jetstream

2 hours ago, Ships and Stars said:

I've tried the Leica against Ethos and the Delite series, can't tell any difference. Both terrestrial and astronomical. Besides the field stops, the Leica just wins over an over.

To my eyes the Leica zoom is sharper than Delos a bit and quite a bit more than Ethos. It really does like the VIP barlow..The color tone of the LZ is superb for Jupiter etc IMHO and also excels on planetary's.

Delos does deeper than either the LZ or Ethos to my eyes but the first and most important requirement is dark and transparent skies. Another excellent addition for you might be a 10mm BCO, ortho purists scoff at its enlarged FOV but this eyepiece really does work, at least my example does.

You will also see the HH with the 20" and the Super 25mm from the H130 will work, TV plossls are nice here too.

14 minutes ago, mapstar said:

A nice session but not up to your usual transparency. A little bit like over here by the sounds of it. 

We seem to suffer from quite a lot of poor transparency but I'll admit I've not been out for quite some time so the sky conditions may have changed. Hopefully this upcoming winter season will be a good one.

Hickson 55 should be a nicely placed target in Draco and a great challenge which I'm sure you'll tick off. A personal favourite. 

I'm just happy to observe again Damian, the weather was poor from last fall, not much observing at all. I miss those cold clear winter nights, we had cold with cloud and tons of snow. Overcast now with a thunderstorm last night after I packed up.

Hickson 55 is behind a bunch of trees, I'm in a draw between 2 ridges at the bottom but my new obs spot I made up on the ridge top might work. I just can't see wheeling this sucker up about 150 yards of steep hill though lol!  After I check out the placement of 55 up there I might put the 24" on my trailer and drive it up.

My plan is to have all my equipment up there eventually with a 15'x15' concrete observing pad, local thermals are excellent up there.

Many kudos to you guys for the excellent observations, made in less than transparent skies for some of your obs.

It is excellent!

I do like hyperwides for large neb viewing or for star fields but this is a very much personal thing, many don't like them.

Awesome!

I have one too and it really responds to the Baader VIP I find. Wait until you see the core of M42 with it...

2 minutes ago, Ships and Stars said:

I hate when that happens! haha... no looking forward to it. I managed to pick up some very nice eyepieces this year, I think everything is in order. Fingers crossed, mid-August will get properly dark here.

Great!

Which EP's did you get?

2 hours ago, Ships and Stars said:

Hi all,

My first observing report. Despite the better half saying 'no, no, for the love of God why did I marry you, you spend more on used eyepieces which hold their value extremely well' (I made up the second part) which is a frequent event, I cranked up the old country outlaw music and took the camper and a SW 130 to my closest semi-dark sky spot in the hopes of seeing the North America nebula. Around 1:13am which is the darkest point now at 57N. No joy. I tracked Deneb, but looked all around for the nebula. I was happy with the little SW 130, super portable around the tall pines, no finderscope needed, stars were needle sharp, just aimed along the tube clamps. I swapped OIII filters, but nothing. Airy disc was perfect, so at least I know that's in order.

Having said all of this, the sun never dipped too far below the horizon, it was basically dawn the entire time. Glad I didn't drag the 20" dob out. I had a great time out in the sticks, singing to myself and the squirrels, despite the lack of nebulosity!

Dark skies return in mid-August. Welcome to NNE Scotland!

 

Cheers

 

Great report!

Keep trying with the H130, I can tell you first hand it does very well on the NAN. The supplied 25mm does a nice job on it and we use a DGM NPB with success. An OIII helps contrast espc under less than dark skies.

Wait until you see the Pleiades in the H130!

Just a heads up- your 20" will be fantastic on so much... on the huge NAN though you will look "through" the nebula and need to catch the edges... put that bad boy on the Crescent and Veil and hang on!

2 hours ago, mdstuart said:

Excellent 6! I saw at least two last night but I was only passing by 7331.

So next recommendation...how about ngc5353 and friends in cvn...and maybe the supernova although it's now down to mag 16...

Mark

Thanks Mark, I'm kind of in galaxy mode right now for some reason.NGC 5353! you are making things tough Mark lol! It will be lowish at the needed 12:30 am minimum for darkness and this area heads below the trees but I might have a loophole to observe through. I'll check it out on a less than perfect night so no wasted time.

Is the SN in 5353 itself?

I need practise on these faint point sources too in order to stand any chance on Einsteins Cross. During all this I'm honing in on my best EP combination which does seem to matter. Last night my 6mm Circle T and 5mm Circle T were ok but not at the 7kk level and pretty far off the 10BCO/VIP.

