First good night in over a month!

[Yellow dwarf]

As this was the first clear night I’ve had were I live in over a month, I was quite excited to use my telescope again. I was also looking forward to looking at Jupiter and Saturn, as this was also the first night that I would be able to observe them with my 8 inch dob. At around 11:40, after letting the scope cool down for a while, I set about finding my first target, M11 in Scutum. However, I found it impossible to find. I am still getting used to finding objects in a dob, and as M11 is in a very star-dense part of the sky, the finderscope wasn’t much use. After about 15 minutes of searching, I reluctantly gave up, and instead went to search for a target I have found before, M57(the ring nebula) in Lyra. I found it easily, and it was very beautiful at 160x magnification, using a 7.5mm eyepiece. I could make out the ring shape easily, but it didn’t look as good as the last time(seeing wasn’t great and transparency was less than perfect). However, it was still a lovely object to observe. I then had to get a look at M13, which looked fabulous. Individual stars where easy to make out around the edge, with them tantalisingly close to resolution in the core. I viewed it best at between 75x and 120x magnification(using 32mm or 20mm eyepieces with a 2x Barlow respectively). I then looked at M71, the faint globular cluster in Sagitta. It looked alright, pretty unremarkable and very faint. After spending about 10-15 mins on this target, I then searched for the M27(the dumbbell nebula) in Vulpecular. It was very difficult to find, and when I did find it, it looked very faint, with the shape difficult to make out. I may have been on the wrong target, as Turn Left says it is a lot more spectacular. Anyway, it was about 1 o’clock now, and Saturn had cleared my house’s roof. Eagerly, I pointed my scope at it, and could make out the rings at 37.5x magnification. I then went up through the magnifications, and then looked in awe at 160x. The rings were clearly visible, there was a band running across the planet. Adding an 80A blue filter enhanced the band, and I then went up to 320x magnification by adding a 2x barlow. This did make the band harder to spot, but made the Cassini division just about visible around the edges of the rings, furthest away from the planet. After staring in awe at Saturn for a while,  I notice Jupiter had cleared the tree next to my house. I then eagerly turned my scope towards Jupiter at looked at it at 160x magnification. The sight was amazing. The four moons where very clear(going from left to right were Callisto, Europa, Io and Ganymede). There was also a lot of banding on the planet; with clear colour differences between the belts and zones. I then continued to switch between Jupiter and Saturn until I eventually packed in at around 1:45, when I got a bit too tired. This is probably a night I’ll remember for quite a long time, as it was the first good telescopic view I’ve ever had of Jupiter and Saturn.

Equipment used:

Skywatcher Classic 200p Dobsonian

Astro Essentials 32mm, 20mm and 7.5mm super plossl eyepieces

Astro Essentials 2x Barlow

Antares #80A blue filter

 

I’ve just realised that I’ve wrote quite a lot, thank you if you have taken the time to read this all, it means a lot to me.

[Pixies]

Seeing was poor last night for me - due to the hot weather I think, rather than the jetstream. I had a bit of a late session and the transparency and especially the seeing improved greatly around 2am.

The dumbbell is faint unless you have a dark sky. An Oiii filter makes a HUGE difference with this target. Last night I could easily see the hourglass shape with direct vision. M57 is less improved with filters (IMHO), UHC is a little better than Oiii - but my UHC filter is  a relative cheapy, so I could easily be mistaken.

For M11 (Wild Duck Cluster) , you need to find the 'Croissant' asterism (that's my name for it) at the base of Aquilla:

That's easy to find in a magnifying finder or binoculars if your sky isn't dark enough:

You can find M11 (blue) using the 2 bright stars Eta and Beta Scutii - plus the 2 close stars (yellow) act as a pointer, too:

Happy hunting!

Edited July 17, 2021 by Pixies

[Yellow dwarf]

1 hour ago, Pixies said:

Seeing was poor last night for me - due to the hot weather I think, rather than the jetstream. I had a bit of a late session and the transparency and especially the seeing improved greatly around 2am.

The dumbbell is faint unless you have a dark sky. An Oiii filter makes a HUGE difference with this target. Last night I could easily see the hourglass shape with direct vision. M57 is less improved with filters (IMHO), UHC is a little better than Oiii - but my UHC filter is  a relative cheapy, so I could easily be mistaken.

For M11 (Wild Duck Cluster) , you need to find the 'Croissant' asterism (that's my name for it) at the base of Aquilla:

That's easy to find in a magnifying finder or binoculars if your sky isn't dark enough:

You can find M11 (blue) using the 2 bright stars Eta and Beta Scutii - plus the 2 close stars (yellow) act as a pointer, too:

Happy hunting!

Thank you very much for the help, hopefully I can attempt M11 tonight if the sky stays clear. I should have added to my report that my observing night was the night of 15th - 16th July. I’m going to probably by an astronomik UHC filter soon, I’m hoping that will make enough of a difference on faint nebulae.