John
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Posts posted by John
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Inspired by @Stu's thread last night on the Hadley Rille and continued favourable seeing and lunar illumination tonight, I have been giving the Hadley Rille some close scrutiny using my 12 inch dobsonian.
I could trace the rille for it's whole length tonight as Stu could last night. This is his thread:
The area surrounding the Apollo 15 landing site was very nicely illuminated and, for the first time that I can recall, I could make out the crater St George on the western facing slopes of the Mons Hadley Delta overlooking a meander of the Hadley Rille.
The ejected material surrounding St George crater was visited and sampled by James Irwin and David Scott in the Lunar Roving Vehicle. The crater is 2.42km in diameter and lies 4km south west from the Apollo 15 landing site.
This was a nice spot and showed how steady the seeing was tonight, in between puffs of wind. I was using 338x magnification.
St George is behind James Irwin as he loads up the LRV in this photo:
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21 minutes ago, Piero said:
My new 16" dobson cooling down 🙂
Very fine looking scope Piero
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Hadley Rille is looking lovely tonight as well
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4 minutes ago, mikeDnight said:
I'm currently observing the moon through my 100mm refractor, and thought I'd take a moment out in the hope of encouraging some of you to check out the ultra fine, white central rille running along the Alpine Valley. It's a challenge but its visible with critical focus. The rille appears to be closer to the southern wall than the northern, and may appear broken. See how you go, but persevere! ☺
Yes I can see it Mike. But I am using my 12 inch dob
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Moon in the sights of the 12 inch dob:
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I've probably posted these before but never mind. TMB/LZOS triplet 130mm F/9.3 on the T-Rex alt-azimuth mount:
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56 minutes ago, Stu said:
I generated this image of Alphonsus which shows the dark spots clearly, just as they appeared.
I saw those last night. There was also a thin rille visible that runs past the pair of spots in the top right of the crater in your photo.
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4 hours ago, mikeDnight said:
I sold my Equinox 120 ED after several side by side sessions observing Jupiter back in 2015. The DC lost nothing to the 120, and the colours in Jupiter's belts appeared much more vibrant, which gave an almost 3D effect to them. Jupiter of course was much higher in the sky back then, so detail was easy to see in both scopes, but festoons, garlands, white ovals and barges were so well defined in the DC that I simply wouldn't use the 120ED much after that. Plus the DC was such an effortless telescope to use that I observed with it at every opportunity. It was an absolout joy to use and always gave me more than I ever expected of it.
I've not found such a difference between my ED120 and my FC100 DL. There have been a number of occasions when the additional aperture has delivered something that the 100mm could not. That's why I still have the ED120
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I do find my lunar observing has been made much more interesting by the "21st Century Atlas of the Moon" by Charles Wood and Maurice Collins
What I love about that book is that it invites the amateur observer to ask questions and to share in trying work out what might have been going on to create the features we see.
Whereas many astronomy books will state something like "this feature is caused by factors X and Y" the 12st Century Atlas is open about the perplexities that face lunar scientists in many cases - why are there dark patches in this crater but not in the one next door ?, why has rille x taken a sharp deviation at this point ?, scientists are divided on whether such and such a feature is of volcanic or impact origin, or maybe both ?, is it a co-incidence that this feature lies in an area of some of the strongest magnetic anomolies ?
Once you start thinking this way I think you start observing (rather than just looking perhaps ?) questioning what you are seeing and then go seeking other examples of your own
I've been trying this approach on non-lunar observing as well over the past year or so and often find that it does add a further dimension to familiar targets as well as new ones
It's working for me anyway
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Interesting !
The Rima Birt was very well defined with my Skywatcher ED120 this evening.
I would imagine that the Edge 8 ought to beat it though
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Great report Stu !
Those catenas / crater chains are great - the one across Davy is very delicate and there are some others not far away as well.
I was impressed by the sharpness and clarity of the moon tonight, despite the thin high cloud.
I was pleased to see the rille across the floor of Alphonsus tonight and also the dome next to Gambart C as well as a myriad of other detail.
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100mm is the smallest aperture for me. I have owned a number of decent 70, 80 and 90mm refractors but didn't hang onto them for too long.
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I've packed in as well now. Too much cloud cover for other targets. Great stuff on the moon though
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10 minutes ago, laudropb said:
I did not want to know that Jeremy. The temptation is just too much
Luckily, you already have an excellent refractor - your Skywatcher ED120
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40 minutes ago, Barry-W-Fenner said:
The thin cloud is a bit thicker here as well now but the moon is still showing well. Not many stars to be seen though !
I'm mostly using 191x with the ED120 currently. That seems to give a very sharp and contrasty view despite the thin cloud cover.
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Excellent illumination for the rille and the Apennines tonight
Further south, the crater Alpetragius just N of the Straight Wall is really well illuminated as well. It has that huge, egg-like, central mountain / bulge in it's centre. Very striking !
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10 minutes ago, JeremyS said:
I know you give each of your scopes equal billing, John, but are they used on a strict rotational basis?
Not a strict one but they all get used quite often. The 12 inch dob and the Tak 100 are probably the most used though. The Vixen 102 perhaps the least and about "honours even" between the ED120 and the TMB/LZOS 130.
If I ever wanted to reduce the number of scopes I own (and it has crossed my mind a few times) I would find it difficult to make the decision on which to part with. They each have characteristics that I'm very fond of
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The old ED120 is out this evening. Very nice lunar views. Thin high clouds here will probably not help deep sky stuff. Maybe some double stars later though ?
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A simple rig and another with the moon in the eyepiece this evening
The seeing is superb just now.
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It's no good Doug - you got me to get a scope out after I'd sworn that I would have a "night off"
You are dead right - the seeing is superb for lunar detail this evening
I'm glad your post was a "bad influence" on me !
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3 hours ago, jetstream said:
While nice views can be had with smaller apertures, I find around 8" really starts to open them up. A 200mm f6 SW dob maybe? It could be cheaper than throwing a bunch of money at eyepieces for this IMHO.
I agree with this.
Meanwhile your Hyperion 24mm will be allowing your current scope to show all that it can.
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59 minutes ago, SuburbanMak said:
...Also would really value your opinion on an upgrade for that max field 24mm 68 degree - the one that keeps coming up is the Televue 24mm Panoptic.
Dosen't the Hyperion 24mm already do that for you ?
In your 127mm mak-cassegrain I would have thought it would be doing a fine job.
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NGC 3147 is an interesting galaxy:
http://www.sci-news.com/astronomy/thin-accretion-disk-ngc-3147-central-black-hole-07382.html
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12 hours ago, Mark at Beaufort said:
There is a good thread in cloudy nights especially the photo by SSmith.
https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/764742-supernova-sn2021hpr-in-ngc3147/
Thanks very much Mark
I think I got this one tonight with my 12 inch dob:
Lunar challenge for tonight. 21st April.
in Observing - Lunar
Posted
I think that is very true, especially with these very fine details. Even the change in illumination over a few hours can make a difference. I believe that this rille is only 1km wide at maximum, less for most of it's length, and only 240m deep at the deepest point.