RobertI

Tonight’s mission - to test out my newly acquired Astronomik UHC and OIII filters. I also planned to re-acquaint myself with the Tal before my new ED100 arrives. I resurrected the venerable battery driven non-goto CG5 as the host for tonight’s observing . Whilst the C8 was cooling I had a quick scan round with the Tal. The double double (of course) was easily split and the stars showed lovely ‘glowing’ diffraction rings. Jupiter and Saturn were rising but still low over the rooftops. At 164x Jupiter was showing a surprising amount of detail in moment of clarity. The great red spot was coming into view and was easily visible although nothing more than a smudge. Several bands were visible with hints of detail and one band showing a significant feature near the limb. A blue filter helped improve contrast slightly. Saturn revealed less detail, but the Cassini division and ring shadow were prominent together with some faint banding. The driven mount was proving to be a delight for this kind of observing - no pushing or knob twiddling required. Time to put the Tal away and bring out the C8. Surprisingly Jupiter and Saturn did not look much better, and I put this down to the mediocre seeing at such a low altitude. And on to the main event, the Veil with the UHC and OIII filters. Popping in the UHC revealed the Eastern Veil quite clearly. Not so much detail evident but very bright. Then on to the OIII, popped it in and ..... nothing....or very nearly. Very disappointed I put it down to the relatively bright sky, then I realised what was up - dew on the corrector! I hadn’t put on the dew shield. While waiting for the dew to clear I pulled out the Heritage 130P on its tripod mounted Giro (a one handed lifting job), popped in the eyepiece with OIII filter and .....oh my .... the entire eastern Veil was in the FOV with a clarity and sharpness never before seen. Filamentary detail was definitely there but mostly with averted vision - with a darker sky in a month or two it should look spectacular. I swapped between the OIII and the UHC and the differences were clear - UHC darkened the sky less than the OIII but made the nebula slightly brighter more extensive. However there was definitely less filamentary detail than in the OIII. By this point the moon was casting quite a glow so time to pack up, but very much a success and looking forward to darker skies with the UHC and OIII! Completely forgot about the comet! 🙄 Lessons learned from tonight's session: I realised after I had finished that the FOV in the C8 was much smaller than it should have been and I think that this was because the focal reduction was less than 0.63 (possibly more like 0.8) due to the eyepiece being closer to the reducer than it should be (I was using an SCT threaded diagonal which removes the need for a visual back and I was sitting the Hyperion eyepiece ‘deep’ into the 2” fitting of the diagonal). Lesson learned for next time. Aluminium tripods should not be used for long or heavy scopes, too much vibration - I wasted valuable time swapping it out for the 2” tripod. Batteries should be checked before observing - the red dot finder in the H130P was dead. SCTs need some form of dew control - always. GEMs are pain the butt for moving around the sky to see different objects and 'freestyle', but are great for critical and lengthy observing of individual objects. Long fracs look great on GEMs!

Fabulous capture John!

A nice scope like that deserves some nice tube rings. 👍

Some interesting reading matter to help keep my interest up during these cloudy nights.

Great information, thanks both. I am new to the world of barlows and teleextenders so this is all very helpful (despite the fact I have already bought the Baader!)

Thanks John, good to know, I’m really looking to getting it. The plan is to replace the Tal and the meg72 (already sold) with the ED100 so a similar story to yours. I will keep the Tal long enough to do an in depth comparison which I shall share. Currently putting together a plan and a list of targets. Might reach out for some help on that. 🙂

A lovely array of fracs Stu, not a dud amongst them. I’ve just placed an order for a Skywatcher ED100 and am fully expecting this to be the slippery slope! My first task when it arrives (not expecting it until August TBH) is to do a detailed comparison with the Tal to start to really understand the differences between the different flavours of fracs. Hoping to be able to get a squint through a Tak at some point.

Sorry unexplained duplicate posts - FIrefox has gone mad.

Accidental duplicate post - can't remove - sorry!

You're building a bar in your observatory? I must come round for a 'session' at yours sometime!

Call it a hunch, a sixth sense if you like, but I am getting a strong feeling that you like refractors?

Well done! What are you getting next?

Bizarrely.....snap!

Finally finished reading this - very informative review and obviously we’ll received. I have now placed the order for the 2.25x barlow and am seriously considering a BCO. Thanks for the help everyone, I’ll post my experiences of using the barlow in due course. 👍

Well done on bagging it. Sounds like I will need to find a dark site too or a superb night if I am to stand a chance of seeing more than a glimpse. And my biggest scope is 8” so not the biggest. Fortunately there is a very distinctive pattern of field stars which should make it much easier to find, but seeing it is another matter!

