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18" Dob At A Dark Sky Site

webboid

By webboid
in Observing - Reports

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webboid

webboid

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Following on from my not really first light report from the 6 December here is my experiences from my local astronomy clubs dark sky site.

Arriving just after 6 pm I had my first go at setting up by red light head torch. Each of the parts are reasonably heavy but only a few kilos more than my 12". A bit of back & forth from the car park & everything was all ready to go. Checked collimation with my new Howie Glatter barlowed laser (thanks FLO) & a small adjustment was required. Weather forecasts reported everything from mist to high clouds through out the night. But in reality the sky was mostly clear. However the Milkway was subtle when it is often quite vivid. Stars were bloated too. So I suspected that fainter stuff was not going to be likely.

I had a few tricky targets in mind but decided to look at the familiar ones & see how they compared to my experiences with my other scopes. Although this is a fairly big dob I have had a reasonable amount of viewing in similar or larger instruments of my observing buddies, so I had certain expectations. 

Straight away I noticed that the scope was very easy to move & smooth in it's action. The custom light shroud also stayed put & did a good job. Dew heaters worked well until later when something went wrong & the controller lights kept going on & off. I have to investigate this but it will hopefully be something simple.

So here is what I looked at. Warming up on some easy favourites first to look at was M57. Now fairly low & in the murk it was quite bright in the 24 mm at 91x. This is effectively my lowest power eyepiece in this scope. Also rather low was M27 but this also was bright but no real detail. I could not over look M31,32 & 110. Very extensive halo was seen but again not any detail. There was some high thin cloud around & the temperature was dropping. M110 was very visible & more than just a faint fuzzy. Another familiar pair was M81 & 82. M82 is a very often visited target & I was not disappointed. I could see the dark lane in the middle fairly well. I tried 136x & that was better but not so good at 198x. M81 was very different to how I had seen it before. Apart from brighter it had a much more obvious shape & the halo faded out more. Nearby I looked for & found NGC 3077 without difficulty.

It was now clear that the transparency was far from suitable for dim stuff after a quick look at M33 showed a very poor view. So I continued with the familiar sights. M15 showed stars to the core & at higher magnification filled the eyepiece. M35 & it's companion NGC 2158 next. This was still a bit low but was quite spectacular. With the 24 mm the whole cluster filled the view with more stars than ever seen. A small nudge brought in to view the previously seen as very faint 2158 in my 12". Now it was the finest peppering of tiny stars almost nebula like at first glance. A little higher up was M37, my favourite of the three Auriga Messier objects. This also took on a more stunning appearance. Many more stars gleaming back at me. M36 & 38 were duly spotted. M1 however was not so good.

A bit of a tea break as it was now below zero & frost was forming every where.

Suitably warmed up I continued on my journey of discovery. NGC 7331 was in my eyepiece & I was just able to spot two of the fleas. I have been told that all four should be visible in my scope on a good night. Changing direction over to the owl nebula. A large almost perfect circle of even glow but no detail. A short nudge to M108. Now this was different from what I recall. Quite a lot different. Clearly a tilted galaxy & extending more than I have seen previously. No detail tonight. I had recently observed NGC 3079 in UMa with my 12" on a very good night from home so I took a look at that. A stellar core & a nice edge on appearance. A few more regulars before the highlight event began. They were the cat's eye nebular which was very blue. Then Mirach's ghost visible even with the star Mirach in the fov.

Over the trees M42 had just cleared for take off & my scope speeded to it's location. This has got to be the visual observer & imagers most favourite & boy was I blown away. Considering I thought the sky was not at it's best I can't wait to see it on a good night. Without any filter it was ridiculously bright but the most incredible thing was the extent that the nebulosity went on. Moving further & further away from the familiar wings I could see thin spindles & waves & indescribable features. I reluctantly moved on to the flame nebula. This in comparison was very tenuous, but seen all the same. Further up to M78. Here the nebulosity was clear to see compared with my last viewing in my first scope, an 8" reflector, a couple of years ago.

There was still time to have a go at something not previously seen before the Moon began to rise. At this point my dew heaters were playing up & unattended eyepieces fogged up merely from the heat off my eyeball. It was -2 degrees! Close to Mirach on the way to M33 is a galaxy group. The main one being NGC 507. Star hopping was difficult because the finder was fogging. But after some effort I caught a glimpse of what I think was 507. Averted vision only. Then a couple of smaller galaxies which I believe were NGC 499 & 495. These I would have to return to on a better night for confirmation. My observing buddy told me I should be able to see quite a few more with good transparency.

I'm feeling very lucky to have acquired this scope & look forward to many deep sky adventures of discovery for the rest of my life.

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