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Galaxy asterism


mdstuart

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Out for the first time in a while the other night..

After a few more isolated targets I went back to the 383 Pisces group of galaxies ...ARP 331..

This was beyond my 10 inch but I thought I might try with the extra 4 inches of my Darkstar Dob.

I would start with NGC 383 mag 12.4...should be possible surely...

Oh yes...

NGC 383 was visible .......yes another big ellipticals group seen...383 is the brightest and was pretty obvious to me almost with direct vision..Apparently it is a double xray quasar like object!..

post-1454-0-47113100-1411497772.png

Wait I am sure I can see other galaxies...so inside and out with the books and eventually got a map in Kepple and Sanners guides although it was one of those galaxies but the stars are almost invisible pictures!

Anyway now managed to pull out 379 / 380 and the astonishingly could see the pair 384/5...Later discovered the edge on NGC 403 seen earlier in the session is also part of this group..

A galaxy asterism....Marks galaxy chain???

post-1454-0-07116900-1411497795.jpg

So this lot are about 225 million light years away..

Awesome...

Mark

So if you have a 10 inch and are wondering whether to go to a 14 inch then this group makes it worth it on its own!

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Well done, interesting looking group. And I do think we would call it "group" since "asterism" comes from the word for star, so you can't really have an asterism made of anything except stars :smiley:

The NGC galaxies in your chain image are (from top) NGC 379, 380, 383/2 (close pair), 387 (stellar), 386 (stellar), 385, 384, with 388 (stellar) off the chain.

Discoverers:

379 W Herschel 1784

380 W Herschel 1784

382 Stoney 1850

383 W Herschel 1784

387 Parsons 1873

386 Stoney 1850

385 Stoney 1850

384 Stoney 1850

388 Stoney 1850

384/5 was a particularly good catch for you, having been missed by Herschel.

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  • 4 weeks later...

As it happens, I was observing this area during sessions this week, so I looked at the cluster. On Tuesday night with my 12"  f4.9 I was able to see all the NGC objects in the cluster. The Herschel discoveries (NGC 379, 380, 383) were by far the easiest, seen immediately with my Baader Hyperion zoom at highest power (8mm). Splitting NGC 382 and 383 required a 4mm eyepiece. Navigating the cluster was difficult: on my Great Atlas Of The Sky the individual galaxies are bunched very closely. So I looked in Uranometria (Volume 1) where I found that map A7 charts the area in detail. With the help of that chart I was able to confirm all the non-Herschel galaxies in the cluster. I also observed other galaxies in the immediate vicinity (there are lots). Having seen 13, clouds rolled in, and after waiting for nearly an hour I decided to pack up. As soon as I'd got it all away, the clouds cleared. And since I still felt pretty alert, I set up again in the hope of catching a few more, but did so very quickly, not even bothering to collimate. Star images were a little poorer, but otherwise it made hardly any difference. By 4am I'd observed a total of 23 galaxies in the area, including a couple more Herschel discoveries, but mostly very faint. 

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