jetstream

7 hours ago, Ships and Stars said:

And Stephans Quintet is another interesting one from what I've read. And the veil... Can't wait!

It was very good tonight under avg transparency!

about the filters- older Astronomiks might be a bit wider than the new ones but they are still good. My 24" is really responding to the tight older Lumicon OIII I have on the Veil.

Promises, promises- the weather forecast was wrong again- at least 2 of them with the third more accurate...supposed to be very high trans but it was avg then poor.

The first part of the evening was pretty good- not great but good for sky quality and after viewing NGC7331 and the fleas over to the Quintet I go and yes it is a Quintet! Very happy to easily see the 5 members. The object was a large triangle formation with another tight galaxy next to the bottom one and lower again and away a bit was a fifth galaxy very near a star. I used the 10mm BCO at 249x but 499x with the VIP added really woke things up here... this combo is excellent actually.

Chuffed to bits so they say lol!

A big puzzlement for me tonight- I Sky Commandered over to the Bubble nebula and saw a large .8 deg wide curved arc? I have not seen this before- has anyone else? I must revisit.

A new favorite for me is now NGC40 a great planetary- the Bowtie nebula. I was getting structure and segments of an annular ring I believe, using the 10BCO native at 249x and no filter, this one really will strut its stuff under better conditions and will be visited regularly.

The scope was the 24", EP's 20mm Lunt, 10BCO/VIP barlow and Lumicon OIII/UHC filters.

How has the Bubble nebula shown to other members?

1 hour ago, Ships and Stars said:

I can't wait Gerry! Hope the weather halfway cooperates. 

Off topic, but the sky here tonight might be extremely good... I'm thinking NGC7331 and dissecting Stephans Quintet further with the orthos. After this back to the picturesque Veil, wait until you see those little forked tips at the end of the 2 brighter wisps...

What do you have for an OIII?

1 hour ago, Ships and Stars said:

you might have saved me a three and a half hour drive when an equally good spot is under an hour away!

 

lol! This is exactly what happened to me using the SQM... I used to drive piles of miles way up in the bush to observe- only to realize our cabin was just as good! I do miss the adventures though, but its sure nice living under dark skies.

Your gonna like what you see in this scope....

19 hours ago, Ships and Stars said:

Thanks Jetstream! Your post has me ready to do some proper viewing. The long term weather forecast for the next few weeks is not looking great, but at least it's changeable. Your comments on the milky way and little veil have me itching to get out! Fingers crossed, I've waited since April to get the big dob back out, and have picked up some nice eyepieces over the summer. Thanks very much!

Your welcome and pursuing dark skies is fun in itself. Reading reports elsewhere I've noticed that when the term "Bortle" is used by some as a static label- I even did when I said I live in Bortle 1 skies.  My skies vary as do others and to say that most any location is always "Bortle1" is very misleading.

I read a report where the observer described a Bortle 2 sky as 22mag with high 7's NELM.....and then the site was then labelled Bortle 2.

What I did in the pursuit of dark skies is to find a few dark sites that I could travel to and avoid cloud etc- it might be in your best interest to find sites such as this. I'll take a super transparent 21.4 sky over a 21.6 sky with lower trans. My best views come near zenith and I try to pick objects up high, like the Veil is now. The other night M81/M82 were nice in the 24" but no where near as good as they will be higher up.

As far as the Little Veil, try many times after warming up the eyes but don't waste too much valuable dark sky time on it IMHO- too many better objects to see lol! Normally one challenge object is included in each serious obs session here, thats it.

3 hours ago, scarp15 said:

Good to learn that your observatory is coming along Gerry. I think that I understand John's comment, you would understandably have had expectations in comparison over the 15" capability, yet clearly as you have descriptively conveyed, those expectations may have been succeeded, surprisingly so, particularly if not at very good levels of transparency. Look forward to further reports.

Iain, I can tell you this- my expectations are by far and away exceeded!!

All clouds tonight- can't wait for some dark, fall transparency before the snow comes.

3 hours ago, John said:

Thats great to hear Gerry but why should it surprise you ?