18 hours ago, mdstuart said:

You are clearly enjoying that dob. See how many "fleas" around NGC 7331 in Pegasus you can spot..😀

Mark

10 hours ago, mapstar said:

the cluster around NGC7331 is fabulous. 

Well fellas the night gave avg to below avg transparency and Pegasus wasn't that high but... for about 25 minutes the avg trans allowed the 4 easy fleas no issues and on the other side above a triangle of stars and with a star nearby I saw another very faint round non stellar glow. The 10 BCO gave hints of it so in went the 7kk, better but I tried the VIP/10BCO for 5mm and no question the glow was not a star.This was at 500x if the VIP gives 2x with the10 BCO. On went an extension ring and that much better again.

I moved a bit and found another glow with a tighter star, using 500x and also with the ring, not sure of the mag. So tonight 6 fleas were seen.

Another feature I saw in Stephans Quintet was a "bright" knot on the bottom of the bottom galaxy (dob orientation) this could be a 4th galaxy core. I will revisit this area again in better conditions. The MW showed little structure, the Cygnus dust lane was weak and the southern split very much blended into the sky. When the Quintet disappeared in the EP I packed it in.

Lesson learned: the 10mm BCO/VIP might be better than I thought it could be for this, it was VG. More testing under better skies. Btw using the realign on object feature when using an ortho, it will put the ortho right back on target when moved off. Not bad for a .13 TFOV....or less.

1 hour ago, mdstuart said:

You are clearly enjoying that dob. See how many "fleas" around NGC 7331 in Pegasus you can spot..😀

Mark

Will do Mark, I love NGC7331 itself. Pegasus might be viewable if I wheel the scope to a different spot so trees are not an issue if not now it will be soon. I did count over10 galaxies in the Arp 172 area in the FOV of the 12.5mm at once, kind of hard to keep track of them.

I find I can only observe this faint stuff for so long and then my eyes kind of go- maybe 1-1.5 hrs, do you find this?

I just had the 12.5mm Docter on M51 (stunning) and M101 (spectacular) in the 24", so about 3mm. The range I use for large nebs is 4mm-6mm generally.

The sky is great tonight, very transparent with the MW very sharply defined and the 24" was set up, collimated and nicely cooled.

After talking with some experienced large dob members (thanks Calvin, Damian) on here I decided to give some unusual and difficult objects a try. First on the list was ARP 81, I figured the listed mag would give me a shot. The DSC put me right on the spot with the 12.5mm Docter, actually quite faint but there were suspicions of a couple of very faint knots in there. In goes the 7mm KK ortho- a proven copy- and the object turned into a small worm like galaxy with 2 brighter knots showing with nice separation. Mag was 357x.

Well that one was harder than I thought... but I did find it and see it, a big challenge is getting on the object with a .128 deg TFOV using the ortho...

Now for Seyferts Sextet or Hicksons 79.

This object is listed as hard to break up so I figured it would be a good test of my eyes and the optics. The 12.5mm UWA picked up the comma or kind "u" shaped galaxy system with no issue. In goes the 7mm KK ortho and there they go! 3 separated galaxies for sure with a 4th possibly in averted. The shape was like an "L" but the 4th one that seemed to dance and move(?) created fleeting glimpses of a box shape. This object reminds me of Stephans Quintet somewhat.

I'm pretty happy about seeing this one!

Many more objects observed including Magic Carpet PN, showing its green, 2 toned shaped and the carpet feature nicely, the 10mm BCO really did well here. A new one tonight was the Blue Raquet ball PN, and yes its blue! a very nice color and again the 10BCO was used at 249x. No filters were used on these PN.

I am very pleased with this 24" dob and one thing is for sure- good,proven orthos are needed to open up some of these objects. The Docter 12.5mm UWA is a high transmission eyepiece, it reminds me of the Delos in this regard and is a huge asset for getting on the spot. My 3 EP for this are the Docter 12.5mm,10mm BCO and the 7mm KK ortho. I need to test the other orthos out when I get the chance.

Yup, its blue, a very nice bright blue with no filter.

I'm going for the Blue Racquet ball NGC 6572 tonight, conditions look vg. I'll try the 12.5mm and zoom.

A good test for the eyes on the brighter larger DSO is seeing if you lose dark adaptation- I do on M57 and M42. Also eye illumination is important ie I see pink in M42 with the 200mm f3.8 with 20mm Lunt even at a low X38 mag...

We can definitely see color in a few DSO, espc green.

2 hours ago, Ships and Stars said:

Does anyone know what to expect colour-wise  with a  scope  of  this size under dark Bortle 2 skies?

