Minor planets at Kleť—from discovery to numbering

Abstract

Hitherto there are more than 250 numbered minor planets discovered within the framework of Kleť Observatory long-term search programme. This paper describes observational techniques and subsequent methods which are used from discovery of some object to its numbering in the Minor Planet Circulars. For searching we use 0.63 m photographical Maksutov telescope, follow-up astrometry is now performed by 0.57 m reflector with CCD camera. A new feature in our programme is searching for minor planet prediscovery observations in the observatory archive, which contains over 9000 plates since the year 1968 to the present time.