John

Lovely image !

I had a look at Panstarrs last night up not far from M81 and M82. It's still a decent comet to observe - magnitude 8.8 but quite condensed. I saw those three galaxies as well

Comet SWAN is just too low for me just yet, unless I wait up really late.

It think it is just Mercury and Venus that were given that term. It seems to go back a long way but it looks as if the usage is dying out:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inferior_and_superior_planets

46 minutes ago, Ags said:

You have tried a lot of eyepieces and speak of this cheap zoom so highly I am tempted to get one... This is the same thing, correct?

https://www.firstlightoptics.com/ovl-eyepieces/hyperflex-72mm-215mm-eyepiece.html 

Yes, I'm pretty sure that it is the same eyepiece. I have seen them under different brandings at a range of prices as well. The OVL one is well priced.

They are a little narrower at the 21.5mm end than, for example, the Baader zoom, but the optical quality seems good. I use mine with a Baader 2.25x barlow and that works well as a high power zoom.

Not a perfect eyepiece of course (what is ?) but pretty good and very versatile.

I used a 30mm optical finder to put the scope where I knew Mercury to be, but I could not actually see it with the finder. I actually "found" it using the scope at low magnification.

If you know the separation and approx orientation between an easy to find and a harder target, the defined field of view of finders (6 degrees in the case of my 30mm) can make finding things easier, or at least getting to the right spot, even if they are not actually visible in the finder.

I find Stellarium and Cartes du Ciel very useful for helping with this process. CdC has a handy distance measuring tool to help preparation. Maybe Stellarium does as well ?

41 minutes ago, JG777 said:

Ah but imaging starts with a bracket, then a camera, new mount, and thousands of ££££s later....

Not here I think

The AZ100 has an EQ6 fitting. That's why FLO loaned me the 2nd Uni 28 - mine is HEQ5.

@johninderby converted his to dual fitting I think.

I reckon my 21.5 - 7.2 zoom will become a "sentimental" eyepiece of sorts. I just use it such a lot !

I'll wear it out at this rate !

Great stuff Nick.

I went for some of those with my 12 inch dob after the Venus / Mercury observing.

I want a refund though, the Blinking Planetary does not blink when observed with a 12 inch !

Both the tripods in my photo are Berlebach Uni 28's.

Here is one that I took when I was trying out an early AZ100

Great post Doug - more for my next time out as well !

Thanks folks. I use a very cheap bracket to mount my old mobile phone to the eyepiece. There are much better ones (and phones !) available but I'm a cheapskate when it comes to astro snapping (can't really call what I do imaging)

I don't know if the term "Inferior Planets" is used much these days

Anyway, it refers to Venus and Mercury. Mars, Jupiter Saturn, Uranus and Neptune are the "Superior Planets" (but don't tell them that !)

Anyway, here are the snaps of the Venus / Mercury pairing. Many better ones will be posted but these are my "souvenirs" of yesterday evening

Some good targets there. Better point out though that they won't look anything like that though a scope - unless you have a 30 inch dob on top of the Canaries !

6 minutes ago, markse68 said:

Yea but why would you 🤦‍♂️😂

Beats me !!!

But I thought this thread had gone into realms beyond practical usage so I thought I'd throw it in

2 hours ago, markse68 said:

And of course a very small thing that doubles in size is still very small- you’re never going to magnify till the airy disk is the size of Jupiter in the fov

If you use a smaller aperture scope, you get a larger airy disk.

This is an excellent idea and I'm sure it will be a great success

I hope that visual observation and other non-imaging interests will be catered for in the near future 

I do realise that the majority of forum members do probably image or are interested in imaging though.

Back to my eyepiece now, while it's clear ....

Definitely upgrade the scope if that is an option. The 2x barlow will be pushing it to the limit already so the 3x or 5x won't help even if they are top quality.

Great result Craig !

Makes my crude mobile-at-the-eyepiece efforts look pretty poor but, hey, it's been fun trying and seeing the phase of Mercury in a scope is a rare occurrence 

Got them both !!!!

Lovely views with the Tak 100. Mercury's phase showing clearly at 100x and more. Venus just 6.6% illuminated so very slim and delicate now.

Venus clear in the 30mm finder but I found Mercury at low power with the scope.

Took Mercury up to 281x but the high power seemed to emphasize atmospheric diffraction. 150x was nicer really. A small planet far away !

I think this is only the 3rd time that I've been able to see Mercury's phases clearly with a scope. Very pleased !

I took some at the eyepiece mobile snaps but I've no idea if the Mercury ones will show much.

They will be closer together tomorrow evening and Friday but the forecast is dodgy then so I'm glad I got sorted this evening.

Hope others are getting nice views of the pair as well

I've taken my Vixen 102 upstairs to try and get a decent view of the conjunction. From the garden my view to the W is quite constrained by a very large conifer hedge

I've been seeing Venus OK but I wanted a bit more clear sky in that direction for the next few days.

15 minutes ago, F15Rules said:

That's superb magnification John..what eyepiece/combination of did you use?

Dave

Nagler 2-4mm zoom. Just kept clicking down the .5 mm increments .....

If it had been the Moon it would have been "floater city" I would think though

The weird thing is, when I backed off to 3mm or 4mm and "took it easy" the scope was still way above "50x per inch"

Yep - I've got a scope upstairs at the moment because that where I have my clearest and lowest western views.

Last time I observed it I managed an image, well in silhouette anyway

Just now, miguel87 said:

Any hope of surface detail?

I've not seen anything obvious when I've observed it previously. But I didn't have a Tak back then .......

Mercury's disk is around 6 arc seconds in apparent diameter. Venus is 52 arc seconds.

Mercury will be a very small gibbous disk.