Froeng

The C8 had been chilling outside since 4pm this afternoon. When I finished work at 6.30, the previously blue sky was just a grey mush of dampness…

Jupiter disappeared behind the house, so that was it for today. Everything is inside and thawing! I just realised I must have seen the "Oval BA" or "Red Spot Jr.", as described in here: Atmosphere of Jupiter - Wikipedia Fascinating stuff! Everyone who has some more good seeing tonight - enjoy while it lasts!

The seeing here is still decent!

Now some clouds have appeared out of nowhere. Going inside for a break… result for now:

Correction! What I thought was the GRS was only a thickening of the equatorial belt. It remains interesting…

Seeing is good here. Three white ovals and the GRS appearing the equatorial belt. There is an odd dark spot next to the middle oval. Anyone seeing this also?

Well, you should always watch Uranus, just in case anyway! sorry - couldn’t resist!🤣

A geostationary satellite? As your mount was driven it would have appeared to be moving when it fact it would have been stationary above you… The movement across the sky background would have appeared to be the same (slow) speed as Jupiter’s movement would have appeared if you had switched of the motor drive, but in the opposite direction…

Hi Mike, don't mind at all. Typically I start with low magnifications and then see how far I can push it before the image looses contrast. I was getting a nice crisp view at 335x tonight, but the seeing seemed very steady indeed. Normally I would go to either 135x or 225x (I have pairs of 15mm and 9mm LVs). Although now you say it, I may need to start looking out for a pair of 12mm LVs 😁. The fact I was not able to see much detail towards the end of my sketching session (which only lasted 10mins), was the clouds that kept thickening. At the beginning, there was quite a bit of cloud detail on show, but 10mins later the planet had almost "faded away" and with it its details...

These are really nice! And what amazed me is I just saw that little white oval in one of Jupiter’s belts you captured with the camera! I wasn’t sure if my eyes were playing tricks on me! Thanks for posting these. The shot of Uranus is particularly cool (literally!).

I was lucky! The high clouds started to cover almost the entire sky when I came back out after dinner! Jupiter was rock-steady and about 40deg high at 7.30pm. I quickly started sketching and I could see Jupiter's brightness fading away while I was drawing. By the time I had finished, hardly any detail was visible as the disk was now too dim! Anyway, I just about made this: Now everything is inside drying off, although it was noticeably less humid outside than most nights...

...and in the moonlight

not quite night yet...

I am looking at Jupiter again tonight. There is some high haze and nigh clouds coming through slowly. The seeing is very good! I tweaked the C8's collimation further until I got a nice bullseye at 500x focus. Unfortunately the GRS is not visible. The two equatorial bands are contrasty with some swirling in one of them (sorry I can never figure out which way is up!). Taking a break and I may get my sketchbook out a bit later...

Just came in from a frosty evening. Winter is coming! Jupiter was quite good tonight. Unfortunately a third of it was behind the roof of the house! However, it still took 500x 😮 in the C8 with bino. A bit mushy but that was the optics - not the air! A dark feature in one of the equatorial belts was transitting around 10pm…

This is quite impressive! I have had musou black in my Amazon basket for a while and was waiting for a promotion as the (much too big) small bottle is over £30! I was going to try to apply it on the inside of my C8’s baffle tube, as bright objects have a brightened sky around them…