Even your average skies are pretty dark and 24 inches is a whopping increase in terms of light gathering area over 15 inches. Similar to the difference between my 12 inch and a 20 inch and I've been left in no doubt about the additional capabilities of that additional 8 inches of aperture when I've had the chance to observe with a 20

It's good for kit to make you pleasantly surprised though - much better than the other way around !

 

I guess I was just over excited when seeing the Veil like this John! 😃

We can figure out magnitude gains, exit pupil,image scale blah blah blah but when it comes together and the view is like this it is a wow moment! and yes seeing an object this well with a mirror, eyepiece and eyeball does surprise me lol!

Pickerings Wisp is a whole 'nother surprise in itself!

On 16/08/2019 at 15:44, Ships and Stars said:

Just thinking the Bortle 1 could be mind-blowing. Viewing through a 20" dob. 

Any thoughts?

I live in Bortle 1 skies and was just observing with the 24".

Personally I don't like the Bortle scale- it says M33 is visible naked eye under Bortle 4 skies... skies are variable as is darkness levels for a given site depending on time of year etc. These days I judge the sky by the look of the Milky Way- under my best skies it casts its glow, brightly reflecting off the lake and shows sharp jagged structure along its course and will extend from horizon to horizon. Many objects such as the Lagoon neb are brightly lit among the billowing bright clouds in the split.

The ability to see M33 naked eye is a superb, tough test of sky conditions and I do see it here.

I can't wait to hear your 20" reports from dark skies! Get that sucker on the Veil!

ps if you observe in truly dark skies your 20" will chew the Little Veil up no problem.. (Sh2-91), give it a whirl with the OIII.

My observatory is coming along with the addition of a 20' shipping container for scope storage, what a handy thing this is.When I ordered the 24" scope I had no idea how much it would have over the 15" ....

When viewing the Veil tonight I was very surprised at the intense structure it offered, much more detailed than in the 15" and as an example the western veil showed forked little splits at the tips of the 2 main broom splits. This is the first time I noticed these features. The "lower" 52 Cygni side broom split showed incredible twisted structure, holy! Pickerings Wisp was finely, brightly structured too!

My attention was riveted on this object as well as M13, another stunner.

The sky was good with avg trans and dark for this time of year 21.5ish and the Lunt 20mm, Lumicon OIII worked splendidly. The extra aperture is really surprising me with its DSO performance compared to the 15", in side by side comparisons.

Can't wait for tomorrow night- the trans is supposed to be VG..

Excellent report Stephan and really inspiring! Can't wait to get back observing.

1 hour ago, vlaiv said:

Ok, that sort of concludes frequency restoration using spatial domain, or "How to blur image more in order to make it sharper"

Holy cow!

Thanks Vlaiv- I'm going to read this many times and try to get the concepts.

Maybe I'll just stick to visual lol! I was going to buy a C8 to try imaging but held off until I actually understand the processing...

Actually, if true this points to using the largest aperture that can be used, for imaging, as processing can help with the effects of CO,etc, etc,.

Not to say that smaller apertures don't produce fine images- they sure can. I see why Astroavani, Kokathaman use the scopes they do - Avani has been helpful to me in understanding imaging and I have a long way to go... I am going to try a C8 down the road I think for lunar. For me, I want to start with as many things stacked in my favor as posssible- ie accurate, collimation, good optics and understanding the effects of IR (frequencies) vs seeing...

To the OP- very good thread started, sorry to sway the convo a bit!

19 minutes ago, andrew s said:

A lot of work was done on the when the fault with the HST was found and before a hardware fix was available. Google "HST inage restoration" for some examples.

Various forms of deconvolution were tried.

Regards Andrew 

Thanks Andrew.

57 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

This graph explains why unobstructed aperture gives best contrast for visual, and why larger scope provide finer detail even when somewhat obstructed over smaller aperture.

When it comes to imaging, something else happens - there is processing stage

Great post Vlaiv, I understand the first visual part and I'm intrigued to learn your ideas in the second- the idea of restoring lost frequencies due to CO,collimation errors, optical quality etc in processing. I would be very interested in seeing images that bear this out.

