Les Ewan

Still a lot better than the astronomical world I started out in the early 70's. My first full time job in early 1975 was £15 ppw at that time a Dixons special 60mm refractor was close on £30,there really nothing much else at the time without going to specialist dealers mail order costing a fortune . A short time prior the miners were thought to be unreasonable wanting a £40 pw pay deal. When I bought my first 'big',scope in 1978 a very basic 6" altaz Newtonian it cost £200 but my wage at the time was only about £50 so I got a bank loan.It had to be made so I had to wait weeks for delivery. I don't want to sound like a old codger but young newcomers today don't know their living with all the technology bells and whistles, large apertures and next day deliveries.

Wasn't out Wednesday/Thursday mainly due to my observatory roof being welded shut by ice. I suppose if I really tried I could of released it but what with the snow showers and a temperature of -11C I decided to give it a miss. I managed to brush the snow off the roof and release it in the afternoon while the sun was out. Conditions this morning were a bit weird ,things were normal in the late evening but later most of the sky had a background milky glow which made the fainter DSO's difficult.Even my southern aspect which looked fairly dark there was no inkiness with the fainter galaxies invisible. My theory for the reason is fronts in the west have extended a haze across the sky and it has been made more visible by the albedo of the snow cover.I also think the jet stream may have started to return as seeing for binaries has also deteriorated. To make matters worse a breeze with gusts up to 18mph has sprung up which is unpleasant in itself also started blowing snow into the observatory.😡

Street lighting is not the main problem for me as street lighting technology has reduced pollution markedly over the last few years even though my local village 4kms away has almost doubled in size since 2000 .No it's tall pole floodlighting from the car parks of recently built shopping centres, conference complexes and sports fields that have increased without any apparent restriction . Even a new school car park 8km away has several of these beacons visible from my site all night. I consider myself lucky however as my southern,eastern and most of the west has no pollution and I can see the Milky Way.I also have established hedging and bushes that helps screen a lot of light. I do feel for observers in Fife having Edinburgh and its conurbations ruining their Southern aspect.

Looks a lot like my old 60mm but the Prinz had a wooden tripod. If I remember right it had a 710mm fl. The yoke and slow motions are very familiar .Mine had 3 0.96" Huygen eyepieces and a useless barlow. I agree for all its faults it gave reasonable views. I remember fondly seeing the Ring Nebula with this scope despite living only about 1km of the centre of Edinburgh at the time. Along with doubles it gave memorable views of Venus,Jupiter and Saturn. I remember vividly observing the Moon occulting Saturn through it on March 2nd 1974.😎

Glad you still have your old 60mm. My Prinz is long gone. I saw one on Ebay with the complete kit still boxed a couple of years ago I was very tempted but I really didn't have the space.

Your actually right at least in my case.Mizar was the first telescopic double I resolved with my first proper telescope,which was a Prinz 60mm refractor( the type that were all the rage in the early 70's) the same evening I first saw Cor Caroli. Funny how early observations stick in the mind more than the more recent 'first see's with much better equipment. For example I cant ever remember my first view of say Epsilon 1 and 2 Lyrae, or Ras Algethi or even Albireo. It's strange then that I very seldom even glance either Mizar or Cor Caroli these days,but I will rectify that next time I'm out.

Thanks for the likes and comments,😃.

Technically lights can stay up until Candlemass in early February but when I did bother I normally took them down around January 3rd. Don't actually see the point of them after 12th night as if they are kept up too long you'd get used to them and lose the magic the following Christmas. Having said that I'm not into Christmas these days and have not had a tree up for several years and private household outdoor displays have always really annoyed me.😡

Welcome, You'll find no matter how long you've been in this game there's always something new to learn and something new to spend your money on!

I've been using telescopes for nearly 50 years and I think I'm fairly adapt at it but even I get frustrated at times. Cold, damp and dark conditions is a perfect recipe for awkwardness and mishaps , if something can possibly go wrong it probably will. I often use ungentlmanly language under my breath (and sometimes out loud in the wee small hours). The biggest frustration (apart from cold hands dropping eyepieces) is dew. Get a hair dryer for finders and eyepieces on bad nights they can dew up within minutes and sometimes it can reach the telescope optics. Beware a hair dryer can be as loud as a jet taking off in the middle of the night,(and use a contact breaker even though I don't).

I've spent many hours over the years to spot the Pup with 8" and 12" Newts. Over the last couple of years I've tried even with a 16" and failed. Conditions were close to ideal last night for binaries and spent twenty minutes trying last night still failed. Tried different filters even stacked filters still nothing. I'm starting to give up hope of ever seeing it with the conditions at 56degrees north despite and equipment I've got. 😡

In the early hours this morning I couldn't resist the view of Orion descending in the west appearing to be walking on the farm track that passes my house.

