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Great Saturn!


Piero

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Last night I managed a short (due to clouds) but excellent session on Saturn with my 8" dob. 

The Cassini division was well distinct and clear over time. I could spot it also on the frontal-central side quite easily. The equatorial belt showed a dense colour too. Shadows between the planet and its rings were limited but noticeable. Three satellites were visible and displaced on one side of the planet. 

The sight was really beautiful despite the high humidity levels and the layer of high clouds which condensed shortly. 

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Nice report! Very similar experience here Piero: I had my 180 Mak and ED80 frac out on the SkTee2 mount. For as long as it lasted before the cloud drove me indoors to the Nero d'Avola , the detail was exquisite and amazing for an altitude of 12 degrees or so. It was noticeable that some of the fainter moons I've seen with Saturn higher in the sky were not visible, but hardly surprising given the haze and the cloud beginning to form.

Chris

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had some good views myself lastnight through thin cloud, using old faithfull f9.5, got a few snaps too, didn't see any moons but that's prob the cloud filters fault, could see colour and cass-div well. great report Piero, hope to get another chance tonight. charl.

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2 hours ago, Littleguy80 said:

Enjoyed some great views too although the Cassini division still eludes me. How much magnification are you using to see it? 

I could see it at 92x and easily at 138x. I didn't use higher magnifications because the high clouds were thickening, making the image too dim. 

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3 minutes ago, Piero said:

I could see it at 92x and easily at 138x. I didn't use higher magnifications because the high clouds were thickening, making the image too dim. 

Oh wow. I used 150x and was missing it. Should it be achievable with a smaller scope? I have a 5" newt. This is probably "user error" on my part ;) 

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15 minutes ago, Littleguy80 said:

Oh wow. I used 150x and was missing it. Should it be achievable with a smaller scope? I have a 5" newt. This is probably "user error" on my part ;) 

It all depends on the seeing and the angle the rings, actually! :) 

I managed to spot the division on the outer parts of the rings with a 60mm refractor at 72x under excellent seeing. Make sure your telescope is properly collimated, cooled down, and that the air is steady. Then, a bit of patience always helps! :) 

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Went back for another look last night. I collimated my scope in the afternoon. Quick star test on Polaris showed good collimation but the seeing didn't look so good. I spent over half an hour, around midnight, trying and failing to see the Cassini Division. Decided to move onto other targets. Saw M31 for the first time which was really exciting. Came back to Saturn around 2am and within a minute I saw the Cassini Division. It was amazing how much difference the improved seeing made. I'm putting it down to Saturn being a bit higher in the sky and the conditions improving as it cooled after a hot day. By far the best views of Saturn I've had! As you said, Piero, a little patience needed :)

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1 hour ago, Littleguy80 said:

Went back for another look last night. I collimated my scope in the afternoon. Quick star test on Polaris showed good collimation but the seeing didn't look so good. I spent over half an hour, around midnight, trying and failing to see the Cassini Division. Decided to move onto other targets. Saw M31 for the first time which was really exciting. Came back to Saturn around 2am and within a minute I saw the Cassini Division. It was amazing how much difference the improved seeing made. I'm putting it down to Saturn being a bit higher in the sky and the conditions improving as it cooled after a hot day. By far the best views of Saturn I've had! As you said, Piero, a little patience needed :)

Well done! :thumbsup: 

I forgot to say, and you correctly pointed out, that Saturn is quite low in the sky. This makes things more complicated of course. This weekend I have been observing in Italy at a latitude of 45 deg. As consequence, Saturn is noticeably higher. 

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I was observing Saturn (amongst many other objects) with some astro society friends last night from our observatory site which is around 300 feet up and has clear and low E and S horizons. Saturn looked exquisite :smiley:

The scopes in use were the 1950's society 12" F/6 newtonian, a 10" Meade SCT, a 6" TAL newtonian, my ED120 refractor on the Skytee II and a super-high tech Celestron Edge 11 with full automation of everything.

I was rather surprised to find that my ED120 more than kept up with the larger aperture scopes on practically all targets, including Saturn where the concensus was that it was putting up the sharpest and most contrasty views. It also had the FoV to deliver lovely views of the Veil Nebula with the O-III filter in use.

Mind you, witnessing the C11 Edge producing detailed, colourful  and processed DSO images "on the fly" was very impressive indeed :smiley:

 

 

 

 

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Good views of Saturn tonight as well. At 125x magnification the Cassini division is clear and for the first time I can see 4 moons: Titan, Dione, Rhea and Tethys. The broad grey banding on the planet is quite obvious.

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  • 1 month later...

Nice report... Saturn is one of those hypnotizing views.. on a clear night I find my self glued to the eyepiece looking at Saturn for ages.... it's almost as if one can't get enough of the view.

 

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2 hours ago, MarsG76 said:

Nice report... Saturn is one of those hypnotizing views.. on a clear night I find my self glued to the eyepiece looking at Saturn for ages.... it's almost as if one can't get enough of the view.