I also like Tsula’s big adventures and Fraser Cain for general astro news..,

I went on a little "dark sky expedition" last night. I met with a friend at our observing spot in rural Cambridgeshire. When I got out of the car, the Milky Way was arching overhead with Cygnus just past the meridian. What a view compared to my light polluted balcony at home! The site has no direct visibility to any nearby light sources and we counted three cars passing by during the whole evening. Clear Outside says this a Bortle 4, which I believe is correct. You can still see the scopes clearly and there are light domes around us, most markedly from London to the SW. I set up the C8 on my Avalon Linear. My friend had brought his 8" dob. As he is more of a beginner, we stuck to the brighter targets... Amongst us we saw a good mix of objects, in loose order: I had arrived first, so I started as soon as I had everything ready: M27 - as always, bright and clearly defined (I did not try the O3 filter as the view was already very good) M33 - nice view in the C8 with 50mm eyepiece at ~40x and 5mm exit pupil. No detail visible, but a large hazy patch. NGC7331 - somewhat disappointing as I had remembered it to be much bigger. I only used the 30mm eyepiece in the C8 (66x, 3mm EP), so will definitely magnify more next time. An oval shape was apparent. My friend then arrived and we had a good chat while he built up his dob. Then onto some more autumn objects: M31 - best view in the dob 8" f/6 with a 40mm Ultima (30x, 6.6mm EP), the dob nicely framed the core region with M32 and M110 in the field of view. M1 - very faint but clearly a hazy patch in the C8 By this time we had Perseus straight over head with the Milky Way spanning from East to West. Double cluster - amazing in the dob with the wide field of view (the 40mm Ultima stayed in the eyepiece holder most of the evening!) The Pleiades - not worth it in the C8 due to restricted field of view, but again - very nice in the dob! M34 - very crisply resolved in the C8 M42 - of course this is a MUST-see at this time of the year. In both scopes very bright with the "wings" spreading out from the central region around the Trapezium. A bit of "swirling" visible in the cloudiness also. We finished the night with a high magnification view of Jupiter. We used a 7.5mm eyepiece in the dob (160x) which showed the collimation wasn't perfect, but still an impressive view. Then over to the C8, using binoviewers and 2x6mm eyepieces for 335x magnification. Not the best view ever, but also not too shabby! The GRS had just appeared on the limb and some clouds belt details were on view. At this magnification the planet remained a little fuzzy, but I think this was due to the Jetstream being overhead. It was very impressive non-the-less as the apparent size of the planetary disk at this magnification was huge, in particular using binos. Three of the Galilean moons were close by and in the field of view. As both scopes were now dripping wet, we decided to call it a night. After this fantastic evening, we packed everything up set off at around 1am.

Just inside now after a “planetary evening” with Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus in the C8. Saturn wobbling along between neighbouring houses - will need at least another couple of years before it’s worthwhile! Uranus a pale disk as usual. Jupiter getting better as it was rising up higher. Best view at about 10pm, although not as good as the better sessions last year. I think we may have had the Jetstream overhead tonight. Some high clouds appeared around 22.30. A mixed result evening, but happy to have been out!

Nice! This image is pretty close to the actual eyepiece view in my C8, too. Well done!

Hi Roy, this is very true. Although, to get to a dark place am happy to drive about an hour. Who knows the killer-seeing spot may be an hour away, but in the opposite direction! I have found the seeing on my balcony to be quite good, even though I am in town. The 10m+ elevation off the surrounding ground seems to make a big difference. Maybe there are some hills somewhere where this effect is even more pronounced...🤔

I have often asked myself where the best locations for astronomical seeing would be in the UK. One reads reports from places like La Palma or Southern California, where there is a steady laminar air flow from the ocean and you are at medium to high altitude. I have no illusions of a similar steadiness of the atmosphere being possible on the British Isles, but... does anyone know of a good spot in the UK that has at least above average seeing conditions in general. It may be an "upwind" or "downwind" location on the side of a specific hill or high land area (thinking Exmoor or Dartmoor here). Or it may be somewhere completely different. It would not need to be a dark site either... I tried searching on the web, but all it gives you is dark sky areas. No mention of seeing... Any ideas?

Just finished. It is funny how dim Saturn is compared to Jupiter. Too low down in the wobbly atmosphere to be truly impressive. Finished off with another 20min on the King and now the seeing was terrific! Lots of belt details coming through. scope was dripping wet at 22.45, so called it a night.

One other thing I observed earlier was T Lyrae. A quite remarkably red star. The colour was VERY obvious!

Just had a look at Jupiter in the C8. The air is quite steady tonight. Reasonable view in the bino at 335x. Not too much going with all the moons to one side. Every now and then one can glimpse a bit more detail in the cloud belts. Now inside warming up and waiting for Saturn to clear the house…