After being out under the open sky for five hours with temperatures down to -5C the dob was about ready.😁

I was out from 10pm until 5am.The Moon was the main target in the late evening then in the early hours I had a few great views of double triple stars using my 16" Dob. Usually clear frosty nights are too unstable for the closer binaries but last night there was sub arc second seeing with the main star of Tegmine Zeta 1 easily resolvable using a 9mm Orthoscopic and 2X barlow giving a power of 400X. I think the reason for the good seeing is the thick blanket of snow cover preventing the usually ruinous thermals from radiating,something I've noticed before in such conditions..After the Moon went down the sky darkened enough to catch The Ghost Of Jupiter and few Spring galaxies.😎

A rare gap in the cloud at 01:30 showed brisk Geminid activity mainly in the Monoceros,Leo,Hydra area of meteors between 1st and 3rd magnitude.As clouds invaded again I started a mini count between 02:00 and 02:15 in which I saw 8 Geminids three of which were of about zero magnitude the first was through Monoceros/Puppis,the second in the NE through Bootes and one in the bowl of Virgo. It may be worth while checking for increased activity nearer dawn if clouds permit,unfortunately Atlantic fronts are on their way.😩

Seeing for Mars was pretty awful here as well,started off OK in the early evening,but it clouded over and when it cleared a couple of hours later the disc was sheared by horrible simmering horizontal streaks🤬.

Sigma Orionis never fails to impress no matter how many times I see it, saw it for the first time of the season last night and was one the highlights of the night.😎

HI Richard, I know Biggar well ,my brother lives just south of there. Has the hogmanay bonfire started to appear yet?! He stays near the Cornhouse Hotel where they think its a good idea to light up the trees at night.🤬 My brother and his wife are not bothered as they are not at all interested in astronomy ,but it really annoys me when I visit. I have a flextube dob as well and also the optical finder and a telrad its a very handy combination(when the telrad isn't dewed up that is). We all know what a flextube dob looks like but it would be nice to see a image of it,good star watching and clear skies.

I remember back in the 70's seeing a hint of granulation with a 60mm refractor using projection.

The usual rule of thumb is X2 the apature of the primery in millimetres this is also what is used by manufactures. This means your 250P's upper limit is 500X.As Spock says everything depends on seeing. I have the 400P which in theory goes up to 810X but Ive seldom gone over 300X with it,and this seems to be the upper limit of seeing the vast majority of the time. So the upshot of all of this is you get large telescope for resolution and light grasp not magnification and if a telescope provides a comforable image quality at 300X in good seing thats all thats required as far as magnification is concerned.

Its a pity you got the 6mm eyepiece because I would have recommended a good quaity 12mm Kellner which would be good for planets coupled with the 2X Barlow that would have the effect of 6mm as well,or if a Kellner wasn't to your liking a 15mm plossl . If you have light pollution problems I would steer clear of the 32mm as it could brighten the background which will not help the visibility of faint fuzzies. My reasoning here is you could use the 25mm+ Barlow for DSO's and the 12.5mm Kellner or 15mm plossl + Barlow for planets. I missed out the the 10mm as issued MA and Plossl eyepieces rightly or wrongly often get a bad press (I have a couple of such MA and Plossls and personally think their acceptable). One point my Kellners are over 40 years old,I've seen new Kellners on sale on Ebay but I dont know how good the quality is on modern ones.

Back in 1972 I first saw Saturn's rings with a 40mm refractor using a power of 50X ,not very well even though the planet was riding high in Taurus at the time. Between 1974 and 1978 I had a 60mm refractor and got a lot better view of the rings,but It wasn't until I got a 150mm Newtonian did I first glimpse the Cassini Division.

Filters have long divided opinion,Im not too sure about them I tend to not use them as I cant usually detect any conclusive benifit ,plus I prefer the natural hues of the planets. I get your point about the brightness of Mars at the moment so an Neutral Density filter will help. I had some success recently in mediocre seeing with a ND filter and a 80A blue filter stacked which seemed to cut down glare and marginally improved the contrast of the surface markings and sharpen the ice cap. I suppose others will have their own ideas but why not experiment with your own filter combination without over using them too much as in some conditions they may hamper rather than help things.

Seeing was not that good and 180X was about as far as I could go. Stu,there was no wind thankfully but it was crystal clear and frosty.Dan ,the scope is a driven Skywatcher 400P on a Dob mount.

Just spent the last few hours watching Syrtis Major swing round and disappear into the limb. The arm of Sinus Sabaeus and its clenched fist Sinus Meridiani well in view as of 3am BST. I realise wishful thinking has been long notourious for anabling observerers to see things on Mars ,but I think I saw the fork of Meridiani for the first time using a 21mm Plossl and 2X Barlow(180X) using my 16" Newtonian during the brief steady micro seconds! I'm used to observing Mars with a 8" Newt in the past and always thought the vista of Syrtis Major,Mare Serpentis Sinus Sabaeus gave the appearance of a leaping cat but with the extra resolution of the 16" this illusion is largely lost in extra detail.😎