Can anyone tell me what are this vertical shadows on Vega??

[imichelena]

Hi guys,

The night of the eclipse while I was all set up and waiting for it, I got bored and tried shooting a few stars. One of them was Vega and I found this strange effect of parallel vertical shadow lines.

Can anyone explain to me what they are?

Thanks!

[Freddie]

Which scope was used?

[imichelena]

Sorry, I forgot to mention the details of the setup:

Skywatcher ED80 + 0.8x focal reducer + Modified DSLR

[brantuk]

Looks like diffraction spikes to me. The black lines are the darker background to the spikes of light. Just my guess.

[imichelena]

How can I have diffraction spikes with a refractor?

[ChrisLX200]

How can I have diffraction spikes with a refractor?

You might want to check there is no foreign body (e.g., a hair) attached to the objective. I had a fine flake of dried paint (about the same size as a hair) attach itself to the reducer lens and that caused a diffraction spike. It doesn't need to be spider vanes cutting across the whole of the front of the scope to cause this effect, even something right at the edge - like protruding lens retaining clips - can take a chunk out of the star image.

ChrisH

[Ant]

Sometimes the little clips that hold the lense cell in place can cause diffraction spikes - maybe it could bet that's?

Can you see anything when looking at the lens cell?

Cheers

Ant

[Steve Ward]

Could even be from a clothes line or similar like a telephone wire.

[MarsG76]

I agree its diffraction spikes/lines.... if you cleaned your objective or FR lately make sure there is (as well as above mentioned hair like obstruction) streaks due to cleaning residue.