Mars 21-03-12 - in bad english

[bombassa]

Finally I managed to view Mars after a few failed attempts.

First time I didn't bother with my dew-shield which resulted in a dew-covered scope and no observation. Second time I managed to knock the scope hard enough to ruin collimation and Mars was nothing but a bloated blob.

But tonight was good. Scope was collimated and dewshield in place.

I read on a national server that Mars wouldn't show anything below x250 so I plonked my Talx2 and a 5mm ortho in my 130/650 Heritage.

Possibly due to glare or something the planet didn't seem red or orange – more like off-white. After a while I could clearly pick out some shading on the planet – and a bright white polar cap. Please don't laugh too much at my sketch – I'm just roughly trying to illustrate what I saw:

(BTW I love the work you people do in the sketching section).

Now I guess I should learn something about Martian geography to know what I actually saw...

A bit on equipment. I get lots of reflection and I think it's from the tube of the Talx2. I have noticed this in combination with other eyepieces as well. Perhaps it's time to consider an upgrade?

The exit-pupil with my setup was 0.5 and oh yes floaters were visible. One in my left eye insisted on following the planet. Very annoying!

Do you use filters when observing Mars?

A great night really.

[Matt Scunthorpe]

Sounds good, i looked at Mars last night and think i saw the most detailed image yet, i swear i could see a bit of detail towards the pole, but like you, i managed to back into my scope twice and kick the tripod leg once, eventually i packed up before i did real damage . What dewshield do you use ?

[Stu]

Great to see detail on mars, it's not always possible depending on seeing conditions.

Neodymium filter seems to work well on mars, cuts the glare down, gives a nice natural pink orange colour and pulls the detail through well. Just used mine for the first time a couple of nights ago and am very pleased with it. I bought mine after reading good reports on here

Stu