[pgc hunter]

Noticing a lovely clear sky on the way home from work last night, I figured it would be a crime to let it slide. So after a couple of beers and dinner, headed out with the 120st refractor for a bit of wide-field in the summer Milky way.

Date: 6/11/10
Time: 3:00-4:30am
Scope: Skywatcher 120mm F/5 refractor


Started with M42. With the 22mm LVW at 27x the entire sword was in the FOV and a very pretty sight with M42, M43 and the Running Man Nebula (NGC 1977) immersed in a rich star field. M42's "wings" stretched quite far, with the expansive SW portion of the cloud visible. M43 appeared as a small fuzzy blob with its eastern edge slightly indented and better defined. NGC 1977 was fairly faint but easily detectable with two portions seen.

Also did a bit of a sweep of the Milkway, Eta Carina at 27x with the OIII filter was excellent, very detailed, curdled and filling most of the FOV. Several nearby nebulous knots could be seen, including the "Gabriel Mistral" Nebula which took on a semi-circular shape, somewhat like a first quarter moon. Without the filter, the starfields around here are quite spectacular. All the large clusters in the area including NGC 3532, IC2602 and NGC 3114 are excellent in this scope. NGC 3114 looks uncannily like the nazi sign! anyone else notice this?

Also had a look at the Pleiades, the entire cluster easily fits in the FOV with the 22mm LVW at 27x. The sky in here is fairly light polluted though, but still a pretty sight.

Lot of fun cruising the Milky way with the 120st, it's excellent for that purpose and its large aperture makes those rich starfields and clusters a visual treat.