What did you see tonight?

[Stu1smartcookie]

8 hours ago, Naughty Neal said:

My f11 frac stays tucked away in  the warm with the wind and cloud about.

Mine too 

[jjohnson3803]

On 26/12/2023 at 16:03, bosun21 said:

I have had a solid curtain of thick clouds here for the past 2 weeks. Beginning to wonder whether spending over £1.5k on my new scope was a waste of time 🤔.

It can help if you have an indoor hobby to spend time on until the clouds move out.  I've decided to dig my HO trains out of storage - it's been cloudy here since before Christmas...

 

[Franklin]

21 minutes ago, jjohnson3803 said:

It can help if you have an indoor hobby to spend time on until the clouds move out.

Eyepiece collecting, now that's a great indoor hobby😁.

[Mr Spock]

Looked outside and it looks clear. I could see the moon and Jupiter. Got my kit out of its cupboard, carried the mount outside and carried it straight back in - clouds were rolling across 😡

[Mr Spock]

Forecast says clearing later so I'm going to stay up and wait it out.

[Mr Spock]

Just had a few minutes on Jupiter while the scope cools. GRS is about a third of the way across. Things are a bit fuzzy at the moment though - patience!

[Mr Spock]

Just had a great session on the moon. Petavius looked spectacular at x224 in the 4"; incredibly uneven surface with lots of different shading. Petavius A was lovely and crisp as were the rimae. Mare Crisium was also well presented with lots to see. The Dorsa Tetyaev was very prominent.

Jupiter was a loss. Too low and fuzzy now - I need to get this earlier in the evening. 

Finished off with a glimpse of the pup. Not easy with the strong wind shaking the scope.

I've come in now as the wind has gotten a bit too much. Shame as the seeing is quite good.

[JeremyS]

Observing Jupiter with the Mewlon but seeing is very poor

[Alan White]

Observing Jupiter, it’s clear and why not

GRS at 8.29 tonight I believe, it’s coming and going seeing wise but when it’s good it’s good 😊 

Tonight is just what I need right now

Edited December 29, 2023 by Alan White

[lunator]

Same here, some cloud blowing through but clear periods. The seeing is average at best but some reasonable detail on Jupiter and the GRS is reasonably visible. 

Also had a look at STF76 a tight faint pair. Not a clear view, one to return too in better conditions

cheers

Ian

[Mr Spock]

It's clear again here, but there's a howling wind. So, I'm staying inside.

[Ags]

It is clear here, but I am currently capturing some frames of a pile of wood-ash. I watched Oppenheimer tonight, so I decided to see if my fallout cam really works. I may need more wood ash, so this may only be a trial run...

[GrumpiusMaximus]

Finally got a session in tonight after waiting for more than a week!  My garden (faces practically due East, with the South and North visible, West totally obstructed by my house and all aspects obstructed by other houses, curse you developers!) was lit up by the Moon but I decided to look at M42 first of all through my 70ED and whilst much of the nebulosity was washed out by the Moon, it did afford me an excellent view of the Trapezium, which only improved once I put my 2X Barlow on with my 20mm WO Swan.  Averted vision gave me a nice view of the nebula too (obviously).

Had a little peek at Sirius.  No chance of splitting it in a million years but thought I'd have a look anyway whilst it was in view and not obstructed by my neighbour's house.  It's a star.  It's bright.  That's all I got!

Then I spent a while on the Moon's terminator.  I know absolutely nothing about Lunar geography but based on a bit of reading I had a great view of the central prominence of Langrenus as it was right on the terminator.  I'm always amazed at how much clearer the elevations are when they're on the line.  Grabbed my C5 for comparison but quickly realised that I desperately need to clean the front corrector plate.  The view in the 70ED was much sharper!

A good night, all told.

[bosun21]

5 hours ago, GrumpiusMaximus said:

.  Grabbed my C5 for comparison but quickly realised that I desperately need to clean the front corrector plate.  The view in the 70ED was much sharper!

Have you checked the collimation recently?

