May 28/29th. 11:30 pm to 2 am. About 70 degrees F.
Orion XT8 Intelliscope. Agena Astro 2” 38 mm, 70 degree (31.5X), ES 2” 25 mm 70 degree (50X), 1.25” ES 6.7 mm 82 degree, Meade HD-60 4.5 mm.
No filters were used.
I have street lights and house lights all around so my eyes never really dark adapt. The sky to the West is so bright that it is virtually blank as is much of my Southern sky.
Now that it is warmer I can’t use a hooded sweatshirt to shield from the streetlights and house lights. I wear a baseball cap so I can use the brim to help shade my eyes from the lights and to block light glare off the eyepieces. I wear that hat in some weird positions as a result.
I collimated the scope it in the afternoon. In prep I looked down the tube and noted that a long piece of grass had found its way onto the mirror. So I pulled out the vacuum, put the scope horizontal, put on the dust brush and when down the tube. I had no intention of touching the mirror, but hoped that, in that confined space, I could create enough swirl to pull of the grass blade, about 3” long, and any other stray dust. It was a success. While I was in there I figured I might pick up any other stray dust that was loose enough to lift. I did not actually take the dust brush to the sides for fear of lifting some of the flat black paint.
Using the supplied collimation cap I made a very slight adjustment. Was probably not necessary but I was there so I did it.
The cloud forecast was for clear skies that evening so I ran a list using Tonight’s Sky going to mag 8.5 for Open and globular clusters, galaxies, planets and star groups that would be above 40 degrees starting around 9 pm and for the next 4 hours. We had about 50% clouds at 9:30 and 10:30 pm when I peaked out the door. However, when I checked again around 11:15 the sky had cleared. Let’s go!
Starting around 11:30 pm and going through to 2 am I had some of the best conditions that I have ever had in terms of transparency and seeing. Still not totally transparent but I would give it 4/5 based on my site. Others may say 3/5.
Exploring - I started the evening with the 38 mm and just went exploring the sky around the big dipper. No plan, no targets, just looking around to see what might be interesting. Spent about 15 minutes but did not find anything to really grab my attention. So I decided to hook up the Intelliscope object locator and work a list I had prepared earlier.
Working the list with the Inelliscope
I did manage to see M44, M39, M11, M5, IC4665, NGC 6633, IC4756, all found with the Intelliscope so I have a high degree of confidence that the computer was properly aligned. No moon, so I guess there was just too much skyglow. But this was about the best I have ever had at my house.
IC4665 – Open Cluster. Best with the 38 mm - Almost looks like a 6 sided kite on a string. This was out in a blank part of the sky to the SE, even in my 9X50 finder scope so no way I don’t know how I would have found this by star hopping. It was an interesting shape and I spent about 20 minutes on it to do a poor sketch on my pad. Interesting how we want to find patterns in the stars. Winking smile
NGC6633 – Best with the 25 mm eyepiece – Open cluster. The shape reminded me of a running man. Maybe he was holding the string to IC4665 and was pulling it along. It was also in the blank SE sky. Again I spent about 15 minutes doing a little sketch in my notebook.
M39 – Best enjoyed with the 25 mm eyepiece – an open cluster with a roughly roundish shape. Nice sparkle but did not take time to make any kind of a sketch. Worth finding but only spent about 5 minutes on it.
IC4756 – Best with the 25 mm. Another areas of blank sky. I could not see this one in the 9X50 finder scope at all. Roundish in shape or perhaps somewhat trapezoidal. Hard to say where the boundaries are on these targets but it seemed to fill a good portion of the field of view with this eyepiece. Took about 10 minutes to do a rough sketch in my notebook, just to capture the general impression of the shape.
M5 – Hunted this one for a while. Just a gray smear in the 25 mm and the 6.7 mm eyepiece. Could not really extract any detail at all.
M11 – Wild duck cluster – Looked best in the 6.7 mm 82 degree eyepiece. I had to let my eyes adjust quite a bit to really see this one well. I could not pick up the wild duck shape that gives it its name but it was a real interesting cluster. I spent 10-15 minutes on this one even though I did not sketch it. I just enjoyed the view.
I tried for M81 and M 101 with no success with any of the eyepieces. Nothing I could pick up as a distinct target. Sad smile
Saturn - Around 1:40 am I decided to turn the scope on Saturn which was now high in the sky. This was, by far, the best view I have ever gotten of Saturn. There was still a glow around the planet but much less than I had seen previously and no cross pattern in the glow. The view was really nice in the 6.7 mm and the 4.5 mm eyepieces. I saw the Cassini divide for the first time and picked up two faint cloud bands on the planet. I think I spotted 4 moons visible around Saturn. I even tried the barlow with the 6.7 mm eyepiece. The view was pretty steady but I could discern no additional detail.
Mars – I finished the night on Mars. I could see a darker region that seemed to ring the right side ( in the eyepiece ) with a bright spot that I took to be an ice cap. These were very faint so I can’t be sure. But this was my best view of Mars.
Around 2 am it was time to call it quits.
I had had one of my best nights of viewing every. Saturn and Mars had some glow but they were better than I have ever seen them. I was able to get Saturn up to about 360X with very little drift due to atmosphere. Perhaps the slight adjustment I made to the collimation helped or perhaps I had the best atmospheric conditions I have ever had.
Just goes to show you that it is as much about the site as it is about the equipment.
Normally I sort the target list by constellation to avoid jumping around the scope but tonight I did it by magnitude. And sure enough I was up and moving around the scope all evening. I think I will go back to the constellation sort next time.
Even with the 8” scope I seem to have great trouble seeing anything with a magnitude of greater than about 7.5 that isn’t a star. I guess the surface brightness is not enough to contrast with my sky. Forget something like the North American Nebulae.
It was a very satisfying experience.
May 28/20, 2016 - Mars and Saturn and clusters and ...
