RobertI

Fascinating article. That 3” F16 Unitron must have been quite a scope - splitting both components of Epsilon Lyrae at x48 is no mean feat. 

Lovely report Magnus, some nice finds there. I really like the finder - did you say you have a flattener fitted? Does that help with reaching focus?

Great report. You’ve really bought the Starsense experience to life, I’ve read several magazine reviews of the tech, but your report is the most convincing so far! I can see that galaxy hunting is where this tech can really stand out. Regarding your technique of moving the scope, I often do this for really faint stuff and I think it is an accepted technique, though not often talked about. I stumbled on the three brightest members of Markarians Chain with my 4” recently during a really transparent night, which was very pleasing, and plan to have a closer look with my C8 next time out to see if I can see more. 

Lovely report and nice to hear about some of the southern constellations and objects. 👍

Super scope Stu, you’ve got an exciting summer of Milky Way fun to look forward to with that beastie. 

Congratulations, you lucky thing! Keep us up to date with what happens. That will be a wonderful scope to own.

Wonderful drawing (the word “sketch” under-sells it!) 

That’s a very impressive improvement! Presumably the resulting focal length on your C6 is around 950mm?

On 07/05/2023 at 12:46, Agerskov said:

Great lists, Rob.

But I can't dechiffer the open cluster in line 6 on the Taurus list.

Thanks in advance

@Pixies is correct, it’s shown in Interstellarum as visible in a 4” but SkySafari lists magnitude as unknown. Haven’t tried it myself yet - one for the winter I think.  
 

I’m always surprised how much you can see through a 6x30 and they are so light too. I have been meaning to get a 6x30 RACI for a while to sit on my 102ED as my 9x60 is rather  bulky and causes balance issues. 

A nice 32mm Plossl for my C8, as recommended by @bomberbaz (thank you) to help me with my nemesis, the Crescent nebula. 
 

Two nice additions to the FLO stable. The wooden tripod looks the biz and decent price.  

4 hours ago, Louis D said:

Are you saying that even at f/10 those two Hyperions are not sharp to the edge?  If so, are they pretty close to that goal?  By way of comparison, my 13mm and 17mm Redlines (Astro Tech AF70 version) massively improve going from f/6 to f/12, but not quite perfect.  They are very similar to the Hyperions in design parameters, so I would expect similar improvement.

You’re right Louis, they are fine at F10 and I’m sure they would suit if the OP if they stayed at that focal length or longer. My feeling is the Morpheus is more future proof, SCT owners often get the 0.63 reducer and other faster wide field scopes, but I could be wrong……

I used a 10mm and 21mm Hyperion in my C8 for many years and was very happy, and I think you’d be happy with them in your setup. I recently acquired a 17.5mm Morpheus and have been extremely impressed with the wider field and sharpness to the edge, and thinking of getting another - a definite step up from the Hyperions. The Morpheus are more expensive but currently on sale and looking great value -  get them quick!

11 hours ago, bomberbaz said:

A 32mm plossl in FLO'S AE  range is 29 quid

Thanks for the additional info, I’ll order the Plossl and let you know how it goes.  

Very nice, let us know how that works. Your 60mm should sit nicely on that. Still time to catch Venus!

50 minutes ago, bomberbaz said:

I( would suggest trying it. The exit pupil is a little on the large size at 5.7mm, but try that on a dim nebula, (M57 etc are far too bright) and also an eyepiece around the 25mm range to see what results you yield. I would expect the 38mm to be brighter than the 25 but the darker background would help the smaller exit pupil.  It could possibly a little washed out depending on your eyes response to darkness, none of us are the same.

What filters do you use/have?

I have an OIII and a UHC, I believe the OIII works well on the Crescent? As far as the 38mm 2” eyepiece goes, I recall that I found it would not focus with the reducer, so that combination is out. I’ve tried the C8 with a 21mm eyepiece plus reducer, but I now have a 24mm too, which I could try, but I suspect the 32mm will give the jump I need in exit pupil size to make a difference on the Crescent. I will give it ago this summer! 
 

Sorry to the OP for diverting the thread, but hopefully of interest.  

On 02/05/2023 at 15:21, bomberbaz said:

Sorry Rob but I have only just seen your query directed at me from the end of last year.  I think the reason you are struggling with seeing this object is your exit pupil although you don't state any viewing details, let me elaborate.

My dob may be a light bucket in comparison but the key here is the focal ratio. At F4.86, a 24mm eyepiece gives a near 5mm exit pupil (24/4.86) so all that lovely light we need is spread over as many receptors as possible, 5mm is seen as something of a perfect size when using a line filter, OIII in this instance.  Also my magnification is 71

Now let's look at your F10 SCT, generally used for planetary work and star clusters etc. A 25mm eyepiece is going to give you around x85 magnification but the exit pupil is only going to be 2.5mm! (25/10) There in lies the problem.

Just to elaborate on this a 2.5mm exit pupil cover and area of 0.04909 cm2 and a 5mm exit pupil covers 0.19635 cm2 which is 4 times greater. You don't need to be a rocket scientist to figure which will give best views on feint fuzzies.