Green is the predominant color I see, but in M42 the very rich mottled green is accompanied by a pinkish red color under the wings. Friends say the 24" under VG skies will begin to show blue as well. Planetary nebula are amazing including the Catseye NGC 6543 and the Magic Carpet NGC 7027. The Eskimo nebula NGC 2392 is superb and your scope will show a 2 toned green (stunning) and very fine radial filaments. Of course M57 is just so bright.....

You might be amazed at the views with no filter...

If you get well over 21mag skies objects take on a different nature and every bit over 21 matters...really matters, along with transparency.

1 hour ago, FenlandPaul said:

I think there’s a lot of merit to that approach, Gerry, especially with your skies. I use published Deep Sky magnitudes solely as a rough guide to “might be possible” vs “definitely impossible”. If it falls into the former camp, I give it a shot.

I spend more time trying to figure out what I saw than I do observing them, the other night was no exception- frustrating really. This is where the "doesn't matter to me" comes from lol!

The galaxy magnitudes are very puzzling to me...

34 minutes ago, mapstar said:

Fantastic stuff Gerry wish we had your skies over here.

Galaxies really jump out with the larger apertures. I would be interested to see what the optics perform like on targets like hickson 55 and 57.

M57 central star straight away must be nice as I've only glimpsed it once and it was a maybe at that. Struggled quite a lot the last two seasons with getting the weather and transparency.

I don't sketch but use a home made dimmable 12v led strip light fashioned like a bankers light  to read my star charts. I don't have a pic of it to hand but it works really well going down to nothing. 

Spent quite a few hours chasing the galaxies in Hercules and it has a great mix of targets in there for shape and magnitude variations.

Thanks Damian, observing these objects is a process to get good at, for me anyway. This scope is really helping me out and I hope to try those Hicksons when in view, I'll look up 57 too. From Cals info it looks like some good mag is needed to separate 55. I've noticed with stars that there is a sweet spot to observe them for mag when in theory we should be able to go as high as we want but for me too much mag and they disappear... M57 central star is such an object for me, too little nothing and too much nothing. It might be possible that faint galaxy cores begin to look like point sources and act like them, so I'll keep this in mind on Hickson 55- I know Huey will use a pile of mag on some galaxies with orthos.

For me the way to get M57 star is orthos, and they have to be good themselves and it seems as if 250-270x is a good place to start in scopes like ours. All you guys have great dobs and I like the style of yours in particular Damian, what a great job you did!

17 minutes ago, John said:

The refractors do better then their apertures might suggest, ie: they "punch above their weight" and mediocre observing conditions

Good ones do, and this could be because a high spec refractor will have a near perfect MTF as represented on the graphs and also because the smaller aperture is affected by poor seeing less of the time. My TSA120 really does surprise me.

Just now, Stu said:

Sorry to be thick Gerry, what are g and r standing for?

I think red and green- the galaxies have different measurable light or something, possibly also called fluxes?(not sure). Averaging them might give a useable number, not sure. Lots I'm not sure about lol!

If anyone is interested:more from Gottleib

" Specifically, the Lupton formula:
V = g - 0.5784*(g - r) - 0.0038; standard deviation = 0.0054

or equivalently, V = .4216*g + .5784*r - .0038 (round as you wish and the last term can probably be dropped)

For example with NGC 1, the SDSS gives:
g = 13.55
r = 12.70

Plugging into the formula results in V ≈ 13.05.
For comparison, RC3 lists V_T = 12.89.

Even if you just average the SDSS g and r, you'll be in the same ballpark. "

It appears that formulas are used to calculate V mag from color (flux?) data I think? Doesn't really matter to me, I'll just point the scope and wish for the best lol!

14 minutes ago, Stu said:

Sounds like Mag 16 is within reach under the right conditions Gerry?

I think so Stu, but the size and predominant flux(s) could make a difference. I'll need everything in control of the dark adaptation too- I need to work on this, including getting a monks hood. Not having that much experience I find that having a brighter galaxy in a group of near fainter ones helps too so I can stare right at the spot for averted.

NGC6147 can be rated over 16 mag I think but the numbers are all over the place..no idea what all these mags mean really. Steve Gottleib rates it at V 15, Stellarium 16.3...

from Steves site:

"

NGC 6147 = MCG +07-34-023 = Holm 747b = PGC 58077

16 25 05.8 +40 55 44

V = 15.1;  Size 0.4'x0.4';  Surf Br = 13.0

18" (7/29/08): very faint, very small, round, 20" diameter.  Located 2.3' NNW of NGC 6146 and 1.4' SSE of NGC 6145 within AGC 2197.  The three galaxies are collinear.

