestly hope to do it right this time!  We'd love to join observers
in a collaborative study of the present (very likely) superoutburst.

     Who's out there?

Members of the CBA V803 Cen cabal: 
Joe Patterson (jop@astro.columbia.edu)
Jonathan Kemp
Stan Walker
Darragh O'Donoghue
Marc Bos 
Rod Stubbings

By the way a chart is available at the CBA website too (same address,
sub. "charts" for "publications")

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