Jupiter

Second time out with the C9.25 and Jupiter served up a surprise. At first look I thought - Oh yes, I'm not falling for that one again - one of those apparent moons must be a star. But no, it was actually the four Gallilean moons in an unusual (what do I know, its cloudy here for 4 months of the year) configuration.

Crayford Focuser

I had trouble with vibration when focusing at at 470x (5 mm ep). I need to put a crayford focuser on the back with fine focus control.

F/6.3 Reducer

I recently had a C8 and found when using the F/6.3 Reducer I could bring only one of my eyepieces to focus - a skywatcher 42mm. I wanted to try this again with the C9.25 and with my Celestron 32mm, 13mm and 5mm 2" eyepieces. Brilliantly they all came to focus. Than means I can fit the Pleiades and the full extend of

The Orion Nebula into my field of view.

I already sent away for a 56mm Erfle to get a wide field. If that focuses with the reducer in place I will be down to 42x and approx 1.2 degree FOV - not bad for a scope with a 2.3 metre focal length.

Again I tried the UHC filter - this time at low power with my 32mm Ultima LX in place. But it was Negatory on the HorseHead (a real ask that one - but its on my to do list for 2012), the California Nebula and The Rosette. Now I know the Rosette is not that hard (although I have never seen it), I just need a dark sky and no lights shining on me.

Finally I looked overhead and found a striking view of both M37 - (this normally looks like I'm viewing a cluster of small fine stars from some distance, but this time 180x [13mm ep] put me right up against the cluster which appeared to have slightly blue stars with a redish one in the middle) - and The double cluster. The Double Cluster was superb - the stars were bright points - no sign of collimation issues overhead - perhaps the poor seeing is responsible for my less than impressive Jupiter views after all.

Looking forward to next time out.