Second night out with our 120 Evo

[Charlie_starz]

We have been waiting for this day all week because the forecast was for clear skies.

I put the telescope out while it was still bright around 9pm. It is a second hand scope which comes with a number of pluses, firstly it was cheaper than a new one and secondly it is all set up for polar alignment. Following from a suggestion I received on the forum yesterday rather than aligning fully with Polaris (too bright to see still) I lined up the "N" leg with north using the compass on my iPhone assuming it would be close enough to be good.

Unfortunately my son was sent to bed having been up late last night and tired after school today - over-ruled by my more sensible half there, but he was happy enough as I promised him lots more time on the scope over the weekend.

So I had a few targets in mind tonight, mostly the moon, Mars and then Saturn as they would be going through the same part of the sky in succession. So while I waited for it to get properly dark I spent a lot of time on the moon. Again I started with a super wide 25mm eyepiece. The moon fit nicely in the middle and I watched it for a long time before trying out some of the other eyepieces. I have a 5mm Celestron XCel-LX that I wanted to give a shot and it was really nice but the moon moved pretty fast through the frame. No problem thought I, as I have polar aligned tonight I can simply use my RA adjustment and it will keep in frame. It seriously took my about 5 minutes of adjusting the scope this way, that way and anything else I could think of before it dawned on me that polar aliging doesn't matter for the moon (or planets I figured) as they move in their own orbits....... duh!!! Anyway I moved the scope around so I could achieve the same effect and got back to the moon.

I had "The Half Moon" page from Turn Left at Orion open on my small garden table beside me so I went through some of the targets looking for them. The book does not do them justice, there is no substitute for viewing. I saw some really beautiful shadows from what I think was the Apennines and again I spent time on the same pair of craters I observed last night (Eudoxus and Aristotle). I looked around the edge of Mare Serenitatis looking for the rilles mentioned in the book. Basically I got lost in the moon.

I noticed Mars coming up to a good viewing angle for me so off I went. Now I had difficulty with Mars last night but decided tonight would be different. I started again with the 25mm super wide. All good and focused, a little bigger than a star but bright orange. So far, so good. I used my 2x Barlow to get closer, all good and I could even see one of the moons. Then I went to the 10mm but couldn't focus properly and after a frustrating 10 minutes decided to move on.

It was starting to get darker and more stars were visible in the sky, so as last night I visited Arcturus then Spica. I spent a bit of time on these with just the 25mm marveling at how many more background stars were appearing all the time in my frame of view. Then I saw Saturn coming above the treeline. After last night where I pretty much stayed with a 2x barlow and my 25mm eyepiece I wanted a better look.

Again I started with the 25mm eyepiece. Saturn came in pretty small but beautiful. I had the scope set up so I just had to make adjustments to the Dec (I think that's what it is called) to keep everything centered. I added the 2x barlow and found I could keep watching for about a full minute until I needed to adjust the scope. I must have spent a good 30 minutes captivated by Saturn and it's moons at this level. So this was as far as I got last night, but my scope was set up a lot better and only a single small adjustment was sufficient to keep everything in view. I used the barlow now with a 10mm eyepiece and watched Saturn come through the fov again and it was even more beautiful. I could see a division in the rings and I definitely knew which was the front part of the rings and the back because of the shadow on the back rings. Wow!!!!

Now I had read about the limitations of viewing, but the moon had looked pretty still and no atmospheric disturbances like last night so I thought I would have a go at putting the XCell LX 5mm eyepiece in. I lined everything up so Saturn would come right through the middle of the view and waited. OMG how brilliant. It worked and Saturn was through in about 10-15 seconds but was so beautiful. I found that keeping my other eye open and using a kind of averted gaze was better and after a number of passes through the view I could make out banding on the planet and rings? Not sure if there is supposed to be on the planet but that's what I saw anyway. I had to keep moving the scope so that Saturn would appear a few seconds later and move through the field of view because that would allow the shaking to stop before it did. Another 30 minutes just on this.

I was brave enough to go get my wife out (yes into the cold) to have a look. She was impressed and thought it looked like a picture from a magazine. Not impressed enough to stay out in the cold though 

Excited and wanting to move on If I get nothing more from my telescope ever, that sight alone was worth the price.

So Mars was pretty high up by now so I thought I would give it one more chance. I moved through the eyepieces from 25mm to 25mm with 2xBarlow to the 5mm XCell LX + 2xBarlow and was able to get a pretty decent view. It was still quite fuzzy and not quite round which I knew should be the case from stellarium (set up on a macbook beside me on the table.) I was pretty pleased with this and decided it was as good as I was going to get on Mars for now.

I was excited to try new targets but where to go next??? I looked at the stars of the plough, polaris and then was hoping to see my first messier object but hadn't anything other than my vague recollection that between Arcturus and the handle of the plough there was a cluster called M3. I spent about 5 minutes looking for it with no success, and no real idea of what i was actually looking for so I called it a night and came in for a cup of tea and to write up my thoughts here. 

Another successful and wonderful night. Not only did I get a great look at the moon, I also got to see Mars and spend a lot of time with Saturn. I will never get bored of that beautiful sight although I don't think I will be able to get such a high magnification of it every night.

Goal for the next clear night is to find a Merrier object and to that end I will plan out what I should see before I start and while the scope is cooling down.

Project for the weekend, try and find a cheap webcam and have a whack at modding it to fit the viewfinder - see what happens. 

Good night all, even though I bet most of you are just starting your evening sessions now. Clear skies and good luck.

[Charlie_starz]

I think that I was very lucky to be able to use the 5mm with the 2xbarlow and get a clear view of Saturn through it. Magnification of 400x is way past the advertised highest practical power of my scope but as they say the stars all aligned for me tonight (sorry, had to go there). Is this usually the case with such a bright object like Saturn that you can push out your magnification and still get a great focus?

[FenlandPaul]

another great night -this is becoming a habit! Great to share it with the family too. Keep the reports coming. Paul.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[andyb505]

Nice report. I too have only just started and last night saw Saturn for the first time, and managed to find M3!

If you can get hold of a copy of some free software called Stellarium it will help you find objects a little more easily. I have a version on a tablet and used it last night to help me find M3. (The PC/Mac version is free, the iPad/Android version costs less than £2).

Andrew

[Charlie_starz]

Hello Andy, I do have stellarium thanks but I hadn't really thought about what I wanted to look at last night bar the moon / saturn / mars. If I get the chance tonight I will see if I can find M3.

[Pondus]

Nice report, youre obviously enjoying your time with the scope   .

I doubt however that it was one of Mars moons you saw.

It is extremely difficult to see any of Mars moons cause of the glare from the planet itself, you might have seen a star,

but then again I might be wrong on this one. 

And yes you can see bandings on Saturn, to me it reminds me of a marble surface. 

You must have had exceptional conditions last night  .

Rune

,

[Astro Imp]

Another great report, thanks for posting.

Good luck with your hunt for M3, a slightly easier globular cluster to find is M13 in Hercules. Use Stellarium to locate this wonderful object.

Good luck and keep the reports coming.