josefk

i'm possibly a year or two older than you @Sunshine. I had Johnny-5 in mind from "Short Circuit":

In the chilly temps i dropped in last night on Planetary Nebula NGC 2392 [the] Eskimo Nebula and NGC 7662 The Blue Snowball [i guess you had to be there...🤣]. Both Herschels in the H400. Both showing brightly but without colour or detail and it was too cold to mess about finding the best mag/filter etc. I thought the pre moon sky would support going for some difficult [faint] Herschels but i was washing out and it was too cold for lingering in vain so picked up a couple of doubles - Theta Aurigae at ~4" and 55 Gem/Struve 1066 at 5.6". The seeing wouldn't support tighter. Then moved on to Mars. Finishing on Mars the seeing wouldn't support 200x and 140x mono was very bright but 152x in the Binoviewer was quite enjoyable. Quite definite smudgy features in the Northern hemisphere and Southern hemisphere. Definite without being sharp. There was also a very bright ring around the full circumference of the planet. i'm not exactly sure what accounts for this effect. it wasn't limited to a single eyepiece. Diffraction from the secondary mirror support again very bright so roll on new refractor before Mars shrinks too much further. Clear outside had it as -2 "feels like -7". It did!

-5 is still alive (for children of the eighties)

absolutely brilliant - the location, the set-up, but especially the coffee making equipment 👍🏼

looks VERY "Brrr" @Captain Scarlet

Hi @Stu that’s a very nice looking setup. I assume the 200mm pillar under the AZ100. How do you find it (the pillar)? Any noticeable loss of rigidity? Do you think you would have gotten away with the 125mm extension clearance wise for that LZOS f6? I’m curious as I will have to do the same shortly with one or the other. Cheers.

There are always open clusters if you miss the longer focal length scope 🤣. It's definitely the looking and looking bit that is the benefit but i need glasses (but so far not at the EP itself) so its always a faff and juggle and never enough hands - hence the scrap paper approach at the scope and clean up later 'for the record" even for double star plots. Lunar looks difficult indeed. I used to draw birds (still do sometimes) - at the beginning they all looked like chickens or pigeons but i read (and i believe it) that drawing is as much a skill as a talent (will probably get shot for that) so practise is absolutely the way to go...(though i still turn out pigeons and chickens fairly often)...

It's a Land Rover and my motorised wheel barrow for chunky astro gear - this spot is just a little bit out of the town i live in and super for longer sessions. Being high sided the Land Rover it makes a good windbreak too!

Thanks @Ratlet - i'm trying to make a sketch of nearly every observation since about Agust onwards this year - less electronic note taking - more care and method (ish) at the EP. I transfer rough ones done at the EP to clean index cards the morning after typically so miraculously all my mistakes disappear :-).

Gratuitous shot of the mk2 DIY dew shield (camping mat - matt black on the inside) - not as good as the mk1 variant (kitchen worktop heat deflector). I think mk1 introduces glare, mk2 curls over and into the line of sight. Mk3 will be bought fit for purpose!

So last night i got to the halfway point on the Astro League Double Star observing programme. I'm not going at it full blast but rather using it as an infill activity on manual find grab and go nights or when the moon is high and bright as it was last night. It's a superb programme - not so much for the double stars to be observed - "listing" and picking from lists is easy. More it is improving my discipline at the EP for note taking and sketching. Huge fun (not) trying to determine West near Polaris at only 15x in binoculars and ordinarily not something i would bother trying to nail down but this programme kind of asks you to and it is definitely improving my methodology. Last night i was trying to use my larger scope on tighter doubles that i can't split in my GnG. Unfortunately the seeing wasn't cooperating and i was failing at the 5" level (diffraction rings just looked like squirming finger prints). In between views of Mars I moved onto three wider targets in Cepheus (Xi, Beta, Delta) and one in Lacertae (8 Lac) and trialled first light in my new Baader Polaris I illuminated reticle. It's a bit of a game changer. While not the nicest EP to use; having a narrower FOV than i'm used to (and i have a non tracking mount), a little tendency to black out on this first use and having a hard cold eye lens rubber surround, i have to say as a "tool" it's great. Easily used to align with the exit of stars at the field stop of the eyepiece to the west its then great for narrowing down position angle and separation by giving the eye much smaller nearby markers to check against. The example below isn't a difficult one but where my notes 8"...10" are wrong the sketch is "spot-on" for the separation of this pair at 2/3 of a reticle division (21" per division in this scope using a powermate, separation = 14").While i would still use a "regular" eyepiece on the same target before or after for the most aesthetic view i'm really happy to add this EP to my toolkit. Super chuffed and i highly recommend the EP. I believe it is discontinued so mmh... Obviously other stuff was happening last night so after a first session of doubles it ended like this in a second and third session respectively with the lunar occultation of Mars entry and exit (not a sketch at the EP so no excuses for the rubbish moon): Cheers all

With a less understanding partner i could easily be in trouble this morning 🤣 - making a racket coming in passed midnight last night after trying to take in as much of Mars as possible on the evening of the 7th. Alarm at 04:00 this morning to get out for the start of the occultation. Back in for a brief warm up and change of kit then quite noisily back out again for the exit of the occulation. In between all the Mars observation I got to the half way mark in the Astro League double stars programme last night including 17 Cep, 8 Cep, 27 Cep and 8 Lac. Seeing not great - couldn't split two targets at 5" separation. Now for a coffee.

