A great night for galaxies

[jetstream]

An unexpected clear night had me wheeling out the 15" f4.8 dob to try the encoders out on some galaxies. They worked perfectly and the extra FOV over the 24" is a pleasure to use, no ladder either.

Nothing extravagant observed- NGC 2403 was very large and bright, M108 was revealing some delicate structure and M51 had the bridge and bright spirals showing superbly. I had a whole list of galaxies in the Sky Commander and the 15" finds them very fast. The Rosette showed huge and bright and the Monkeyhead same thing- I must check the maps out as I caught some extra nebulosity near the latter.

M106 has a few nearby galaxies- NGC4248, very bright and just off this one I caught a faint, very close pair-NGC 4231 and NGC4232. The 10mm Delos offered the best view of these, better than the lower mag Docter and all viewing was done with the PCII.

What a great relief to be able to have fun and view with all thats going on everywhere and I'm lucky that if I have to stay home I can still go out on the property in this rural lake area.

I hope others will be able to view soon and have a night like I did tonight

All the best to everyone, Gerry

[Mr_42tr0nomy]

That sounds like a great night out! I have to ask, What are you views in the 15" like compared to the ones in your 24.5"? Im curious about both planetary/lunar and deep sky. I bet Globular cluster look thee dimensional with that 24". I have a 14" And I love it.. I cant imagine a 24 inch dob! haha

 

Clear Skies

[Ships and Stars]

Sounds excellent Gerry! I'm hoping to nip out tonight before the c.1am moonrise but cloud looks hit and miss. The 15" sounds like a brilliant scope and with the encoders, a real timesaver as well. 

We are not getting out much, but plenty of places to walk around here so we're lucky as well in the grand scheme of things.

I'm hoping to make the most of the remaining darkness for this new moon and the next, then it's going to be quiet here on the DSO front until late August.

Cheers!

[jetstream]

7 hours ago, Mr_42tr0nomy said:

That sounds like a great night out! I have to ask, What are you views in the 15" like compared to the ones in your 24.5"? Im curious about both planetary/lunar and deep sky. I bet Globular cluster look thee dimensional with that 24". I have a 14" And I love it.. I cant imagine a 24 inch dob! haha

 

Clear Skies

Thanks, it felt good to observe for sure.

First off the sky here goes from 21.4 mag to 21.8 mag depending on season and transparency, so it is dark. From these skies all scopes offer very high contrast, even the H130 mini dob.

The 24" gives great view of galaxies, PN's and the Veil etc as it has large image scale at a bright eye illumination at f4.1. Globs are excellent in it...

The 15" is a top lunar/planetray scope- it is an exceptional scope that goes well beyond 760x on the moon, very sharp. It beats the 24" that goes 500x-but- more fine detail is seen in the 24". The 24" has thermal issues for consistent high power planetary/lunar viewing.

Your 14" should give great views!

 

[Piero]

Good report, Gerry

Sometimes it is nice to simply revisit old favourites. I'm sure whatever you use, you will have a great galaxy season ahead! 

Hope that the sky becomes clear here too.

[jetstream]

49 minutes ago, Piero said:

Good report, Gerry

Sometimes it is nice to simply revisit old favourites. I'm sure whatever you use, you will have a great galaxy season ahead! 

Hope that the sky becomes clear here too.

Thanks Piero, its like visiting old friends in the sky which I seem to do more and more. A small portion of the sessions are dedicated to exploring, including this one and some surprises do pop up such as near the Monkey Head- I do believe I got the best view yet of the Sharpless group SH2-254-258. I had seen some of this previously but tonight it was "in my face" with the new TV filters. Not sure if they had anything to do with it but the views were VG.

I seem to be better at these diffuse objects over galaxies for some reason. The galaxy observing is coming along though and the Delos/PCII are working very well. This f4.8 scope likes a bit lower mag than the 10D/PCII gives on most all but the faintest of cores. A 12D would be VG and of course the Doc UWA is working well.

Yes, clear skies to you!

Edited March 15, 2020 by jetstream

[Piero]

6 minutes ago, jetstream said:

Thanks Piero, its like visiting old friends in the sky which I seem to do more and more. A small portion of the sessions are dedicated to exploring, including this one and some surprises do pop up such as near the Monkey Head- I do believe I got the best view yet of the Sharpless group SH2-254-258. I had seen some of this previously but tonight it was "in my face" with the new TV filters. Not sure if they had anything to do with it but the views were VG.

I seem to be better at these diffuse objects over galaxies for some reason. The galaxy observing is coming along though and the Delos/PCII are working very well. This f4.8 scope likes a bit lower mag than the 10D/PCII gives on most all but the faintest of cores. A 12D would be VG and of course the Doc UWA is working well.

Yes, clear skies to you!

I just put your data in my calculator. 

So the Docter with your 15" w/ PC2 gives 168.25x and 2.26mm e.p. 

In my dob w/o PC2, the Docter gives 145.04x and 2.03mm e.p. W/ PC2, these # become 166.80x and 1.77mm e.p. 

[jetstream]

58 minutes ago, Piero said:

I just put your data in my calculator. 

So the Docter with your 15" w/ PC2 gives 168.25x and 2.26mm e.p. 

In my dob w/o PC2, the Docter gives 145.04x and 2.03mm e.p. W/ PC2, these # become 166.80x and 1.77mm e.p. 

The advantage to fast f ratios is eye illumination as you know and the larger aperture adds focal length. I like more eye illumination than f4.8 gives so for me on many galaxies I like 2mm-3mm but to pull cores out I go much lower.

If I were going to buy another bigish dob it would be f3.5 and 18"-20"- so I could stand -no ladder. There would be much flexibility with such a scope and within Naglers PCII design specs. if money was no object Mike Lockwood would craft the mirror- this is his specialty and is perhaps the best at it. A JP Astrocraft cell would be enlisted as well.

As always, astronomy has learning curves lol!

You did well in designing your scope Piero.

 

[Piero]

30 minutes ago, jetstream said:

The advantage to fast f ratios is eye illumination as you know and the larger aperture adds focal length. I like more eye illumination than f4.8 gives so for me on many galaxies I like 2mm-3mm but to pull cores out I go much lower.

If I were going to buy another bigish dob it would be f3.5 and 18"-20"- so I could stand -no ladder. There would be much flexibility with such a scope and within Naglers PCII design specs. if money was no object Mike Lockwood would craft the mirror- this is his specialty and is perhaps the best at it. A JP Astrocraft cell would be enlisted as well.

As always, astronomy has learning curves lol!

You did well in designing your scope Piero.

Thanks Gerry. 

I also think that a lot depends on the skies on observes. Under my moderately light polluted skies, I like 2mm-1.5mm exit pupil as medium power eyepiece. That gives me a the best contrast for a large variety of targets. There is also a personal factor to add.. I tend to like a "jump" in magnification rather than small increments. For instance, the 20mm rarely saw the focuser as I tend to jump from 30mm to 12.5mm, and then I kick the VIP in to go to about 300x with the docter. Other people like larger sets of eyepieces so that they can fine tune. Different tastes!