(cba:news) BK Lyn needs love too...

[Joe Patterson]

Dear CBAers,

Oops, got distracted by school biz.  I think I went too far in 
suggesting some back-off from BK Lyn.  It seems to be the star of 2012, 
and I was just musing that it could survive with somewhat less 
attention.  The result was no data at all for about a week... and since 
the star is showing some very unusual behavior this year (the brightest, 
and faintest, ever), it has a good claim to be back on your A-list (or 
at least B).  I peer anxiously at my inbox for BK Lyn data every day.

I'm still studying BH Lyn (as is Enrique, more carefully than me I'm 
sure).  Jury is still out.  Superhumps are certainly much weaker than BK 
Lyn.

The CR Boo and ER UMa superoutbursts seem to be over, but these stars 
are almost certain to maintain their superhumps long afterwards - 
"aftershocks", or superhump inertia.  It's our job to document this. So 
these stars should remain on your A-list.  CR Boo especially - with such 
a short Porb and with so few decently bright members of its class (the 
AM CVn class), we should strive mightily to trace its behavior in detail 
all the way to the next super, at least.  Mighty important star.

I did want to take V1193 Ori (too dead) and CP Pup (season over, 
sufficient data in hand) off the list.  I'm skeptical about V1159 Ori; 
it's a very suitable star for us and I've been delinquent in not 
mentioning it for 15+ years... but it's just too late in the season for 
us to get the needed dense coverage.  If you only have a few evening 
hours available, some better targets might be BG CMi, PQ Gem, Swift 
J0732-13, RX0636+35, and RX0704+26.  All stars not much observed this 
year.  The last one has a *sensational* light curve - run the exposures 
5 times faster than you think you can get away with for this 17th mag 
star.  (Nearly everyone looks at the light curve and thinks it's noise; 
it's actually a very fast and very large pulsation).

      joe