However a way around this is to use a reducer  Celestron f6.3 Focal Reducer | First Light Optics and you have a scope that should perform pretty well on nebula and galaxy. Pop a 32mm plossl or similar in that and presto, 40x magnification and more importantly, a 5mm exit pupil. 

Thanks for your help Steve, appreciated. I hadn’t really considered the exit pupil aspect, that’s a good thought. I have always worked on the basis that I didn’t really want to go below 68 degrees FOV which limits me to a 24mm eyepiece in an SCT, but what I didn’t really consider is the limitation on the exit pupil. Your excellent suggestion of a 32mm Plossl gets around that, at the cost of a narrower field of view of course. And I do have a 0.63 reducer which I use most of the time. Before I rush out and buy a 32mm Plossl, do you think my 38mm 2” eyepiece might also work? There will be vignetting at the edges but I’m assuming the central 50 degrees will be no worse than a Plossl?

Nice report Magnus. 👍

10 hours ago, Drkneb said:

A first look that I hope this helps people get an idea of the size and content of this updated book.    

Unboxing Video of the Observer's Sky Atlas 4th Edition

My observing buddy Tim kept an old paperback copy of of the Observer's Sky Atlas jammed in the top of his eyepiece case. I thought this was an unecesarily addition to an alrady clunky case but when we'd get out on a work night unexpectedly when there was little time to plan a session he'd pull this book out and flip through it picking interesting targets. I was resistant since the targets aren't ones I'd necessarily pick, but now that I've purchased my own copy I get the sense that this is the point. We are bing taken on a bit of a guided tour.

It contains the Messier and the Caldwell targets but then there is a list of 100 other targets the author curated plus many other NGC's for a total of 500 objects, though I've not counted them myself, but all observered by the author through his binoculars and 6-inch telescope. It is a bit idiosyncratic in the layout as it feels like one has obtained a copy of another observer's planning book for what they wish to see in the night sky. Charts are a bit haphazzad with full constellations then large non-geometrical contoured zoomed in sections for telscopes and binoculars as if someone just drew an area around a target then plopped in that bit from a larger star atlas. Yet this seems to work and I look forward to trying it in the field.

Chris

Thanks Chris, I wasn’t aware of this guide but it looks like a really nice one. Love the show btw, i’m a regular listener  🙂

Well done on making the jump, I’m sure you’ll love it. 

12 hours ago, LDW1 said:

Thats their problem !  Maybe it will encourage them to develop, to expand. Thats the way the game is / should be played.

Indeed it is. It will be fascinating to watch how this plays out. There will be many great products to come. It’s also interesting to see how the attitudes of the astro community are slowing changing towards positive acceptance of this kind of technology

9 hours ago, SteveNickolls said:

The most intriguing part is naming the product the 'SeeStar S50' so expect more models in the future with wider objectives and different focal lengths, maybe. Understand the device is currently limited to 10 second sub-exposures too which might relate to build quality? Years ago I was lucky to have a good example of the SkyWatcher Synscan Alt Az mount where 60 seconds was achievable before the mount mechanic limitations showed up. Seems a good device for travel.

Cheets,

Steve

Yes, agreed, I think there will be more to come, with some larger apertures and better mounts. It’s an exciting prospect, but very bad news for Vaonis and Unistellar, I really can’t see how they will be able to compete. 

As a primarily visual astronomer over the last forty plus years, I had a period of EAA which I really enjoyed and hope to get back into it soon. I was forced to into EAA through massive light pollution which made visual impossible, and my home brew EAA rig, using my basic Lodestar guide cam, was a miracle solution and a massive boon for me. But after I moved to a better location I continued with EAA. So as a visual astronomer, what did I find so enjoyable about EAA? For me it was still a thrill to see that faint fuzzy slew into view on screen, and then watch the detail build up over the next few minutes, and then investigate what I could see. I could also fiddle with sliders to increase contrast, brightness and sharpness and reveal more detail - a bit like popping in a visual filter. It didn’t feel like like imaging, it was more immediate. At 650mm focal length I could see so many faint objects (particularly galaxies) that I would never be able to see visually without a massive light bucket. Plus I could keep a snapshot for later analysis and sharing with the community. In fact I discovered a supernova (well I captured it before the ‘official’ discovery time, but sadly only found out days later!). With a black and white sensor it was very sensitive, and strangely more akin to visual than a colour sensor. Downsides were all the typical issues you get with imaging - alignment, collimation, focus, dust bunnies, hot pixels, etc. and it took time to set up. Products like the SeeStar seem to remove most of these issues, although from what I have seen of Unistellar and Vaonis, they still require some fettling, but that will improve over time. Personally I think at 200mm focal length for the SeeStar, the number of objects of interest (at least to me) will be limited. Unistellar’s eVscope is better at 450mm, but I still don’t think the results are as good as my super sensitive black and white setup. But these systems will only get better and cheaper and more popular and I will undoubtedly get one at some point.

From what I can see, this is the same sensor and aperture as the Vaonis Vespera, so I guess you could expect similar results. There are lots of examples around of what the Vespera is capable of. At £459 it’s almost worth a punt for a bit of fun. I think it would be fine for the brighter emission nebulae and galaxies. The price point is seriously bad news for the Vespera though which retails at £2100!