John

Nice report Barry

3 hours ago, John said:

...Wonder when these planets were last 40 arc minutes apart in the sky ?

 

 

 

 

To answer my own question, the last time they were this close (ie: 40 arc minutes) was in February 1961 I think. I was 1 year old so I missed out on that.

I don't think they will be as close as they are tonight again until 2080. I will be 120 then so I'll probably miss out on that one as well !

The very best quality eyepiece in purely optical terms that I have ever owned and used was probably the TMB Supermonocentric 5mm. I would not really call it a favourite though. It was hard to use and only had a 30m degree AfoV. It did show Saturn and Jupiter superbly well though, during the 6 months or so that I owned it.

These change hands at crazy prices now. I think I paid £100 for it and sold it for the same:

I don't need to move my head around to see the whole field of my 21E. I may be unconsciously moving my eyeball about but I've never found 100 degree eyepieces any particular effort to observe with. I know this varies person to person so that's fine. I can only give my experiences with them

If they were tricky or awkward to use I wouldn't have held onto them. There are many other fine eyepieces available today

Also I would not have tipped them as my favourite eyepiece .....

2 hours ago, Luke said:

I'm going to be lazy and go for the 21mm Ethos. Why?

Because it is my widest eyepiece and if you saw how bad I was at star hopping with a manual dob, you'd understand perfectly!

They don't get so much love these days, but I am quite fond of my 8mm Radian. It has served me very well for solar viewing, and my gear tends to get more use for solar.

I'm going to join you in being lazy Luke

I've had plenty of sessions with my 12 inch dob when the 21mm Ethos is the only eyepiece I've used. 76x and a 1.3 degree true field. Superb

2nd Favourite (not that it's been asked) would be the 8mm Ethos probably. With the same scope a real planetary nebula / globular cluster killer eyepiece !

No disrespect to any of my other eyepieces either - they all earn their keep

Clear SW horizon here tonight so out with the ED120 refractor to check on Jupiter and Saturn currently nestling just 40 arc minutes apart.

Very nice views using the 8mm Ethos eyepiece @ 113x. The field of view frames the pair with a bit of room to spare either side. Enough magnification to see some details as well

3 Galilean moons showing plus a couple of cloud belts. GRS might be on view but the seeing is poor so that's not clear. Titan just beginning to gleam. Cassini Division flicking in and out of visibility.

Grabbing every chance I can - just don't know what the next few days are going to bring, weather-wise !

I get about 40 minutes of time between picking Jupiter out of the twilight sky and it dropping behind the branches of a large tree so need to make the best of it. Fortunately I can see that piece of sky from the back garden so I'm not needing to travel far.

Wonder when these planets were last 40 arc minutes apart in the sky ?

Hope others are getting some views this evening too

I've used Vixen SLV's quite often and reviewed them for the forum a while back:

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/217971-vixen-slv-eyepiece-report-6mm-12mm-and-20mm/

I don't use SCT scopes but I'm sure the SLV's would perform just as well in those as they did in my 12 inch dobsonian and refractors.

I've not used an ES 82 though so I can't make that comparison.

Hi Stuart,

You are on the right track - both of those are very good scopes for visual astronomy.

Stock levels are very, very low everywhere though due to an upsurge of interest in astronomy over the past 8 months (Pandemic related I'm sure) and a downsurge of imports from the far east (where most stuff is made) for the same reason.

Good luck if you can find any stocks but I think you may need to be patient.

I had completely forgotten about the Geminid's

I'll have to pop out again and see if I can see any.

I did get the Eskimo Nebula in Gemini before packing the scope up. Nice view with the central star gleaming away

After getting clouded out earlier this evening, the clouds broke up and I now have quite extensive dark, clear patches of sky to enjoy.

I have the ED120 refractor out and I'm just enjoying the simple pleasures of the highlights of Orion, Gemini, Taurus, Monoceros and Ursa Major.

Most of my observing has been with the 17mm ES 92 degree monster eyepiece and the 8mm Ethos.

My tour stops have included:

- Galaxies M81 and M82 in Ursa Major plus the large planetary nebula M97, The Owl Nebula. I added the Astronomik UHC filter to pick the ghostly "football" of M97 up.

- M1, the famous Crab Nebula in Taurus. Again the UHC filter was helpful in teasing that one out from the starry backdrop.

- The large, sprawling open cluster M35 in Gemini looked wonderful with the much fainter and more distant (4x further away) cluster NGC 2158 close beside.

- The lovely triple star Beta Monoceros. Easily split at 112x with the 8mm Ethos.

