Fifth Catalog of Orbits of Visual Binary Stars
William I. Hartkopf, Brian D. Mason, & Charles E. Worley
U.S. Naval Observatory, Washington, DC
(orbits published through 1 January 2001)
Note: The Fifth Catalog, containing orbits published through 1 January
2001, is one of four USNO double star catalogs recently written to CD-ROM.
Copies of this CD-ROM are available upon
request. This catalog has now been supplanted by the
Sixth Catalog, however, so will no longer be updated.
This catalog continues the series of compilations of visual binary star
orbits previously published by Finsen (1934, 1938), Worley (1963), Finsen
& Worley (1970), and most recently by Worley & Heintz (1983) in their
Fourth Catalog of Orbits of Visual Binary Stars.
The successor to Fourth Catalog was to have been the retirement
project of Charles Worley, but these plans were thwarted by his untimely
death on New Year's Eve 1997. We (WIH & BDM) have attempted to continue
Charles' project with the care and thoroughness he brought to all his
astronomical endeavors.
The Fifth Catalog presently includes 1,465 orbits of 1,430 systems
(from a "master file" currently containing 3,494 orbits). All orbits have
been graded on a 1 - 5 scale, as in earlier catalogs; the grading scheme
has been modified, however, as described below. Ephemerides are included
for all orbits, as are plots including all associated data in the current
Washington Double Star database.
Contents:
Your comments regarding either style or substance are welcome. Please
inform the authors of any errors you run across in the catalog, as well
as missing orbits, etc. We would also welcome notification (and/or copies)
of any newly published elements.