[dpastern (Dave Pastern)]

Hi guys,

What objects do you guys recommend for visual observing from heavily light polluted suburbia with a 4" refractor. I don't have any LP filters either. North Eastern area is not very good as there's houses and trees in the way. South, due North and most of West are OK.

I had a mate over on Friday who wanted to see my setup, so I showed him several objects, but most of what I tried was very faint and hard to spot. We did M4, M80, M7, 47 Tucane, Jewel box, Antares, Jupiter, Moon, M57 (barely spotted, and I mean barely spotted). I couldn't think of too much else to be honest.

We didn't do M31 (packed up at midnight) or Omega Centauri (damn tree in the way). Seeing was poor imho, so I didn't push magnifcation more than 225x (really the limit for my setup anyways) and try and split doubles.

I'd never seen M80 or M57 before, so they were firsts to me! We're planning more viewing sessions, hence my asking you guys on what your thoughts were. We didn't try any galaxies as they're usually faint and you can't see bugger all from suburbia in reality imho.

The viewing session was good - next door neighbours had a few visitors, a boy, his father and the boy's best friend, so they enjoyed a few hours of viewing pleasure. They were mightily impressed with it all and thoroughly enjoyed themselves. I guess that's my bit for the IYA!!!

Dave