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Jupiter in a little frac!

Stu

By Stu
in Observing - Planetary

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Stu

Stu

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I had the Fracs out during the day observing the sun, so thought I would switch them to night mode and have a quick peek at Jupiter and a few other favourites tonight as it has stayed clear.

Initially I was using the TV85 as a finder with 24mm Pan, and was seeing how the Tak FC-76DC performed with Leica zoom and Zeiss barlow. If honest I'm not totally sure what multiplying factor I was getting but believe it was around x2.5, giving a 3.5mm at maximum zoom equating to x162 but it's possible it was higher.

Jupiter was nice and crisp even at max, but I backed off a little to keep the contrast. At the time I started observing Ganymede was just starting a transit. I watched as its bright disk moved over the limb and it was nicely visible as a bright point on the surface.

There was limited detail in the main bands, with a slight separation showing in one of them. Polar regions were visible too.

I popped inside for dinner, thinking that by the time I got outside again Ganymede would be lost in the glare. How wrong I was. It was over the paler equatorial zone and by the time I saw it it appeared as a dark spot against this lighter backdrop. Quite a change from the bright disk that had crossed the limb.

I swapped the Leica over to the 85, and as expected the view was a little brighter and with more definition. The belts showed more detail and the moon was better defined against the surface. It was not the inky black of a shadow transit, but clearly darker than the surface.

Final test, could I see the moon in the Tak 60? Simple answer was yes! I swapped scopes over and at full zoom it was visible. Not in your face visible, but quite clear to me, particularly as I knew where to look. I think I would still have picked it up if I hadn't looked in the others first, but it was definitely more challenging.

The bands showed little if any detail but it was still a pleasant view, nice and sharp at just over x100, or perhaps a little more.

A couple of doubles split too, Izar which is favourite of mine looked very nice and clear in the 76.

Just a quick session really, but interesting comparisons and good to see what the little 60 is capable of.

Stu

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Qualia

Qualia

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Great report, Stu. Along a similar line, I was out last night doing a bit of galaxy hunting and viewing Jupiter with the little 76 and the bigger 10". Both views were obviously different in terms of resolution, but in terms of aesthetics, how Jupiter was experienced, I feel hard pressed to say which one I preferred. The 10" obviously gave more information and probably one of the best views I've had this year. The GRS and Io's moon transit were spell binding. But that frac image, so compact and tidy remains to haunt. It made me think how nice it would be to own a 10" f5 Moonshane Apo :p

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Stu

Stu

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Splendid report, lucky enough to catch the white pea of Ganymede just as it entered the disc. Transparency wasn't all that smart, but the bands held their ripped appearance,

Nick.

What surprised me Nick was the change from being a bright disk as it crossed the limb and when in the area with limb darkening, to being a dark disk against the lighter background. All effects of contrast I guess.

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Stu

Stu

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Great report, Stu. Along a similar line, I was out last night doing a bit of galaxy hunting and viewing Jupiter with the little 76 and the bigger 10". Both views were obviously different in terms of resolution, but in terms of aesthetics, how Jupiter was experienced, I feel hard pressed to say which one I preferred. The 10" obviously gave more information and probably one of the best views I've had this year. The GRS and Io's moon transit were spell binding. But that frac image, so compact and tidy remains to haunt. It made me think how nice it would be to own a 10" f5 Moonshane Apo :p

I totally agree Rob, I'm a sucker for the clean, sharp presentation of a refractor even though I know it does not show as much detail, although the 6" is pretty good under the right conditions :)

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Luke

Luke

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Nice one, Stu :) The other night I saw Jupiter through my Tele Vue 60, seeing was very steady, bands clear and sharp, tricky to make out the finer details. A fine sight it was in the 60! :) M13 looked good too, M51 and M81 and 82 showed more detail than expected.

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Stu

Stu

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Nice one, Stu :) The other night I saw Jupiter through my Tele Vue 60, seeing was very steady, bands clear and sharp, tricky to make out the finer details. A fine sight it was in the 60! :) M13 looked good too, M51 and M81 and 82 showed more detail than expected.

Thanks Luke. I certainly enjoy the views, and get a satisfaction from getting the most out of smaller scopes. Lovely crisp views as you say

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Stu

Stu

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You've just motivated me to remove the imaging train on my 106 frac and take a good look. Just always heard they were poor at planetary so I never bothered. Thanks for that!!!

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

How did you get on L360? Good views?

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Liquid360

Liquid360

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How did you get on L360? Good views?

