Barry-W-Fenner

Fascinating to read that even under such amazing dark bortle 2 sky's that conditions don't necessarily work out. I would be distraught if I managed to get from my usual bortle 6 sky to a bortle 2 and the seeing wasn't good. Still sounds like you had an amazing time though! Would love to get to more dark skies myself.

Hi sas. Excellent report with some nice humour 😀 sounds like a great night's observing. Not had a clearish night here since 21st September so Reading this was a nice shot in the arm. 👍 Baz

Sorry to sound like a lemon Don. But do you mean you rate the 4.5 and 17.5mm morphs or the whole range, 4.5 through to17.5? Cheers

Cheers for the heads up on this book chaps! At a quick glance it looks very informative.

Morning John Any recommendations as to what the best 2" OIII filter would be for use with my 30mm Aero ED? I am thinking of purchasing one to view The veil, NAN, Owl Nebula and so on. Its worth mentioning that I will be viewing from my bortle 6 sky location. Thanks Baz

Hi Robert, I purchased a 9mm Morpheus about a month ago. For what its worth it is my favourite eye piece. It gives a nice medium power, has a great FOV, comfortable to use and most importantly gives lovely contrasty & colourful view. I rate it very highly. Baz

I have just had a look for NGC 7027 but it would appear I need to purchase an upgraded version of SkySafari as it is not listed 😞

The Catseye is a favorite of mine, Its almost at the zenith here, It looks stunning through the 12" dob, The nebula forms two shell like structures and you can see the central star. I bet it looks unbelievable under dark skies with a 24" dob! The Magic carpet is a new one on me, if it is as good as the cateye I will certainly have to give this a look next time out. Great report. Baz

There is some very dark looking skies to the North West! Do you ever get out that way SAS? I was in a bortle 3 location a few weeks ago and the sky was spectacular comparied to my usual bortle 6. Seeing the Milky Way was amazing. I cant imagine how good a bortle 2 or 1 would be! Out of interest, is there much of a difference in sky quality between say a 21.5 & 21.75 reading? It seems a small increment, I am interested to know what impact that has on sky quality. baz

Morning Pixies, The Morphs are a fair chunk of glass, You can certainly get a decent grip on them when swapping over. The main lens is 37mm plus a few mm for the rubber eye cap so around 40mm total. The the barrel is slightly wider where the rubber grip begins. The views they give are outstanding to my eye. I guess I have some explaining to do! being a Monday night and a "School night" I had to pass on having a cold one, The dob just didn't feel the same without a beer sitting there! Sorry to let you all down. Normal service will resume at the weekend, I will make sure I post a pic 🙂 That is uncanny, Just like looking in the mirror 1st thing! 🙂 baz

Getting ready to rock and roll for some viewing..

Excellent read, This certainly is a frustrating hobby and can get you down. Nothing like the friendly support from the SGL community to help get you back inspired. 3 cheers for nick, hip hip 😁

Nice report pixies. Uranus was a fist pump moment for me also, I have read a few reports of it being underwhelming. However I though it was stunning, a crisp green sphere that crossed the FOV.

Oddly enough I have just picked the moon and skyglow filter up 2nd hand from a SGL member. I have been keeping an eye open for one to come along on the used market. My intention is to sell my moon filter and VP filter and solely uses the moon and sky glow. As others have mentioned I would probably prefer to go filterless on the planets for the most natural views. However the orange sky glow around these parts is really bugging me! So far I have only had chance to hold the filter up to the sky and look through it with the naked eye. Straight away I have noticed it eliminates the yellow sky glow which is a big positive, I hope it doesn't add any form of tinting to the planets, that will be the big test.

Looks like a nice improvement in reducing the unnecessary stray light pollution, not to mention the carbon reduction! Have you had a chance to observe yet? Any improvement to the conditions? Where I live the council has just started an 11 million pound conversion of around 26k sodium lights to LED. They couldn't do this soon enough IMO. Facing North in my points towards a major town which has all been changed over. The yellow sky has now been replaced by a grey /black in that direction. I don't know how much of an impact doing this conversion will have on LP but I hope its very positive all round. If you look at Kent on the light pollution map the medway towns is the only area that's Red/orange levels. The rest of Kent is yellow and green as I believe it all has LED lights now bar medway. Baz

A lovely looking filter from a fellow SGL member. In great condition. Holding it up to the sky seems to reduce the yellow glow so positive signs. Hopefully try it out tonight. 👍

I bet that was a site to behold John and a great reward for being patient teasing out this target. I would give it a try with my 30mm aero ed however I haven't got a 2" OIII filter yet. 😢

Is the Veil not very forgiving to magnification? is trying to see it at x107 to much. are we talking very low power x50-x80? Cheers

Hi Magnus, This is a good question, I look forward to some of the responses. I was observing Saturday night. The Veil wasn't on my list of objects to view, Before the conditions deteriorated I decided to have a look for it with my 14mm Morpheus and O-III filter giving x107 and I couldn't find it. Its worth mentioning that I am in a bortle 6 location so not ideal. Maybe I was using to much power? I have never seen the Veil so would like to get an idea of what conditions I need to view it under 🙂 baz

Hi, If the ariel is on a roof close to your proximity you wont get focus. You should try to focus on something 100-200mtrs away ideally. Regards Baz

That is exactly what I though the moment I see this shot, Alien! Beautiful image with some intricate & complex details. Baz

Great sketch of a beautiful planet. I really enjoy Uranus, The beautiful crisp Green disc crossing the FOV is a joy to see. This is one thing that always strikes me when viewing Uranus, It seems perfectly spherical more so than the other planets. Baz

What a wonderful read, great report and very inspiring as usual Neil. Glad you had a great time observing some tricky targets. As you say seeing the milky way is a sight to behold, I wish we could only see it more often. Baz

Well, Neptune evades me again! It was just about getting above the house roof tops and the fog / dew has rolled in big time, conditions deteriorated very quickly. Up until then I was having a great time viewing globs. I was hoping to see 6 planets. Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, Mars, Uranus and a naked eye view of Venus around 5-6am. But not to be, the hunt for Neptune continues 😁

Good luck with this challenge John. I also have the 12" dob out and I'm sitting here having a look at the stunning Jupiter, the GRS is looking brilliant. I hope to get my 1st look of Neptune later, and maybe Triton one day! On the subject of pluto, I see it is currently somewhere between jupiter and saturn. Would this give half a chance of seeing it, Or is it to difficult? Baz