§AB
01-06-2008, 10:48 PM
I took the 12" dob outside at 5pm to cool for what I hoped will be a productive session. By 6pm, the thing was already completely covered in dew.
Began observing at around 7pm, by now the dew was ridiculous, to the point where it isn't even dew anymore, but actual water droplets.
My first target - Eta Carina. Enjoyed it very much at 83x with an OIII filter. Also took a long look without the filter to get a load of the sensational starfields around here! Tried 208x aswell, it became apparent that the seeing was awful, like really awful. I could see some structure in the Homunculus Neb, including a tiny dot west of the main star and some structure in the eastern lobe. I noticed that the nebula itself appeared much more washed out this time. It was actually painful seeing those stars distorted into every possible shape known to man. Anyway, jsut did some sweeps of Eta Carina at 83x with the filter.
Transparency was poor, thanks to 100% humidity and obvious fog in the south, northwest and east. The dew was the first I've seen in a long time , if ever. I tried for M104 Sombrero Galaxy , looked very nice at 208x, dark lane obvious even under these trying conditions.
I attempted the Antenne (NGC4039) in Corvus but to my surprise I could barely see anything. I then noticed that the northwestern sky was glowing bright orange, indicating fog, and hence much reduced transparency. Guess that explains it.
It became apparent that the dew is jsut too much and the seeing was crap, so I packed up at 9:15pm. Felt like I was out there forever, and was unusual to pack up at this time, I suppose I'm used to much later starts and finishes.
Began observing at around 7pm, by now the dew was ridiculous, to the point where it isn't even dew anymore, but actual water droplets.
My first target - Eta Carina. Enjoyed it very much at 83x with an OIII filter. Also took a long look without the filter to get a load of the sensational starfields around here! Tried 208x aswell, it became apparent that the seeing was awful, like really awful. I could see some structure in the Homunculus Neb, including a tiny dot west of the main star and some structure in the eastern lobe. I noticed that the nebula itself appeared much more washed out this time. It was actually painful seeing those stars distorted into every possible shape known to man. Anyway, jsut did some sweeps of Eta Carina at 83x with the filter.
Transparency was poor, thanks to 100% humidity and obvious fog in the south, northwest and east. The dew was the first I've seen in a long time , if ever. I tried for M104 Sombrero Galaxy , looked very nice at 208x, dark lane obvious even under these trying conditions.
I attempted the Antenne (NGC4039) in Corvus but to my surprise I could barely see anything. I then noticed that the northwestern sky was glowing bright orange, indicating fog, and hence much reduced transparency. Guess that explains it.
It became apparent that the dew is jsut too much and the seeing was crap, so I packed up at 9:15pm. Felt like I was out there forever, and was unusual to pack up at this time, I suppose I'm used to much later starts and finishes.