An easy one might be to image slightly de collimated and then restore the frequencies lost across the whole spectrum. Thoughts?

3 hours ago, Louis D said:

Found a European supplier of those 55 degree eyepieces under the Omegon brand.  I've never looked through one, so I can't comment on their relative merits.

Nice eyerelief, and perform better than their price point.

21 hours ago, vlaiv said:

I want EP around 5mm

These Long Perng 55 deg eyepieces are under rated IMO, they are sold as Williams Optics SPL, Orion Edge On, Zhumell planetary, Stellarvue planetary etc. The Orion Edge on is $99 USD and easily available. These are sharp low scatter eyepieces.

I have 7 scopes and would say the the 15" truss dob would be the one- if I could keep it assembled. If not the 10" dob wins. The 15" is a very nice aperture.

On 26/07/2019 at 10:29, scarp15 said:

Resembling a fish on top of a platter, B144 is 6' x 3 degree

Under good but not great skies last night I managed this with the MK1 eyeballs. I wasn't dark adapted totally and the MW showed nice structure- not near the level it can show here however. Its big and appeared about a thumb long and seemed to show in 2 directions. The MW split was obvious but I did have some extinction above the horizon a bit with stars in some directions.  I sat in an old broken wood lawn chair at the lakeshore, a favorite spot to use the eyes...

The real treat was the bright billowing clouds where M17 etc reside...

Leica Aspheric with barlow, mine is a Badder VIP. This zoom seems more flexible with respect to focal ratio compared to the Zeiss 25.1-6.7mm.

28 minutes ago, Piero said:

Fair point, John. I should have been more precise. I didn't mean that the BCO is not good, but simply that the one I had was not at the level of my Docter UWA. As this similarly was detailed a few posts above, I simply infer that there could be some differences between BCO units. 

My previous SLV 9mm was close to the BCO I had. Between the two I prefer the SLV due to the larger frontal lens and longer eye relief.

In which respects wans't it as good? The BCO series was designed to open up the field and shows edge distortion a bit whereas the Docter is better in this regard.

1 hour ago, scarp15 said:

and Gerry may chip in

This sucker is hard-SH2-91- but do able in a 10" if everythings right. One thing- its easy to get pulled over to that great little chain of stars...in the wrong spot lol! Use discretion with the exit pupil...too little forget it too much forget it...for me anyway.

I eagerly wait reports on this one!

1 hour ago, Piero said:

They support the primary mirror. They look identical to those installed on the triangles of Orion Optics mirror cells.

I meant the metal ones- one on each triangle- is this what you meant?

Looks VG Piero!

Question- what function do those screws set up above the triangles serve?

Also, here are some numbers relating to mirror cells if anyone is interested.

3 minutes ago, markse68 said:

No I’m a complete noob- it is only personal “feeling” not even a proper opinion-  nothing more. Next time I get the chance I’ll spend some more time with it- I’m sure it’ll grow on me.

I think your opinion was fine, proper etc. I just wanted to convey some experience with this eyepiece- it is just as sharp as my Docter 12.5mm, sharper than my Delos, goes deeper than the 12.5mm Tak ortho (vg btw) and barlowed is becoming a favorite galaxy core eyepiece, up around 500x. It is one of my best eyepieces.

Eyepieces are a personal choice for sure and there are many good ones out there, have fun with your choices!

1 minute ago, markse68 said:

Well it’s probably more a feel thing than its optical quality and I will spend more time with it but it just feels a bit cheap, I don’t really like the eyecup and when I have used it before it didn’t stay long in the focuser- unlike this barlowed combo that I couldn’t get enough of 🤷‍♂️

I respect your opinion for sure to each their own I say.

My visual experience might differ somewhat from yours and you might want to keep it, even if for later. The 10mm BCO is an extremely useful eyepiece IMHO. Are you an experienced astronomer and what do you observe with? No disrespect intended with the questions btw.