A bit from the 20th

[neil phillips]

Pretty good seeing tonight. Too tired to process. Need my big scope running. But this little 114mm  Newt punches way above its weight.

EQ2 mount QHY 462c converted to greyscale

[CraigT82]

Superb Neil! Even got a clear view of the rille in Valles Alpes. Hadley Rille looking lovely too.

[Roy Foreman]

Very nice detail and quality. Well done. I have yet to process my images from the 19th and 20th !!

[Stu]

Excellent shots Neil. Hadley Rille was looking very good last night which you’ve caught in your last shot. 

[neil phillips]

1 hour ago, Roy Foreman said:

Very nice detail and quality. Well done. I have yet to process my images from the 19th and 20th !!

Hi Roy not sure what you thought ?  but on the 19th i captured a whole mosaic in IR850. Yet on screen there is clearly a lot of heat ripple. Which IR is supposed to to reject especially at 850nm. But last night. shooting in Colour with just a  IR UV  block. The image was almost (not quite) dead still. Just wondering did you notice more heat disturbance on the 19th compared to the 20th ? Cheers for any feedback 

[neil phillips]

was tired last night forgot to add was using a 2X Omni Celestron Barlow in the imaging train. Getting better at tweaking this cheap economy manual RA drive (powered with a 9 volt battery) Then when i first started.

You set the speed with a little rotary dial. fine for a bit then its off again. But spending a lot more time tweaking this variable speed setting.  Which has allowed me to up the focal length to F16 

[neil phillips]

2 hours ago, CraigT82 said:

Superb Neil! Even got a clear view of the rille in Valles Alpes. Hadley Rille looking lovely too.

Hi Craig getting the Rille surprised me. I have never got it with such a small scope before. A first for me. Spent time tweaking collimation last night both the secondary (preferring to use a coli cap than my laser) and the primary with a cheshire. Collimation was def better i thought. What with the good seeing Very pleased how the little scope performed. Sentimental to me too, as it is my daughters 15 year old birthday present. (We are very close love her with all my heart) Was in a bad way but recently flocked it. cleaned and centre stickered the primary. Hiluxed the secondary

Edited April 21, 2021 by neil phillips

[neil phillips]

1 hour ago, Stu said:

Excellent shots Neil. Hadley Rille was looking very good last night which you’ve caught in your last shot. 

Cheers Stu yes as mentioned to Craig a first for me with this size scope.  Seeing was pretty stable last night. Sounds like you had good seeing too ?

Edited April 21, 2021 by neil phillips

[vineyard]

Those are lovely. Delicate, sharp & v nicely processed (the textures on the 3rd one in particular) 👍🏾 

[Stu]

22 minutes ago, neil phillips said:

Cheers Stu yes as mentioned to Craig a first for me with this size scope.  Seeing was pretty stable last night. Sounds like you had good seeing too ?

Yes, that’s an impressive effort. I tried it briefly in my Tak FC100DC and I could just about see a section of it, but in the 8” it was clear.

Seeing was pretty good last night, some slowish wobble but the detail remained good, and occasionally excellent.

[neil phillips]

6 minutes ago, vineyard said:

Those are lovely. Delicate, sharp & v nicely processed (the textures on the 3rd one in particular) 👍🏾 

Thanks Vineyard much appreciated

Edited April 21, 2021 by neil phillips

[neil phillips]

1 minute ago, Stu said:

Yes, that’s an impressive effort. I tried it briefly in my Tak FC100DC and I could just about see a section of it, but in the 8” it was clear.

Seeing was pretty good last night, some slowish wobble but the detail remained good, and occasionally excellent.

A good assesment of what i was seeing last night too 

[Nik271]

Superb images! These long tube Newtonians are really good, at F7 or F8 I guess? They don't make make many slow focal ratio scopes like that any more, which is a shame, they seem to be excellent for planetary work.

