Tight ones in Orion

[John]

It seems a nice steady night for doubles tonight. Orion is currently comfortably placed so I've started there. I'm using the ED120 refractor at 257x and 300x. Limbered up with Rigel, Alnitak and Eta Orionis. Nice clear splits with well defined componants and colour tints.

I then pushed on to something more challenging. 52 Orionis showed as a "waisted pair" or "peanut". No clear black line between the stars but you could tell you were looking at two stars - a bit more than just elongation. I think the split is around 1.1" at the moment ?.

Also had a go at 32 Orionis on the other side of the hunters "chest" area. That one was a close but definite split. Unequal pair with intriguing tints of whitish and blue/grey ?. I think this one has a separation of around 1.4" ?

Then had a go at 42 Orionis. This is quite an unequal brightness pairing of mags 5.5 and 8.5 with a 1.5" separation I think. Very hard to see whats going on here. Possibly saw the fainter companion hard alongside the brighter one but much dimmer. Seemed to "come and go" a lot. Not going to claim this one but I might come back and try again when Orion is a little higher in the sky.

Nice little Orion-based session. The eyepieces used were a loaner Myriad 3.5mm XWA and my new 3mm TV Radian. Nice "christening" for that one and it seems an excellent eyepiece for this purpose 

 

[nightfisher]

Nice report John, I am hoping to do a double star hunting session at the weekend, it will be a good test for the 2 tal 100`s

[chiltonstar]

The seeing was superb here tonight - until it clouded over about 20:00! I did manage to visit some old Orion favourites (Eta and 52 Ori) though before the sky disappeared....

Chris

[John]

Hard luck Chris.

The seeing has dipped a bit here now. Jupiter GRS transit is OK but I've seen the features more clearly defined than this.

What scope can you split 52 Ori with ?. The ED120 was very close I feel this evening but if the dark line dividing the two stars was there it was so fleetingly that I don't feel able to claim a proper split.

Too many central heating plumes around here - I'll have to petition the neighbours to do without heating for a few nights !

On a more positive note Alnitak was really lovely tonight, probably the best I've seen it looking for a long while

[cotterless45]

Neat ! We got about ten minutes of clear sky here, just enough to see comet Lovejoy off Almach. Got as far as 32 Orionis, which I noted as " very tough".

η Orionis shows a clean 1.7" split at x200.

33 Orionis splits at x218 , 1.9" split.

Certainly a very rich area to explore, under those elusive

Clear skies !

Nick.

[chiltonstar]

What scope can you split 52 Ori with ?. The ED120 was very close I feel this evening but if the dark line dividing the two stars was there it was so fleetingly that I don't feel able to claim a proper split.

John: With my 127 Mak. I get two disks, side by side, with an occasional hint of a black line but I feel I should do better as I've split closer doubles than this. Orion was low though, and my neighbour was pumping out heat into the night sky as well, just E of where I was looking.

On previous occasions, it's looked pretty much the same. When I set up on Castor last night, which was higher and less thermally polluted, I centred the pair and turned on the drive and waited until I got the best view before I moved to Orion. With Castor, I had a perfect pair of Airy disks of the correct diameter for the aperture, with complete and stable diff rings....

Chris

[lunator]

John Nice report

52 Ori is a tight pair but I have split them at x180 in the OMC250

32 Ori I was able to split at x188 I had them as both white.

42 Ori is the tricky one the last measurement is in 1995. I have never got a clean split on it. I have checked the 6th orbit catalogue and there is no orbit calculated....

05354-0450DA    4      1848 1995   25 220 205   2.0   1.1  4.61  7.50 B1V       -007+000 -007+000 -04 1185 N D  053523.16-045018.1

I might have to drop Brian Mason at the USNO a line on this one.

Cheers

Ian

[chiltonstar]

I tried 52 Ori again last night (Mak 127) and got a better split, with two yellow disks with a little bit of space between them (x 190 and x325).

With 42 Ori, I get two clear disks but touching.

Chris

[chiltonstar]

42 Ori is the tricky one the last measurement is in 1995. I have never got a clean split on it. I have checked the 6th orbit catalogue and there is no orbit calculated....

05354-0450DA    4      1848 1995   25 220 205   2.0   1.1  4.61  7.50 B1V       -007+000 -007+000 -04 1185 N D  053523.16-045018.1

I might have to drop Brian Mason at the USNO a line on this one.

Cheers

Ian

Worth noting that 42 Ori appears to be marked in the wrong place in the S&T Pocket Sky Atlas (correct position though in the Cambridge DSA and in TLAO)!!

Chris

[The Flinty Fox]

Alnitak may be just a warm up for you lot, but would of been a new PB for me had it been a clean split last night.

I set my scope out to cool but forecast was to cloud over so I set up ready to go after only 30mins. This turned out to be too soon as i was presented with a fuzzy blob with my 4mm ortho, I was using the 150p. I didn't think this was going to be a success when suddenly after another 30mins something momentarily detached at about the one o clock position, it kind of made me jump, but guess in the real world this must of been about south Westish. Anyway studied it for a while and it kept doing it until one got the feeling something was afoot.

Can't claim this as a split more of a peanut with occasional fleeing vague separation. Skysafari gave it a separation of 2.2, will have another go soon.

Paul

[John]

Nice report Paul

If the seeing is a bit off par then things get pretty challenging. I'd not call Alnitak an easy split with a small newtonian. I find the star images a lot tigher with my refractors even if their ultimate resolution limit is lower than a larger aperture newtonian.

[The Flinty Fox]

Had another go at Alnitak last night, seeing seemed better and definitely got more of a cleaner split during moments of calmness.

That was a good session.

Paul.