Deep sky objects

[healeddoughnut]

Hi all, fantastic forum, I must say. 

As a relative beginner, this lockdown has made me "get out the scope", and now my kids are fascinated with the moon, (they can see aliens in the craters would you believe). I personally would like to see some deep sky objects such as galaxies and nebula's.

My scope is a Celestron 150mm XLT which my wife bought for me, I have to say the best pressie ever. I recall as a kid one of my neighbours showed me Saturn and I was hooked. Always wanted my own but was never in one place long enough to own one. Now I do.

So the advice I am after is what is the best way to see galaxies/nebulas using my Celestron. Can I see them? Do I need any special eye pieces?

Your advice and guidance would be most gratefully received.

I hope you are all well and safe in these uncertain times, and may I thank you in advance.

Kind regards

Steve

[Paul M]

Hi and welcome!

Indeed, this lockdown has seen many of us making the most of the recent clear skies

Your scope is great little scope. What you will be able to see with is it very much dependent on how dark your sky is, or more specifically how badly you are affected by light polution.

Whatever you do, don't expect to see nebulae and galaxies through the scope that look anything like the impressive images posted on SGL. Imagery and visual observation are very, very different approaches to the hobby. You are best using low power eyepieces. You can have a lot of fun at just 50x magnification. The focal length of your telescope will be displayed on a label somewhere, divide that number by the number on your eyepiece to find your magnification. So if your focal length is 1000mm and your eyepiece is 25mm you'll have a magnification of 40x. A nice starting point. As the number on the eyepiece gets smaller the magnification increases but the image quality starts to fall off and it becomes more difficult to point and control the telescope.

My advice is to learn some constellations. Read up on some objects of interest and try and find them. The more time you spend looking the more you will see as you develop observing skill.

Right now, in the evening sky is Venus, showing an ever thinner crescent as it moves between Earth and the Sun. Later in the year is planet fest. Mars will make one of its better apparitions and the ever reliable Jupiter and Saturn will be in the sky most of the night now until late in the year. Just right now they are early morning objects.

I'd recommend installing a planetarium program on you computer, such as Stellarium or SkySafari on your mobile device. They take a bit of learning but are indispensable for showing what's up and at what time. 

We're heading towards the light nights now so opportunities are limited but the summer constellations with the Milky Way overhead. A great naked eye sight. 

The best advice is to read up on these forums. The best resource in the Universe....probably

 

[bingevader]

Hello Steve!

A bit more info about your telescope would be useful, but a 150mm of anything is a good place to start!

What eye pieces do you have at the moment?

As Paul M has said, you do have to get out a bit later at the moment for darkness.

Stellarium is definitely a good piece of software to start with to find what you want to look at.

[des anderson]

It`s  learning curve that most astronomers go through. Learning the sky is easy, the only downside is..IT`S BIG. Get a basic book with the northern hemisphere in it and northern constellation`s or one of the monthly magazines. Take one bright constellation learn your way around, look at the brightest star,whats name? Is there any double or multi stars as you look around get a little note book and jot down what you see, it all helps to learn and in the future you can look at your notes and you will be surprised how much you`ve learnt. Des

[Jiggy 67]

Get the book Turn Left at Orion. It will teach you everything you need to know to get started and contains accurate locations with maps/diagrams for all the best objects at any time of the year 

[Stu1smartcookie]

If ever there was a case for "learning on the job " then our fascinating hobby is it ! I can literally spend hours looking at a piece of sky and then referencing it to the app "night sky " on my phone . Smaller scopes may not seem a great option for visual stuff but i love the fact that my wide field refractor  means i can literally see wide field . I think your scope is a nice bit of kit .. how wonderful that your kids are enthusiastic too . Enjoy every moment ,  even the frustrating ones, as  thats actually when you learn the most . I reckon you should get some great views of the planets with that scope . Clear Skies to you . 

[healeddoughnut]

You guys are amazing, lots of wonderful advice.  To answer some of your questions, I have listed them in order...lol. 

Bingevader; I have 40mm, 32mm, 25mm, 20mm, 10mm, 6mm and a 3.5mm lenses, plus 5 filters, and a Barlow x 2. I think that's ok for a start don't you?

Paul M; I also have Stellarium and Sky Safari, plus Sky Map on my mobile, can you recommend one for my pc perhaps?

To Jiggy 67, I actually ordered Turn Left at Orion 2 days ago, just waiting for it to come. Thanks for that affirmation.

Des: that's a really good idea, having a note book, I can get my kids to write down what we see so they can learn too.

Stu1smartcookie: I couldn't agree more about my kids enjoying it, they cant believe they are looking at the moon and Venus, describing in beautiful childish detail to their grandma what they have seen.

