Second Light Explore Scientific 305mm (12") Ultra Light Dobsonian

[Mrbloke]

So I decided that I was going to set the scope up out in the back garden tonight instead of my usual spot out in front of my garage.  I mainly did this as we had a friend around and I wanted to show them the new scope and I had worked out if I'm out early enough, I could just get a few minutes with Saturn before it disappeared behind the trees.

All set up and looked through to see it - literally on my knees its so low now.  Not a great view as its just too low and the seeing wasn't great, a bit of clouding too.  Anyway, friend sees it then is off for the evening.  

Normally I view from the front of the house.  It gives reasonable views to the east, west and south, but has to tackle with two street lights on the opposite side of the road.  In the back garden I have a street light that pretty much sits on the east boundary of the back garden and tall trees to the north.  Being lazy, I couldn't be bothered moving it around the front again so just started to have a look around.  Wowsers!  Its better than the front!

I had deliberately placed the scope in the shadow of the pole of the street lamp, but I didn't expect too much as the rest of the garden is bathed in street light.  The view was clearly much better out the back.  Even with the mk1 eyeball I could see more stars than I can from the front.  Right - time for session number 2.

M57 - Ring nebula.  Super defined ring, much darker backdrop leading to even better contrast

M13 - Great cluster.  Much the same as from out front, but still amazing.

M92 - Glob.  This is getting easy now I am finding my way around quicker.  Telrad to eyepiece on the first try!

At this point I start getting cocky.  I see a satellite heading west to east and start to get it lined up, then I am able to track it for about 20 seconds before I get to the zenith and it all goes wrong!  Lost it.

M27 - Brimming with confidence now (and a much clearer view of Sagitta)  this proved to be much easier to find.  Much better view than I had at first light.  Not sure if that is the better location or the sky itself, but it was more apparent - not too defined - but apparent.  Still looking at filters to try and get this even better (still prefer M57!)

Another satellite - same again.   I am able to track it pretty well and catch it again past the zenith as it disappears into the west.

M51 - Whirlpool galaxy.  Easy to see straight away when you know what you are looking at.  I think there must have been cloud out to the west blocking the sun tonight as it was a lot darker than the previous report and that really helped with contrast.

M101 - Ticked!  Again I think that the darkness really helped to tease this out.

Out with the mobile for the Stellerium App to find some new stuff...

Bode's Nebulae?  Oh yes sir, coming right up.  Would you like the Cigar galaxy in the eyepiece at the same time?  Yes, why not?  Super-awesome stuff.

At this point I start running out of things in my available FOV (mainly west, or high east targets), the clouds are starting to roll in and its getting late.  So I start my constellation practice - looking for the bottom of Draco.......A bright spark of light streaks out of the north-east as a large Persid comes across.

Right that's it, not going to get any better than that! 

I pack up for the evening (while constantly checking for any more ). 

[John]

Great stuff George - you are really getting the hang of deep sky hunting

I had a great session myself tonight, the skies here were the best they have been for some time and the Moon did not start interfering too early - I'll post a separate report on that.

[MarsG76]

Sounds like a awesome night.... this is the kind of stuff that keeps you hungry for more... satellite tracking??!!... good stuff.