Saganite

After last nights deluge the sky was clear at 5 am this morning and Orion looked beautiful so a trip down the garden had to be done. Well rewarded with clean split of Rigel and a solid E star with glimpses of the F star. The seeing was good after a thorough washing of the atmosphere, and Jupiter , for the second time in just over a week, revealed four bands with excellent colour, the two equatorial being sharp with fine detail at circa 140x. I am not really a 'morning ' person and the sight of five moons attending Jupiter threw me until the focuser revealed that the culprit was a star, 43 Ari, so Stellarium says. As is usual I spent a long time on the Jovian disc and so it was getting light by the time I moved to Venus. A lovely sharp crescent in the dawn sky, probably the best I have seen for a long time, was a grand finale to brief but fine session.

I too have Zeiss 8 x 30's , and agree they are exceptionally good.

For sure ! Mine cost £120 and I am delighted with it....

We do Stu. Early on my vote was for the 13mm T6 , a superb eyepiece. I have never tried the Doctor 12.5mm but I binoview most objects and for that a pair of Nagler 13's are perfect.

I doubt anyone takes it dead seriously, just a bit of fun between friends.

I have had both in the last eighteen months and they are the same eyepiece in different livery so far as I can see, certainly no difference in performance.

My nominations are, 24mm Panoptic ....best of that range without doubt, utterly invincible.... 13mm T6 Nagler I sold my 30 Pentax XW, replaced it with a Stellalyra UFF 30mm at half the cost and couldn't be happier, it really is sharp to the field stop in my 4" Vixen and my 6" APM ED.

Here you go Neil a Uni 18 . This is what you need This set was excellent.....🙂

Hi Neil, I mounted my FC100 , when I had it, and my Vixen ED103S, which is heavier, very successfully on a UNI 18. Superb and very solid.

I thought I would push my luck and popped in the Burgess TMB 5mm pair..270x . The image scale was great and actually held well, the disc being just a tad softer, but they showed me no more, so I swapped back the Nagler 9's. Always worth a go and sometimes it pays off. I have been so enthralled with the planet that I have only just noticed the four moons are perfect little discs themselves as crisp as you like.

Jupiter keeps on giving tonight. Four belts now visible with swirls in the equatorial regions. Io on the limb of the planet with the shadow half way across.

As expected, with the gain in altitude, Jupiter is giving plenty of detail in a very crisp disc. The two equatorial belts are prominent and the shadow transit of Io is nicely sharp and about a third of the way across A white disc is also visible below and ahead of Io in the equatorial belt. This visible with the Vixen ED 103s, Baader Maxbright II's with 1.7 GPC , and a pair of T6 Nagler 9mm for 150x Both Saturn and Jupiter have been superb so far. The Moon is also stable at 150x . A very enjoyable session, very good seeing but with mediocre transparency,

As things turned out John we were just in time, but it was a memorable trip.

It is only 4 years since I stood on the edge of the Barringer Crater, but seems a life time ago... Thanks for the film...👍

Quite surprisingly Saturn is really crisp with glimpses of the Cassini and some banding across the disc, good colour too and four moons. I had a quick peek at Jupiter in the East and was amazed at the detail considering its altitude so that will be worth waiting for. Meanwhile back to Saturn.....

The transparency is not wonderful here tonight. My Vixen 103 ED is performing faultlessly as it always does, beautifully splitting the handful of doubles thus far and picking M56 out of the gloom as well as M2 and M15. My neighbours to the East of me are having a garden party so the sky in that direction is off limits at the moment, but any other time they see my dome in use they switch off their garden lights, so they are very good. Just waiting for Saturn to clear the Silver Birch and I will have both scopes on the go . A few glimpses between the leaves look promising.

Well done Linton, you're a star.....🙂

I have now set the tracking on and I have been able to tweak the focuser while the images are held nicely in the frame and whilst the 3mm setting was still very good, backing it off to 4mm was tidier but another click to 5mm was then textbook which I think was what Louis found in his extensive report. If it stays clear I look forward to trying it out on Saturn and Jupiter.

Here in my part of Cambridgeshire, the seeing is amazing. I have my 6" APM ED pointing vertically at Lyra and using the Svbony 3-8 zoom for the first time. Clicking down the stops from 8mm , the images of Epsilon Lyrae just got better and better until at 3mm and 400x I have 4 little orbs staring back at me with one perhaps a couple of diffraction rings, and a thick black tramline between them. I haven't bothered with the tracking yet as I didn't expect to be out until tomorrow evening, so it could be easier, but so far I am very impressed with this little zoom for high power.

I bought one of them a couple of weeks ago as it was the best price that I have seen. Not had a chance to use it yet but certainly it has the feel and the heft of a quality item, so I am optimistic...🙂

Fine report Rob and it certainly has fired me up for the next chance to observe, though I must get an OIII filter.

I was a member of the Tak owners club in 2018, honest, until I saw the light...... I thought I had deleted my bona fides in the last PC clearout, but no.

..... That's what I am afraid of Rob....

For me , the challenge to see the most that I can of all manner of object with a fine telescope in real time is what burns inside ....🙂

Agree 100%