#1  
Old 30-12-2007, 08:25 AM
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goober (Doug)
No obs, raising Harrison

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Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Posts: 795
Observation Report: 29 December 2007

Location: Dandenongs
Temperature: 17
Seeing: 4/10
Transparency: 5/10
Time: 10:40pm - 11:50pm

After seeing my neighbour's floodlight on again tonight, the third night in a row, I decided to pack up and go dark sky.

I was debating whether to go to The Briars, or somewhere north. There seemed to be quite a bit of cloud to the south, so I ruled out The Briars.

An IceInSpacer kindly sent me a list of sites they use, so I tried the one closest to home, up in the hills. It took precisely an hour to pack up, drive and set up at the other end. After the baking 40 degrees we had during the day, it was a positively cold 17 degrees, bit breezy, with some high cloud to the west and south.

The site is quite good, quiet, open, and felt a lot safer than other sites I'd tried in the Dandenongs. Dark views to the north, east, and south. Quite bright to the west, with Melbourne over there.

I had a long list of targets, mainly neglected Messier open clusters and interesting sounding doubles.

Rigel - my seeing check. Only tried 108x but split it. Seeing doesn't look great tonight.

M41 - an open cluster in Canis Major. Quite easy to pick out with binoculars, a few degrees south of Sirius. A misty patch at 23x, with a few stars resolved. Interesting triangle of relatively bright stars 2 degrees away. Nice view at 49x, dominated by 2 orange stars that seem considerably brighter than their companions. Nicely situated cluster, against a sparkling backdrop of stars - you sure don't see that effect from the suburban backyard!

M35 - an open cluster in Gemini. Very easy to locate as the Eta Geminorum was naked eye from this site, so I could place it and the cluster in the field with my 24mm Panoptic. A bright cluster, around 20-30' wide. Lots of stars resolved in here. The patterns seemed to trace out loops and streams of stars.

M37 - an open cluster in Auriga. Never bothered looking at these before, low down in the north. However, I could see Capella bubbling away near the horizon, and could trace out the shape of Auriga up to Elnath. That meant the three Auriga Messier clusters should be in grasp. I tried to spot them naked eye, but couldn't see them - I found my eyes kept being drawn to a chain of three magnitude 5 stars in a close line, fooling me into thinking I was seeing a cluster. I did a quite sweep with binoculars and yep, there they were. Three misty patches of light, in a line, about 8 degrees wide. M37 seemed to be quite faint, but I could resolve lots of stars in it. The best views were at 49x and 77x. I like looking for patterns and impressions in clusters - this one seemed to have two dark perpendicular lines through it, like someone had slashed a couple of gaps in the cluster.

M36 - open cluster in Auriga. Next cluster in line. Nothing really spectacular about this cluster - too long gaping at the Jewel Box, I guess, and I am packing only 4" of aperture. Quite dim, with stars resolved. I could see two triangles, one superimposed on the other in this cluster.

M38 - open cluster in Auriga. Last one in the chain. Again quite dim, compared to M37. This cluster seemed to trace out a chain of stars in the form of the letter "Z", or "N", depending on your orientation. Nice to cross some missing Messiers off my list.

M1 - Crab Nebula in Taurus. Speaking of missing Messiers, this one has been a white whale to my Ahab for 15 years. I have often looked for this from my putrid, light polluted back yard, egged on by books that tell me how easy it is. 8" dob, 12" dob, 90mm ETX, LP filters, etc - nothing. So, while I was in the area I decided to be disappointed again, and swung the refractor up a few degrees to Zeta Tauri and had a peek at 23x. Merd! Mon Dieu! Excuse my French, but there it was - easy as easy. Bright, obvious and totally unmistakable. An oval, misty patch of smudge that just jumped down the eyepiece. I was slamming in Naglers as fast as I could, before this miraculous apparition disappeared. 49x, 77x, 108x - all showed it up quite well. 77x seemed to give the best view. I spent a good 10 minutes just soaking up the view. I couldn't spot detail beyond the oval/rectangular glow, around 3x5'. Just seeing it was enough.

14 Aurigae - a double star in Aurigae. While in the area, I had a few doubles to chase down. I put 14 Aurigae in the field of view, a 14" wide double, and popped in the 5mm Nagler. Something didn't look right - the view was all hazy. I flicked my red headlamp onto ultra-bright and had a look - dew. The eyepieces had all fogged over. I checked out the dew-shield on the scope - it's black aluminum - wet. The objective was still clear, but the eyepieces were toast.

I didn't have any dew prevention with me - never needed it before. I'm not sure what to do about it.

It was only the eyepieces that were the problem - perhaps keep them in the case, and not on the eyepiece rack on the scope mount? Dew heater strips (starts heading away from my K.I.S.S. principle!)? A visit to a travel store for a portable hair dryer/heat gun?

It was nearly midnight, so rather than try and dry things out in the dark, I packed up. Bugger, I was enjoying myself. I'll be back to this site.

Last edited by goober; 30-12-2007 at 08:26 AM. Reason: typos
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  #2  
Old 30-12-2007, 09:37 AM
Rob_K
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Location: Bright, Vic, Australia
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Good report Doug, and glad you found some darker skies! Must have been a great feeling to see M1 pop into view like that, after all that trying.

I live in a fairly 'dewy' area, and I just whack the EP cover back on whenever my eyes leave it, to consult charts, have a break, etc etc. A few seconds can very quickly become a few minutes. Works really well..... until you forget!!

Cheers -
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Old 30-12-2007, 09:55 AM
§AB
Its only a column of dust

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Nicely written mate! I was toying with the idea of goin out aswell but refrained from doing so, as the star twinkling (and TWO jetstreams on the weather map) was indicating poor seeing and it clouded over at 1am or so anyway.

Yeah fogged up eyepieces that is irritating - mostly its from my own body heat. Must be when the eyepiece reaches a critical temperature coz it tends to happen near the end of my observing sessions.
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Old 31-12-2007, 07:58 AM
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goober (Doug)
No obs, raising Harrison

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Location: Melbourne, Australia
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Rob_K View Post
Good report Doug, and glad you found some darker skies! Must have been a great feeling to see M1 pop into view like that, after all that trying.

I live in a fairly 'dewy' area, and I just whack the EP cover back on whenever my eyes leave it, to consult charts, have a break, etc etc. A few seconds can very quickly become a few minutes. Works really well..... until you forget!!

Cheers -
Thanks Rob - yes, M1 was surprising. It just shows you the difference between dark skies and suburbia. I'm moving to Bright

Your dew solution seems ideal - I just got into the habit of uncapping everything at the beginning of a session and having it all within arm's reach. Another dark sky vs suburbia issue - you cool down much faster out of the city.
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  #5  
Old 31-12-2007, 12:06 PM
Galactic G (Greg)
Space is big. Really big.

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Join Date: Jul 2007
Location: Narre Warren, Victoria.
Posts: 63
I really enjoy reading your reports goober. I get inspired enough to add some of the things you report to my viewing list.

I had the same dew/fog problem with EP's last night starting about 12:30am. I had to pick out my 3 favorite EP's and keep one in each coat pocket to keep warm with their caps on and one in the focuser. As the one in the focuser started to mist up I'd swap it out for a warm one.

By the time Saturn was high enough for me to observe my scope was dripping wet and I had been eaten alive by the mozzies, even with the repelant on.

However, seeing Saturn for the first time through my new 10" made it all worth it. For the first time I could actually see moons around Saturn as well as the Cassinni division. I'm looking forward to a night with better seeing.

GG
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