Very true! :) Also Jupiter gives me that feeling! But Saturn is... just so elegant! 

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10 minutes ago, Piero said:

Very true! :) Also Jupiter gives me that feeling! But Saturn is... just so elegant! 

I agree, a clear view of Jupiter seems like it just keep on giving... just at you think you looked at all of the faint detail and are about to move to another object, up pops something new within the atmosphere....

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10 minutes ago, MarsG76 said:

I agree, a clear view of Jupiter seems like it just keep on giving... just at you think you looked at all of the faint detail and are about to move to another object, up pops something new within the atmosphere....

:thumbsup: Another time I had a truly hypnotic view, was with my TV60, the Docter, and the VIP 1.5x placed before the diagonal. I was roughly using around 90-100x, and 0.8-06mm exit pupil. The moon was possibly at 70%, but at that exit pupil its glare was completely fine at the eye. The Docter was able to frame the whole moon with a full black background sky. The seeing was very steady that night. It was absolutely beautiful. I floated for 1-2h with the Moon in front my eye. :rolleyes2:

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14 minutes ago, Piero said:

:thumbsup: Another time I had a truly hypnotic view, was with my TV60, the Docter, and the VIP 1.5x placed before the diagonal. I was roughly using around 90-100x, and 0.8-06mm exit pupil. The moon was possibly at 70%, but at that exit pupil its glare was completely fine at the eye. The Docter was able to frame the whole moon with a full black background sky. The seeing was very steady that night. It was absolutely beautiful. I floated for 1-2h with the Moon in front my eye. :rolleyes2:

Reminds me of the full moon view I had recently through both the 31mm Nagler and the 17mm Ethos, using a polarizer set to darkest and a moon & sky glow filter. It is WAY WAY too bright with out the filtering.

Not only did I see the full disc at both cases but the extra contrast added clearly distinguished the Maria and the ejecta streams, but also shows subtle shading within the Maria. 

The difference between the two is magnification, but looks amazing.

I never thought that I'd find the full moon interesting but there you go.

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1 hour ago, MarsG76 said:

The difference between the two is magnification, but looks amazing.

More to the point, the difference between the two is exit pupil. The 31mm in your 14" gives an exit pupil of 6.7mm, the 17mm gives 3.7mm which will reduce the brightness. 6.7mm is normally the realm of deep sky observing, no wonder the moon was too bright without hefty filtering :).

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5 hours ago, Stu said:

More to the point, the difference between the two is exit pupil. The 31mm in your 14" gives an exit pupil of 6.7mm, the 17mm gives 3.7mm which will reduce the brightness. 6.7mm is normally the realm of deep sky observing, no wonder the moon was too bright without hefty filtering :).

True with the massive exit pupil... but it's way too bright using both eyepieces... at such a brightness, I'm sure my pupils closed down to pin points, so the exit pupil out of the EPs wouldn't matter.

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4 hours ago, MarsG76 said:

True with the massive exit pupil... but it's way too bright using both eyepieces... at such a brightness, I'm sure my pupils closed down to pin points, so the exit pupil out of the EPs wouldn't matter.

I think a fully constricted pupil is around 3mm (2 to 4mm). Depending upon the scope it would be normal to be down at 1mm or even 0.5mm EP at high powers so it does make a difference.

EDIT To be clear, the effective surface brightness from the two eyepieces may have been roughly the same because of your constricted pupil but increasing the power beyond this does help cut the brightness levels. This will be through exit pupil effect and also because you then are looking at less than full disk.

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It's funny but I just don't find that I need filtering to view the Moon even with my 12" dob :icon_scratch:

I don't tend to observe it often at low powers mind you although the Ethos 8mm can still show the whole lunar disk (just) at 199x.

I agree that backing off the power a bit does help to enhance the tones and tint of the lunar surface. Following the ejecta rays from the larger craters is fun :icon_biggrin:

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23 minutes ago, John said:

It's funny but I just don't find that I need filtering to view the Moon even with my 12" dob :icon_scratch:

I think this just shows different eye sensitivity John. My eyes are different to each other, one eye less sensitive than the other but shows better resolution. I don't think you can say that because you don't need filters that others will not get a benefit from them. We are getting on a bit ;) so I guess our eyes' lenses are probably less transparent than when we were younger so the young whipper snappers amongst us probably do need a bit of filtering on the moon.

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41 minutes ago, Stu said:

I think this just shows different eye sensitivity John. My eyes are different to each other, one eye less sensitive than the other but shows better resolution. I don't think you can say that because you don't need filters that others will not get a benefit from them. We are getting on a bit ;) so I guess our eyes' lenses are probably less transparent than when we were younger so the young whipper snappers amongst us probably do need a bit of filtering on the moon.

Some old "whipper-snappers" too........ Too much unfiltered Moon in my right eye and a visual migraine kicks in pdq.

Chris

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