Moon-Monkey

Very nice buddy a unique approach I like that 🙂

Great stuff buddy a good rendition of this target 🙂🔭

Thanks buddy the weather has played a part in the quantity and quality of my sessions over the last couple of weeks for sure I have learnt though that it may look cloudy but keep an eye on it and it may clear I’ve lost count of the sessions I’ve set up cooling by the back door and it’s cloudy only for half an hour later to be crystal clear lol

Have been following this comet for sometime now and seeing it rise earlier every day has made it easier at the start I was waiting till 1:30 2:0 Am for it to rise now it’s far more sleep friendly 🤣 but glad I’ve watched this vagabond mature and share some of its secrets it’s been a really fun experience

No need to apologise buddy it was I who assumed great sketch bud 🔭

I’ll just leave this here have had some outstanding evenings on this comet since the 15th probably observed about 7 hours on it now and to see the changes is inspiring clear skies

I have wondered what a comet would look like through binoviewers lovely sketch buddy 🙂🔭

Very nice buddy lovely sketch

Sounds like an incredible night Dave , I love those nights when the universe opens up and lets you ride in the front seat with the best view 🙂🔭🔭

Thanks bud yes totally agree it all had to fall into place for this one at least for me 🙂 try and observe at greatest height from the horizon and just keep trying 👍👍👍

Thanks bud yes I’ve tried with other instruments before including an 8” Dob but the seeing never played ball 🙂

Thanks buddy I guess all the stars aligned for me I just knew to try it when I observed it through the 50 and it was sharp I knew then I may have a chance but never thought it would happen. Lol thanks for the reply mate appreciate it keep trying never give up it will happen 🔭💥 clear skies Phill

Thanks Dave , I appreciate the comments 🙂 I like to repeatedly observe my targets especially tougher or in this case bucket list items as I’m aware of how the human brain reacts at times it can fool us all lol . I’m still buzzing and barely slept last night I just lay in bed thinking about that session I had someone email me with the position just now and it seems to be as you say in the right ball park so from your experience and the sky safari image I think I can tick this off ✅🪣 list 🥳🥳 I guess going out every single night it’s clear and some that it’s not pays off in the end what a great couple of months I’ve had I hope I haven’t peaked lol with the Deimos sighting and this one I’m so glad I train with smaller apeture they were right it does help massively 🙂 clear skies Phill

Apologies not sure why it went white ??

I present to you on a (less then perfect not finished AZ3) 90/1000 SCS voyager (my double star scope) so this evening starts with some observations with the little AT50 and while observing the moon and the beautiful Orion neb I noticed I could split Rigel again now from the vantage point of my upstairs room I saw Sirius and panned over and to my suprise it wasn’t a fuzzy disco show it was clean and crisp this got me excited … so downstairs to the man cave I went I’ve been waiting for an evening like this for a fair while so I finished building up the 90mm F11.1 onto my unfinished modified AZ3 and out I went armed with a few eyeoieces for first light ok so this went extremely well beautiful lunar views crisp and clean high contrast images were Burned into the back of my retina !!!! So I thought to myself do I dare … yep F it I’m gonna go for glory on first light so I cycled through a 9mm ,6mm 5mm and ended up with a 4mm giving 111x , 166x, 200x and finally 250x and I watched and observed it was clean lots of glare but clean practically no CA and sharp but oh so bright I observed and got my eye in for about 20 mins and that’s when I saw it ; a dim dot about 2 o’clock respective to Sirius A I doubted myself so kept observing seeing cycled through ok good and then BAM 💥 again 2 o’clock I could have shouted if it weren’t for the fact I would be lambasted by neighbours AGAIN !!!! 🤣🤣🤣🤣 ok so theirs times a charm am I imagining it am I really seeing one of my bucket list items on FIRST LIGHT !!! Surely I must be tired imagining it or just pure tricking myself could I see it now … no then again seeing went from ok to good to great and BAM 💥 THE PUP !!! So it’s only fair to say here that the pup was in the glare it was not a full blown clean inky black separated split more a “i see you ; you little [removed word] in the glare split” so I guess I’m asking you guys in a frac (diagonal reversed at 2 o’clock currently as I observed it through the eyepiece in the sky) so by my estimate North North East naked eye sky is the pup ? Did I just luck out or am I suffering from astronomical dilusion ?? If not this goes down as the best first light I’m probably ever going to have lol

Lovely report buddy , as I was out last night also I concur with your wardrobe choices lol I done two hours on many targets mainly because although transparency was initially. Very good it faded quickly along with th seeing Mars seemed quite muted last night did get some albedo features with my stopped down ST80 with #21 orange but nothing more than that esp as the moon was lightening the sky enough to wash everything out great report buddy 🙂👍👍👍👍

I live quite close to Bucklebury in Compton and it’s Bortle 4 welcome to the lounge buddy have fun ask questions and also funny how many names I see on this thread within 15 minkes from me lol

That’s a good plan buddy I don’t blame you I wouldn’t sacrifice an ethos to the god of war either lol

Just so your aware the occulting bar has to be at the focal plane of thr eyepiece otherwise it won’t be in focus and may be a bit fuzzy to use 🙂🙂🙂 it’s absolutely possible and great fun although there is a learning by curve it’s all good fun though good luck and can’t wait to hear others reports on this 🙂🙂🙂

