The Cat's Eye

[Ganymede12]

I'm having trouble locating/identifying the Cat's eye nebula. 

I'm using TLAO and I'm pretty sure I know where in the sky it is but I can't find it through the scope (Skyliner 200p). To be honest my problem is that I don't know what I expect to see. I'm picturing something similar to the Ring Nebula, based on TLAO's drawing , with a blue-green hue but everything I can see looks like a star so I don't think I've found it yet! Any tips? 

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

I have found the Cat's Eye with my C8, so the 8" Dob should be OK. It takes a lot of magnification. My report is here:

http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/117061-september-18-2011-dodging-clouds-but-a-nice-run-of-dsos/

[cotterless45]

At x50, it'll appear as a. Blue/ green non stellar round , but bright fuzzy star. look at it directly in the fov and it'll disappear and blink back on again.

Put a SW UHC filter in the ep and it'll glow when the rest of the stars dull. Put up to x200 magnification and you should. Be able to see the outer halo of a very fine planetary nebula, C6. Nick.

[Owmuchonomy]

As above it takes high mag well. This is where my SCT wins for once. It's quite bright at 100x plus but perhaps not as big as you might think.

[Mike73]

My notes and a sketch are below, pretty much what Nick says.

http://darkskysketches.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/ngc-6543.html

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

As above it takes high mag well. This is where my SCT wins for once. It's quite bright at 100x plus but perhaps not as big as you might think.

For visual, an 8" SCT is a real killer scope, as you can easily take it to dark sites. There is no discernible difference between an 8" F/5 Dob with 11mm Nagler, and 8" F/10 SCT with 22mm Nagler. Only a tiny handful of objects do not fit into the 1.34 deg FOV I can get out of my C8. It has bagged me some 400 galaxies, and about 800 DSOs in total. The idea that slow scopes perform badly on DSOs for visual is a myth. For imaging matters are different of course.

[WaveSoarer]

It's just as Nick says really. With my 200p the nebula appears as a greenish star. As you ramp up the magnification its appearance becomes less stellar and you start to see it as a small fuzzy patch rather than a point-like star. It doesn't yield much detail, as far as I can remember, and it doesn't have the immediate impact of the ring nebula. I didn't try using a filter and this, as Nick mentioned, will probably bring out the fainter halo around the bright core.

[HIP3802]

As Nick and Mike73 suggest this is one that can not only take a fair bit of mag to bring out, but also benefits from taking time (sometimes quite a bit of time!) at the eyepiece to tease out details.

[AlexB67]

Its' much smaller compared to M57.  What I usually do to nail the area if you get phi or chi Draco in the corner of a typical 9x50 finder scope on these instruments with a 5.4 degree field, the cats yes should be at the opposite side just coming into view, so try and centre it roughly and use a low power eyepiece after that as the next step is what I do before upping the power once I know I have it in view. 

You can use zeta Draco to do navigate to it as well with the finder.  You may well be just overlooking it due to its very small size, but the greenish/blue tint should make it stand out.

Depending on your skies it may be harder to see it as a non stellar object at low power, but from my home  site in Bristol  in the suburbs I can just make it out as a nonstellar little fuzzy dot on a decent night amongst the more point like  stars and can see that it is non stellar in my lowest power at 42x on the 10 inch Dob.  

A UHC may help with that if you think you are in the right spot and not sure, the cats eye will pop out a bit more against the neighbouring stars. 

Once I am there I usually end up in the sort of 200x ballpark magnification to observe it in more detail. It's a great object.

Weeks ago when I was there I stumbled upon  NGC 6503 as well, great when you bag an extra galaxy by accident, I wasn't sure what it was at the time but had to check of course, worth a look if you haven't  already since it is so close by

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

There are many small planetary nebulae out there, and many of them are more-or-less stellar, looking like fainter versions of Uranus and Neptune. They look far more planetary than famous examples like the Ring, Dumbbell, or Helix. I use a filter-switch diagonal to quickly swap a UHC or O-III filter into and out of the light path. These planetaries suddenly appear brighter than the surrounding stars when the filter is in place.

[Ganymede12]

Thanks! Next time I get out I'll look for the right pattern of stars in my FoV and the zoom in on the object that looks like a star where the nebula should be. 

That is, If I get an other clear night anytime soon... 

[mjpfc]

OIII   Filter works quite well on this one,

                        In my 8" Newt, It looks like a smaller version of the Saturn Neb in Aquarius, with some traces of fainter outer stuff

at the edges but nothing like the photos.

Mick

[Ganymede12]

At the moment I don't have the money for an OII filter. I've never even heard of the Saturn Nebula before! 

[mjpfc]

You can see it without the filter, it just shows more of the nebula but a descent amount of Magnification is the key.

The Saturn Neb is NGC 7009 in Lower western aquarius. Its in the same region as Messiers 72 and 73, and frankly

easier to find and to see than either showing a blueish colour without filters. Its quite small, but bright and obvious

responding to mag well.

Clear skies, Mick.