Pixies

For balance: I never got on with the only Nirvana eyepiece I owned - the 16mm. I had trouble getting eye-placement correct and suffered from blackouts. I'm not sure how the other 2 compare. Given the choice between my Baader zoom and the 3 Nirvanas, I'd go with he zoom without hesitation. It's my most used eyepiece alongside the wider field 30mm Vixen NPL. I have a couple of 82° Explore Scientifics EPs. Would I swap 3 of them for the zoom? Yes, but I would prefer to have both. Some nights the zoom is just so handy, it never leaves the draw tube.

Can you give a little guidance on your budget?

Sorry - another question. I was going to use fast-acting 2-part epoxy - but would superglue work as well? Cheers

I found the 18mm BST to be pretty poor at the outside edge with an F6, let alone a F4.7. My understanding was that the 18mm was the poorest of the set. The 8 and 12mm ones are much better. A bright near-full moon and poor transparency will limit what you can see. I'd suggest waiting for a better dark night before worrying too much. Your big light bucket will be great at picking up the bright background, especially at low powers. What FL are your orthos?

I have opened up an old pair of wired ear-buds. The individual wire strands are very thin. I might try these first.

Our household is a bit lacking in thick dark heads of hair! Not balding, I might add (esp for the missus) but fair and fine. Any suggestions on suitable wire for replacing a broken crosshair that is easy to get hold of and not requiring buying a large amount for just a few centimetres' worth! Cheers

I have an 8" dob and made a cheap and cheerful dew shield out of foam sheet. Luckily, I don't suffer much from dew. I've probably used the shield 2 or 3 time in the past 2 years. I find that the screen of the Telrad finder acts like a dew-canary and is the first thing to dew up before anything else.

Not books, but have a look at this: https://www.youtube.com/c/AdirondackAstronomy/videos Also, there's a useful podcast here: https://actualastronomy.podbean.com/e/194-sketching-and-visual-astronomy-with-mike-rector/ Also: http://perezmedia.net/beltofvenus/2008/11/27/methods_and_int/ And of course!:

Surely, this is the point of Berlebach tripods?

I'd say that streetlight is more of an issue than moonlight! Have you tried asking your local council to shield it? I put up with such a light for a couple of years, then last week I sent an email and this week it was fixed! Now - I realise a lot of readers will be cursing me, having spent years fighting with their local council to get a light sorted. However, my experience shows that not all councils are the same. It's worth a try!

Started late tonight, so straight to the moon. Spent a while observing Vallis Alpes at various magnifications. I was hoping to see the rille down the centre but no luck. The cliff on the southern edge was showing sharp black edges at times, so I thought I might have had a chance, though. For those in the know, would tonight's angle of illumination been suitable to see the rille? Noticed a star on the dark limb of the moon: 103 Tauri. It was about to be occulted, so waited to watch it pop out of sight - which it did at 12:42 am. Have come back in now. I might wait for the moon to get lower then have a shot at some doubles in Bootes.

Don't forget to:

This is part of "Unboxed". I.e. the rebranded festival of Brexit

Sits in the groove of the finder OTA. If you slide the bracket off: It fits in the groove: and then the bracket fits over it:

Send a photo of how you have it set up.

I've always been fascinated with this type of binocular. Hopefully get to try some out one day. What make/model do you have? Using SkySafari plus, the per-object observing notes means one can quickly look back at all observations made for something. Of course - that entails having to make the notes in the first place! Oh - and as of 30 minutes ago, the streetlight at the end of the garden has had a shade fitted! 😎 Roll on tonight....