Thank you my friend it was a challenge but a truely amazing thing to observe

Hey bud yes I will be doing a write up of this once I’m in a position to have used this on more than a few targets buddy I will keep you informed 🙂🙂🙂🙂

Thanks Sirius is ok my bucket list although I’m not sure if I use an occulting bar if the observation would be valid ?? I don’t read many reports of these being used anymore ? That’s why I went down the road of making this specific eyepiece so people could experience this blast from the past

Thabkyou for your kind words I think you should Absolutely give it a try 🙂🙂 Sirius and the pup is on my list too trouble is my horizons aren’t great here so it would be a proper adventure to some good horizons to try for that one really I should think with your mak (I assume it’s tracked ) wil be fine with you have an occulting eyeoieces buddy

Okay this is an observing report from Sunday, the 29th of November 2022 the time was approximately 1050 pm and the skies transparency was around about 2 to 3 out of 5 now earlier in the evening fog was abundant and I was very very excited to see between the fog the air was extremely still so along with the observing report when I got out I had a short period with my sky watcher ST80 while my 8 inch dob was on cool down I was able to observe some planetary observations with the ST80 stopped down to a 40 mm F 10 I was pleased with the views which were somewhat muted however still with the relative amount of detail I could see clearly Sirtis major and some of the lesser known albedo features I then proceeded to bump up the magnification to a 2. 5 mm TMB while I had the number eight rattan yellow filter the chromatic aberration was reduced somewhat I then proceeded to observe Mars which was somewhat clear right now I then decided to replace the number eight yellow filter with a number 21 orange filter this had significant increases in the resolution and contrast of the albedo features I found it interesting how when I stacked the yellow and the orange filter I was able to not only see the albedo features that also the light the polar hood was visible also and the orange became a somewhat lighter orange although light transparency as a hole was slightly less due to the stacking of filters after this experience with the ST80 I realised that my 8 inch dobsonian was now cooled down so my observing session with the ST80 was now complete moving over to my nicely cooled down acclimatised 8” Dob and I realise that the seeing was in fact extremely good and had most definitely improved in the half an hour that I was out there consequently I started off with the 12 mm modified achro Matic eyepiece (my occulting eyepiece )and a 2X Barlow giving me I believe 240 X I could see good detail on Mars with Sirtis major and the hellas planitia coloration was still slightly muted however there was darks and lights of the albedo features that could quite clearly be seen to the eye even with this occulting bar in place it took me around about 40 minutes worth of observing to realise that I didn't quite have the magnification that I needed to observe the Martian moons consequently I then increase the magnification with the 12 mm modified acro Matic eyepiece with a 3X Barlow lens this gave me a power of 300 X through the eyepiece Mars was suitably enlarged and was 2/3 of the width of the occulting bar itself using my Mars application to locate the approximate positions of Phobos and Deimos I realised that Deimos was in fact the furthest away from the planetary disc as was possible over two Mars discs in width location (50 arc seconds) unfortunately DeImos was actually in part of the diffraction spikes and was suitably hard to resolve my session carried on for another 90 minutes and I realised very quickly that as soon as the planetary disk came from behind the occulting bar to the actual field of view my night vision had becomes substantially reduced at that point which made it even more difficult to observe the Martian moons I therefore took numerous attempts and managed up to 5 minutes at a time to keep Mars behind the occulting born I observed Deimos which is between 11th to 13th magnitude 4 or five times over the space of 90 minutes they were fleeting moments although I did see demos in my peripheral vision i.e. averted vision quite often it was small it was dim however it also was there a few times I managed to actually view DeImos with direct vision and it was a fantastic experience it was something that I learnt a few hard lessons over the last couple of weeks making this eyepiece and getting it to the point where it's usable and easy to reproduce one of the learning experiences of this program I believe is the absolute necessity of having your equipment balanced and free moving to absolute perfection at 300 magnification on a manual mount you do not have the ability to make the very fine movements unless you have your mount perfectly tuned perfectly balanced and you almost become one with your scope especially with a dobsonian and this is the case with me the other thing I have learnt is you will be amazed at what you can see if you give it the time and patience initially I couldn't see the moon DeImos which is in fact the dimmer of the two moons although Phobos was within eight arc seconds of the planetary disk far too close in the glare to be easily resolved I will however at a later date go back and pull out Phobos as well if I can time it so that the planetary rotation is that both orbits are opposite ends of the rotation or even just out way out away from the planetary disk then I will attempt to observe both of these Martian moons at the same time which will be a great observation to make at this stage I am 50% of my project completed with just Phobos two complete my Martian moon observing observing project many thanks clear skies

Did you decide on a little frac in the end ?? Just to throw my paper in the hat I would say either an ST80 , sure not the best on planets but use that apeture stop and the CA is then minimal great wide field views and on a little az mount super portable even on that 5kg tripod you said you had there is also the svbony SV501P (60mm F6.7version) the CA is almost non existent but you are limited by the apeture slightly but I can fit all that inc tripod in a small backpack still my bite goes to the st80 lol