Thanks Gerry, good suggestion on the BCO, never had an orthoscopic; they seem perfectly suited to my needs and still well within budget with the Baader 2.25 barlow.

Worthy of its own thread methinks.....🙂

Yes, I’ve been really happy with them, very easy to use, nice FOV, and great with my F10 and F8 scopes. The 21mm was not so good with my F5 and F6 scopes but tend to use the 10mm in those scopes. Good to hear of others using the FTRs, not many folk seem to. @John, do you think it’s worth spending the extra on the Explore Scientific barlow, or is the achromatic Baader barlow good enough for use with all my (relatively modest) eyepieces?

That’s really helpful and illuminating, thanks John. It’s also the cheapest option so I can’t really go wrong! I’ll probably press the button tomorrow unless someone can come up with another convincing argument in the meantime. I understand what you’re saying about the fine tuning rings, I guess I‘ve used them a lot because I am too tight to buy some more glass!

Looking for some help and advice as I just dont have enough eyepiece experience..... I want to be able to take my various scopes upto higher powers for lunar, planetary and particularly doubles. Budget is around the £100 mark, but could stretch a bit further if necessary. As you can see from my sig my smallest e/p is the BST 5mm, which as it happens is not a fab eyepiece anyway (it produces a slightly 'misty' image despite cleaning, wasn't always like this, not sure what happened). For doubles I was hoping to be able to get a range of focal lengths if possible, so the options I have been considering are: A barlow such as the Baader Classic 2.25x (£39) or the Explore Scientific 3x (£86) - this would give a nice range of FLs with my 5mm BST and 10mm Hyperion (I have the fine tuning rings which turn it into 6mm, 7mm or 8.4mm, but also makes the eyepiece much longer!) A 5mm Hyperion - with the fine tuning rings it will give me (2.6mm, 3.2mm and 4.0mm) Another eyepiece suited to lunar/planetary/doubles. The OVL Nirvana-ES UWA-82º 4mm (£69) has previously been recommended. I feel I would also need another eyepiece for the 'mega-magnifications' that can sometimes be applied for resolving tight doubles. Perhaps the Celestron X-Cel LX 2.3mm (£66)? The appeal of option 1 is that I could also use my 8-24 zoom e/p as a 2.7-8.0 zoom, which sounds really useful for doubles/planetary, but possibly not giving very good views in practice?? Option 2 is nice and flexible, I have been very happy with the Hyperions and regularly use the fine turing rings. Option 3 is possibly the most expensive and least flexible, but possibly providing the best views. I also enjoy using two scopes during a session to compare views of the same object and it's nice to have the variety of eyepiece FLs to I get both scopes to the same magnification - possibly another tick in the box for option 1? Really not sure where to go, any advice really appreciated! Rob

You’re so right about things capitulating more easily once you’ve found them - the Veil is a great example for me. I now have OIII and UHC filters which should really help with the Crescent, plus slowly darkening skies. Really looking forward to unearthing it’s glories! 🙂

Nice report and video. Amazing what 72mm can do!

Having been agonising whether to buy an Astronomik UHC or OIII filter, these two came up for sale from a fellow member for the price a new one. Looking forward to using them.

Well done on creating some new converts, I'm sure your enthusiasm helped. Sorry to hear about your bad news.

Great report John, glad you enjoyed some 'eyeballing' and hope you do some more. Like you, I don't know that much about the moon and have promised myself on several occasions to do more given how often it's there. If you've not come across it, the Lunar 100 is a good list for getting to know the moon, there are plenty of resources out there about it. I'm glad you enjoyed the experience of doubles. I really love observing doubles, although not an expert, I am learning all the time, and it's something that can be done even when the moon's out. I bought the 150PL Newtonian specifically for doubles and it's working brilliantly. I tend to get bamboozled by colours with doubles. Often a brightly coloured primary can make the the secondary seem to have colour when it doesn't have any. I've never really managed to see the difference between white and blue stars, epsecially fainter stars. Shades of red are much easier to discern. Carbon stars are fun to find and observe. I sympathise with your contortions, I remember cursing the last time I had my 100mm refractor out! I guess that's where a really tall tripod pays dividends. I must admit, I have found that my Newtonians are the most comfortable observing experiences, with the eyepiece always easy to access when standing, even when pointing near the zenith. And with slow motion extension cables hovering at waist height it's easy to control the mount. It's the best setup I have found to date. I look forward to your next report! Rob