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Testing some new target with a new Scope

Piero

By Piero
in Observing - Reports

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Piero

Piero

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Posted

This is my first observation report with this telescope. Here I will focus on the observation, rather than the equipment. Overall, I am very satisfied with this telescope! :)

Luckily Jupiter came out in the night so I could also test a planet. Not my favorite time to view planets as I think planetary observation is considerably better at twilight or dawn, but it was still okay. One of these day, weather permitting, I will test Venus, Jupiter, Mars at dawn. The moon is also waxing crescent so will have some time to test this soon too.

Anyway, here is the report!

Thanks for reading,

Best wishes, Piero

Date 17/12/2015
Time 21:40-01:30
Location Venice area, Italy
Altitude 8m
Temperature 5C ( 0 km/h)
Seeing 1 - Perfect seeing
Transparency 5 - Clear
Telescope SW Dobson 200 F6
Eyepieces Panoptic 24, Nagler 13, Nagler 7, PM2.5x
Filters Astronomik OIII

M42 Ori CL+Neb 50x, 92x, 125x, 171x +/- OIII
Great Orion Nebula. Impressive at exit pupils of 4.0mm and 2.2mm. A nice mixture of bright and dark areas which emerged when using an OIII filter. After the telescope cooled down properly I observed the Trapezium. The stars E and F were detectable at 92x, but the best view was at 125x. E was easier, but F was not tricky either. Both appeared as dim grey stars next to their companions. A lovely portrait!

M35 Gem Opn CL 50x
Amazing open cluster formed by birght and dim stars. Spectacular.

NGC2392 Gem Pln Neb 50x, 171x +/- OIII
Eskimo nebula. Detectable without OIII filter, it appeared like a grey blob at both these magnifications. An OIII filter made the object more clear from the background sky, but its details did not improve.

M41 CMa Opn CL 50x
Quit rich open cluster formed by bright stars and dim stars in the background. It was fantastic.

NGC2362 CMa Opn CL 50x, 92x
Tau CMa cluster. Quite interesting. A bright star at the centre surrounded by 10-15 dim stars.

NGC2354 CMa Opn CL 50x
Diffuse open cluster with stars of similar brightness.

145CMa CMa Dbl Star 50x
Nice bright pair of stars, one orange and one white-blue.

NGC2367 CMa Opn CL 50x, 92x
Not sure I spot this.

NGC2383 CMa Opn CL 50x
NGC2383 and NGC2384 are two close open clusters. NGC2383 is slightly at north. Their sizes are small but they are quite characteristic because some bright stars are also in there.

NGC2384 CMa Opn CL 50x
See NGC2383.

NGC2421 Pup Opn CL 50x
A small cluster (8') with some bright stars surrounded by medium brightness stars.

NGC2432 Pup Opn CL 50x
Smaller than NGC2421 (4') and it did not seem much populated. Stars were dim.

NGC2440 Pup Pln Neb 50x, 171x +/- OIII
It was detectable at 50x without a filter with a bit of difficulty, but it was visible. It appeared as a grey blob. Stellarium 14.1 wrongly reports this as a target of apparent mag 18.9. It is actually of mag 9.4 on wikipedia. Accordingly to this source, its central star HD62166 is the hottest known white dwarf. Clearly not visible with this telescope!

2PupA Pup Dbl Star 50x
A pair of bright white-blue-ish stars. Nice to view.

M46 Pup Opn CL 50x
Spectacular open cluster. It looks like a great cloud of dim-medium brightness stars. It reminded me of the Sagittarius star cloud (M24). Near the centre there is the planetary nebula NGC2438 which I was not able to spot unfortunately.

M47 Pup Opn CL 50x
This is the most impressive target I saw tonight. A concentration of bright blue-ish stars shapes this open cluster.

NGC2423 Pup Opn CL 50x, 92x
From M47, there is a short chain of stars at North which leads to this open cluster. It is quite pretty, but I believe it is simply forgotten due to its proximity to M47.

NGC2264 Mon CL+Neb 50x
Christmas Tree. Now I understand why it is called tree. With a refractor this is upside down instead. Gorgeous target with two bright stars at the extremes and moderately bright stars all surrounding forming tree branches.

NGC2251 Mon Opn CL 50x
Nice moderate cluster at South-West of NGC2264.

NGC2254 Mon Opn CL 50x
Same as NGC2251. This cluster is located slightly south of NGC2251.

NGC2244 Mon Opn CL 50x +/- OIII
Satellite cluster. Nice bright cluster. I tried to see the Rosette Nebula using an OIII filter but I do not think the sky was transparent and dark enough for this target. It is also too large for my current field of view.

Jupiter - Planet 92x, 125x, 171x, 231x
Jupiter was impressive to observe. Although at 125x most of its features were visible, I achieved the best view at 171x. The primary mirror was already collimated but collimation was not top notch. For this reason I will test high power again as soon as I get the proper key to collimate the mirror. The secondary mirror was perfectly collimated instead. At 171x, the North and South Equatorial belts were visible. The north eq belt showed the presence of small obliquus shades. These were not obvious but detectable. The south eq belt was somehow more interesting. Two distinct lines formed this belt. On these two lines on one side of the planet, it was detectable the red giant spot (GRS). Again, this was not trivial but doable. The polar regions showed other two belts respectively. The south polar belt gradually fainted approaching the pole. The four satellite were all visible.
 

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Piero

Piero

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Great report, Piero, and glad you're enjoying your new toy. How have you found the "dob-nudge"?

Thanks Paul. :-) I hoped to use it yesterday, but it was too foggy to even see Jupiter unfortunately. 

No problem with moving the telescope to chase planets. It seems very smooth to me.

It took me a little bit to learn to observe sitting on a chair. Not a big issue, but I just prefer observing standing up. I am considering to put it on a low table to make the observation more comfortable. Just an option, not a requirement though :)

It is a really nice telescope and I can see why a 200 dobson is the most sold dobson in the UK. I will miss it once back home in England, but again, this might push me to go back to my country more often. 

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