- The quadruple star Sigma Orionis with it's faintest component the 9th magnitude "C" showing well. 

- Tour highlight Messier 42 which looked absolutely stunning in the huge field of the 17mm 92 degree eyepiece. Adding the UHC filter extended the breadth and reach of the nebulosity noticeably and the whole view, encompassing the "Sword" of Orion with the Great Nebula sprawling in it's centre, was magnificent 

Examining the Trapezium stars with the 8mm Ethos eyepiece revealed the much dimmer E and F stars for the first time this winter season.

Lovely to see these Winter showcases again and to be reminded of just why they are so popular. Great to find that the 17mm 92 degree eyepiece works so well with this scope and that the Astronomik UHC filter has such a positive impact.

Just good to be out observing again in fact !

And it's still dark and clear out there .........

I got this using my old mobile phone held by a cheapo clamp to the eyepiece in my 12 inch F/5.3 dob. It's not the Apollo 11 landing site but the Apollo 15 one next to the Hadley Rille. For scale, the rille is about 1,500 metres across. I'm not any sort of imager and I'm sure that a proper lunar imager could do lots better but I was quite pleased with it for a casual snap. No sign of the Lunar Rover though - it must have been clamped and towed away ......

2 hours ago, John said:

... through a gap in the clouds which are starting to break up a bit.

 

Knew that I'd regret posting that

Is this the scope you have ?. It appears to have 2 screws to secure the eyepiece:

8 minutes ago, John said:

Little or no chance here tonight. 99% cloud cover 

Just managed to get them from an upstairs bedroom window, with the naked eye, through a gap in the clouds which are starting to break up a bit.

Little or no chance here tonight. 99% cloud cover 

The 3.2mm is of similar optical quality to the 5mm but the magnification that these eyepieces produce in your scope is what makes the difference. 240x (the 5mm) is a useful magnification on the planets, moon and double stars quite often. 375x (the 3.2mm) would rarely be useful.

Nice report Kerry

You should be able to see Triton, Neptunes largest moon with the Mewlon I would think.

It's around magnitude 12 and at max 16 arc seconds from Neptune. Cartes du Ciel shows the position quite accurately.

High magnification helps but the Mewlon is fully capable of that I'm sure

25 minutes ago, Pixies said:

Can you send a pic?

That would help.

Some scopes don't have collimation adjustment on the primary now so those 3 screws could just be holding the primary mirror cell into the scope. Sometimes the 3 screws hold a cover on which needs to be removed to get to the collimation screws. Most collimation screws come in 3 pairs - an adjusting screw and a locking screw x 3. A photo of the back end of your scope would help a lot.

8 hours ago, racprops said:

Thanks, I did kind of think you were UK based...but to day with the internet we are all next door to one and another...

 

Very true.

I was just thinking of the best chance for you to find what you need quickly will be through your local market. There are a lot of amateur astronomers in the USA and also the costs of carriage across the Atlantic can make buying small / lower cost items quite expensive.

Nice report

M31 can be seen with the naked eye from a moderately dark site and with 10x50 binoculars from practically anywhere so it will certainly be within the grasp of the ST80 even under light polluted skies.

Don't expect too much though - a fuzzy oval is about as much as it will amount to. Low magnification is what to use.

Good luck with it !

I have just posted this link in your thread about the lens cap for the C8. It is the "Cloudynights" forum classifieds section which is USA based:

https://www.cloudynights.com/classifieds/

The forum is free to join.

As you are in the USA, the classifieds section of the Cloudynights forum (which is USA based) might be worth looking at. It is free to join the forum:

https://www.cloudynights.com/classifieds/

There is some nebulosity around Merope in the Pleiades:

https://skyandtelescope.org/observing/the-merope-nebula-and-its-well-kept-secret/

12 minutes ago, Stu said:

..... low power views were the most satisfying. Nice to have seen them.

Just what I found this evening Stu

Some of the nicest for me came using the 24mm Panoptic at just 28x with the Vixen frac. The essential characteristics of each planet were still clear and very sharp 

1 hour ago, Deadlake said:

Single or dual? I think there is space for a single alt-az mount with tracking.

Either. Personally I'm happy with single and I don't need tracking or GOTO or push-to. Slow motion controls are nice. I splashed out on a pre-owned T-Rex mount earlier this year so I'm sorted really but I still think there is a market for something else that is sub-1K with all the bits.

I heard from Rowan (Derek) that they have been kicking ideas around for a mid-range mount but currently, as a small company, they are having to put most of their resources into the AZ100. They are picking up quite a bit of interest from overseas judging by the conversations on another forum that I frequent