Nice Aquarius Double, Then Neptune

[cloudsweeper]

5.05pm, clear sky, cold, 8SE ready.  There was a lovely slim waxing crescent Moon, low, south-west, and slipping behind trees.

Aligned on Altair and Enif.  Got the three bright Psi Aquarii stars (1, 2, 3) to just about fit in the best 1.34deg FOV.

Psi 1 Aquarii: (Sigma II 12 in the von Struve Supplementary Catalogue.)  It's a triple/visual double.  The 4th mag. A star has two very close faint companions, 50" away.  And that's what I saw, very easily of course at x48, with the two tight, faint companions (not appearing separately) at about 11 o'clock.  Sky Safari confirmed the details, and other sources confirmed the position angle.  

8th magnitude Neptune was nearby, and GoTo put me right on it.  I took the mag up to x226, with which the view was deteriorating, but the planet showed magnification, though sadly no colour.

Just a quick hour before mealtime, but very enjoyable.

Doug.

[mark81]

Another nice session Doug - one of many over recent weeks... You must be having some nice luck with the gaps in the cloud (no good here) but, clear skies are one thing... You still need the determination to get out there.. 

Mark

[cloudsweeper]

36 minutes ago, mark81 said:

Another nice session Doug - one of many over recent weeks... You must be having some nice luck with the gaps in the cloud (no good here) but, clear skies are one thing... You still need the determination to get out there.. 

Mark

Thanks Mark!  Yes, determination is vital - I like to grab an opportunity when it arises.  Recently I had a great run of a few hours, then soon after, it was all clouded over.  I've had 11 outings so far this month, many when it's quite cold - no problem, I just have a brief session!  As long as I enjoy it, I'll continue like this.  Hope conditions improve for you!

Doug.

[domstar]

In between looking at the moon I tried this. Fantastic. Nice wide double and an easy hop to Neptune, which I haven't seen for maybe two years. Had a great long look. It's so clear tonight even my 6mm looks good and at 150x clearly not a star. Thanks for the continued inspiration.

[chiltonstar]

An interesting session - a nice double! Strange that Neptune showed no colour, I usually see it as very blue, even with my smallest scope. Do others see it as white or blue?

Chris

[John]

I spent 2 hours sharing Neptune this evening at an outreach event. Many of the 60 or so observers commented on it's blue tint but noticably more so the younger observers a few of which felt the blue tint was quite striking. I've noticed this before when sharing the views of coloured double stars so my conclusion is that younger eyes are the most sensitive to colour tints and older eyes much more variable. Very unscientific but fun !

The scope was my ED120 refractor at 281x.