tomato

Sorry, I don’t have access to a HEQ5 any more else I would have tried this combination out for you. What I would say is you would be imaging at 2.39” per pixel so you have some leeway to play with. The RASA8 and dew shield combination is a bit of a sail in windy conditions but I see you have a nice roll off roof observatory which would offer some protection. I can understand why you would like some first hand experience, it would be frustrating in the extreme to buy a RASA and then not be able to use it because the mount wasn’t up to it. It might be worth asking FLO if they could advise?

So I succumbed to temptation and purchased the Martin Pugh 27 hr LHaRGB dataset from Chile taken with a Planewave CDK 17. I'm not sure whether I should have done this, but for added effect I added in the 8.5 hrs of Starbase RGB data to give 35 hrs total integration. I think I have sated my appetite for this galaxy, at least as far as using third party data goes.

How do visual only astronomers feel about the Pegasus product? Would you embrace it or do you feel that it introduces a disconnect between you, the optics and the heavens?

I made a start a few years back with a 4 panel mosaic of the Chain, but it was only a couple of hours per panel.

It’s a great image and an ideal FOV for this region. I would love to cover this area with my Esprit 150 rig but I’d need at least 12 panels…

Any sign of the Skywatcher HAC125 at the show?

So this one has two hours of Ha, using NBZ dual band filters with the mono and OSC cameras. Total integration is now 20.3 hrs. I'll stop posting these now until I have 30+ hrs, assuming that's possible this side of losing astro darkness.

I had a cooling control issue which I raised with QHY, I got a reply the next day.

If it is Astro Pixel Processor’s sub analysis quality score, I think the numbers are relative to the data being analysed in that session. Recently the numbers have been in the 300-400 for 2 minute subs under a moonlit sky.

Thanks for that, your figure of 20.43 makes quite a difference! I'll be on it again tonight, albeit with a 92% illuminated moon.😟I might try to capture some Ha instead.🙂

This is Abell 2151, the Hercules Galaxy Cluster, centred on NGC 6045. 116 x 2mins Lum, 110 x 2 mins RGB captured with the Esprit 150/QHY268 dual rig. Annotated images are being posted so I've included one.

My Moravian 8300 CCD doesn’t get any telescope time now, but seeing that it won’t even fetch a third of what I paid for it on the used Astro camera market, I’m keeping it as an imaging camera back up, in case I fry a CMOS camera (which I have done once already). They are obviously still capable of capturing quality data, but for the reasons already outlined, it requires a bit more effort.

So I have obtained an SQM figure of 19.83 from ASTAP, but that was with with a sub captured about 40 degrees way from an 70% illuminated moon, but all of my recent M101 data was similarly moon affected. I'm assuming all of your data was collected on moonless nights so assuming your SQM was 20 and if I was to image under the same moonlit conditions, I would need 1.425 times the integration time so around 35 hrs, about double what I already have. Now I know why I went for a dual rig.😉

Much as I like imaging small, little known galaxy targets, I can't let the season go by without having a go at one of the blockbusters. Inspired by @ONIKKINEN's wonderfully deep and detailed M101, I have collected 102 x 2 mins Lum and 94x 2 mins RGB over the last couple of nights to add to 352 x 2 mins RGB from Feb 2022, all captured with the Esprit 150/IMX571 dual rig, captured at 0.74" per pixel. So at 18.25 hrs integration I might have thought that was enough, but if you compare it to Oskari's 25 hr image, it's found wanting. For a start the lack of Ha data is a big minus, I don't have a Ha filter for the mono camera but I could try and get some hours with the OSC and the NBZ dual band. Also, the faint outer spiral arms are less distinct and small objects are lacking in detail. For example, the tiny barred spiral galaxy that I admired is a just a mangled blob in my image. Now some of this may be due to the different OTAs used to gather the data, and my heavy handed processing, or my sky conditions are inferior, but I'm hoping that 18 hrs is just not enough.

Possibly a first on Astrobin, that’s quite an achievement.👍