Excellent - i can use this to explain to my partner what all the fuss was about!

A nice mix of things there Joe and through your descriptions a nice bit of observing by proxy first thing in in the morning after yet another cloudy night here in the UK. I will make a note to check out the PNe NGC 1535. Cheers

Hello and welcome to SGL.

I would like to improve the quantitative aspects of some of my observing notes (particularly doubles) so thought i would give this a try. I can get it it to 100x (and 200x with a power mate) in one scope and will be something like 40x and 80x in another. I'm ok on position angle usually (+/- 15...20 degrees) but my brain does get mushy on simple divisions of the EP FOV for size or separation at times...

Hi Rob - In my observation notes for NGC 1647 I have notes to the effect of "remember to come back and spend more time here on a pitch black steady night". It is lovely isn't it.

Atmospheric pics @scotty1. Nice.

just a cheeky word to the wise @Ratlet - I've liked your sketches before and noticed you sketch light on dark (i think you're not inverting). If you do i've found sketching on index cards rather than in a pad to be utterly transformative and they come in black 🙂 https://www.amazon.co.uk/A6-Black-Card-Stock-Sheets/dp/B00UQ3FM54?th=1

Murky hazy sky here in South Lincolnshire last night and twinkling badly too so just a few doubles in Taurus to relax. 62 Tauri (Struve 534), Chi Tauri (Struve 528), Kappa 1 & 2 Tauri (Struve 541), and Omega2 Tauri. At the start of the session i couldn't split Theta Auriga (4.4") and at the end of the session Mars had astigmatic/diffraction spike like light beams (in a refractor!) shooting off into the damp in all directions so i think both seeing and transparency pretty bad! It was like 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind' all evening though. The RAF have been drilling low level night flying here every evening this week. I don't know what they're flying but they're pretty big and pretty cool.

Sounds brilliant @Astro_Dad - i learnt my own lesson earlier this week to keep banking Mars during these few weeks - it will feature or be checked in every session for me from now till xmas i think! 🙂

It doesn't indeed and thats why i missed it the first time round! Even knowing exactly where to look on a second attempt it is tricky. This will get tidied up to an index card later but here is the EP "sketch" from last night. I'm enjoying recording my observations like this but my dark adapted eyesight is so bad it's a complete Mr Bean faff glasses on/off, red light on/off, drop pen, knock scope by still having glasses on when going back to the eyepiece... etc... Sigma Orionis is the letters group - C not seen to start with but finally seen and marked (in the little group outside the EP FOV) and Struve 761 is the numbers marked group to the west.

Cracking couple of hours in Burghley Park again last night - my 'birding scope' is getting more sky time than the bigger kit. Very cold at the end again. 39 Ori, 34 Ori, 48 Ori (& Struve 761), 43 Ori and 44 Ori observed ad sketched in the doubles set before just enjoying M42 and the surrounding area. Lambda Orionis (39 Ori) at 4.4" quite difficult - seeing wasn't perfect and the primary was twinkling over quite a big space. Sigma Orionis (48 Ori) observed for the second time in three days - this time "camping out" to observe the fourth component "C". It was much harder than i expected at 8.8 Mag. Is much much dimmer than i expected so i assume washed out by the (AaAbB) group at a separation of 11" - very easily missed at the 70x mag i am using. M42 (and then Mars again to finish) just fabulous. Dodgy sketch of M42 and neighbours attached 🙂

As @Franklin points out - this is where your picture of the bright heart of M42 is @Seoras - the trapezium stars (the blurry tight group in your picture) and three bright stars in a line below them in the sky but to the left in your star diagonal view (themselves all just below another Messier - Messier 43). which in the bigger picture is here below Orion's belt: Absolutely loads to see in this area :-). As Franklin says UHC and O-III filters all help bring something out with Orion but then so to does good dark adaptation and a clear sky - it's so bright filters are the "the cherry on top" but its lovely and rewarding without.

i appreciated this heads up and reminder @paulastro. I've been struggling with Mars in recent weeks and had kind of given up till December when i hope to have a new refractor to try again. However your post here yesterday afternoon spurred me to try again last night and "try harder" as it were and in the end i had a great observation and feel like i've got one in the bank now for this opposition. Thanks.