josefk

There is the “Dark Sky Meter” app for a phone/phone camera. I’m not sure how absolutely correct it is but for your own relative record over time it could be useful. I’ve found it quite educational using it over an extended period of time TBH. 

Good luck - feels a bit like committing to a diet in front of friends and family. 😉

What a brilliant night to end the week - a lovely clear night that hadn't been in the forecast. 

Jupiter was the highlight - i dropped on the Ganymede shadow transit by pure luck - sketched over here: https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/415441-ganymede-shadow-transit-101123/#comment-4430730

After that i spent an hour on the most satisfying "negative observation" i can remember. After trying earlier in the week for NGC 604 (in M33) i tried again last night in a totally systematic way; large, medium, small exit pupils all w/ and w/o UHC and O-III and all given plenty of time at the eye. It felt tantalisingly close at times but still no certain observation unfortunately. Enjoyable in its own way though and satisfying because now i know it's really not going to go in my skies with 85mm of aperture and I do know the star field quite well for next time 🙂.   Slightly bizarrely M33 itself looked quite extensive with a medium exit pupil and UHC. I thought it would have been dimmed too much with that filter.

8 hours ago, Epick Crom said:

Hi all. I pulled over on the side of the road on my way from work last night, doing long haulage truck driving. A long 1,200km round trip.

I was 500km from Perth, in the middle of our West Australian outback. The darkness was blinding as I got out of my semi! I brought my trusty Nikon Aculon 10x50mm binoculars with me and proceeded to have a 1 hour long observing session under those pitch black skies, solid bortle 1 with zero light pollution as I was in the middle of nowhere! Highlights included the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds, M7, M45, M42, Jupiter and M31 low on the horizon. The Sky was so dark and transparent I could actually see stars rising on the horizon! Keep in mind outback Australia is extremely flat. A religious experience 😍

 

Clear Skies

Joe

Sounds absolutely awesome Joe. Fantastic

13 hours ago, Paul M said:

It's been one of those days, beautiful, deep blue sky. Looking across Morecambe bay, the high peaks of the Lake District fells had their first wintery dustings. A day that I just knew wouldn't last, and it didn't. As dusk fell, the clouds began to scud along in the west, slowly encroaching.

No point in setting up in the hope of it clearing, the forecast is for overcast. Groundhog Day, allover again.

 

it's probably no consolation but that view of the fells does sound nice in its own right. Slightly jealous here in the Lincs flatlands 🙂

Pure serendipity this one - if i had left the house 30-mins later or spent 30-mins longer on Saturn (i started with Saturn) then i would have missed it.

This is Ganymede's shadow transit of Jupiter's southern pole last night. I picked it up about 19:15 a little bit further away from the limb than in this sketch.

I felt the shadow touched the limb at 19:27 or just a little after and was undetectable (had cleared the limb) at 19:41 though i appreciate both of these times will be related to the resolution of my 85mm scope, the steadiness of the seeing, and my eyesight. i was surprised at the size of the shadow. Larger than the one other i've seen.

Seeing was nice but not fabulous - i couldn't see any real belt detail except a darkening and bulging feature on the NEB in the west. I didn't see any belts or flickers of belts in the southern hemisphere other than the SEB. NTB was intermittent. 

Faber Pitt Pastel #188 (sanguine) is a good match for the belt colours at the EP 🙂

Absolutely wonderful - fabulous lighting on these features.

This thread has prompted a little bit of spreadsheet analysis this morning (#geek). I did the analysis because "by taste" the concept @John expressed to "get as much out of a single instrument as possible" appeals to my character - particularly trying to achieve a particular list of something or other in a single instrument. Considering all of my observations in 2023 (targets not sessions, targets n=283) the results are:

• 5% binoculars
• 55% GnG (roughly 50/50 over two GnG scopes)
• 40% big refractor
• 5% medium reflector 

I'm shocked the GnG percentage this year is only ~60% TBH because it feels like all i've been able to do.

