Unexpected delights - 1/11

[Roy Batty]

I wasn't expecting a good observation session last night given the weather reports during the day for my part of the UK (somerset), but as ever the optimist i stuck my head out of the back door at around 6:30PM and thought h'mm it's worth a go.

Got the mount polar alinged, but by then some cloud was rolling in so it was touch and go as to whether it was going to be worthwhile.

First off locked onto the comet and set my webcam up to take some subs, pretty much left it to do it's stuff while i was doing other stuff (collecting daughter from brownies). Got about 400 X 10 sec subs, well chuffed, but haven't yet had a chance to look at the results.

By this time it was around 8:30 and it was actually getting clearer

So I thought lets go through a few of the tour items on my synscan -

Snowball nebula - first time view for me surprised at how blue it looked.

M27 - not as good as i've seen it at other times, but maybe that's because it was over to the SW of me by the time i viewed it and that's not the best part of the sky for me in terms of light pollution.

M81 - another new one for me, quite low to my horizon so seeing was not great but still quite bright.

M1 - again this was quite low when i viewed it, popped in a uhc-s filter which improved the contrast on this.

Finished up with a quick view of old favourites M31 & 32, although I should have popped in my 2" ep for a better fov, and at near zenith they were nice and contrasty.

RB

PS Here's the result from my webcam:

(click to enlarge)

Not as pleased with the result as my earlier efforts, but this may be down to the fact the comets coma size had increased considerably between in the intervening time - so basically most of the chip is saturated by the core, plus i think it could have benefited from longer subs - (20 -30 secs?)

RB

[PaulR]

Nice one Roy!

I'd never even heard of the Snowball Nebula - it's on my list now - and I'm itching to have a look at the Crab... weather looks better here tonight

[Roy Batty]

Nice one Roy!

I'd never even heard of the Snowball Nebula - it's on my list now - and I'm itching to have a look at the Crab... weather looks better here tonight

Hi,

the snowball is :

Blue Snowball Nebula (NGC 7662), its a planetary nebula in the Andromeda constellation.

Hope this clears up any confusion?

RB

[PaulR]

Yep, I looked it up on the net straightaway - seems like a decent target

[BWBlackett]

Can you see the blue nebula with your eye, or do you need a longer exposure (webcam?)

Brian.

[Rob]

Nice report. Sounds like a good nights worth viewing there. M32!! .. must have go with that one

Rob

[Roy Batty]

Can you see the blue nebula with your eye, or do you need a longer exposure (webcam?)

Brian.

Hi Brian,

the blue snowball nebula has a mag of 9.2 so it should be visible to you with your light bucket

RB

[BWBlackett]

Sorry, what I meant to ask was can you see the blue nebulosity (without a camera) ?

I tried looking at the PacMan Nebula NGC281 but couldn't see any.

Brian.

[Astroman]

Ngc 7662 appears blue to me through the C8, so you should be able to detect it in a 10". Of course, not everyone can see Alberio as blue/orange either. It's worth a view, at any rate.

[lunator]

Roy

Nice report.

It was similar here. It was clear at sunset & then cloudy and at 8.30 cleared up again.

I have never looked for the blue snowball but I will try to track it down.

Cheers

Ian