A whole load of targets

[sorrimen]

Whew, what a night.

Another one with @PeterW. Planned to get out before 8 to try image the ISS and catch a young starlink passover, with forecast predicting clear skies from 8 onwards. Sat looking out the window and saw a thick ocean of cloud so we decided to stay home and wait. Saw the ISS cut through the clouds beautifully from my window. Hour by hour, the clear window kept getting pushed back on the forecast. Boy was this frustrating. Gets to about 11:15 and Peter heads out to check out our spot, but clouds are covering most the sky. After another 30 minutes or so we decide we may as well take the plunge and hope for the best. Arrive at the spot at midnight or so, with fairly vast cloud coverage.

Briefly tested my new Baader zoom mk3 barlowed to see what conditions were like. Pretty satisfying collimation, and surprisingly little thermal action considering the scope hadn't cooled much. Also saw a good deal of airy disks which I've probably seen before, but had never attributed it as such; can imagine how these would be a nice sight in a frac. 

With the zoom in, it seemed a good idea to jump on over to the ring. Resolved nicely and was satisfying to get up to more appropriate mags just with a twist of the eyepiece. Tried to get to M27, but just as I was getting close to Peter's laser marker clouds covered it up. This became a bit of a trend for the first 30 mins - 1 hour of the session, jumping between targets that came in and out of clouds. Must add that observing with someone who knows their skies and has a laser pointer makes things very quick and easy. Almost makes me want GOTO.... almost... 

Hopped on over to Mars just to see what we could see. Seeing was fairly horrendous; stars violently twinkling almost up to zenith. A very short stay on Mars and as Peter was thinking up a first proper target I thought I'd get over to Uranus. It was much easier to starhop a few weeks ago when Mars was close to my chosen reference stars, so my attempted quick surprise ended up taking a few minutes. Still, once we got it it was a clear pale disk and is a lovely sight as always. I'd never tried for Neptune, so we went over to that next. Not too difficult to get to, but a bit more difficult to confirm. HD222147 being next to it was the confirmation, and once I knew it was there the dark blue colour came out a bit more. Very small disk! 

Next up was M36, 37, 38, with the latter of course being the nicest of the three. This is the point at which I had a serious 'wow' moment. Peter handed me a morpheus 12.5mm and my god the sight was beautiful! After taking in the view for a little bit, it was time to put it in the focuser... The well corrected, high contrasty, 76 degree field was truly phenomenal. So many stars to be resolved in 38 and the difference that field of view makes is no joke. Safe to say I've been spoiled and I can never look through my Starguiders the same way. A very nice area of open clusters that will be visited again. 

The order of the rest of the targets is a bit jumbled, which reminds me that I should start taking notes as I'm observing. A few other clusters were seen: M35, M52, NGC7789, Double cluster, and certainly others on our way around. All of these responded to the morpheus greatly and it was in the focusser for most the night. Going from 24mm to morpheus 12.5mm always shows a great increase in resolvable stars. Great views all around the board.

Onto nebulae, this was equally wonderful, but in a different way. Given that we are in a fairly poor bortle 7 (although last night was measured at 19.3 or so), nebulae are obviously challenging targets. First new target for me was M1. This was very faint and my initial attempt to find it failed. Peter got down to the scope and did some real magic to get it. Unfiltered with the 24mm we were using, it was real faint and needless to say an incredibly impressive find from Peter. Adding in an OIII cut it down a little too much, but the ultrablock seemed to be a sweet spot in increasing contrast. Both the 12.5mm and 24mm UFF responded pretty well and it became more and more obvious. In between nebulae, we got over to M81+2. Over a bad bit of sky for us so probably the poorest views I've got of the two, but at least M82 was still faintly visible. Jumped over to M97, the owl nebula. I tried briefly, but like M1 this was really one for Peter's expertise. He got us in the exact right spot, but couldn't see it. Sitting at the eyepiece for a minute with the ultrablock, I just managed to make out the faintest of smudges. I was super chuffed as it was a seriously difficult target (towards sky glow, already poor skies, low in sky, 8" aperture etc. etc.) Managed to snap a picture to confirm the sighting and as you can just about make out, it's there! The view was very similarly unobvious, if not even fainter. Briefly tried for the veil and although Peter may have made out a little nebulosity with the OIII, I couldn't see anything (haven't seen before so that doesn't help). 

Final nebula was M42. My first ever sighting of it and best believe it was phenomenal. Tried all sorts of filter and eyepiece combos, with one surprising one being Hbeta. Completely changes the target and was actually the most expansive view of the nebula. OIII and UHC working well too. Good detail in the core of it, with large bat-like wings expanding out. Looking at the trapezium, I managed to get down to E but nothing more. This was before I knew where it should be or even if I was looking at the correct trapezium, so it was a definite sighting. The seeing was awful, but twinkling actually helped see E as it was only visible when it would flash a certain colour. Did some imaging after Peter left and revisited M42 when it was higher up. Was much more expansive, even with a totally unfiltered view. Quick phone image below! 

There were other targets, such as the Garnet star and Polaris, but I've rambled on a bit! All in all, what should have been a good night, turning into a bad night, turning back into a great night. Not quite a 'was going to stay in but went out and seeing was 10/10, saw 50 meteors and Jupiter eclipsed by all 4 moons colliding' kind of night, but very glad I got out. Feeling the effects of getting back at 6 am though....

Thought I'd attach the Mars image I got at the end of the session here so check that out too below if you like. 

 

 

Edited September 25, 2022 by sorrimen
Pictures

[Froeng]

Excellent! Congrats on brilliant night and report. Well done!

[Stu]

Great report, glad you had a good night in the end. @PeterW is a sly one. Had no idea he had a 12.5mm Morpheus. What other treasures is he hiding? 😉

[PeterW]

I moved from 13T6 to Morpheus on the 70mm bins as I expect I will need the extra eye relief soon and I didn’t like their distortion in the daytime). @Captain Scarlet quite liked the daytime views earlier this year. I like giving both eyes the chance to enjoy the views… 

Peter

[PeterStudz]

What a fab report and excellent session. The images of Mars are pretty much as I observed it too. 

[Captain Scarlet]

5 hours ago, Stu said:

Great report, glad you had a good night in the end. @PeterW is a sly one. Had no idea he had a 12.5mm Morpheus. What other treasures is he hiding? 😉

Not “a” 12.5 Morpheus but TWO!

We went birding last year and he had them in his APM 45degree binoculars looking at Snipe IIRC. The vista as your eyes approached the eyepieces reminded me of approaching the liquid-shimmering barrier to the other part of the Universe in the film Stargate. Two pools of swimming contrasty brightness. Lovely views.

Magnus

[PeterW]

Wanting to use both eyes gets expensive on the eyepiece budget… why I don’t own a truck load of eyepieces like many other people I know… 😉

 

Peter

[sorrimen]

6 hours ago, Stu said:

Great report, glad you had a good night in the end. @PeterW is a sly one. Had no idea he had a 12.5mm Morpheus. What other treasures is he hiding? 😉

Each session he brings more goodies, a 100 degree to come next 😯….

[sorrimen]

5 hours ago, PeterStudz said:

What a fab report and excellent session. The images of Mars are pretty much as I observed it too. 

It’s nice that it’s large enough to compare to images now, isn’t it? Need to try looking at maps and finding out what I’m looking at!

[sorrimen]

4 minutes ago, PeterW said:

Wanting to use both eyes gets expensive on the eyepiece budget… why I don’t own a truck load of eyepieces like many other people I know… 😉

 

Peter

Wouldn’t mind if a truck full of expensive glass pulled up to the rec… lights off of course!