Northern Globulars

[glenc (Glen)]

I had a look at some northern globular clusters last night with my 12" Dob.
Magnitude 6.2 M3 and mag 7.6 M53 are easy objects.

NGC 5466 is a faint mag 9.0 GC 5.1 degrees east of M3.
M3 is about half way from beta Com to N5466.

NGC 5053 is a very faint mag 9.5 GC 58' from M53. I missed it the first time I swept over it.
M53 and N5053 form a triangle with alpha Com.

Has anyone seen the mag 10.3 GC NGC 4147?

The attached SkyMapPro map shows the northern sky at midnight with south up.
I also looked at the Messier galaxies on the map while I was in the area.

[Lismore Bloke (Paul)]

Some nice targets there Glen. Unfortunately, anything much further north than Saturn is hidden by the house. So, no Leo, Coma, Canes etc. etc.

[Rob_K]

Originally Posted by glenc

Has anyone seen the mag 10.3 GC NGC 4147?

Nice report Glen! I've seen 4147 a few times - the only notes I have on it are these:

"Easy to see in 4½" – tiny bright fuzzy blob, starlike. Seen 15 June 2007"

This would have been at 47x.

Cheers -

[ngcles]

Hi Glen

I have one observation of NGC 4147 made 13 years ago at Mudgee with 25cm:

x86 34' TF. x138 21' TF Mag 10.2 Size 3.9'. Quite a small cluster of moderately low central condensation class, in the SW outer halo is a mag 13.5 *. With A.V it seems grannulated slightly and there seems the odd sparkly point in the outer halo, 2' diameter with broad moderate concentration to the centre.

Have always been intruiged that there are 3 GCs so close to the Northern Galactic pole. Here is my note using 46cm of M53:

x139 35' TF
x185 27' TF

M 53 NGC 5024 Globular Cluster *
RA: 13h 12m 55.3s Dec: +18° 10' 09"
Mag: 7.7 Mag V(tip): 13.8 Mag V(HB): 16.9 B-V (tip): ---
Size: 13.0' Class: R.V.: --- Source: Archinal *

This is a very nice GC that is reasonably resolved -- in better seeing more resolution would be apparent I'm sure. A bit better with the 12mm TII. The whole object is probably 10-11' diameter, round rising strongly and broadly to centre est cc 6, without zones, The central blaze is probably 3-3.5' diameter. Most of the resolved stars are in the outliers, the brightest at about mag 13.5, with at least 50 if not 100 stars visible. A very attractive cluster.


Best,

Les D

[glenc (Glen)]

Thanks Paul, Rob & Les.