I'm still investigating the local effect of the LED replacement streetlights in Edinburgh. So as faint fuzzy season approaches, I'm hoping to see an noticeable difference in what I can observe. Of course, a year of observing experience means I am better able to locate these low-contrast objects more surely, but I am confident that there should be an improvement visually. I still have that annoying streetlight in the lane at the bottom of the garden, which means I can never get well dark-adapted and which limits the locations I can plonk down the scopes. Hopefully the council will be getting that shielded soon. Anyway, last night turned out a suitable night for observing. Seeing was very poor and transparency wasn't the best, not one of those dark crisp winter nights. Still, it was a rare clear night, so it wasn't going to waste and I set up the 8" dob. I thought I'd test out the seeing first. The Trapezium was showing the 4 brightest stars but E&F were nowhere to be seen. Also, the faint 'C' star in Sigma Orionis was only fleetingly visible at 150x. Moving east, I checked out comet C/2019 L3 ATLAS. It was easy to find, close to Mebsuta (Epsilon Geminorum) and was a fuzzy ball with an obvious brightening at the centre. I made a note of its location as I thought I'd check back later and see if I could determine its motion. A quick visit to Castor then NGC 2392 Now, further east again and I thought I'd check out Cancer. In the past, I'd never been able to see it naked-eye as its southerly location meant it was hidden in the light-pollution murk. Now I can make out some of the brighter stars - Beta, Delta and Iota - but I can also see M44 as a brighter patch NW of Delta Cnc! That's a big improvement! Then back to the dob and I tried for M67. Looking back at previous observation notes, they were like: "Fainter than Expected", "Hardly visible and very small" and "little resolution". But last night is was much nicer! About 50 bright stars with many other fainter ones not being resolved (and not helped with the poor seeing). I could make out bright and dark lanes, too. Tegmine - don't know why I bothered, but I did. No hope of splitting the close pair. Then on to the faint fuzzies that were now starting to appear over the rooftops. Comments in () are previous attempts from the back garden Leo 1 galaxies: M105 - faint in direct vision. the brighter core obvious with averted vision. (Only averted vision previously) NGC 3384 - similar to nearby M105 (Only AV previously) NGC 3389 - faint in averted vision and only obvious using dob-wobble (not seen from back garden before) M95 and M96- Just visible with direct vision with best contrast at 120x (faint AV only previously) Leo Triplet: M65 and M66 - both visible in direct vision, better with higher magnification up to 150x (faint but barely visible with direct vision) NGC 3628 - faint with Av and dob-wobble (not seen before from back garden) Cold stopped play, but first I went back to the comet to note it's change in position after 90 minutes. It had obviously moved and checking on a map later, appeared to have moved about 0'45" in those 90 minutes. A good proper observing session. I'm impressed with the improvement that the new streetlighting has made towards the south! Lots of things I'd never seen from here before and faint stuff was now visible with direct vision. Still, not a patch on a proper dark sky, but this will make my usual backyard sessions much more satisfying!

Observed ATLAS tonight. It's easy to find just now, being very close to Mebsuta: It's also fairly motoring along! About 0'30" in an hour.

The jetstream was giving us all a kicking tonight:

Seeing was very poor and transparency wasn't great. But it was a clear night, so it was dob-time tonight. I'll write up a proper report tomorrow. Hit quiet a few targets though: Trapezium Sigma Orionis Comet C/2019 L3 ATLAS Castor NGC 2392 M67 Tegmine Leo 1 galaxies - M105, NGC 3384, NGC 3389 and M95 and M96 Leo Triplet - M65, M66, NGC 3628 Cold stopped play, but first I went back to the comet to note it's change in position after 90 minutes. The highlight of the evening? The new LED streetlights now mean I can actually see Cancer and M44 naked-eye from the back garden (just)!

Since Edinburgh's change to LEDs, I've noticed the view SSW from here towards the city centre has changed. No longer an orange glow in the sky, it's a white glow. However, the observing targets in that direction are now much clearer. I can only assume that this white glow is not from the new streetlights (which are very effective in their downwards direction) but the remaining upwards light pollution from housing, shops, car parks, etc. that is now obvious after the overpowering sodium-vapour lighting has gone. Is there anyone reading this that observes over Edinburgh - like from the Fife coast? Is there an obvious difference for you?

Yep - managed that last week, too. It's going to be even lower for me, too. Unfiltered, it was hard enough to make out M46, but with the Oiii (Astronomik) the little planetary nebula popped out with AV. This was with an 8" dob and a 5mm exit pupil.

Wait till you get the new dob!

I'm inspired! This is in our back garden: The kids' old playhouse, now a rabbit house with attached run. It's only 4'x6', but the paving it stands upon is 4' x 8' That conduit down the wall is 240v down to the shed. The wall and trees are towards the south and west - local light pollution means those aren't the best directions anyway. Now.... we just need the rabbits to have a little accident! PS. Apologies for the state of the grass. The rabbits and dog have seen to that!

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