Galaxy Season Underway

[PeterC65]

Yet another EAA session last night, although this one may be the last for a while given the impending rain. This time I went for narrow field, having noticed that the Winter / Spring galaxies were starting to nudge above the horizon. So I paired the 72mm refractor (1.48° FoV) with the 8” Newtonian fitted with a x1.7 Barlow (0.38° FoV).

The Newtonian can be a little troublesome. With this amount of magnification it’s hard to get the focus just right, and the small field of view sometimes means that plate solving fails. When that happens it’s handy to have the wider field view from the refractor. The Newtonian doesn’t seem to handle stray light as well as the refractor, and the Moon was about, and while I have a dew heater on the primary, I think the secondary may have been getting misted up by the end of the session.

I started with Jupiter. The x1.7 Barlow doesn’t give me quite the right pixel scale but its good enough (2.9 = F8.5 / 2.9µm) for the new SharpCap planetary live stacking tool to let me see the bands. Unfortunately the GRS was not on display.

Jupiter was a bit too close to the Moon really, so I moved on to that. Slightly disappointing with the UV / IR cut filter, but the IR pass filter greatly reduced the atmospheric wobble allowing the SharpCap lunar live stacking tool to show me some nice crisp views.

On to M42 because, well, you have to, this time to try to split the Trapezium with the higher magnification of the Barlowed Explorer 200. While the nebula itself looks much better with the refractor, the Trapezium stars are washed out and indistinguishable, but not so with the Explorer 200.

I tried for M1 but the light from the Moon was reflecting inside the Explorer 200 I think, so I slewed the scopes to point in the opposite direction to the Moon which fortuitously was where all the galaxies lay.

I spent the rest of the session just working my way down the sky, taking in M81, M82, NGC3077, NGC2976, NGC1961, NGC2403, NGC2146, NGC2336, NGC2841, NGC3079, NGC3359, NGC3185/87/89/93 (Leo Quartet), M95, M96, M100, NGC4216. Some of these I hadn’t observed before and it’s always nice to see an object for the first time.

They are all small but (mostly) interestingly shaped galaxies, and I could see some of that interesting shape each time. None of them was crystal clear, possibly because of the high magnification, possibly because of the Moonlight, possibly because of dew. I’m never quite sure which. I do need to get a secondary dew heater for the Explorer 200 to rule out the dew though.

It’s difficult to pick out highlights from all these galaxies, but I do always like to observe M82, especially when it’s showing me some of its lovely structure and colour.

An unexpected highlight, and the final object I observed during the session, was NGC4216. This is quite a nice edge on spiral galaxy that shows some structure, but what attracted me to it was the reports of a supernova. SN2024gy was clearly visible as a bright dot in the outer rim, almost as bright as the galaxies core. I love to observe these short lived objects, existing for timescales that are on a human scale when so much of the sky is eternal from our perspective.

 

[bosun21]

I have always used a dew shield with my reflector scopes. I find that it protects the secondary from dew and cuts down on any stray light.

[josefk]

Another great list @PeterC65 and sounds like a fantastic pairing to finish. I didn’t know about that new SN and it should be in the reach of my cassegrain so that goes on my list! Thanks

[Froeng]

Thank you for the great write up! Sounds like a fun night. Thanks in particular for pointing out that SN. I will need to look for it next dark night!

[PeterC65]

14 hours ago, bosun21 said:

I have always used a dew shield with my reflector scopes. I find that it protects the secondary from dew and cuts down on any stray light.

Thinking about it, the only scopes I have that don't have dew shields are the two Newtonians, and it's these that give me problems with stray light. The secondary dew heater looks difficult to fit, and to connect to, so I will try dew shields instead. Thanks for the tip!

 

[bosun21]

1 minute ago, PeterC65 said:

Thinking about it, the only scopes I have that don't have dew shields are the two Newtonians, and it's these that give me problems with stray light. The secondary dew heater looks difficult to fit, and to connect to, so I will try dew shields instead. Thanks for the tip!

 

They work great on relfectors Peter. I've never had a problem with my secondary dewing up and the stray light benefit is substantial. The standard Astro Essential ones from FLO are the ones I use. 

[Zermelo]

I like the M82 in particular.

[tomato]

Great SN capture. I really should set up some sort of notification alert for these events, this one certainly passed me by.