31st August 2010

Conditions were good, forecast was slight cloud then clear night.

Location - Brikrigg Common, Cumbria.

I decided that I was going to try and do some imaging and needed a telescope that had drives. My new Skywatcher Explorer 200p 8" and EQ5 mount does not have drives fitted yet, so it I was left with the Skywatcher 130m with RA clock drives.

Arrived at 21:00 and proceeded to set the EQ2 mount up, polar aligned and balanced

scope then allowed it to cool down while I set up the Canon S31s on it's tripod for the ISS pass at 21:31.

The first thing I had to do also was look for for missing lens from my glasses

that was lost a couple of days before, a quick scan around and I found the exact

place I had been 2 days earlier, and lo and behold there laying on the wet dew

grass was my lens, cleaned it up and popped it back into my glasses frame and I can finally see again.

Time was getting on and the ISS was approaching from the South/West to South East and I set the camera up for 15 second exposures and F3.5 taking a series of 10 exposures per run.

Once the ISS and Progress had passed over, it was on to the 130mm and EQ2, well the first thing I noticed the massive size difference, the 130 was basically a toy scope compared with the 200p on the EQ5 mount.

Jupiter was rising nicely in the East and while the moon was below the horizon I

took advantage of the darker shy in that direction and quickly located the Andromeda galaxy with my binoculars, it's very easy to see from this dark sky

location.

Instead of the Normal red dot finder that I use on the 130, I swopped it for the

200p finder scope, this makes it easy to point the 130 in the right direction,

quickly locating M31 and I must admit the view from the Skywatcher 130mm was very good, now I have been spoilt over the previous observing sessions using the 200mm scope, and this shows the galaxy as it should be viewed. The 130mm was very good, defined central core and wider field of view with the galaxy stretching North and South from the central core, quite impressive really, the clock drive was engaged on the EQ2 and I went for a cup of tea from the flask while I prepared the cameras.

Returning a few minutes later and checking the eyepiece view I was surprised the M31 was still in the field of view, making slight adjustments to center the galaxy I proceeded to fit the DSLR camera, first problem was then obvious to me, the Canon DSLR is a bulky camera to hang off the side of the 130 and EQ2, this dragged the scope and moved the object out of the FOV, making adjustments the other problem was then the galaxy is very faint in the cameras viewfinder and it was difficult to get focus and center any object that is not at least planet bright.

So the photography was abandoned and I was just going to enjoy the galaxy for it's

beauty in the eyepiece, 32mm showed it best, but the standard 25mm showed a

crystal clear image of the galaxy although not as bright as I would have hoped

for. I spent a good 30 to 45 minutes just looking at the galaxy and surrounding

area, but it's companion galaxy M32 was not located with any certainty, ill

defined and very poor brightness, perhaps I was expecting the 130 to perform as

the 200 had done previously.

I checked Jupiter and the cloud belt could easily be seen and 3 of it's moons, the

other being hidden by the planet, but Jupiter was still low in the Horizon at this

point, and the Moon was just starting to rise at 22:15, so I decided to check M13

in the West direction away from the bright Moon, in the East.

I located M13 the Globular Cluster in Hercules using binoculars and then trained

the finder scope on the fuzzy object, using the 32mm eyepiece the cluster was

centered then changing down to 25mm and 10mm eyepieces, but the view was

disappointing really, the cluster could easily be seen, but the central mass of

stars was just that, a mass of stars tightly packed, although very pretty in the

25mm eyepiece I was struggling to make out any stars on the edge of the cluster

but perhaps my expectations have a higher bar now, viewing M13 in the 200mm scope is an experience, so many stars.

The 130 is a really good scope despite my comments, M13 was easily located and

easily identified as a globular cluster with a sharp images, although these were

very much lower in detail and brightness compared to the 200p.

I spent a while just trying eyepieces and improving the view of M13, one could

thing the EQ2 has, is the clock drive with once polar aligned will keep the object

in the FOV for ages without adjustment.

I adjusted the scope to view Jupiter again, as it was higher in the sky by this

time, and was really clear, the detail was very good indeed, Jupiter was small in

the eyepiece and increasing to a 10mm and x2 Barlow the image was very good

indeed, I am really impressed with the planetary detail this scope produces.

By this time some cloud was starting to come over and I changed over to the Moon, clarity was very good indeed, even through light cloud the image was breathtaking, the craters were clearly seen and shadows were very good. The light cloud was starting to spoil the evening.

I was busy sorting out a camera, when again I got very bright lights pointed at

me, this is the second time this year the Police and come up to check me out?

After a quick chat with them, and I must admit they were very pleased with the

explanation of the scope and camera, and showed some interest, although one

policeman made the gesture of it "all being above his head" but wished me good

luck with my photography.

As all the cloud was now starting to move into the East spoiling the views of the

Moon and Jupiter I decided to relocate M57 using this scope, found it in

binoculars and the finder scope ok, but could not resolve it to well with the 130,

except wispy fuzzy blob syndrome, could have been high cloud moving in which

spoilt the view.

I decided at 00:15 to start packing my gear away and a quick check around using the cars headlights and white light torch revealed nothing, I hate the thought of leaving anything behind, I headed off home, happy with the results but disappointed with the photography.

Ray