M16 and the Firworks Galaxy

[Rodd]

I noticed that there was a slight tilt issue in the recent WR-134 image so I decided to purcase a Precise Parts adapter that replaced three separate parts.  Wow--what a difference.  Flats shot with the old connections did not have the lightcircular center with fading corners that we all come to expect from our flats--but they looked the opposite--bright corners and dimmer center.  Not terrible and certinly workable....WR 134 came out pretty good.  But I wanted it right.  So, Here are my first images with the  .7x reducer on teh TOA--well, partial images, only the red channel for the Fireworks Galaxy and the Ha channel for M16.  The big question with M16 is should I continue?  I concider none of the 41 300 sec subs worth keeping.  Conditions were poor and the target is very low in teh sky anyway.  FWHM values for the stack are about 4 arcsec.  That is 2x my goal.  I was discouraged.  The next clear night, instead of continueing with M16, I decided to shoot the red channel of the Fireworks Galaxy.  The FWHM value for this 34 300sec stack is much better (2.65 arcsec), which is decent for me and with my sky I can't complain.  Not much processing went into either.  

My question for M16 is--should I reshoot the Ha to acheive better FWHM, or am I making too much out of that?  My question for the Fireworks galaxy is should should I collect lum using sub lenths much shorter than 300sec.  I tried shooting a 300 sec lum and the frame came out very light gray.  My sky could not handle it.  Its true the sky was not at optimum darkness and the target was still low in teh sky---but womething tells me 300 sec lum will be way to much.  Should I collect 2min lum and 300 sec RGB--or shoudl I scrap the rd data I have a reshoot all subs at 2 min.  

M16: 41 300 sec Ha subs.  the FWHM value is much higher than I like.  My goal is to improve on my last M16 attempt, so starting with inferior data defeats that purpose

 

Fireworks Galaxy 34 300 red subs.  Is it OK to use 300 sec RGB subs and 120 sec lum subs.  I am concerned that 300 sec subs may saturate the stars.

Edited June 27, 2020 by Rodd