A Successful Night of Observing.

[sheeny]

I took the scope out last night (August 15, 2006) for what proved to be a very fruitful night of abserving. It was a bit touch and go at first. I loaded up the truck with the scope and all my gear, not sure what the clouds would do. Before dinner I was almost resolved to calling it off, then after dinner... it was clear!:)

So I drive out to Blue Hill and set up in the quarry. Very little breeze, about force 1, clear skies as far as as I can see from the bottom of the quarry (about 10 degrees above horizon to the east), but there's frequent lightning flashes in the east. Obviously Sydney / Wollongong area are not enjoying such a clear night.

I did half a drift alignment (azimuth only), then slewed around to observe Jupiter... hmmm the goto is out about 10 degrees or so in declination. A couple of sessions ago I had a shocker with the centre mount bolt coming loose as the scope cooled, and I chased alignment all night. Obviously this error in declination is carrying over from session to session even when doing a "Quick align" which should simply model the sky in the computer.

OK since I'm going to be using the goto a bit, and not just imaging, it was time to sort this out. I powered down the drive and completed an auto align. This corrected the evil data in the drive and the goto behaved beautifully all night from then on.

The night was surprizingly mild all night till I decided to pack up about 10:00pm, then the cold hit. There was not a sign of frost or dew on anything while I used the scope, but as soon as I shut the scope down and dragged out the 20x 80s for a little play before packing up, the frost hit hard and I had to don a freezer jacket and ski gloves to thaw the hands!

BTW there were lots of meteors streaming in from the east. I noticed at least a dozen without specifically looking for them. Very bright and very fast.

The following notes from my observations:

Jupiter: 13mm Nagler. Seeing poor, very swimmy round the edges. able to see the dark trpical bands. All 4 moons vis. Noticably worse with 2.5x Powermate. Goto got Jup inside FOV of 13mm. Thought I might have dew or frost on scope due to lack of contrast with 2.5 Powermate, but a check showed this not to be. Seeing not up to high magnification.

NGS 4755 Jewel Casket: Beautiful as always. Stars very sharp in 13mm Nagler - more difficult to see the colours at first than with other EPs but the colour's still there, just smaller sharper stars! Stunning view.

47 Tucanae, Caldwell 106, Messier 104: Gorgeous as usual! Fills 13mm Nagler FOV. Resolves stars to the core. Stunning.

M16 Eagle Nebula: Bit of confusion - looking for nebula, kept finding open cluster, with some faint nebulosity... that's how it's supposed to be when I checked!):rolleyes: 13mm Nagler and 32mm plossl.

M17 Swan Nebula or Lagoon Nebula: Distinct white swan. Fills at least 1/2 diameter of FOV of 13mm Nagler.

Caldwell 104 Globular Cluster near the SMC. Lot smaller than 47 Tuc. Can resolve stars round the edges but not in the core. Probably further away than 47 Tuc. V fast meteor though FOV.

Small Magellanic Cloud NGC 292: Scan with 13mm Nagler. Nice little cluster found.

Beta Tucanae: Triple star system. B1 and B2 both very similar, same brightness and color. B3 same colour perhaps slightly dimmer, but very similar. Dist B1,2 to B3 approx 1/2 FOV of 13mm Nagler. Easy binocular triple in 20x80s.

Uranus: Goto got it just outside FOV of 13mm Nagler. Tiny milky blue circle. Definite size to it. Happy with that. No moons visible. 2.5x Powermate increase image size but not as sharp or bright.

Neptune: Used Precise Goto to locate. Think I have it. Appears about 1/4 size of Uranus. Viewed with 13mm Nagler and 9mm Plossl with 2x barlow (450x). Reasonably confident it has size and so is Neptune.

No sign of frost or dew just after 10:00pm. Transparency is excellent, seeing is poor. Did some star tests with my C5060 to check manual focus for infinity. Also had cruise around the sky with my 20x80 binoculars - Wow!:thumbsup:

Home in bed by 23:15 (work tomorrow!:rolleyes: )

I used a 1GB MP3 player as a voice recorder for my obervation notes, then document later. I'm giving that a whirl cause I am pathetic at taking notes in the field! I start with good intentions and then get absorbed and forget it... anyone else do similar?

I checked details on Uranus and Neptune after the fact. Astronomy 2006 indicates angular size for Uranus should be a 4 arc sec, and Neptune about 2.5 arc sec. The difference in size doesn't seem to match my observations. Either I'm a hopeless just of size, or I really didn't get Neptune afterall! Guess I'll just have to try it again!:P

Al.

[mickoking]

Thanx for your report Al, it sounds like you had a ball. The Eagle neb is nowhere as spectacular as the Swan visually. 47 Tucanae is always a winner :thumbsup:

[Dujon]

Great notes, Al.

I went out last evening simply to check my collimation efforts (which seem to be fine) and whilst there had a quick peek at Jupiter using the 9mm EP. Dreadful seeing, the main bands were drifting in and out of view. I couldn't hang around and wait for the better moments, if there were any, as the planet was heading for my tree line at a great rate of knots and my back decided that thirty seconds was long enough to lean over the 'scope before having to stand and straighten.

Oddly enough (to me) the stars to the east of the Crux pointers seemed to be reasonably steady. As I say, I didn't spend more than half an hour bumbling around - and the house lights were blazing away - as I was merely checking on my settings.

[jjjnettie]

Thanks for the report, lots of detail, I like that. I might take the same sky tour so I can do a comparison.
What a great idea to use a voice recorder! Taking notes can be a real pain at times.

[ving]

hey great report!!
we dont see near as many reports here as we used to :)

[jjjnettie]

That's because they are all out there taking pictures instead!
Come on Ron, get on your soapbox.