[RobertI]

6 hours ago, GrumpiusMaximus said:

My garden (faces practically due East, with the South and North visible, West totally obstructed by my house and all aspects obstructed by other houses,

Identical to me! 

[GrumpiusMaximus]

2 hours ago, bosun21 said:

Have you checked the collimation recently?

I have - but I'll need to check it again.  Had an 'incident' with it a few months back that involved collimation...

[Ed in UK]

This post is a bit late as it wasn't last night, but the night before 😳.

Out for a couple of hours and spent most of that on Jupiter. Still the same for me, Fuzzy disc with the occasional clearing showing the banding quite clearly.

After that moved on to Aldebaran and a looked around Taurus.

Followed by a look at Mirfak and the stars close by. This was the first time I've looked at Perseus and kicked myself a little for not compiling an Observing List from the Astronomy Now magazine which had an article on this constellation in the December issue.

This was also the first outing for my RA Motor which worked really well. Nice not having to fiddle the RA control and then wait for the scope to settle again.

Wind buffeted the scope a bit couldn't go beyond 12mm (x75) due to the movement from buffeting.

Edited December 30, 2023 by Ed in UK

[wesdon1]

On 21/12/2023 at 18:14, Mr Spock said:

Just a reminder - no bypassing the swear filter please 

@Mr Spock I wish other sites were as grown up and civilised as this one. The language and behaviour you often see on other sites just sully's the website and makes for an unpleasant experience.

[GrumpiusMaximus]

Saw an opportunity early this evening to take a look.  Was being rather stupid with my AZ-GTi though and it took me about ten minutes to realise I'd mounted the telescope on the wrong way around.  I need a bit more practice in getting a really good two-star alignment and I take too many shortcuts out of impatience and I'm usually able to work with a rough alignment but if I'm going to be looking for fainter objects in my 70ED, I need to do it properly.

My main goal is to improve my actual observing skill.  To this end, I'm going to have to learn to be more patient and take more time over each object but given the recent conditions I tend to rush everything to get out and look up quickly - which has its merits but doesn't really help me get any better at this hobby.  Learning to properly star-hop would be good too...

Anyhow.  Had a few minutes on Jupiter.  Was reasonably good to start with and saw Io very close to Jupiter.  Fiddled with my mount for a bit and by the time I'd got it sorted, it had disappeared from view - looking it up, it looks like there is a transit this evening but I couldn't pick up the moon in my small scope.  I really need to get my C5 cleaned and check the collimation before Jupiter goes out of my garden view, otherwise I'll end up at the front of my house worrying the neighbours...

Moved onto the Pleiades.  Decent view, very nice contrast.  Lots of detail really and some faint stars.  Had about fifteen minutes on that and then thought I'd have a go on M35.  Got a very clear look at it, just over some houses.  Open clusters really aren't something I usually bother with but I'm making a conscious effort to try and widen my observing as I really am stuck on the same four or five objects as i) I'm a beginner and ii) they're easy to see from my garden.

Had a go at M81.  I think due to a combination of poor seeing (it was starting to cloud to the North - in fact, it was starting to cloud all over), the small aperture of my scope (bad workman blaming tools) and total ineptitude (more like it), I completely failed to locate it.  I found the triangle of stars that points away easily enough but couldn't get it in view.  It's an easy view in my C5 and I've seen it through 80mm binoculars before so I suspect it's stupidity on my part.

Still having a lot of fun and learning a lot each night.  This is the most I've observed in a long time and I need to crack the telescope out at every opportunity.

Edited December 31, 2023 by GrumpiusMaximus

[mcrowle]

Oh, the Met Office currently forecasts Wednesday evening being clear for a while! Hope that works out, as it’ll be my first astro opportunity since early December.

There are some clear spells this evening to be fair, but with 40+ mph gusts and hail showers I can hear over my hifi, I think I’ll give tonight a miss 😄.

Good luck all, and happy New Year! Mike.