The challenge for the purposes of this thread is which single scope then to get behind? I do know i enjoy small scopes a lot but i enjoy them especially when i know i have a bigger scope in the background "in reserve" 🙂

i don't really have an answer to that @IB20 except possibly it's the conjunction of those variables being favourable plus the storms themselves being there of course and then maybe just a little bit of lucky timing that we're out at that moment. This time of year i have the habit to take a quick look at Jupiter and Saturn most sessions - normally at the beginning and end of a session - even if i really want to look at something else for most of the other time, my thinking is it's always worth a quick check "just in case". 

I'm happy i've picked up this new visual memory and log for "my collection" though i'd of course now i'd like to repeat it with a bigger scope and in more favourable seeing conditions 🙂

sorry to spam your observation Nik.

This is a 35' FOV (x90 for me last night) with the hour glass asterism that helped me lock-in. Those stars are mag9.5...mag10. The corner star where NGC 604 is is mag11.1 but it doesn't feel like the dimmest star in the pattern.

No detection of NGC 604 last night with 85mm of aperture. My sky was dark but not too clear with strong atmospheric extinction below about 30-degrees so i think lots of damp scatter in the air. I forgot to take an SQM reading.

• M33 was nicely visible at x38 with an exit pupil of 2.3mm but not NGC 604,
• M33 dimly visible at x56 with an exit pupil of 1.5mm but not NGC 604.
• M33 not detectable at x90 and an exit pupil of ~0.9mm and neither NGC 604 but this magnification really framed the squarish hour glass star asterism where TYC 2293-0642-1 is the corner star where NGC 604 should be and HD 9687 is the diagonally opposite star in Nik's mark-up above...

Cloud rolled in before i could start again at the lower magnifications but using UHC. If UHC doesn't do it than i think i need a bit more aperture at that x90 type scale. Good fun.

PS. for calibration i star hopped in from M31 and could see M32 (easy) but not M110 up there (i often can't if its not properly clear).

5 minutes ago, John said:

Well it's good to know which nights are likely to be cloudy over the coming 3 months ! 😁

it's the (roller coaster of) hope that kills you 😄😪😄😪

21 hours ago, JeremyS said:

But Dave @F15Rules won’t get beyond this page

Brilliant handle and available from FLO if you ask nicely (isn't on the website) 🙂With the accessory ring it needs it is just about the most expensive handle solution you can imagine!

I had a week off the internet last week so this is a belated posting of an observation of Jupiter at perigee last week (01.11.23). I  wasn't sure i was going to post it all because i wasn't 100% confident in my own observation and sketch till yesterday when i saw some online images of Jupiter taken at more or less the same time where if i squinted (at the images) i could see why i saw what i saw at the scope so became confident i hadn't simply seen a kind of optical illusion ascribable to the poor (bouncy) seeing.

What i observed were the most extraordinarily rough edged and dark edged NEB/SEB i've ever seen (blue grey swirls) and a totally "crooked" NEB with a bulge on its south-western edge and an arch on the north-western side. I had about an hour with the observation before it hazed over (high cloud) which is a massive shame because the GRS was just off the eastern limb and i would have loved to see what it would have looked like in these circumstances.

The image at the scope was very desaturated in colour terms - very little (no) ruddiness in the main belts.

Tidy version: 

...at the scope version:

That's a super report Nik and very encouraging for me because this is on my list for the next dark night. Depending on when that falls i could be trying with an 85mm scope but i assume it will probably need to wait till i have a bigger scope out. There is a lovely in-depth M33 observers guide in the November issue of Sky & Telescope  which is quite inspiring though it very quickly needs a big or very big scope to follow up on. NGC 604 looks like the bright highlight.

Here's a screenshot of the table at the end of that article in Nov-23 Sky & Telescope (it confirms your estimate for Mag12 BTW):

Don't let me put you off if others have more positive experiences - my experience isn't totally negative (far from it) - it's just not perfect (yet) 🙂

How far do you have to carry it @IB20 (i.e. how important is lower weight really) and what kind of magnification are you thinking about? I ask because...

