Sirius A + B

[Astronut]

Despite the almost full moon last night in Gemini and the less than favourable seeing conditions I had a look at the Trapezium and couldn't detect the F star and the E star was elusive but just visible in steady moments. I've seen both E and F previously but the seeing conditions were better and the Moon was out of the way. I had a go at Sirius to see if I could see the mag 8.6 'pup' but failed.

Does this need a moonless night and better seeing conditions? I'm using a 12" dob with Paracorr, 13mm Ethos and 2x Powermate. I've been reading up and the separation is currently about 7 or 8 arcseconds (or maybe less) and increasing each year.

Anybody seen the 'pup' and what techniques, magnification, etc. did you use? A home-made occulting bar might be useful but I'd be interested to see if anyone's seen it without one.

[GazOC]

IMHO for faint double stars, a driven smaller scope is better than a manually moved Dob (within reason). The best bet is either an occulting bar or to try and Siruis just outside the eyepiece field stop.

[barkis]

I always thought a 3" f15 frac. at fairly high mag would offer a reasonable chance of seeing the pup. Based on the Idea that even the glare of Sirius would be dampened down, and the little chap may get a look in.

Never had the chance to use such an instrument though. I tried many times to see it though. No luck.

Ron.

[lunator]

The best way to see the Pup is to head South.

From the UK the lack of altitude makes the split very hard.

Cheers

Ian

[Doc]

Sirius is very hard to split due to A being so much brighter then B.

And I agree with Gaz refractors are much better splitting tight doubles IMO