[SwiMatt]

1 hour ago, GrumpiusMaximus said:

Saw an opportunity early this evening to take a look.  Was being rather stupid with my AZ-GTi though and it took me about ten minutes to realise I'd mounted the telescope on the wrong way around.  I need a bit more practice in getting a really good two-star alignment and I take too many shortcuts out of impatience and I'm usually able to work with a rough alignment but if I'm going to be looking for fainter objects in my 70ED, I need to do it properly.

My main goal is to improve my actual observing skill.  To this end, I'm going to have to learn to be more patient and take more time over each object but given the recent conditions I tend to rush everything to get out and look up quickly - which has its merits but doesn't really help me get any better at this hobby.  Learning to properly star-hop would be good too...

Anyhow.  Had a few minutes on Jupiter.  Was reasonably good to start with and saw Io very close to Jupiter.  Fiddled with my mount for a bit and by the time I'd got it sorted, it had disappeared from view - looking it up, it looks like there is a transit this evening but I couldn't pick up the moon in my small scope.  I really need to get my C5 cleaned and check the collimation before Jupiter goes out of my garden view, otherwise I'll end up at the front of my house worrying the neighbours...

Moved onto the Pleiades.  Decent view, very nice contrast.  Lots of detail really and some faint stars.  Had about fifteen minutes on that and then thought I'd have a go on M35.  Got a very clear look at it, just over some houses.  Open clusters really aren't something I usually bother with but I'm making a conscious effort to try and widen my observing as I really am stuck on the same four or five objects as i) I'm a beginner and ii) they're easy to see from my garden.

Had a go at M81.  I think due to a combination of poor seeing (it was starting to cloud to the North - in fact, it was starting to cloud all over), the small aperture of my scope (bad workman blaming tools) and total ineptitude (more like it), I completely failed to locate it.  I found the triangle of stars that points away easily enough but couldn't get it in view.  It's an easy view in my C5 and I've seen it through 80mm binoculars before so I suspect it's stupidity on my part.

Still having a lot of fun and learning a lot each night.  This is the most I've observed in a long time and I need to crack the telescope out at every opportunity.

You know, I'm having a lot of similar issues when it comes to star-hopping. We should open a thread for newbies like us, where we pick objects and challenge each other to find them.

E.g., if you find M35, you post about what star-hop "strategy" you adopted, and I or someone else can try it out and add our own notes. This would force the poster to be more aware of how to start hop to an object, and help newbies by sharing resources...

[GrumpiusMaximus]

21 minutes ago, SwiMatt said:

You know, I'm having a lot of similar issues when it comes to star-hopping. We should open a thread for newbies like us, where we pick objects and challenge each other to find them.

E.g., if you find M35, you post about what star-hop "strategy" you adopted, and I or someone else can try it out and add our own notes. This would force the poster to be more aware of how to start hop to an object, and help newbies by sharing resources...

I'll see if there's a thread already but please feel free to start one!  I've bought a copy of 'Turn Left at Orion' that I pulled out tonight, which is quite helpful. The main problem is that I absolutely hate having to get behind the red dot finder and constantly taking my glasses on and off.  I bought a new RDF that helps matters and mounted it the other day, so it's better but long term I'd rather have an RDF with a 90-degree diagonal mirror when funds allow.

I hate getting behind the red dot finder because I am a rather plentiful 21 Stone and 6'2".  Fully appreciate that's a 'me' issue...

[cloudsweeper]

On the subject of hopping..............

The basic principles are I suppose similar for everyone.  

First, I get onto an easy start object, as close to target as possible.

Then depending the 'scope, I choose a low power EP giving close to 2 deg or 4 deg of field.  This then corresponds with the circles on Stellarium, so I follow patterns between EP and computer until target is reached.  (CTRL ^ H is used with a frac to get the same views.)

Of course, you can occasionally just scan to the target area, again using low power.  This is good for M31, Double Cluster, etc..

Doug.

[Mr Spock]

The new year starts off with heavy rain... 

[bosun21]

The book "Stargazing under Suburban Skies" explains with diagrams and talks you through the relevant star hops. It also lists suitable targets for suburban skies listed either bronze, silver and gold depending on their difficulty. I'll post a picture of the book tomorrow.