Thanks to all who replied, I did join this forum a good few years back, but with one thing and another, life kinda got in the way and this got put on the back burner.

We have a nice house now, with a large pitch black garden, so I am really hopeful I will get to see lots this year, and be able to report back here.

Thanks again guys, stay safe and well.

Kindest regards

Steve

[Stu]

4 minutes ago, healeddoughnut said:

You guys are amazing, lots of wonderful advice.  To answer some of your questions, I have listed them in order...lol. 

Bingevader; I have 40mm, 32mm, 25mm, 20mm, 10mm, 6mm and a 3.5mm lenses, plus 5 filters, and a Barlow x 2. I think that's ok for a start don't you?

Paul M; I also have Stellarium and Sky Safari, plus Sky Map on my mobile, can you recommend one for my pc perhaps?

To Jiggy 67, I actually ordered Turn Left at Orion 2 days ago, just waiting for it to come. Thanks for that affirmation.

Des: that's a really good idea, having a note book, I can get my kids to write down what we see so they can learn too.

Stu1smartcookie: I couldn't agree more about my kids enjoying it, they cant believe they are looking at the moon and Venus, describing in beautiful childish detail to their grandma what they have seen.

Thanks to all who replied, I did join this forum a good few years back, but with one thing and another, life kinda got in the way and this got put on the back burner.

We have a nice house now, with a large pitch black garden, so I am really hopeful I will get to see lots this year, and be able to report back here.

Thanks again guys, stay safe and well.

Kindest regards

Steve

There is a PC version of Stellarium which is very good, or Cartes du Ciel is another that gets recommended a lot although I don’t personally use it.

As others have said, you have a very nice and capable telescope and it sounds like you have an ideal garden to observe from which will make all the difference; nice and easy to setup with no need to travel and dark skies to get the best out of the scope.

I’m sure you know, but the magnification of each eyepiece is given by the focal length of the scope (750mm in your case I think) divided by the focal length of the eyepiece. So the 40mm gives x18 and the 3.5mm x214. The other useful thing to understand is the field of view you will see in each eyepiece. Each eyepiece has an apparent field of view spec. If you divide this by the magnification it gives in your scope then you get the true field of view seen through the eyepiece. Understanding this really help you to know what you are seeing, as objects vary in size hugely. The Andromeda Galaxy for instance is about 3 degrees long when seen under a dark sky, so needs a wide field of view, whereas something like the Ring Nebula is small and needs high power to see properly.

Assuming your eyepieces are 50 degree apparent field of view, the 40mm would give 2.7 degrees of sky, and the 3.5mm gives 0.23 degrees. Simplistically if you try to view the Andromeda Galaxy through the 3.5mm you will just see the core filling the view and no detail. Viewed in the 40mm you will fit most of it in, along with the two satellite galaxies M32 and M110. Conversely, if you use the 40mm to view M57 then you may just overlook it as a slightly fuzzy star, but in the high power you will properly see the ring shape.

To see nebulae well, you may want to invest in a UHC and potentially an OIII filter. Whilst galaxies don’t benefit from filtration in general, emission nebulae do and objects like the Ring Nebula, Orion Nebula, Veil and North America nebulae etc really do benefit from narrow band filters which darken the background significantly whilst allowing the light from the nebulae through, enhancing the contrast and visibility significantly. These large objects can have relatively high brightness values but the light is spread out over a large area the surface brightness is low so they can be harder to see, hence the need for dark skies and filters for nebulae.

So, use the programs like Stellarium and Skysafari to understand the size and brightness of the objects and choose your eyepiece accordingly.

Hope that’s of some use, sounds like you should have some fun!

[Alan White]

A bit late to your post, sorry.

Have to agree with all the pointers given, a 150mm is a very capable scope, it should prove most useful, I have a 150mm reflector amongst others and it’s a firm favourite.

Having a dark garden and sky is a major advantage, you are lucky.

The one big thing is to not be disappointed with the grey smudges that you can see, they will most certainly not look Hubble like in anyway. But don’t let that put you off, a grey smudge is very far away and that light is very old hitting your eyeball.

Time with your children is truly Golden time well spent, My now long passed Dad set me going observing and I continued that with my own two, now grown up. Time at the eyepiece or just watching the sky together is great. I sometimes lay in the garden spotting satellites with one of my two when they come home after a hard shift, one in the Police the other Ambulance Service.

[bingevader]

12 hours ago, healeddoughnut said:

Bingevader; I have 40mm, 32mm, 25mm, 20mm, 10mm, 6mm and a 3.5mm lenses, plus 5 filters, and a Barlow x 2. I think that's ok for a start don't you?

Plenty!