New to the game

[ralph1]

Originally Posted by ShOrEbReAk

pete

sirrius and canopus are they the two near ther dipper, as I tried looking for the constellation lepa above the dipper to find it?

I got Eyskye once I got home last night and reading another post so I will see if that one helps. Google I will also try.

hopefully the clouds don't come in tonight

Troy

Directly above the saucepan at sunset is rigel and directly below it is betelgeuse which is orange. If you extend the three brightest stars of the saucepan to the left you find aldebaran which is orange like betelgeuse. If you extend it to the right you find sirius which is the brightest star in the sky. a little bit later you can use sirius and betelgeuse as the corners of an equilateral triangle. at the third corner you will find procyon which is yellow. canopus is even further to the right and above of sirius.
The constellation Lepus is directly above rigel at sunset.

[ShOrEbReAk (Troy)]

Ralph, John and Pete.

That information is great. now I know that the saucepan is backwards it helps.

If I polar align my mount I cant then turn the mount north right? I have been to the library and borrowed the Phillips sky atlas and a beginners astronomy book. all this info I am SLOWLY getting to grips. plus reading all the posts and articles from here and the web my head is rolling with info

Looks like I am getting clear skies tonight and head back out towards the Barossa again tonight, as last night was unreal with the darker skies!
This time I am going solo NO KIDS to nag and fight .

Anyways everyone here has been great with the information given and I really appreciate the help.

cheers
Troy

[creeksky (Pete)]

Have fun! Looking forward to hearing what you see.
Clear skys here too,wish I was home on the farm ,but will see how I go with light polution, should be fun,

[Hoges (John)]

If I polar align my mount I cant then turn the mount north right?

Once you get your mount polar aligned, you can still access all the sky with the telescope. Although I find that sometimes an equatorial mount can leave the scope in odd positions - you may have to occasionally rotate the Newtonian scope in it's rings to get comfy access to the eyepiece.

You should only ever need to adjust the altitude once - providing the scope is level. So pointing it within a few degrees of the pole should keep things in the eyepiece for several minutes. Photography requires really precise polar alignment but for casual observation, a rough setup should suffice.

[ShOrEbReAk (Troy)]

John

Cheers for that !

Just setting up now but the winds are going to kill me I think. See what happens as I have never dealt with winds and the telescope.

Cheers troy

[ShOrEbReAk (Troy)]

All set up south wards now wait for the stars.

My lovely 6mth pregnant wife is chilling back with me no kids loving it

Troy

[Hoges (John)]

Sounds like a good night for low power views of M42 and Tuc47. I often imagine what it would be like to be on a planet circling a star that was part of a globular cluster - hundreds of thousands of stars relatively (1 light year??) apart...the mind boggles.

[ShOrEbReAk (Troy)]

John

Ok you have given me something to achieve, well hopefully. I gather what photos in books look like is nothing like what you actually see?

Anyways let you know how things pan out. Just need the stars to show up have 2 so far. By SkEye Sirius and Canopus

[Hoges (John)]

Originally Posted by ShOrEbReAk

John

I gather what photos in books look like is nothing like what you actually see?

That's probably why so many of us are into astrophotography these days. A five minute photograph can show me stuff I have never seen - like the horsehead nebula and spiral arms in galaxies.

Having said that, the bigger globular clusters DO appear like the photographs in a reasonable scope and saturn and jupiter never fail to give a 'wow' moment. Double stars - particularly contrasting colors - can be really pretty as can a lot of star clusters. My favorite targets are usually galaxies - alas in my small scopes they are rarely more than small grey smudges...the mere fact that I can see them and I can find out how far away they are gives me a good sense of satisfaction. Finding stuff like the Grus quartet (four galaxies close together) in a small refractor is very pleasing. Object appreciation and knowing what you're looking at is a big part of the enjoyment. (at least for me).

[ShOrEbReAk (Troy)]

hey

just got back home, short and sweet.

I think I found a cloud like structure, my scope was in focus on other stars when I moved the position of the scope bam it was there. focused in and out to make sure and it was still there.

while looking above the Southern cross up higher I found a cluster, this by EySkye was N2669 in VELA. So I may have actually found something.

couldn't find Lovejoy, no love for me or I just didn't know I seen it. M42 was a bust.