By the way did somebody get the 'eyes of Calvius' last night, around 9pm? Clavius C and Clavius D were the only craterlets illuminated and they looked like an owl staring at me. I was doing only visual and was too tired to fiddle with the camera, focusing etc. Still was rather hoping somebody took an image of this 

[Stu]

2 minutes ago, Nik271 said:

These long tube Newtonians are really good, at F7 or F8 I guess? They don't make make many slow focal ratio scopes like that any more, which is a shame, they seem to be excellent for planetary work.

Indeed they are! This is my 8” f8. Lovely for lunar and planetary.

[neil phillips]

29 minutes ago, Nik271 said:

Superb images! These long tube Newtonians are really good, at F7 or F8 I guess? They don't make make many slow focal ratio scopes like that any more, which is a shame, they seem to be excellent for planetary work.

By the way did somebody get the 'eyes of Calvius' last night, around 9pm? Clavius C and Clavius D were the only craterlets illuminated and they looked like an owl staring at me. I was doing only visual and was too tired to fiddle with the camera, focusing etc. Still was rather hoping somebody took an image of this 

Hi Nik not noticed it yet, but if i do see it, should be able to post at some point. Long focus Newts are killer for lunar. Sky watcher do a 6" F8 for a good price that i would like to try. Infact FLO sell a Bresser 6" F8 Dob that can also be split for imaging. I saw on there website

[neil phillips]

34 minutes ago, Stu said:

Indeed they are! This is my 8” f8. Lovely for lunar and planetary.

Lovely 8 there Stu must be superb. I see tracking there too

[Roy Foreman]

1 hour ago, neil phillips said:

Hi Roy not sure what you thought ?  but on the 19th i captured a whole mosaic in IR850. Yet on screen there is clearly a lot of heat ripple. Which IR is supposed to to reject especially at 850nm. But last night. shooting in Colour with just a  IR UV  block. The image was almost (not quite) dead still. Just wondering did you notice more heat disturbance on the 19th compared to the 20th ? Cheers for any feedback 

Hi Neil - I found that the 19th was a lot steadier than the 20th.  Haven't processed the data sufficiently yet to tell from my results. but I am in a different part of the country to you so that might make a big difference. On both nights I was shooting in twilight, which is normal for me as I find the air is steadier at this time where I live. I was using a red filter which really helps in the battle against turbulence, so I would have thought that your IR filter would have done an even better job - as you were expecting also.  I can't explain this, other than to say that maybe the red / IR filters reduce micro turbulence at the fine detail level, but not the 'macro' turbulence where the whole moon appears to ripple and shift about. Your exposure times might possibly play a part in this also. 

In spite of all this you do seem to have recorded some fine detail, which is what caught my eye. Good luck and hope you manage to resolve this

Roy

 

[neil phillips]

6 hours ago, Roy Foreman said:

Hi Neil - I found that the 19th was a lot steadier than the 20th.  Haven't processed the data sufficiently yet to tell from my results. but I am in a different part of the country to you so that might make a big difference. On both nights I was shooting in twilight, which is normal for me as I find the air is steadier at this time where I live. I was using a red filter which really helps in the battle against turbulence, so I would have thought that your IR filter would have done an even better job - as you were expecting also.  I can't explain this, other than to say that maybe the red / IR filters reduce micro turbulence at the fine detail level, but not the 'macro' turbulence where the whole moon appears to ripple and shift about. Your exposure times might possibly play a part in this also. 

In spite of all this you do seem to have recorded some fine detail, which is what caught my eye. Good luck and hope you manage to resolve this

Roy

 

Cheers for that Roy, as you say so many possibilities probably will never know, but seeing did seem more stable here on the 20th interesting it was the opposite for you. Probably some regional difference. Having said that it wasnt awful on the 19. just more heat but with IR 850 ? Which seemed odd

[WestCoastCannuck]

Holy Moly Neil!   This, with the 114?!!   Wow!  Absolutely love the IQ and processing here.   The higher key look was done really well.

 

Cheers

 

Mike