Galaxies with a skywatcher 200p

[Mart29]

Never seen a galaxy with this scope , but hoping to before the year is out. Any tips to locate without a goto mount? 

[malc-c]

Star hopping.....  find a bright galaxy near a naked eye bright star that you can identify.  Locate the star through the scope and then adjust the scope until it's more or less on target.  I would suggest starting with a wide angle eyepiece  and centre the target before increasing the magnification.  It also helps to have a nice dark site and moonless night because visually these won't look anything like the pictures you see in books or forums.

[sorrimen]

Start off with andromeda (M31). Depending on your skies you should be able to see it naked eye, or at least see all the reference stars you need. The best way for me to find it is to locate mirach, then go up Mu and Nu until I can see it. If you have an optical finder you’ll be able to see it through that anyway. 

From M31, you’ll also be able to see M32 just off to the top left and M110 on the other side, although 110 is a bit tricky. 

Next up for me is M81 and M82. I find Dubhe, walk along until I can see the ET, 32, HD90745 triangle and follow the same distance from Dubhe and ET, along the direction of the triangle hypotenuse until I’m in the right area. Certainly a bit trickier than M31, but you can always figure out your own star hopping route that you might find easier. M81 is fairly bright, and M82 I find is always a bit further than you’d think but it’s unmistakable by its shape. 

[Stu]

Great suggestions from @sorrimen there, which I can’t better. I will however share some diagrams which illustrate the star hops described, which might make it easier to find them.

 

 

The other thing to get right is your finders. It’s a great combination to use a Telrad alongside a RACI finder, really helps.

[Zermelo]

Some links that might help:

Telrad diagrams for the Messier objects (some brighter galaxies):
http://avila.star-shine.ch/astro/messiercharts/messierTelrad.htm

General advice on star-hopping:
https://lovethenightsky.com/what-is-star-hopping/
https://britastro.org/2018/star-hopping

 

[wookie1965]

I usually find M81 and M82 going the same distance between Phad and Dubne again then a touch to the left. 

[scarp15]

Do you have a i.e. Rigel Quikfinder or Telrad or similar fitted to your 200p, quite necessary, in conjunction with a Right Angled Finder Scope for star hopping. As mentioned above, Andromeda is a credible target presently. 

[vlaiv]

Get 200p to a dark location.

Once you do that - galaxies will start popping out whichever direction you point the scope. Seriously.

Just get dark adapted and get comfortable. Best to aim scope high up as there is least atmosphere to interfere in that part of the sky.

One more tip - try to steer clear of Milky way. There is a lot of dust in our galaxy that will block the view - plenty of stars but not a lot of galaxies to be seen there.

[Bernd Nies]

M 51 is an easy to find and see.

https://www.deepskycorner.ch/m51/m51.en.php

[Bernd Nies]

Also M 101 is easy to find.

https://www.deepskycorner.ch/m101/m101.en.php

Get a Telrad finder, a star chart and learn the constellations. Finding stuff that way is a much more rewarding experience than any goto mount.

[Kon]

I have a manual 200P and I have seen several galaxies from my bortle 3 skies. What the other already said but to add,  If you do not already have, get a Rigel or Telrad and a RACI for star hoping. Turn Left at Orion is a good starting point to plan around the seasons and your star hoping or if you prefer any of the usual apps (Stellarium or Skysafari). Try observe on a moonless night or near new moon. Transparency is key as it can easily kill the ability to see them. Galaxy season is in late winter/early spring where you will be spoiled for choice. Have a look at the observing report section and you can see what others are observing based on the season. 

[Spile]

This is how I find dim fuzzies. https://astro.catshill.com/finding-dim-objects/  As you can see asterisms are the key.

I will occasionally use a print out from Stellarium but these days I tend to use an app on a tablet.

It gets easier with practice and dark skies help. Where I live isn’t great and I’ve yet to see M101 but I have managed a number of others.

[IB20]

The best two galaxies I have seen in the 200P in Bortle 6-7 skies are M51 and the Sombrero galaxy (M104).

These two showed additional detail other than just being just grey fuzzies. You really need the moon to not be hanging around though.

