Caldwell catalog frustration (and success!)

[kev100]

Hiya,

A last minute change of plan surrounding whether or not to go to the pub and play darts last night left me free to pop out with the dob for a couple of hours. Although quite blustery, with some clouds whizzing over, there was no moon and the sky was very clear and dark!

I'd set myself a few targets (Caldwell objects: Blue snowball, blinking, iris, bow-tie, and flaming star planetary nebulae, and the Perseus A, Helix and Fireworks galaxies)!

While I waited for the scope to cool, I pottered about getting my eye in on some familiar objects (Andromeda, Triangulum, double cluster, Plieades and the ring neb). All looked great in my new 16mm, MaxVision 68 (absolutely great EP, by the way!). And so, on to the targets for the evening!

Started with Perseus A ... nothing. Tried swapping in the 32 and 20mm EPs ... nothing. 'I know', I thought, 'the blue snowball', this having eluded me on several previous nights (including one complete evening at Astrocamp in Wales!). Nothing! Anyway, to cut a long story short, I tried all the target objects, one after the other, and got nothing! Sooo frustrating!

Had another look around at some of the previous familiar objects again, feeling a bit p***ed off, to be honest. I know astronomy takes patience, but seriously ... how hard can these things be ?! Then I remembered something about the term 'planetary nebulae', they're called that because to earlier astronomers they looked a bit like planets! Of course. Instead of looking for things that resemble faint fuzzy clouds/patches, perhaps I should be looking for small planets!

Tried the blue snowball again, still nothing! Then Perseus A (ditto). Okay ... the blinking nebula then ... bingo! In the 32mm plossl, it appeared as a small, pale, very slightly greenish orb, which disappeared as soon as I looked directly at it; in its place a tiny bright star. Look away again and ... pop! Back again. Tried it in all the EPs, but the best view was in the 16mm MV. Just above it is a very striking pair of yellow stars; very pretty.

Next up the flaming star neb. Got the right hand star in Auriga in the fov, nice and sharp, pulled the dob to the left and ... bingo! A reddish, hazy, shimmering star ... set against a backdrop of pin sharp stars on a black background. Try as I might I couldn't get the red star to focus and stop shimmering, and the more I looked at it the more I saw why it's called the flaming star neb. Absolutely cracking object. Had a look at M38 while I was in the area ... very nice open cluster.

Next up, the fireworks galaxy. In the end I found this easily enough; though, to be honest, it didn't appear very 'fireworky' ... more of a relatively dense open cluster than a galaxy. Still nice, though.

Had a brief go at a couple of the other objects on my hit list, but, again, nothing. They'll have to wait for another night!

Kev.

[Lanius]

Nice report Kev...you've given me a couple of objects to look for next time I'm out. I was out there last night for an hour but concentrating on Neptune and Uranus.

Would you recommend that Maxvision 68 EP?  I've got a Vixen NPL 15mm for my "middle of the range" EP.

[kev100]

Nice report Kev...you've given me a couple of objects to look for next time I'm out. I was out there last night for an hour but concentrating on Neptune and Uranus.

Would you recommend that Maxvision 68 EP?  I've got a Vixen NPL 15mm for my "middle of the range" EP.

Hi Lanius,

I'd definitely recommend the EP (as, I'm sure would others on here). There's a good thread somewhere comparing them with BSTs. I haven't tried a Vixen EP, so I can't comment on them, but the MV is very nice in my 250PX.

Kev.

[SteveB72]

Thanks for your report, I will try a few more planetaries on my next session. I was out last night as well, there was a lot of turbulence in the air so could not use much magnification. I was looking at clusters and galaxies in Pegasus then on to Uranus. Still really enjoyed it!

[alan potts]

I would have gone to the pub, even if the beer was not as good as I would normally like. This is only because I don't have a pub selling English bitter here.

Nice report by yourself and looks like you have had simialr problems to myself, I have done a lot of the Caldwell objects with my different scopes and I am not a massive fan, I find some rather a let down ,C 1, though some are superb C14 for example. I have never had a problem with the blue snowball but I cheat with a goto system.

Alan.