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Comet 168P/Hergenrother


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This ones showing well in the great square of Pegasus tonight for those with clear skies :smiley:

Looks a little brighter (perhaps ?) than the reported 10th magnitude with my 10" newtonian. Looks great at 150x (8mm Ethos). Tight nucleus surrounded by hazy ball of light which fans out noticeably to one side.

The Sky & Telescope finder chart seems fairly accurate:

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/home/Comet-Hergenrother-Puts-on-a-Show-172753901.html

Well worth a peek if you are out and about. Should look even nicer as it rises up later :smiley:

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Looks a little brighter (perhaps ?) than the reported 10th magnitude with my 10" newtonian.
Thanks for the 10th+ estimate John, that explains why I could not find it !

I saw a report by Nick Howes et al 4Oct that it had brightened to about visual m8

http://remanzacco.bl...her-bright.html

I had hopes with my 10x50 bino but no luck, nothing brighter than about m9, if I have got the right region !

So no greater outburst :( (yet!) and it looks more like a fade :(

sky now deteriorated such that I cant see better than m8

sigh !

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Thanks for the 10th+ estimate John, that explains why I could not find it !

I saw a report by Nick Howes et al 4Oct that it had brightened to about visual m8

http://remanzacco.bl...her-bright.html

I had hopes with my 10x50 bino but no luck, nothing brighter than about m9, if I have got the right region !

So no greater outburst :( (yet!) and it looks more like a fade :(

sky now deteriorated such that I cant see better than m8

sigh !

It's quite a small comet so would probably appear as no more than a slightly hazy and rather faint star with binoculars - very easy to overlook. Even at 150x it was far from filling the field of view !.

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John I was not aware of this Comet so thanks for the thread. Hopefully we might get a clear night towards the end of the week so I will give it a go with the 10" then.

Mark

Well worth it Mark - it's "small but perfectly formed" as they say :smiley:

Hope you get a clear night before it starts to fade.

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Would this comet be doable in a 5inch newt, do you think?

tony

I think it would be visible, if you can find it and you don't have too much light pollution. I've seen galaxies down to magnitude 12 (OK, just glimpsed but still there !) with my 4.7" refractor so this comet, which is mag 9.6ish at the moment, should be doable.

You will need to use the finder charts for it carefully and be prepared to use some magnification once you find a "suspect" object.

Basically look for a dim star-like object with a faint "halo" of light around it that appears to be "smeared" in one direction.

Daves photos here show more or less how it appears with a 10" scope at high magnifications or so. The contrast visually is less than the photo though - much more subtle:

http://stargazerslou...68hergenrother/

The comet will move quite a lot against the starry backdrop from night to night so will need to be "re-found" each night - assuming that we get more than one clear night while it's bright that is !.

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cool! just chanced my arm and even though it's not even that dark yet and Pegasus is still pretty low down, the comet is very obvious in the 16". I'd say it's a lot brighter and more compact than Garradd was and is certainly brighter than Hartley from my recollection?

high hopes for later if the conditions improve/maintain themselves.

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I reckon it must be brightening a fair bit if that's the way you're seeing it now. When I found it with the dob the other night it was nowhere near as bright or obvious as Garrad was in my 15x70s.

James

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the mind plays tricks I suppose. my site is very light polluted and maybe Garradd was affected more than this one which seems pretty compact after an initial stab. just gonna have something to eat and then have another butcher's in a bit.

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with dark skies I reckon you'd easily see it. you might need a bit more power with less aperture to appreciate that it's not stellar. the general area is an easy star hop from Alpha Andromedae. the map is pretty accurate in the S&T piece.

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with dark skies I reckon you'd easily see it. you might need a bit more power with less aperture to appreciate that it's not stellar. the general area is an easy star hop from Alpha Andromedae. the map is pretty accurate in the S&T piece.

If you can see Omega Pegasus it's a very easy hop from there now. There's a chain of stars eastward from Omega and the comet should be close to the end of the chain. Looks like it's being quite closely followed by P/1998 U3, though at mag 16+ I imagine that would tax nearly everyone.

James

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