17.5" (7/24/95): extremely faint and small, 15" diameter, round.  Only able to glimpse repeatedly <25% of time with averted vision.  Faintest of trio and situated 1.4' SE of NGC 6145 and 2' NW of NGC 6146 in AGC 2197.  Incorrect identification in the RNGC.

George Johnstone Stoney, LdR's assistant, discovered NGC 6147 on 26 May 1849.  He noted "2 new neb, alpha (on diagram) eF st, Beta small."  The diagram clearly shows NGC 6147 = PGC 58077 (labeled as Alpha) on a line between NGC 6146 (not labeled) and NGC 6145 (labeled Beta), with NGC 6147 slightly closer to NGC 6145.   The direction of drift is not shown but is presumably down in the diagram. Dreyer later added the parenthetical comment "Query h1957 [NGC 6145] and h1958 [NGC 6146] and one Nova."  One faint star (labeled alpha) is shown on the diagram and it appears to correspond with MCG +07-34-022 = PGC 58078.  Since Stoney didn't record it as nebulous, it didn't receive a NGC designation."

17 minutes ago, John said:

Great report again Gerry - I'm green with envy at that scope under your skies

Interesting observations on eyepiece performance as well. I've long been convinced that you need to be pushing the performance envelope on challenging objects to get to a point where the performance differences between good quality eyepieces start to show.

Alvin Huey in the US was the first person who reported how good the 10mm Baader Classic Ortho was at teasing out faint galaxies - he rated it as second only to the Zeiss ZAO 10mm and a touch better than the 10mm Delos (which he also rates highly). Personally I really like the 18mm Baader Classic Ortho as a deep sky eyepiece as well. It's great that these eyepieces are available for a touch under £50 a throw or even less on the pre-owned market

Thanks John, it was your excellent review that led me to the BCO series- the 18mm and 10mm are super DSO eyepieces- your reviews are very very helpful for us! I think now that I have an idea how this scope performs I;m going to settle into some Arps etc and have some fun.

it is unbelievable that this 10mm BCO will outperform some pretty expensive glass!

Just now, estwing said:

My favourite reads...

Fantastic! I have Urano 2000 but I need that Arp book- hows the others? I need one of those headlamps too, I'll need luck finding one here lol!

1 minute ago, estwing said:

Thanks Calv- what red torch do you guys use at night?

Conditions last night were superb with only my best winter observing beating it. The MW was sharply defined with bright billowing clouds reaching to the horizon to the south with the split so obvious. The Cygnus area showed its huge dark lanes with great definition. It took until about 1am for these conditions to maximize.

I'm curious as to the DSO performance with the 24" so I went for a few galaxies again.

I never realized how many galaxies are in Hercules... I tried a nice group starting with NGC 6146, no issues here, actually I bagged all of the group including the tough NGC 6147 in averted. So, NGC 6141, NGC6145,NGC 6146, NGC 6147, and NGC 6138.  There are galaxies all over the place here!

What a great beginning!

Next was a couple of galaxies in Draco- IC1258 and IC 1260- I thought these would be toughish but the were bright in direct vision. Strange how some of the galaxies seem easier than others regardless of listed magnitudes and size.

Another Draco success included NGC 6338, NGC 6345, NGC6346 and IC1252. I thought IC1252 would give me grief at 15.7 mag but the .8 armin size helped I think.  The 10mm BCO really helps on the fainter galaxies.

When I ordered this telescope my goal was to easily see galaxy clusters, not being limited to the brighter ones the 15" allowed (it went deep though!) and the 24" is living up to expectations- actually beyond them. If it can get the Einsteins Cross or the Andromeda Parachute I'll be ecstatic!

A few more things: M16/Docter 12.5 UWA /Lumicon UHC- extremely bright with a very dark knot in the wings- what a sight!

M17, the Swan: the Docter gave the best high power views yet, extremely high detail in the neck, under neck body area- so many lanes with bright mottling!

M57: central star came into view with the 10mm BCO first try- no issues at all.

To recap: an ortho is needed for very faint galaxies in a scope, the 12.5mm Docter is outperforming the Nikon 14mm HW for transmission and bright nebula appearance and the Sky Commander might not be my dark adaptation issue. My little red flashlight is to bright. After sketching out some galaxy positions using it my eyes were blown! The galaxies disappeared for a good long bit after using it. More investigation needed.

Question: what do members use for a red light to sketch etc at night? 

A great night!!