All was done just with the 20mm and no Barlow. Starting to think the Barlow sucks ahahahahahaha

Anyways rains are a coming so a few days to read up on my new hobbie.
Thanks again guys

Troy

[Starlite (John)]

Troy, A good tip to keep the kids interested is to have a list of stars with the light year distance from the earth. Sirius 8.58. Rigil Kent 4.37. Alpha Centauri 4.37. Caster 52. etc. Find the ones that are the kids, mum, dad. grandparents age and explain to them that the light they are seeing right now started it's journey when they were born.

[ralph1]

John
Just to clarify, Rigil Kent and Alpha Centauri are the same star.

[barx1963 (Malcolm)]

Troy
Well done on finding something. The area you are looking at around Vela is open cluster central so is prime territory for smaller scopes.
M42 should be an easy get as it is all but a naked eye object. If your finder is accurately aligned you should be able to place it easily in the finder and it should be close in the main scope.
You do have an EQ mount and from experience these can a little getting used to and patience so take your time!
With the barlow, I am not a big fan of them, tried them on several occasions and never liked them, other use them a lot but I always prefer a stand alone eyepiece.

Cheers

Malcolm

[ShOrEbReAk (Troy)]

Malcolm

That's the first night I polar aligned the scope and I was there before dark and aligned the scope and finder after I set up the scope.
M42 is it a bright red cluster?
Barlow is now going into the unused pile as I had more luck last night with out it. just happy to find something, my big problem is I am seeing stuff but probably not recognising it .
one thing I noticed was I was running out of adjustment in some directions on the scope if you get what I mean, no more adjustment available. if I moved the scope to a different position it would come back to letting me adjust.
I had little drift with the clock drive but then it would start jumping cogs so I stoped using it as I think it was at its adjustment level for the way the scope was facing?


John will try that next time I take the kiddos. as I found castor and pollox and looked at sirrius. Damn bright star had the 4 lines look but I think that is from the Newtonian. now I am getting familiar with constellations I will start by searching each one individually like someone posted in another topic.

cheers again guys for the advice and listening to a new member, this is what helps a forum and keeps people interested in this hobby.

skies are cloudy and raining so reading up for me tonight

Troy

[Hoges (John)]

M42 is the bright nebula top center/right in the photo. It's a real standout in a scope but you won't see the color. It's the middle 'star' in Orion's sword with the two bright stars bottom left being part of Orion's belt. (or, if you must!, the bottom stars of the saucepan).

The flame nebula is below the bottom right star with the horsehead nebula silhouetted against the red glow above the star - which I've never seen in an eyepiece but is visible in a 5 minute photograph. This was a stack of about 7 4 minute exposures I took the other evening with a 70-300mm lens.

edit: just above the Horsehead is Sigma Orion - a very pretty multiple star that's worth a look. To me, multiple stars are actually more impressive through the scope than in a photograph.

[ralph1]

Cloudy and raining? The clouds must have got sick of tormenting me and picked another victim instead

[ShOrEbReAk (Troy)]

John

Thanks for the information. That photo is awesome and something I want to do later!

Ralph hahahahahaha the rains have passed and we have blue skies at the moment hahahahahaha so I may just go again hahahahahahahaha

Cheers guys

[louie_the_fly (Stew)]

Having a lot of fun there by the sound of it Troy. I'm not a big fan of Barlow lenses. Think I've used mine maybe twice in the past couple of years. I'm going to take it out of my eyepiece case and replace it with another eyepiece.

[ShOrEbReAk (Troy)]

Hey found a book called southern gems by Stephen James o'meara.
This is awesome, has photos of the different objects so I now have an idea what to look for! Have a read good book!

Troy

[Hoges (John)]

He's got some very, very good books. I get a lot of info out of his books. I spent a lot of time reading his Messier objects book and try as I might, I could not see the details that he could, even though I had a much bigger scope. He's an excellent and meticulous observer and has access to some pretty good seeing on the top of one of the Hawaiin volcanoes.

He also has 'Caldwell Objects' and 'Hidden Treasure' published which are excellent books. I should probably re-read mine!

(I haven't seen 'Southern Gems' - I'll look it up).