The weather here in Alabama has been inconsiderate in the extreme with no clear nights in sight [emoji57] I do not much appreciate spring. It has a way of placing a serious damper on things.

post-22697-142911705329_thumb.jpg

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Stu

Stu

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I have a 3.7mm Ethos-SX I've never used. I'm wondering how my frac would do on Jupiter with it.

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Sure it would be pretty nice. What's your focal length?

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Special K

Special K

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What surprised me Nick was the change from being a bright disk as it crossed the limb and when in the area with limb darkening, to being a dark disk against the lighter background. All effects of contrast I guess.

Hi Stu, sounds like a lovely session, with some food included in the interval :)

I was observing around 11pm last night after a very long hiatus and saw a dark pimple right around the central meridian, bang on the Equator. I assumed I was lucky enough to be catching a shadow transit but looking at my apps today it was only Ganymede listed at that time and the shadow wasn't around that position till 3am this morning. If that was the actual moon I was seeing I'm pretty surprised too! It really looked like a shadow transit so I was fooled.

Incidentally, after viewing Jupiter at higher mags I dropped down to a widefield and it really is nicely positioned amongst a fairly strong group of background stars, for an interesting 'cosmic' contrast of our solar system against those distant stars.

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Stu

Stu

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Hi Stu, sounds like a lovely session, with some food included in the interval :)

I was observing around 11pm last night after a very long hiatus and saw a dark pimple right around the central meridian, bang on the Equator. I assumed I was lucky enough to be catching a shadow transit but looking at my apps today it was only Ganymede listed at that time and the shadow wasn't around that position till 3am this morning. If that was the actual moon I was seeing I'm pretty surprised too! It really looked like a shadow transit so I was fooled.

Incidentally, after viewing Jupiter at higher mags I dropped down to a widefield and it really is nicely positioned amongst a fairly strong group of background stars, for an interesting 'cosmic' contrast of our solar system against those distant stars.

Nice one Special K, it was indeed the moon, I think it caught quite a few of us out!! :)

I enjoy looking at Jupiter at low mag too, so you can just see the bands but also the moons and background stars.

EDIT: Mrs BigSumo had surpassed herself with a very nice dinner so it was worth taking a break for ;-)

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John

John

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When I was a teenager, back in the mid-1970's, a mate loaned me his Prinz 60mm refractor for a couple of months. This co-incided with a favourable apparition of Jupiter and another mate and I spent many nights observing Jupiter and sketching what we saw. I've found those sketches again recently and I'm amazed at the amount of detail we managed to see, particularly during the later sessions when our observing skils had been honed a bit. I've had nights when I could not match that detail with much larger scope recently. I guess our eyes were young and we were full of enthuasiasm :smiley:

Shows what a small scope can do though, as do the experiences in this thread :smiley:

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Stu

Stu

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When I was a teenager, back in the mid-1970's, a mate loaned me his Prinz 60mm refractor for a couple of months. This co-incided with a favourable apparition of Jupiter and another mate and I spent many nights observing Jupiter and sketching what we saw. I've found those sketches again recently and I'm amazed at the amount of detail we managed to see, particularly during the later sessions when our observing skils had been honed a bit. I've had nights when I could not match that detail with much larger scope recently. I guess our eyes were young and we were full of enthuasiasm :smiley:

Shows what a small scope can do though, as do the experiences in this thread :smiley:

John, you should scan some and get them up on here

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Stu

Stu

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533mm... I purchased it as an ap scope, but the more I read the more I need to try it out visually, especially after reading your comments.

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Should give you x144 with a 0.74mm exit pupil. Will be a nice crisp view I should think, but let us know!!

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chiltonstar

chiltonstar

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I had my ED80 out for a run on Jupiter last night as the seeing was a bit mushy with the Mak. The colour contrast - as ever -  was amazing with a very bright, clearly defined orangey GRS, and surprisingly good belt detail. I even managed to follow Europa for a bit as it crossed the limb.

Small fracs are great!

Chris

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Stu

Stu

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I had my ED80 out for a run on Jupiter last night as the seeing was a bit mushy with the Mak. The colour contrast - as ever - was amazing with a very bright, clearly defined orangey GRS, and surprisingly good belt detail. I even managed to follow Europa for a bit as it crossed the limb.

Small fracs are great!

Chris

Nice one Chris. Conclusive proof that your eyes are better than mine! I seem to need at least 12" to see much colour on Jupiter unfortunately :-(

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Pig

Pig

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I had some fantastic views of Jupiter at the local dark site last night, 400mm focal length and 4mm SLV. Quite a good size through the eyepiece too, lots of detail and a strange very dark spot around the centre of the middle band at the point where the band raises slightly

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