I have a Berlebach planet / AZ100 for considered sessions and a Gitzo GT4533 / MVH612 for grab and go (that i have to carry a bit of a distance).

• The heavy wooden planet is like mounting on a rock  - basically no meaningful vibes at any mag but the combo weight is 19kg
• The carbon Gitzo combo does have vibes above ~130x (though while focussing only - they do damp down straightaway after letting go the focuser and i don't have obvious vibes when panning).  i don't extend the tripod very much at all BTW but i suspect it would be worse if i did. The tripod/mount combo weight is 4.58kg. i mount a short ~6kg scope package on it.

I had an AZ75 for a few hours and mounted this on a lightweight tripod (i intended to use it for GnG) and unfortunately that combo was also a bit vibey - i felt like i was under mounting the mount so went a different way with the fluid head.

What i don't know is:

• Is the GT55xx meaningfully better damped than the GT4533? - there's a test site somewhere that more or less says there's very little difference between them and both are head and shoulders better than other tripods tested in the sample - I know this because i've looked hard at this as a possible "upgrade" and talked myself out of it as too high a risk at ~£800.
• Are the vibes i have due to the tripod or the mount? Difficult to check but i'm going to mount my fluid head on my planet to rule it in or out.

So too TLDR - i don't think there's a free lunch with a tripod even using magnesium and carbon - i think if you want well damped at higher magnifications you're looking at a middle weight Berlebach and by BB's own descriptions the Uni-18 is better damped than the Report so your looking at the Uni-18 (i know I am 🙂)...

Cheers

That libby is a good resource @John_D. i don't particularly like that kind of reading on a screen but it does bring a huge range of titles for free so i'm not complaining. I've noticed the AUS S&T and US S&T share a lot of main articles so its still an interesting read even here in the North. Cheers

More in hope than expectation tonight i'm afraid - bright moon, boiling skies, and local fog 😞

Saturn did look quite nice for a few milliseconds here and there though and the deer park was pretty...

It's expensive on subscription for us in the UK (relative to its US cost) and expensive as an individual copy even when you can buy it locally being an import! Still a good read though. 

nice one Paul - i do like those Sky & Telescope articles that compile short lists of things in a concentrated area. 

I recommend a small "really useful box" as combined dew protection and small desk Malcolm.

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/412840-clipboard-alternative/?do=findComment&comment=4405505

I also use a red head torch and would like something dimmer but haven't found anything yet so can't help there. I'm considering a pirate patch approach to protect dark adaptation in my observing eye at least. I'm not sure if it will work yet or work very well while also juggling with reading glass 🤷‍♂️

Definitely worth popping into somewhere like WEX and having a play about with a lightweight fluid head @badhex - at the kind of scope weights and magnifications being discussed in here i would be confident even a lightweight one would be very nice ergonomically. I've never used a ball head but if they behave like the ball in a trigger grip (i.e. with a bit of stiction) then i would definitely recommend having a look at a fluid head alternative...

10 hours ago, saac said:

This is my new setup with the Esprit 120; despite some clear nights recently I'm still waiting for an opportunity to get it into imaging mode but I've had some very pleasing visual sessions.  Spent today raising the observatory floor and putting down some new carpet tiles. Had to race to get it finished against our impending Red weather warning deluge (NE Scotland) !  I'm starting to think that I should have tanked the observatory !  Thankfully, although we get some localised flooding in the garden,  there have been no leaks or water ingress around the observatory itself  - fingers crossed.  

Jim 

 

What a comfortable environment in which to sit and enjoy the view. Brilliant.

Me too. Great read.

On a personal note i do slightly blame you 😉 for fuelling own attraction to refractors over other types of (usually bigger) scopes which on paper are perhaps more rational - your quite poetic descriptions of your view chime exactly with what i wish to see and do sometimes see and enjoy with my own OTAs so other scopes that may be more "rational" and "better on paper" be dammed. Look at those beautiful stars!