NGC253 in 10x50 binos

[barx1963]

Had the beast out for a couple of hours. Seeing wasn't bad, moon a bother so restricted objects I could try for. Had a crack at NGC253, always popular and I wanted to make sure I could find it easily when I get to Snake Valley next month. Did the track from Deneb Kaitos moving roughly south via a triangle then an extended parallelogram of stars via the finder and I could have sworn I was seeing 253 in the finder!. Looked great in the ep at all powers. Had another look in the finder and sure enough there it was. Got out the 10x50 binos and it was even clearer.
Very pleasing result.
Apart from that the only new target I nailed was NGC288. Faint old glob very dispersed, not far from 253. Cruised around a few old favourites and finally got a look at NGC2070 (Tarantula) in the 13mm Nagler and a Neb filter. Looked brilliant!

Malcolm

[ngcles]

Hi Malcolm & All,

Well done on finding NGC 253 -- it is a very beautiful galaxy. Over time you will get more and more familiar with that pattern of triangles between Beta Ceti & Alpha Scultporis. It is one of the most easily observed galaxies in binoculars south of the celestial equator. From a dark site, I've had no problems seeing it in my old 8x30mm finder. There have acually been a few scattered reports of it being detected naked eye from ultra-dark skies. I've tried but never succeeded.

NGC 288 is a nice cluster too. From a dark sky (like Snake-Valley no doubt) you will see it very well resolved in your 'scope. As you note it is one of the least compressed globulars. The uncompressed G.Cs numerically dominate the sky. A very large majority of the highly compressed globulars (eg M2, M15, NGC 104, M62, NGC 2808 etc) are intrinsically very bright and massive compared to the general population of G.Cs.

Enjoy your star party -- Wish I was going! :thumbsup:


Best,

Les D

[barx1963]

Thanks for your reply Les
It really was quite amazing that I could see it with such small apertues considering the moon was still up, albeit low and the light pollution was as usual in Colac dreadful. Just goes to show what a little experience, knowing what you are looking for and using a good atlas can do!

Malcolm