[KevinPSJ]

I've used star hopping with my 150P to find all of the galaxies mentioned above. M31 is in a league of it's own and doesn't prepare you for the misty, ghostly, almost-not-there experience of finding the others. I do my observing from my bortle 3/4 garden where I can just about spot Andromeda Galaxy with naked eye but the first few galaxies I found I had to put a camera in the eyepiece and snap a picture to convince myself I'd found them. 

Definitely go for M81 first - it's one of the easiest to find. But prepare to doubt yourself when you think you have it. I look for a faint cloudiness that stays fixed relative to stars when I tweak RA / Dec to confirm usually. Averted vision is useful once your confident you've located the target but doesn't work for me while I'm scanning the general location - that faint puff of smoke is what I home in on!

I find checking and double checking to the star hop and star chart in finder and eyepiece is essential too - if you are sure you're in the right place then be patient and nudge the scope around with tiny movements looking for that misty patch that moves with the stars.

Best of luck - it's very very rewarding when you do spot one eventually... Photons from something that's 10s or 100s of millions of light years away and packed with billions of stars have travelled across cold empty space to arrive in your eyes that night - possibly the only person looking at that galaxy that night even.

Roll on galaxy season!

[bingevader]

15 hours ago, Mart29 said:

Never seen a galaxy with this scope , but hoping to before the year is out. Any tips to locate without a goto mount? 

I'm assuming it's still in the box then? 🤔🤭😆

You are in for a treat then, if galaxies are your thing!

Great advice above.

If you find the galaxies a bit of a challenge then there are loads of clusters that are super in the 200p.

[IB20]

Yes globular clusters look great in the 200P. M5 and M13 in particular, M5 is one of my favourite all time objects. 

Planetary nebula in this scope work really nice too. M57 is a doddle to find.

[ollypenrice]

21 hours ago, Stu said:

Great suggestions from @sorrimen there, which I can’t better. I will however share some diagrams which illustrate the star hops described, which might make it easier to find them.

 

 

The other thing to get right is your finders. It’s a great combination to use a Telrad alongside a RACI finder, really helps.

The Telrad is also a great tool for short cuts. If you put a facsimile Telrad circle over a star chart (whether a paper one or on screen) and centre it on the object, it is often possible to replicate that circle's position on the sky and drop on your object directly.

Olly

[PeterStudz]

I’m in Bortle 7 and have a SkyWatcher 200p Dob. The only galaxies that I’ve been able to see from my back garden are Andromeda and M81 plus M82. By far the best are M81/M82 with some structure visible on M82 and it’s nice getting two galaxies in the same field of view. I’ve even been able to see them (although far fainter) in a much smaller 4.5inch Newtonian. 

I’ve located M81/M82 by star hopping using the methods above, but if I’m being lazy I’ve used the PushTo feature of PSAlign Pro (a smartphone app) using my iPhone. It’s brilliant. Eg to find M81 all I do is sync on a close-ish known star. Dubhe is close enough. Select M81, push-to it and there it is in the FOV of a low powered eyepiece. Nudge the Dob a bit and I have both M81 & M82 in the same FOV. It’s never failed. As in exercise I’ve used the app to find Mars during the summer after the sun came up. I couldn’t even see Mars in my RACI. A couple of pictures to show how I mounted my phone. I really should do a little write up as soon as I can find some time!

Edited October 13, 2022 by PeterStudz

[allworlds]

My experience is with smaller scopes, but some of the things that worked for me:

Get properly dark adapted which means getting away from nearby lights. You can't do much about general LP except travel a considerable distance away. But you don't want streetlamps, neighbours windows, insecurity lights, and so on shining on you or the ground around you, that will kill your dark adaptation. In a city this can be difficult and is why I quit observing for a while. Opaque screens might help.

Precise and methodical star hopping with good charts. Low-depth charts and instructions like "find these stars then go three times further", that involved panning multiple fields of view with little guidance, never worked for me. I needed more detail in my hops; the next star either within the same field of view or just a little way outside it.

You can set up your telescope and eyepieces, magnifying finder, or Telrad in Stellarium's "oculars" setting. On computer; not sure about the phone app. You can then use this to rehearse your star hops virtually. Be sure to set the light pollution setting in Stellarium to something about right. (I usually make the computer program a *bit* better than my depressing city skies, but I don't have it set to dark-sky-site levels.)

General observing skills, averted vision and so on, which really just come with practice.